This day, Good Friday, I’m drawn to explore Jesus Christ.
Death. Life. Love. What’s it all about?
A death on a cross? Why?
A sacrifice? For what?
Death can evoke deep realities in us sometimes.
Our failures can be laid bare; our human frailty, our mortality, can become visible before us in the death of another.
But Jesus died on purpose, for a purpose;
he made his death a means to an end – a means to our end.
Is death all that there is? Is death itself the end?
The cross says, no: death is just the beginning.
There is the crucifixion, and then the empty cross.
After death comes the grave;
and after the grave comes the Light, at the end of the tunnel.
After death comes a new kind of life.
Why should this day be called Good Friday: this day, on which we remember Jesus’s death?
Because Jesus offered his life for us: so that he might lead us through our own graves into a better life.
There are many kinds of deaths, just as there are many kinds of resurrections.
There is life, there is death, and then there is life again.
Sometimes the new life costs: sometimes it requires facing a kind of death first.
But the sun rises in the morning: a new day. A new life.
At the cross, we can see ourselves: who we are, who we are not, who we ought to be – who we can be.
At the cross, we can see an offering: Love, with all its sacrifice – a role model! A new Way! The right Way.
There is a kind of Life stronger than Death.
There is a Way of Life stronger than our own lesser way of life.
The cross is calling us into something more than we are.
The cross is calling us to someone greater than we are.
But this is no mediocre calling: no, beware.
The best things in life aren’t free: they demand our all.
This kind of Love is radical: this kind of Love is life-changing, and life-demanding.
‘Take up your cross and follow me.’
This is no ‘walk in the park’ offering: this call is serious.
Reciprocity! Jesus’s sacrifice is a call to reciprocate:
a call for us to offer our lives in response to his offering of his life;
a call for us to give ourselves into his Calling.
Why not answer the call?
