Good Friday

Today we remember the dying of Jesus.  He stands, as we all will, at that liminal boundary between life and death, empty and alone. Like Jesus, there will be nothing more we can offer to hold death at bay when it comes. No strength, no possessions, no relationships, nothing and no one — only our final breath, our final oblation. Jesus did what we must do. He gave his life back to the one who gives each of us life and breath and hope. Into God’s hands he gave his whole being, and so must we.

Death frightens us and fascinates us at the same time. Maybe that is why we are so interested in the last words of those we love and admire. We sense that the dying are further up the line than we are, and maybe they can see something that is on the other side, what lies ahead, so their final words have a certain poignancy. When one of my closest friends died of cancer several years ago, her last words to those of us gathered around her bed were simply, “I see freedom.” And she breathed her last.

But the reason we can face our death, is the same reason we can face the whole of our life, both its joys and its sorrows, its gifts and its demands. We can face all because we have a God who has walked our road for us, and will be with us always, and perhaps never closer than when we are called to make our final offering. “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”   His entire living and his entire dying have come down to this one single moment of grandeur, simplicity, and naked trust.  “And having said this, he breathed his last" (Luke 23:46).

We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you.
Because by your holy cross, you have redeemed the world.  Amen.

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