Good Friday “not sad instead of glorious, nor glorious instead of sad .”

Good Friday can very reasonably be described as the saddest and most glorious day of the year.

It is the saddest, because it confronts us with the full weight of sin, cruelty, injustice and suffering, all falling upon Christ.

It is the most glorious, because in that very act Christ is accomplishing redemption, revealing the love of God, defeating sin and opening the way to reconciliation.

That tension is exactly why the day has such power. It is not sad instead of glorious, nor glorious instead of sad. It is both, at the highest level.

Christ crowned with thorns, Iglesia del Divino Salvador, Seville

Good Friday.

Not an easy day.

Not a polished day.

Not a day for pretending that suffering, cruelty and loss are minor inconveniences to be brushed aside.

This image, photographed in the Iglesia del Divino Salvador in Seville, carries something of that weight for me. The crown of thorns. The sorrow. The quiet dignity.

For Christians, Good Friday is the day we remember that Christ did not stand at a safe distance from human pain, but entered into it fully, and did so out of love.

“But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

Romans 5:8

I cannot pretend to fully understand how the Being who created the universe, and all that exists within it, should then create us as separate creatures on this small planet, give us freedom to choose whether we believe He exists, and allow that freedom to lead to so much that is wrong.

That in itself is hard enough to grasp.

But then comes the even greater mystery: that the same God should send His Son to die for you and me, to deal with the result of all that wrong, so that the default end is not separation from Him, but the possibility of relationship with Him, both now and beyond this life, in what we call heaven, whatever that fully looks like. 

I do not write that as someone who has it all tied up and settled.

I write it as someone who finds it too great, too strange, and too full of love to dismiss lightly.

Good Friday does not ask us to shrink this mystery down to something easy. It asks us to stand before it, "to look until you see", and decide whether there is actually anything in that awful but loving event, that has any relevance for you or me. 

Whatever your own beliefs, there is something profoundly moving in the idea of love willing to suffer for others. 

Not sentimental love.

Not convenient love.

Sacrificial love. A love that is to be abosrbed, rather than accpted - or rejected, ungraspable, but vital.

In a world that often rewards self promotion, image and noise, Good Friday points us towards humility, mercy and a love stronger than hatred.

Wishing peace to all who mark this solemn day, and to this tumultuous world as a whole.