Skipping John 19?

¹⁶ Finally Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified. So the soldiers took charge of Jesus. ¹⁷ Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). ¹⁸ There they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle. John 19:16-18

Good Friday:  the darkness before the light; the storm before the rainbow.  The battle before the victory.  How tempting it is to just skip John 19 and jump right to chapter 20... no torture, no thirsting, no emotional pain, no defeat.  Many people do just that... they skip John 19 and go right to chapter 20.  And what they get is a hollow Easter.  What good is a victory without a struggle?

It would be great to skip the cancer diagnosis and go right to the clean PET scan, but there is so much more joy in good health when we've experienced sickness.

It would be great to go right from school to the "best job ever," but it is through the not-so-great-jobs and periods of unemployment that we discover what the "best job ever" looks like for us.

It would be great to skip the hurts and fights and almost-breaking-ups to celebrate 50 years of marriage, but it is the hurts and fights and almost-breaking-ups that make our love strong enough to endure those 50 years.

No Good Friday would take all the best stuff out of Easter Sunday.  With no Good Friday there would have been no sacrifice.  No sacrifice, no atonement.  No atonement, no resurrection for us.  No resurrection, no Easter.

Good Friday is a tough day to get through.  But we know the rest of the story.  It was much harder for Jesus' followers on that first Good Friday.  Let's gather to hear the story once again.  Let us hold it in our hearts until we can receive the Good News of pure joy we will hear on Easter morning.

Lord Jesus,
Help us to walk the entire journey with you so that we are better prepared for the joy of Sunday.  Thank you for your your love and your sacrifice and your work on the cross.  Amen.

Joys:  Wonderful Maundy Thursday worship; hardest work week of the year almost over; Daniel's excitement over preparing Cecelia's Easter basket.