The story doesn’t seem very good, does it?
Jesus was arrested, tied up, interrogated, tortured, and executed.
The cross is a story of suffering and death.
How is it that something as brutal as this has become the centerpiece of our faith?
How is this story good?
Because this is the story of God being with us in our pain and sorrow and suffering.
Who among us hasn’t known pain and sorrow and suffering?
The cross isn’t just Jesus’ story. It’s your story and it’s my story.
It’s the story of those we love, and it’s the story of those we who seem hard to love.
It’s the human story.
If you’ve been here this week, you know these bowls. Chipped. Cracked. Broken.
The story for these bowls seem to be over. What good are they any more?
So what are the chipped and cracked and broken pieces of your life?
What is your story of suffering and loss? What is the pain that never goes away? What suffering do you bring to the cross today?
I wish I had answers and explanations. But I have none. All I have is chips and cracks and brokenness of my own.
More than any other day, today holds our chips and cracks and brokenness before us.
I wish I could make sense of suffering, for you and for me.
But I can’t.
All I can do is point to the cross.
All I can do is point to the promise that Jesus is with us in our suffering.
All I can do is point to the promise that God is with us in our chips and cracks and brokenness.
Today, on Good Friday, the cross stands tall and declares that the story isn’t over if the story isn’t good.
Jesus, the perfect, sinless man, today is smashed to pieces with us.
For us.
That’s it. That’s all I have to offer you. That’s all I know about this day and I believe it with every fiber of my being.
Today isn’t called Easy Friday, or Happy Friday, or Painless Friday.
It’s Good Friday.
It’s good because God is with us.
It’s good because God is with us in our chips and cracks and brokenness.
And God is gathering up all these broken pieces…
Because the story isn’t over, and God is up to something…
And it’s going to be so, so good.
Amen