Good Friday

Happy Good Friday!  The day the Church remembers Jesus Christ being crucified on a cross at the hands of the Roman government and the religious leaders. For those of us that believe that Jesus is the Son of God, He chose to suffer and die rather than to kill.  Violence only leads to retaliatory violence which leads to more retaliatory violence….. For those that are Christians; we are required to take up our cross and follow Jesus.  Matthew 16:24-27 -  Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.”

The religious leaders and the Roman government both saw Jesus as a threat to their power. Jesus completely interprets scriptures (what we call the Old Testament) differently than the religious leaders. Jesus was the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abram (later renamed Abraham) back in Genesis 12:3b “and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” Luke 13:29 -  “People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God.” Jesus knew that worshiping God, the Father meant being a servant, loving others including enemies, it meant treating everyone as a child of God.  The religious leaders saw division; scripture as a way to interpret right and wrong to put people outside of God’s love. There are many Christian religious leaders which still do this even though it is completely rejecting Jesus.

The Roman government was power hungry as all empires are and Jesus claimed to be a king. In a way it seems like a huge over reaction, Jesus preached peace and His movement was not that large compared to the Roman.  He said His kingdom was not of this world. However, if the Christian movement truly followed Jesus, it would serve the poor or weak regardless of borders and would not fear retaliation from the earthly government; so maybe they understood more than I know. It shows how easily and quickly empires will use violence to end any competition. We are seeing that today.  

So here we are in 2025 USA; we are sending innocent people to another country to be tortured!!!  According to USA law people are innocent until proven guilty.  On Good Friday; we worship or pretend to worship an innocent man that died on the cross because religious people and government people wanted their own power.  Hmmm.  A man that DEMANDED that we take up our cross.  A man that DEMANDED that we stand up for the least of these. A man that DEMANDED that His Kingdom was not of this world and had no borders. In the Bible when we first read about Paul; he is crucifying the Church and is even participating in the murder of Stephen. After his conversion, he is no longer making others suffer, but he is willing to suffer. The spirit of Jesus caused him to put down his weapons and take up his cross. It is time for us; ALL of us that follow Jesus to take us their cross and follow.  He never said it would be easy; but He did promise eternity for those that believed and followed.