March 29, 2024

Good Friday. Is it really good?

It represents a day of death. A day of suffering. A day of sacrifice. It has been called good because it is designated as holy. A day set apart to remember the crucifixion. A day when holiness, righteousness, and good triumphed over evil and sin. When love, forgiveness, and justification overcame our depravity.

I have had the opportunity to travel to Jerusalem on multiple occasions. On one of my more recent trips, we got up at 5:30 a.m. the day before our departure and walked into the walls of the Old City. We walked virtually empty, silent streets. We traveled the Via Delarosa – the way of suffering. We stopped at each station of the cross: reading Scripture, offering a prayer, and periodically singing as we walked together.

I led the devotional reading at the 11th station. There, standing on the backside of the Church of the Resurrection, we remembered Jesus being nailed to the cross.

When the soldiers came to the place called “The Skull,” they nailed Jesus to a cross. They also nailed the two criminals to crosses, one on each side of Jesus. (Luke 22:33)

Cardinal John Henry Newman was a 19th century Anglican priest in Britain. Oxford educated, he eventually became a cardinal in the Roman Catholic Church. In his Way of the Cross devotional, at the 11th station, he wrote:

The Cross is laid on the ground, and Jesus stretched upon it, and then, swaying heavily to and fro, it is, after much exertion, jerked into the hole ready to receive it. Or, as others think, it is set upright, and Jesus is raised up and fastened to it. As the savage executioners drive in the huge nails, He offers Himself to the Eternal Father, as a ransom for the world. The blows are struck - the blood gushes forth. Yes, they set up the Cross on high, and they placed a ladder against it, and, having stripped Him of His garments, made Him mount. With His hands feebly grasping its sides and cross-woods, and His feet slowly, uncertainly, with much effort, with many slips, mounting up, the soldiers propped Him on each side, or He would have fallen. When he reached the projection where His sacred feet were to be, He turned round with sweet modesty and gentleness towards the fierce rabble, stretching out His arms, as if He would embrace them. Then He lovingly placed the backs of His hands close against the transverse beam, waiting for the executioners to come with their sharp nails and heavy hammers to dig into the palms of His hands, and to fasten them securely to the wood. There He hung, a perplexity to the multitude, a terror to evil spirits, the wonder, the awe, yet the joy ...

We look back at the cross because it offers a fierce reminder of the cost of forgiveness. It reveals to us how pain and purpose connect and intertwine. It reminds us of how righteousness and justice prevail.

We’ve walked through this holy week, a week when we remember all that Christ has done, and now stand squarely on Friday – a day of death and sacrifice, a day of forgiveness. We reflect with both wonder and awe at what Christ has done for us. It is good. It is holy. It is transforming.

We look toward Sunday, anticipating yet the joy ...