How Deep is Christ's Love

Scripture 

Luke 23:44-49
⁴⁴ It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, ⁴⁵ while the sun’s light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. ⁴⁶ Then Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Having said this, he breathed his last. ⁴⁷ When the centurion saw what had taken place, he praised God and said, “Certainly this man was innocent.”⁴⁸ And when all the crowds who had gathered there for this spectacle saw what had taken place, they returned home, beating their breasts. ⁴⁹ But all his acquaintances, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things.

Devotion

 

(Please listen to this hymn as you read the devotion)  

Today is the hardest day in the church calendar.  It is the day that we admit that we killed God.

Let that sink in for a minute.  We killed God.  We did so in one of the most brutal and humiliating ways we could, and we stood around to watch the spectacle.  And God let us do it.

As Jesus hung there in agony, Creation itself shrank in horror.  The sun failed and the Earth was shrouded in darkness as we killed the one who gave us light. Matthew says that the earth shook beneath their feet, cracking stones and breaking open tombs.  In the Temple, the thick curtain that separated the rest of the space from the Holy of Holies (the place where God's presence dwelled) was torn in two.  Jesus's followers, stand at a distance and watch the crowds mock him until the bitter end.  It was only after it was all finished that the crowds who had gathered to see the spectacle of Rome executing a popular  figure seemed to realize at least a bit of the wrongness of what has just occured.  

Lest we judge the people of Jesus's day too harshly, we should acknowledge our own complicity in the crucifixion.  Like the long-ago crowds gathered round the cross, we show up to witness the spectacle of Christ's death and resurrection without taking the time to truly understand or follow his teachings.  We drive nails into Christ's hands and feet each time we harm or take advantage of someone.  We mock Jesus every time we claim to be Christians but fail to protect the vulnerable or ignore his command to love one another as he has loved us.  Each and every day, we are the ones who crucify Christ.  We are the ones who kill God at work among us.

  So why do we call this horrible day Good Friday?  Well, "good" actually means "Holy."  And today is an incredibly holy day.  It's holy not because we killed God-on-Earth in the form of Jesus Christ.  It is holy because God love us so much that Jesus was willing to die for our sake...and even forgive us we killed him.  As Jesus breathes out one last time and the curtain in the Temple tears in two, we learn that nothing--not even death--can separate us from God.  Our innocent Christ willingly takes all disrespect and violence we can inflict into himself and then and dies to this world so that we may never doubt God's wondrous love for us.  This is the true power of our good and loving God.  This is the  holiest of acts that Christ could ever perform for us.

Friends, today is a day of deep grief, but it is also a Good Day...a Holy Day.  For on this day, Jesus shows us that God loves us more than we can ever comprehend.  Creation may cringe in horror at the hatred and sinfulness of our acts.  The sun may go out.  The rocks may tremble and earth may break, but God's love lives on.  It is eternal.  And nothing can ever separate us from it.  In Christ, God himself died so that we may live in his love forever.  There is no greater or more wondrous act of love than this.

Prayer 

Jesus, we hang our heads in sorrow and shame for what we have done to you.  Be with us in our grief, and help us repent from our hatred so that we may feel the power of your love.  We lay you in your tomb to rest awhile, and we await the moment when you arise.  Amen.