March 30, 2018 - Good Friday - Tenebrae

Christianity is the only world religion that confesses a God who suffers. It is not all that popular an idea, even among Christians. We prefer a God who prevents suffering, only that is not the God we have got. What the cross teaches us is that God’s power is not the power to force human choices and end human pain. It is,instead, the power to pick up the shattered pieces and make something holy out of them—not from a distance but right close up.

 Barbara Brown Taylor
 God in Pain

Pastor Ray posted this on Creator's Facebook page for Good Friday.

Writing about this Good Friday feels like it will be different from my past writings on Good Friday services. There is a discipline I picked up after Christmas. Just before I reflect on worship and write these entries, I draw a random card from an Oblique Strategies deck by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt. The deck can inspire new directions and thoughts that I find are helpful in composing my thoughts.

The cards are called dilemmas. I feel the appropriateness of that description today. Today's card reads - Change nothing and continue with immaculate consistency.

After the Maundy Thursday service the word immaculate on this card stood out for me. We pray Create in me a Clean Heart O God. We want our sins washed away. Is there a chance we can become or create anything that is truly immaculate?  

When worship moves to the main calendar days of the liturgical year, memories of how these holy days were celebrated in the past loom large. Last year Pastor Michelle and Ron Houser worked on a unique Stations of the Cross display with contemporary pictures that were set up like traditional stations around the sanctuary.  In years before O Sacred Head Now Wounded was a traditional piece we would always sing. Last year's  Good Friday closed with us singing repeatedly "My God, my God, O why have you abandoned me?" from Marty Haugen's My God, My God. 

Reading this Oblique Strategies card today I smiled. I know many people who complain that our worship is set in stone and never changes. Truthfully "changing nothing" regarding worship is impossible, even when we try. Immaculate consistency may not be a true goal of worship anyway.

Change is inevitable. You can't go home again but you can remember. We did not sung O Sacred Head Now Wounded for Good Friday this year (which was a traditional staple until two years ago) and Tenebrae is now our new "traditional" service. However, there was another focus for worship tonight,

The spirit of Good Friday that the congregation read and celebrated this year was captured in the Bulletin introduction:

At the heart of the Good Friday liturgy is the passion according to John, which proclaims Jesus as a triumphant king who reigns from the cross. The ancient title for this day - the triumph of the cross - reminds us that the church gathers not to mourn this day but to celebrate Christ's life giving passion and to find strength and hope in the tree of life... 

This pushes me to continue the reflections I started to write about on Palm Sunday. Perhaps we should not mourn but rather to proclaim Jesus as triumphant king on this day. There is nothing against bleeding the Easter message into Good Friday. And this is in keeping with John's depiction of Jesus in this poetical, passion narrative. John's portrayal is a Jesus who is powerful, pushy, and in total control.

Yet I am not sure I would call this the triumph of the cross. Celebrating Christ's life giving passion is not the triumph of the cross but that the Roman punishment that was supposed to annihilate life and identity was not the end of the story of Jesus. His followers continued to tell his story. What is was like to be with him. Stories about seeing a different way to be in the world through the heart. Through the eyes of compassion. Through the love of God. His followers came to see what Jesus saw. through their own eyes. And they couldn't stop talking about him.

In John the author can't stop quoting scripture and, to my ear, works like a script. Jesus knows all that is going to happen, and needs to happen to him in order to fulfill the scripture. During his arrest he asks “Who is it you want?” and when those who are arresting him reply “Jesus of Nazareth,” Jesus responds “I am he,”. Then they draw back and fall to the ground.

Let's think of a 1 to 10 scale of Jesus where 0 represents Jesus as suffering servant and 10 represents a triumphant King. When people fall down all around Jesus as he speaks, this rates a definite 10. There is an "other-worldliness" to this Jesus that balances the "this-worldliness" emphasis given to him on Maudy Thursday. On the other hand, the Barbara Brown Taylor quote that opened this post likely rates a 0 or 1.

Our God is a God of surprise and reversal. N.T. Wright calls the Crucifixion "The Day the Revolution Began".  Again, I see why people view the cross and Crucifixion as a triumph in human history and want to proclaim Jesus as a triumphant king who reigns from the cross. Today my heart leans towards the words that do not proclaim the the triumph of the cross in this way on this day.

There are other Gospels, other passages, with other words of Jesus. Today what echoes within me are the words of Jesus that were not included in tonight's service but will likely always stay with me when I attend future Good Friday worship services:

"My God, my God, O why have you abandoned me"