Good Friday, April 19
The Death of Jesus
Luke 23:44-49
“It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, while the sun’s light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.’ Having said this, he breathed his last. When the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God and said, ‘Certainly this man was innocent.’ And when all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned home, beating their breasts. But all his acquaintances, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.”
You awoke today to the most sad and somber day in Christian memory and experience. Enter and engage the day for what it is, not as a day to be avoided with contrived happy-go-lucky escapist thoughts. It is a day of faith.
Today is the day Jesus died. Today is the day Jesus shares our experiences of death. Today enter that reality; entomb yourself in that reality; immerse yourself in that reality. Our Lord walks with us even in that sad and hard reality in our lives, we will die.
Go deeply into Good Friday reality as you remember Christ’s death. Read this account slowly, stopping to imagine what it was like for our Lord and for those at the cross who loved him.
“It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, while the sun’s light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.’ Having said this, he breathed his last. When the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God and said, ‘Certainly this man was innocent.’ And when all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned home, beating their breasts. But all his acquaintances, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.” (Luke 23:44-49)
On this Good Friday, gently enter the sadness of your own personal memories of death: being present at the death of one you love, or a moment when your own continuing health and even life were in question, or the near-death experience of loss of faith. These too are holy memories and moments. Christ walks beside you in these moments just as you walked beside him as you read and reflected on his dying.
You have entered the tomb of your own death in these sad and somber Good Friday thoughts and prayers. But, you have gone into that tomb believing Easter Sunday is coming. The hallelujah trumpets are warming up!
Prayer: Merciful God, even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil. Amen.
Peter Morgan