The Text:
Luke 24:21 But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.
The Question:
Which day–Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday–is the day of Christ’s crucifixion and death?
The Answer:
Thursday is the option that best meets the evidence in the New Testament record.
See the 1942 book by Roy M. Allen, Three Days in the Grave, for a full and accurate discussion of what is involved.
A key point of evidence is found in the statement of the two disciples on the Emmaus Road as given in Luke 24:21,
Luk 24:21 But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.
If Sunday is the Third Day Since these things were done, then:
Saturday is the second day since these things were done;
Friday is the first day since these things were done.
Therefore,
Thursday is the day “these things were done.”
Take note of Mark 8:31,
Mar 8:31 And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.
A Friday crucifixion would violate four Scripture passages:
Mat 12:40 For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Mat 27:63 Saying, Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again.
Mar 8:31 And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.
Luk 24:21 But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.
Roy Allen has definitively resolved any chronological issues you might think arise from a Thursday crucifixion in his book, Three Days in the Grave, New York: Loizeaux Brothers, 1942, 159 pages + fold-out chronological chart. 2000 copies printed.
I have shared his findings at length on my site.