I was there, walking the dusty roads beside Him while the scent of olive trees mingled with the salt of the Galilean sea. I felt the crush of the crowds as they pressed toward Him, hungry for healing, truth, or simple hope in a world that offered so little. I watched lepers stare in disbelief as ruined flesh became whole again beneath His touch, and I saw blind men gasp as their world exploded into color and light. I heard demons shriek as they were driven into the abyss, and I watched storms collapse in obedience when He spoke.
And I watched Him die, and the memory burns within me as vividly now as it did on the day it happened. I stood on the hill of Golgotha, where the ground felt wounded beneath our feet, as if creation itself recoiled at the sight before it. The sky choked with darkness though the sun should have been high, and the air trembled with a tension that seemed to crackle against the skin. Even hardened Roman soldiers, men who had witnessed horrors without flinching, shifted uneasily as the world groaned under the weight of this moment.
His body hung between earth and heaven, torn and battered, and yet an authority that surpassed any earthly throne clung to Him even in agony. The wind rose and wailed like a grieving mother, and the ground shuddered as He gathered His final breath. When He cried out, It is finished, the words rang across the hill with a force that felt like triumph rather than surrender, as if all of history bent its knee to that declaration. In that instant, the earth split, stones shattered, and the heavy veil of the temple tore from top to bottom as if invisible hands had ripped it apart.
We hid for three days with our hope buried in a borrowed tomb, afraid that the next knock on the door would signal our end. Dawn came and went, but our spirits remained trapped in a night that would not lift until the women ran to us with their breath torn from their lungs. They shouted, ‘He is not here; the tomb is empty,’ and the fear in their eyes was mixed with wonder so fierce that it almost frightened me. We struggled to believe them, but then He appeared, alive and radiant, with scars that testified to His suffering while His presence testified to His victory.
When He spoke my name, I felt every doubt fall away, every fear collapse, and every stain of failure dissolve like mist before sunlight. His eyes carried eternity within them, and their gaze reached a place in me that no one else had ever touched. We followed Him afterward with a renewed devotion, because to see death undone by His hand was to know that no power in heaven or on earth could oppose Him. And today, that same Savior has ascended before our very eyes, and the hill where it happened will forever remain carved into my memory.
We walked with Him to the Mount of Olives, where the scent of wild thyme drifted across the stones, and the valley stretched below with its familiar hush. Jerusalem gleamed in the sun, unaware that the greatest miracle since creation was about to unfold on that slope. He turned to us with a radiance that seemed to gather all light toward Him, and His words settled on us with the weight of divine purpose. He promised that the Holy Spirit would come upon us, that we would receive power, and that we would bear witness to the ends of the earth.
Then He rose, and the sight of it took the breath from my lungs and the strength from my knees. He lifted from the ground as if drawn upward by the will of the Almighty, and even the air around Him shimmered as though creation recognized its King. His robes stirred around Him while the light bent toward Him like a tide pulled by a celestial force. A cloud brilliant as molten gold enveloped Him until He vanished from sight, though His presence lingered in the very space He had occupied.
We stood in stunned silence until two figures appeared beside us, men clothed in garments that glowed like morning light. Their voices rang across the hill as they reminded us that He would return in the same way we had seen Him go. Their message settled over us with both sorrow and joy, for He was gone for now, but the promise of His return burned within us like a living fire. We remained there for some time, trying to comprehend what our eyes had witnessed and what our hearts now carried.
That promise has become the anchor of my soul, because one day the sky will break open and the heavens will shake. The trumpet of God will sound, and the King of Glory will descend with all the authority of heaven roaring at His back. Every knee will bow, the dead will rise, and the faithful will be gathered into the brilliance of eternity where sorrow has no place. The Holy City will shine with a glory beyond imagination, and the river of life will flow from the throne in a song that never ends.
And I know, with a certainty deeper than breath, that I will see Him again. I walked with Him once as a student and friend, but the next time I see Him, it will be as the risen and reigning King of Kings. My soul trembles with anticipation for that day when time will fall away, and the world will be remade in His glory. Until then, my heart cries out with longing and love for the One who conquered death and called me His own.