Blood. Agony. Pain. Suffering. These are not words we like to think about, much less incorporate into our daily vocabulary. But, these are the adjectives of today, Good Friday. For most of us, we live in a fairly safe place. Most of us, that is.When was the last time you took a long look at Good Friday? One cannot take an honest look at this Holy day without being moved. Yet there are many who wish to cleanse the story of Jesus and salvation from these no-so-pleasant images of torture. These words and these images make us uncomfortable. We don’t like to think about things that are not pleasant. I mean, doesn’t the Bible say we should think about things that are lovely, pure, praiseworthy, and good (Philippians 4:8)? So what are we to make of the thinking that comes with the rising of the sun on Good Friday?
The truth of the matter is that the story of Jesus, the climax in the narrative of redemption and salvation, cannot be told without these thoughts. Without blood and agony, pain and suffering, there is no story of Jesus.
I will never forget it. I was in Divinity School and enrolled in a class that every Divinity-School student was required to take: Introduction to Christian Worship. In this class the professor led us through the history of, types of, and ways of leading Christian Worship. Then we took a field trip toward the end of the semester. (I know, a field trip for graduate students! I guess God still works miracles!) We went to a nearby church to participate in what the professor called a Baptism Lab.
The professor said, “Class, I want you to graduate from seminary with the experience of baptizing someone. That way you can say you’ve done it!” So we met at the local church whose congregation had agreed for us to use their baptistery to baptize one another.
It was during Lent (the forty days before Easter, excluding Sundays) and there it was, a large, wooden cross. Some reading this may be saying at this point, “Andrew, what is the big deal about a large, wooden cross in a church…a Baptist church nonetheless?” Unfortunately, my eyes would have glossed over the cross had it not been sprawled out over the pews in the center section of the sanctuary. It was lying across at least fifteen pews. It was placed diagonally so it was taking up a lot of room.
At first I thought, “Oh, they are working on a cross for an Easter production.” Then the man who was leading the congregation as interim pastor entered the sanctuary. He was one of our professors at the Divinity School so we all knew him. We were waiting for the rest of the class to arrive and the pastor began sharing about this cross. “You’ve noticed the cross, I hope.” We all shook our heads in agreement. “Interesting placement of the cross, isn’t it?” Again, we agreed.
Then he began to explain the placement of the cross. It was there for a purpose. It was there on Sunday morning before our arrival for the Baptism Lab and it would be there the next Sunday too. There it was, sprawling across the pews and taking up space. It wasn’t off to the side but was occupying the highest number of pews possible. The pastor shared how each week it was moved to a different place in the sanctuary and was laid across a different set of pews. There would even come a time, he said, when it would be placed in front of the pulpit itself, so as to obstruct the view of the pastor from the congregation. So when congregants entered for worship on Sunday morning, no one would know where the cross would be.
“That’s the way the cross is, though, isn’t it?” the pastor said. “It is always in our way.” He shared how it was occupying the seats of people. It obstructed the arrangement. It was in the way! There was no way of ignoring that cross. Everyone had to change where they would go and what they would do and even where they would sit. (If you’ve ever been to a rural church, you will know this can be a big deal!)
See, that is just it. The cross gets in our way. The cross disrupts our lives. The cross causes us to change direction and leads us in a new direction. This instrument of death, the most violent of any death at that, is now unavoidable. This means the blood, the agony, the pain, and the suffering of Jesus cannot be avoided either. We must all do business with the cross. It gets in our way!
“God, can you please move this cross from in front of me so I can get on with my life?” Have you ever prayed that prayer? For some reason, I doubt it. If we would not dare pray such a prayer, what makes us think we could lives in such a way that the actions of our lives pray such a prayer?
Paul does tell us to center our thoughts on the things of God but he also admits something bold to his Philippian readers:
I want to know Christ and…the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death…” (3:10).
For Paul, and for us, there is no avoiding the cross. In fact it is just the opposite, we must embrace the cross. The cross means blood. The cross means agony. The cross means pain. The cross means suffering. The cross means death…the death of ourselves unto God. The cross means dying unto life!
Good Friday? Absolutely! We are dying to live!
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