For most of the Good Fridays I can remember, I would sit and look at the cross, focusing on how my sins nailed Jesus there. As a mode of reflective prayer, I would focus on each suffering Jesus endured- the scourging, crowning with thorns, incessant mockery and insult- thinking of the countless ways I have sinned- thinking, a heart heavy with guilt, “I did this to you.”

But this Good Friday, for the first time, I am accepting Jesus’ offer to look away from my own sin and into His loving gaze and to let His words cover my own as He whispers gently- “I did this for you.”

I am stepping from the interior of my own heart and into the interior of His- so that the identity I embrace during this solemn day is not ‘betrayer’ but “beloved”. To realize that the voice of my crucified God-man is not one of accusation, but invitation- that when He looks at me from the cross and says “I did this for you” it’s not in an “I told you so manner”- not “I did this for you because you are unworthy” but “I did this for you to DEEM you worthy.”

Good Friday- Jesus’s sacrifice, its not (and has never been) about my own inadequacy; it’s always been about our God’s abundance.

Jesus always transforms. He always redeems. There is no sin He cannot cast from our lives, no sorrow in us He cannot overcome with His joy, no darkness He cannot illuminate.

That’s what Good Friday is about, my sisters- even in its very name it shows God’s trans-formative power- that He could take humanity’s worst day ever and deem it “good”.

He does the same for you and I, wherever we’re at, whatever we’re struggling with or suffering through. He deems us good. He deems our suffering restorative as He enters into with us.

He looks to us at every step of His passion, his eyes burning not with betrayal, but with love.

And as we follow Him, let our hearts weep- not from guilt- but from wonder, absolute awe at a love so great, so big, so powerful and perfect that it makes all things new.

Jesus, as you walk this journey with and for us, create in us new hearts- hearts which encounter your Love and by it find themselves transformed. Amen.

Love+Blessings,

Faith