Good friday 2021

It’s been a tough year. That’s not new news.

We’ve lost friends to Covid. We’ve lost jobs, self esteem, time alone or endured too much time alone.

We’ve been sick; back aches, tooth aches, aching for family.

And today we relive the the sufferings of one who knows our pain. He carried a giant cross on shoulders that were shredded and bloodied to the bone. He was made to wear a circle of thorns on his head that cut into his skin and forced so much blood into his eyes that he couldn’t see as he stumbled to the place of his eventual death -death by spikes nailed into his hands and the tops of his feet. Forced to drink gall ( a bitter wine) when he cried out for water. Left to asphyxiate and be humiliated in his nakedness and aloneness. And finally stabbed in the side to make sure he was dead.

Does he ‘get’ our pain? Oh yes. He died in this way for us. He endured this prophesied death to “open the gates” of Heaven . And then to prove he was God and not just a prophet he resurrected from the dead and sent us the Holy Spirit to be our helper today. In 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, Paul gives a list of people to whom the risen Jesus appeared. These witnesses to the resurrected Jesus include the Apostle Peter, James the brother of Jesus, and, most intriguingly, a group of more than 500 people at the same time. And he still speaks to people today.

We have no church without Good Friday. “Holy” Friday. Because Good Friday leads us soon to Easter and Easter is the promise of life everlasting someday.

Thanks be to God.