Good Friday 10 April (A reading and short reflection.)
Collect for today (from the Prayer Book)
Lord Jesus, you carried our sins in your own body on the tree so that we might have life. May we and all who remember this day find new life in you, now and in the world to come, where you live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen
Read John 19:17-30
This is the story of Jesus’ journey to the cross. In John’s gospel this journey is a gradual unfolding until the final act of crucifixion, which for John is the great climax of his gospel, and as far as he is concerned the great climax of Christ’s ministry.
1). Every journey has a destination. Jesus’ journey led him to the cross. That was always going to be the outcome of his ministry, but the cross was not to be the ultimate destination, it was not journey’s end. The cross was the human end but God was involved in this journey, and so there is something as it were, through the cross.
Jesus had to travel this journey alone: His was the choice to keep on with the quest. God would not make the choices for him, anymore than God will make choices for us.
The Christian life is not one large decision but a series of choices. It takes a lifetime of choices to be a follower of Christ.
2). Christ’s life was a series of choices. He was connected to God, not by pressure or fear but through prayer, and by opening his thinking processes to let God in. He then made choices that signalled his obedience. Because of that lifetime of choices, Jesus went to the cross alone and yet not alone for God was vitally involved: Not to hold the cross away from Christ but with him as he bore the pain and shame of it.
Charles Wesley’s hymn, God if unexampled grace. Reads:
Never love nor sorrow was like that my saviour showed,
see him stretched on yonder cross and crushed beneath our load.
Now discern the deity, now his heavenly birth declare.
Faith cries out, tis he, tis he My God that suffers there.
And Paul reminds us “… in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.” (2 Corinthians 5:19
3). God was with him because of the choices that he made. The cross was essential for Jesus to complete his mission but because God was involved it was not the ultimate destination but a door into newness. “God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places,” Ephesians 1:20
It was his choices that brought that victorious outcome.
As we contemplate this act today, as we see this godly drama displayed we too are reminded of our choices. It is possible to view this drama as a bystander, not involved in the action, but that is to miss the entrance to a new way of life, a new opportunity to face life, a new possibility with Christ, for though Jesus had to walk that lonesome valley alone, no else could walk that walk, we need to remember that he walked it for ‘me’, for each of us, we were involved
“I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.” Romans 8:18
Prayer. Lord you went out carrying your cross to the hill of Calvary, bearing a load of sin and shame, a load you willingly embraced; and on that cross and in that place, together with sin and shame you died, that we might live a life of forgiveness and peace. Surely the prophetic word has come to pass, “by his stripes we are healed”. So in wonder and in love today we remember that cross and your great sacrifice. We are torn with many emotions but above all we are thankful for your acceptance and healing. Help us dear Lord to live a life worthy of your gift to us. May our choices draw us ever closer to you: And may your love fill our hearts and our minds and bring us peace. Today we pray for those who are lonely, those who are missing the gathering of family and friends. Cover each one in your loving embrace that the waiting may not be too long or too hard. Bring us all through to a satisfactory resolution so that once again we may gather to praise you, our Lord and our God. Amen
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