What’s So Good About Good Friday?
There’s something unsettling about calling this day good.
Good Friday is not clean.
It’s not polished.
It wouldn’t be suggested as our next favorite Hallmark movie.
It is brutal.
It is the sound of wood splintering under the weight of a dying man.
It is the sky growing dark in the middle of the day.
It is blood, thorns, mockery, abandonment.
It is God Himself hanging between heaven and earth, unrecognized, unwanted, and rejected.
And yet we call it good.
The Weight We Don’t Want to Carry
Good Friday forces me to face something I spend most of my life trying to avoid.
My sin is not small.
It’s easy for me to talk about brokenness in vague, abstract terms.
It’s harder to stand at the foot of the cross and realize… This is what it cost.
Not a lecture.
Not a second chance.
Not a divine reset.
A cross.
John Stott once wrote,
“Before we can begin to see the cross as something done for us, we have to see it as something done by us.”
It’s easy for me to stand at a distance from the cross.
To talk about it. Preach it. Explain it.
And still keep it from getting too close.
But Good Friday doesn’t let me do that.
Because this wasn’t just for the world in general.
This was for me.
Jesus did not go to the cross for some abstract version of sin.
He went for my sin.
The things I try to hide.
The things I excuse.
The things I still feel shame over.
He saw all of it.
And He did not turn away.
He went to the cross to deal with my guilt.
To carry my shame.
To absorb what should have fallen on me.
Not to make me better.
To make me clean.
The reality is, the cross exposes me.
Not just as flawed.
But as needing rescue.
The Silence of Heaven
One of the most haunting moments in the gospel accounts is when Jesus cries out,
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
The Son, who had known perfect communion with the Father for all eternity, now stands alone.
Silent heaven.
Unanswered prayer.
Full abandonment.
Not because He deserved it.
But because we did.
This is the mystery of Good Friday.
The judgment that should have fallen on us fell on Him.
The silence we deserved He endured.
The separation that belonged to us He embraced.
This Is Love
We throw that word around so easily.
But Good Friday redefines it.
Love is not sentimental.
Love is not soft.
Love is not just words.
Love is substitution.
“He was pierced for our transgressions; He was crushed for our iniquities.”
He did not come to make a point.
He came to take our place.
Every lash.
Every nail.
Every drop of blood.
Not random. Not tragic.
Intentional.
For you.
It Is Finished
Three words that changed everything.
Not “I am finished.”
But “It is finished.”
The work is complete.
The debt is paid.
The sacrifice is enough.
Nothing left to prove.
Nothing left to earn.
Good Friday declares something we struggle to believe.
You do not have to perform your way back to God.
Because Jesus already made a way.
Why It’s Good
It’s good not because it was easy.
It’s good because it worked.
Sin was dealt with.
Justice was satisfied.
Mercy was unleashed.
The cross is where the worst thing imaginable became the most beautiful reality possible.
Your shame does not get the final word.
Your failure does not define you.
Your past does not own you.
Because of Good Friday,
Grace does.
Sit Here a While
Before we rush to Sunday, before the celebration, the empty tomb, the victory…
Sit here.
At the cross.
Let it slow you down.
Let it humble you.
Let it remind you what it cost.
And then let it overwhelm you.
Because the One on that cross knew everything about you… and stayed.
