It was not a fairy tale

I think that it is easy to trivialize the Cross of Jesus Christ! Perhaps it is in part due to the commercial aspect of Easter, but perhaps it is plainly that we humans find it difficult to face brutal and barbaric murder and celebrate in it!
Today was Good Friday, though it probably seemed far from good to those disciples who followed and loved this man Jesus, who was hung upon the cross! If we'd been there would we have called it good?
In John Piper's message at Passion OneDay 2000 he said the following;

"No manner of execution that has ever been devised was more cruel and agonizing than to be nailed to a cross. It was horrible. You would not have been able to watch it - not without screaming and pulling at your hair and tearing your clothes."

Lets face it, the cross of Jesus was not some happy go lucky walk in the park, it was a bloody, painful and brutal death, anyone who has seen Mel Gibson's portrayal of the passion can think about the physical aspect of the pain that is reflected in that film! But the physical pain wasn't all that was placed on Jesus in those hours!
He bore the punishment, the wrath, the anger of God over sin!

With His beard ripped out, A crown of thorns driven into His skull, the flesh stripped from His back from the scourging and nails in His feet and hands there was more agony than you or I can possibly imagine, yet add to that something far worse, something even more unimaginable - the wrath of God!

If we did not know or understand the bigger picture this would not be called good friday but wicked, evil or the worst friday ever!

As Christ suffered something unimaginable was taking place, I think John Piper, in the same message as already mentioned gives some good insight;

"Every good thing - indeed every bad thing that God turns for good - was obtained for us by the cross of Christ. Apart from the death of Christ, sinners get nothing but judgment. Apart from the cross of Christ, there is only condemnation. Therefore everything that you enjoy in Christ - as a Christian, as a person who trusts Christ - is owing to the death of Christ. And all your rejoicing in all things should therefore be a rejoicing in the cross where all your blessings were purchased for you at the cost of the death of the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

One of the reasons we are not as Christ-centered and cross-saturated as we should be is that we have not realized that everything - everything good and every thing bad that God turns for the good of his redeemed children was purchased by the death of Christ for us. We simply take life and breath and health and friends and everything for granted. We think it is ours by right. But the fact is that it is not ours by right.

We are doubly undeserving of it.

1) We are creatures and our Creator was not bound or obligated to give us anything - not life or health and anything. He gives, he takes, and he does us no injustice.

2) And besides being creatures with no claim on our Creator, we are sinners. We have fallen short of his glory. We have ignored him and disobeyed him and failed to love him and trust him. The wrath of his justice is kindled against us. All we deserve from him is judgment. Therefore every breath we take, every time our heart beats, every day that the sun rises, every moment we see with our eyes or hear with our ears or speak with our mouths or walk with our legs is free and undeserved gift to sinners who deserve only judgment.

And who bought these gifts for us? Jesus Christ. And how did he purchase them? By his blood.

Every blessing in life is designed to magnify the cross of Christ, or to say it another way, every good thing in life is meant to magnify Christ and him crucified."