WHEN GOOD FRIDAY DOESN’T SOUND “GOOD”

Do you bristle at the word “good” on this day where we pause to reflect upon gruesome torture and death?

Me, too.

It hangs on this day like an ill-fitting garment. We twist and squirm uncomfortably within it, wondering if we should change.

But maybe it is our definition of “good” that needs changing?

Maybe our discomfort with grief needs correction?

And like any good definition, this word should be traced to its origin, all the way back to the beginning of time, where “good” is first proclaimed over God’s creative work (Genesis 1-2).

Why did God call His Creation “good?”

Because it was finished.

Each day’s creation was pronounced “good” because it was complete, done, acceptable in His sight.

And from the moment of the Fall until the moment of Christ’s death, all Creation had collectively mourned the loss of this pronouncement - it had literally yearned to be called “good” again.

The gnawing sense of incompleteness, the gaping chasm of separation from a God with whom we once walked in the Garden, perpetually underscored with each innocent sacrifice through the ages - all culminated with Jesus’ last words…

“It is finished.”

Echoes of Eden reverberated in these words. Then again in the sound of His final gasping breath.

The work of the ages complete. Finished. Acceptable.

"Good."

So why do we set aside a day to collectively grieve and reflect? Why mourn what we know will be overturned victoriously in just three short days?

Why grieve when hope is so assured?

Because grief is not undone by hope; it ushers us into hope.

Yes, we grieve with hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). But first, we grieve.

The very idea of “hope” is future tense, which necessarily implies that the present is not yet a fulfillment of what we hope for.

Grief is that unsettled feeling that not all is quite well; hope is the assurance that one day it will be.

So yes, Good Friday is good because the work is finished, our access to the Father restored.

But we grieve because of what that access cost - and because full restoration is not yet fully realized.

Grief vitalizes hope; in fact, it drives us into it. Without grief, hope would be a triviality.

But when we allow grief to do its work, hope becomes a necessity, a hook upon which everything else is hung.