Why It is a Good Friday

If you saw someone at church this afternoon sitting among a flock of nuns and trying to hide her tears, that would be me. Something about Good Friday hits me in the core of my being. This man, yes, the Son of God, but still a man, suffered horrifically for me. So I could have the possibility of eternal life.

Me? Who am I? At this point, I am a married woman past middle age with an aging body, with two adolescent children and a host of bad habits. Please don't think I lack for "self-esteem." This isn't about that. It's about being human like everyone else. Most of the time I am  flawed, fatigued, fearful, forgetful. I am self-absorbed, rough around the edges, impatient with myself and the ones I love the most. Christ gets all that.

And yet, at a moment in human history, He died for my sins. Sins I hadn't even committed yet. Sins that I will commit every day because despite my efforts to improve myself, despite my sincere efforts to change, I will fall down. He will reach down and pick me up and He will carry me if He has to.

I pray a lot on my own. Today I am praying for two of my girlfriends. One, a friend from childhood, just lost her mother. The other friend is a new friend, a colleague from the high school where I teach. She is waiting, not so patiently, for her first child to be born. I pray both friends  will feel the overwhelming love of the Lord in these days.

To pray, to sing, to worship, to add my voice to the voices of hundreds of other flawed, fragile souls is true Beauty. We are beggars, all of us.

To day we kissed His cross. Today we sang: "Jesus, remember me, when you come into Your Kingdom." I believe He will.