It is finished.

Good Friday.  The night in which the most perfect sacrifice ever occurred.  When I truly stop to think about it, I am baffled.  Jesus Christ, the perfect and holy Son of God, not only came to the earth to walk among people, but died a horrible, painful death that he did not deserve.  He died for people that would mock him, scorn him, deny him.  He died for sins that had not even been committed by people who had not even been born.  Try and wrap your head around that one.  This day is a reminder to me of God's constant and relentless pursuit of my heart.  At the Tenebrae service at my church tonight, I found myself in a dark sanctuary full of people, but feeling as if it truly were just God and me.  I couldn't help but ask the question - What were you thinking?  Jesus didn't have to do this.  But I realized that he did.  It was once explained to me in this way.  God is perfectly just and perfectly merciful.  Well, doesn't that seem like a double standard.  So let's break it down.  Sin must be punished. Ok, I can understand that.  The punishment for sin is death.  Still following.  There is the just part.  Jesus had no sin, but took on the sins of the world.  He DIED.  He took our punishment.  There is the merciful part.  Whoa - mind is blown.  I cannot even begin to conceive what that kind of love is like.  This is one of those things I'm just going to have to wait and ask the Big Guy about when I see him face to face.


A couple of years ago, this was printed on the front of the bulletin for the Good Friday service.  It was really spoken to me.  I wanted to share it with you.

It was on the Friday that they ended it all.
Of course, they didn't do it one by one.
They weren't brave enough.
All the stones at the one time or no stones thrown at all.

They did it in crowds...
in crowds where you can feel safe
and lose yourself and shout things
you would never shout on your own,
and do things you would never do
if you felt the camera was watching you.

It was a crowd in the church that did it,
and a crowd in the civil service that did it,
and a crowd in the street that did it,
and a crowd on the hill that did it.

And he said nothing,
He took the bruises, the spit on the face,
the whips on the back, the curses in the ears.
He took the sight of his friends turning away, running away.

And he said nothing.

He let them do their worst until their worst was done,
as on Friday they ended it all...
and would have finished themselves had he not cried,
"Father, forgive them..."

And began the revolution.


It is so easy for us to skip from Palm Sunday to the celebration of the Resurrection - but we cannot forget the sacrifice of the Cross.  It is finished.


Live with love,
-JD