And it was good

It is Good Friday, and I'm speaking this morning at a breakfast, so I decided to use the piece I've written (or most of it) for this blog.

         The idea of what is good starts early in scripture, in the seventh line of the Bible. God lets the waters beneath the sky flow together into one place so that dry land appears. God sees that it is good. God creates fish, lights in the sky, animals and it is all good. Then he creates humans and steps back for an admiring look and it is very good.

         In the New Testament what is the Gospel called. It is good news. 

         THE APOSTLE PAUL WRITING AFTER THE CROSS WITH THE FULL KNOWLEDGE OF THE RESURRECTION SAID WE KNOW THAT GOD CAUSES EVERYTHING TO WORK TOGETHER FOR THE GOOD OF THOSE WHO LOVE GOD AND ARE CALLED ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE FOR THEM.

         For the Good.

         SERIOUSLY? Sometimes doesn’t it flat out seem like there is nothing good in whatever is swirling around us? When the diagnosis comes, when the accident happens, when the lost can’t be found, where is the good?

         When the tradition of commemorating the day an innocent man named Jesus was beaten, nailed to a cross, and died, it was first called holy Friday.

         Why the difference? It took humanity literally hundreds of years to get the nerve to call this act GOOD

         An innocent man is thrashed, bruised, spat at, called names. He is hungry, thirsty, bleeding and in severe pain. He is facing a death sentence for a crime he did not even think of. And he is nailed to the cross and is breathing his last breath. To the external world that looks on, he is a defeated man, he is a loser, he is powerless.

         AND LOOKING DOWN THE CORRIDORS OF TIME, WE CHOOSE TO CALL IT GOOD.

        A FRIDAY THAT WAS GOOD.

         CAN WE AT LEAST PAUSE FOR A SECOND TO SAVOR THE IRONY OF THIS LIKE IT WAS A SIZZLING STEAK AT RUTH CHRIS?

         GOOD WE SAY.

         JOHN’s gospel tells us this:

19:1 Then Pilate had JESUS flogged with a lead-tipped whip. 

That’s very minimalist writing.

         In Flogging or scourging as it was known, The prisoner is stripped of His clothing and His hands tied to a post above His head. The Roman legionnaire steps forward with the flagrum in his hand. This is the lead-tipped whip john refers to.

         This is a short whip consisting of several heavy, leather thongs with two small balls of lead attached to the ends of each. The heavy whip is brought down with fill force again and again across Jesus’ shoulders, back and legs.

         And it was good.     

         At first the heavy thongs cut through the skin only. Then, as the blows continue, they cut deeper into tissue, producing first an oozing of blood from the capillaries and veins of the skin, and finally spurting arterial bleeding from vessels in the underlying muscles. The small balls of lead first produce large, deep bruises which are broken open by subsequent blows.

               And it was good.

          Finally the skin of the back is hanging in long ribbons and the entire area is an unrecognizable mass of torn, bleeding tissue. When it is determined by the centurion in charge that the prisoner is near death, the beating is stopped.

Because it is good.

          The half-conscious prisoner is then untied and allowed to slump to the stone pavement, wet with His own blood. 

         In this case it is so good that The Roman soldiers see a great joke in this provincial Jew claiming to be a king. 

 VERSE 2: the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head.

          Don’t skip over this friends.

         They throw a robe across His shoulders and place a stick in His hand for a sceptre. A small bundle of flexible branches covered with long thorns is pressed into His scalp.

         This would have caused  copious bleeding because the scalp is one of the most vascular areas in the body).

 And it is good.

          After mocking Him and striking Him across the face, the soldiers take the stick from His hand and strike Him across the head, driving the thorns deeper into His scalp. Finally, they tire of their sadistic sport and the robe is torn from his back. 

         It is good.

         Now, This cloak had already adhered to the clots of blood and serum in the wounds, and its removal, just as in the careless removal of a surgical bandage, would have caused excruciating pain - almost as though He were again being whipped, and the wounds again begin to bleed and the soldiers declare it is very good.

         So I ask this fine good Friday, 

When the blood is flowing down red, where’s the Good?

When the pain is growing, where’s the Good?

When the suffering is just too much, where’s the Good?

When the mountain won’t move, when the loved one won’t call, when the friend won’t accept the call, when the bills can’t be paid, when things are what we would call bad by any one’s definition WHERE IS THE GOOD.

          I suggest to you that at the foot of the cross, we surrendered our ability to see bad.    

         Hear me. At the cross, as he hung there in more pain that we will ever imagine much less suffer, we who believe in the events of that three day period surrendered our ability to see bad happening to us.

         For what happened that day was our trust was birthed.

Our faith was grown.

Our love turned red and flowed onto holy ground at the foot of a cross that was thought to be a curse but was turned into something we could wear around our necks. And we call it Good for the outcome was beyond belief for many but what we’ve gone all in about.

 This Good Friday, this GOD Friday, this is God’s promise to each one of us. Revelation 21: 5-7 reads

“He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true." 

He said to me: "It is (telestoia), finished. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son.”

         It is finished, Good has won. The battle is over. Let us go forth and overcome.

         This morning I want you not to merely leave here and go cut your grass or something. Leave here as over-comers.

         For the God who created you saved you. He became flesh and took the pain that comes with flesh so that you could defeat your own fleshly desires and shortcomings. 

          So, today as we remember the worst day of humanity by calling it good, Isn’t it time we all started overcome our shortcomings by turning to the one who loves us most?

         God created you to overcome pitfalls and mistakes and bad choices and sins of all kinds. He created the mechanism to remind you of that and save you from those times when it seems you’ve been overcome by life itself. That mechanism was the cross.

         And the most sadistic manner of government mandated capital punishment was turned good.

         The business plan of Jesus was finished.

         The plan of salvation was finished, completed, done.

         The game plan to beat back indifference, and apathy, and religiosity, and all that keeps us from overcoming was absolutely without questioned or doubt finished once and for all.

 And it was very good.