GOOD FRIDAY

April 15, 2022

St. Uriel’s, Sea Girt, N. J.

 

 

Isaiah 52:13-53:12

Hebrews 10:16-25

John 18:1-19:42

 

The Saint John Passion Gospel that we’ve just heard is so grand in scope and so rich in detail that it’s impossible to comment on it in its entirety in one sermon. So, preachers on Good Friday often employ the technique of selecting perhaps one or two verses – or a particular phrase, character, or incident – narrowing the focus to a small part that in some significant way illuminates the meaning of the whole. Over the years, I’ve employed this technique myself many times.

 

Today, however, I want to try something different and comment briefly on all three readings: not just the Passion Gospel from John, but also the readings from Isaiah and the Letter to the Hebrews. The text I want to use as my point of focus comes not, however, from any of these readings but rather from an antiphon that comes later in today’s liturgy: “We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.”

 

That antiphon embodies a paradox in what we’re about here today. We naturally tend to think of today’s liturgy as an occasion of sadness and mourning, in contrast to the joy of Easter. Today on Good Friday we wear black vestments. The altars are bare. The organ is silent.  Come Sunday, all that will change. We shall be wearing our best white-and-gold vestments. The altars will be decked in flowers. We’ll sing the Easter hymns with gusto. But that contrast risks obscuring the underlying reality that both Good Friday and Easter Sunday, and indeed every offering of Christian worship throughout the year, combine at one and the same time elements of sadness and joy, mourning and celebration. The only real difference is one of emphasis.

 

“We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.” Today, the note of celebration is muted but not absent. (As T.S. Eliot put it, “Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.”) Conversely, at the Sung Mass on Easter, the most joyful day of the Christian year, the note of mourning and repentance is likewise muted but not absent, because we never forget that the price of our redemption; the source of our hope in our own Resurrection is none other than our Lord’s sufferings and death on the cross. As Saint Paul says, whenever we break the bread and share the cup, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

 

Every Good Friday, we hear the same three readings: an Old Testament reading from Isaiah, a New Testament reading from the Letter to the Hebrews, and the Saint John Passion Gospel. Together, these three readings are like a medieval triptych, a three-paneled altarpiece. Imagine the Saint John Passion as the great central panel, with the Isaiah reading as the panel on the left, and the reading from Hebrews as the panel on the right. The purpose of the side panels in a medieval triptych is to point to and interpret the central panel. And so it is with the Good Friday readings. The Saint John Passion tells the main story; the readings from Isaiah and Hebrews illuminate that story’s meaning.

 

The first reading reminds us that the Jesus we see dying on the Cross is none other than the Suffering Servant foretold in Isaiah’s prophecy. His suffering brings the people redemption and healing. As Isaiah puts it, “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that made us whole, and with his stripes we are healed.” Yet in the same passage the Prophet also foretells the Servant’s ultimate triumph and glorification: “Behold, my servant shall prosper, he shall be exalted and lifted up, and shall be very high.”

 

On the other side of the triptych, the reading from Hebrews describes Jesus as the great high priest who opens heaven to us by offering his own flesh and blood. In the strict meaning of the term in religious language, a priest—as opposed to a minister, prophet, or teacher—is one who offers sacrifice on behalf of the people. But the Letter to the Hebrews explicitly describes Christ as a different kind of priest; instead of sacrificing something or someone else, he offers himself, his own flesh and blood, upon the altar of the cross. This sacrifice is the end of all sacrifices because it obtains the forgiveness of all sins. And it opens the possibility of new life. As the author concludes: “let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

 

The left panel, the reading from Isaiah, gives the view from the past, anticipating the Lord’s crucifixion which still lies in the future. All this was foretold long ago. And the right panel, the reading from Hebrews, gives the view from the future, remembering the Lord’s crucifixion as a past event capable of transforming our lives in the present. And between these two, the great central panel of the Passion Gospel tells the story itself, as if in the present, recounting the Lord’s suffering and death for the world’s redemption.

 

As we gaze on the triptych comprising these three scripture readings, sadness and mourning combine with joy and celebration as two sides of the same coin. The Good Friday antiphon sums up and gives expression to our response: “We venerate thy Cross, O Lord, and praise and glorify thy holy Resurrection; for by virtue of the Cross joy hath come to the whole world.”