the day we had to have.

I wonder where you’re at this Good Friday – we’ve come through the season of Lent, we’ve come through Holy Week, we had Maundy Thursday last night, and now we’re here.

This saddest of days, but also the most important of days, the day we had to have.

I wonder how you approach the cross this Good Friday – what’s your state of mind, what’s going on in your life, what do you see when you look at the cross this time round? 

Many of us have heard it all before, more times than we can remember. We’ve shared in many Easter journeys, here and in other places, with people here and now in other places too. 

Maybe some of us have only heard it a few times, maybe you’re discovering more about this Jesus character and his story as you go. Different ways we might be coming at the cross as we gather today.

For me Easter feels a bit late this year, it is a late one this time around, it feels like a long time coming – maybe having two weeks of school holidays leading into this weekend has had something to do with that! For me the hope of what’s to come – even on day like this – is shining through, that hope also tied in with the privilege I have coming this Sunday where I get to baptize my own son – that’s pretty amazing. 

But we can’t get carried away with all this light shining through – that would not do justice to today, this day we had to have.

We had to have this day, this day where the Messiah, the one great hope, the Saviour of the world, is put to death on a cross. He makes himself humble, but he is humiliated. He fulfils scripture, but it comes at the cost of his life. He gives his mother a new son, but his life must end. This is very intense, it’s confronting, it’s hard to watch, hard to listen to, hard to comprehend. This day is hard, it’s the day we had to have – but it’s not the day Jesus had to have. 

He didn’t have to do any of this! He could have made this day go any other way, he could have stopped it all from happening. He didn’t have to do anything for us – we, like the people there that day, didn’t do anything for him.

When the people are given the choice, they choose to free a criminal instead of freeing Jesus. When we are given the choice, we choose to sin instead of loving God and loving our neighbour. We choose ourselves, not the one who has given us life, who has given us his life. We don’t deserve any of what Jesus does for us on this day, but he does it all the same.

This is the day we had to have, the day we would know how much our God would do for us, the lengths he would go to, the sacrifice he would make, the humiliation he would endure. 

This is the day we had to have because without this day, the price, the debt we owe wouldn’t have been paid. We wouldn’t have been saved by this incredible sacrificial act of generosity, of ultimate grace. We would remain stuck in our sin and without hope or a future. Jesus didn’t need this day, but we did > we needed it desperately.

So we reflect together on this day, wherever we might be at, on this day we had to have. We reflect on how much has been given to us, how amazing the grace of our God really is that his son would die for us, how this king from a kingdom not of this world would come to make us his people.