Thank God it's Friday by Miriam Clifford
Miriam Clifford's Pages
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| |
 |
| A Reflection On That Friday We Call “Good” Jesus cried out, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) I felt like that all week long, until I spoke to my dearest friend Margo giving me words of life and new determination in my faith. All hell breaks loose in the Holy Week in my life. Those moments of darkness-The eerie silence of God, my Father….. “You have to die to yourself Miri,”….I still can hear her words. “For Good Friday is approaching and you will be reborn, renewed and refreshed on Resurrection Sunday and your heart will sing all the praises for the storm has passed. “ Oh dying to my pain and sorrow this week alone has opened my heart even more to be sensitive and tuned in to the Spirit of God. Death is so painful. The Labor pains and new birth awaiting me…Tomorrow I will die and be resurrected with my Lord Jesus Christ on that glorious Resurrection Morning. A new life will begin and there is no more turning back to the old rugged me. And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said “Father, into your hands, I commend my spirit.” And having said this, he breathed his last. (Luke 23:46) Now that might sound odd because often enough, I think, we tend to equate God with happiness and joy and peace and order, and security… not with sadness, or chaos, or pain or suffering or darkness, so much so that when some crisis occur in our lives, we begin to question the love of God for us, we begin to question his presence in our lives, asking if God has somehow forgotten us, or is angry at us, or has left us. We want a God who would function according to the way we think he should work in our lives. We want a God who would do what we want him to do, we want a God who would submit to our will, we want a God who would act according to our schedule and plans, we want a God who is predictable, we want a God who we could box in our own human formula or calculation. We want a God who would make us happy, and not sad. We want a God who would protect us from harm or suffering or pain. We want a God who would shield us from the insecurities of life. Many times, we do not experience God as nice or sweet as we want him to be. The Friday we call “Good,” the day upon which we commemorate the sufferings and death of Jesus on the cross seem to drive this point home to us. This Friday brings us not to the God of our desiring, a sweet and nice God, but to a God perhaps we would rather not have. I suspect that we would rather jump ahead to Resurrection Sunday than sit here for hours pondering an event that seems to destroy our illusion of a God who seems nice and sweet all the time. On Good Friday, we contemplate God not in light but in darkness, we contemplate God not in happiness but in suffering. On Good Friday we contemplate God not in his abiding presence but in his desolating absence. On Good Friday, we contemplate God not in his thunderous voice, but in his silence. On Good Friday, we contemplate God not in life, but in death. On the Friday we call “Good”, Jesus himself came to know God not as light but as darkness, not as presence but as absence. He experienced God not as a “nice” and “sweet” deity, but a terrifying one. “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Why? Why have you forsaken me? Why?” On the Friday that is “Good”, Jesus came up against the silence of God, Jesus came up against the terrifying night that hid God. God is experienced not as heaven but as hell. And indeed, Jesus was right. God did not disappoint him, for Resurrection Sunday shows us that God was in the darkness of Good Friday, that God was really present in the seeming emptiness loneliness and abandonment of Good Friday. And that from out of evil and death, God brought forth goodness, salvation and life… But it is scary for us to let ourselves submit to the darkness of God. It is hard for us to trust in God who is hidden and silent. It is difficult for us to abandon ourselves to God in the night of faith. Yet, what Holy Week teaches us is that we could reach the brightness of Resurrection Morning only if we walk through the darkness of Good Friday. To hear the joyous noise of the Easter Alleluias, we must first endure the silence of God’s desert. The days from Good Friday to Resurrection Sunday teach us that the path to certainty of God’s love for us is through abandonment of our selves to him in the uncertainty of the dark night of faith. Whenever we struggle with the dark moments of life, whenever we grapple with God’s silence in our lives, let us abandon ourselves to him, and say, “As I wait to behold your appearing in my life, O faithful God, as I wait to hear your voice, O God of silence in my storm, I embrace this night as holy, this darkness as a blessing waiting to unfold. I trust that you are here in this terrifying silence, and so, “Father, into your hands, I commend my spirit.” And joy cometh in the morning. Blessings of unknown to you and yours. Please forward this to everyone in your contact list to spread the word about Agape Project. Kind Regards, Miriam Agape ProjectÓ2007 |
