Good Friday

...or "God's Friday" as some people think it used to be called (aren't they all His?), in the same way that Goodbye used to be "God be with ye".

This is the day that we remember the crucifixion and passion of the Lord.  (I have a confession: I've never seen The Passion of the Christ.  I just can't psyche myself up to it.  I get weepy just thinking about the previews.)  This is the day that we can identify, if we choose to use it as a devotional aid, with various people in the story.  Who fits you?

Perhaps it's John Mark, the young man who is so frightened when the soldiers come to arrest Jesus that he runs away, losing his garment in the process, and flees naked.  This is one of those times, I think, when God uses an event that really happened and also gives it symbolic significance--He's good at that.  Because surely, what makes us more naked than fear?  And what better way to lose the covering grace of the Lord than to abandon Him, rather than running to Him, in our fear?

Or perhaps you identify more with stubborn Peter, ruled by his emotions.  When Peter isn't allowed to fight violently for his Lord, he doesn't know what to do, and loses his courage.  Maybe you've denied the Lord like Peter did, for petty reasons, in front of people that didn't matter.  (Surely, the servant girl in the courtyard was not the person who could threaten a full grown, burly fisherman.)  Maybe you've repented.

Perhaps you identify with the women, unable to see what was going on, knowing He was arrested, knowing something bad was happening, seeing all your fears confirmed when He emerges, bloody, forced to pick up the instrument of His death.  Perhaps you've been watching someone you love carry death--death in a hospital, death at home, death coming in the next days or months or years.  I pray not.

Perhaps you are like Simon of Cyrene, caught up in this drama against your will.  You were just going about your business this Easter and suddenly you are brought face-to-face with Christ, and you have to look into His eyes.

Perhaps you identify with the centurion, who was just doing his job, on a busy, exhausting holiday weekend, in a country he probably didn't much like.  Perhaps you've been forced to see God in the mundane, and perhaps you've realized that the job you were wanting to get over with has been the most important moment of your life.

Perhaps you identify with Pilate, and you just want the whole, embarassing mess over with.

Perhaps you identify with the theif on the cross, knowing Christ is what you need, and knowing just as surely that you can never presume to reach out to Him.  Remember, His arms are stretched out to you.

But unfortunately, I think most people on Good Friday identify with everyone else in Jerusalem--they are just going about their business, and while they may know something is happening outside the city where they execute the scum, they have their own worries to attend to.  Business is business, after all, and by the time the veil of the temple rips, the earth cracks, and the sky blackens, it's too late.  He's gone, and it was only a strange earthquake.

But remember, as we spend tonight and tomorrow in vigil, mourning the death of the Lord: it's only Friday.

Sunday is coming.

Breanna