My Favorite Holiday - Good Friday

Easter is undoubtedly my favorite holiday. And when I say "Easter", I really mean the whole weekend that we remember starting from Christ's crucifixion on Friday through his resurrection on Sunday.

Today is Good Friday. All day I have been reading verses and prayers that people have posted on Facebook and Twitter. I looked at some pictures on boston.com of people around celebrating Holy Week. I've read blogs with reflections on what this day means. Today through Sunday is probably the most spiritually significant and saturated weekend of the year.

But with all of the public significance of this holiday, I want to make sure that I am letting it be personally significant. I want to make sure that it touches my soul. I want to make sure that when I go to the Good Friday service tonight that it isn't just another "church service".

Today is a remembrance of a dark day and a dark event. The death of Christ was so significant that the earth darkened, the temple shook, and even graves were opened and people who were once dead rose and walked around. The impact on the spiritual realm we may never fully understand until heaven. The moment Christ breathed his last and exclaimed that "it was finished" was the pinnacle moment of all history and it bought the souls of billions.

But more specifically it bought my soul. When Christ cried "Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?" that is "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" I no longer bore my own sin, but it was Christ who bore it.

I can't watch "The Passion of the Christ" without crying... and I never want to. I want the death of Jesus Christ to bring me to tears. When I watch the depiction of Christ being beaten and ripped to shreds, I want it to grip my soul. I want to mourn over the atrocity that occurred. If I am ever not moved by the death of Christ, I should repent of not seeing the gravity of it as I should.

Today, my Savior died. And when that day was over, the disciples still felt the pain of loss. And yes, it is a Good Friday because of what today brings, but the fullness of it's goodness has not yet been celebrated or remembered. Today, someone died in order to bring me life. And yes I can rejoice because life was given, but it came at a heavy price, the death of an eternal other by the worst means possible. And that heavy price should weigh on my heart today as I remember the death of my Savior.