Reflection
The season of Lent is a journey to the cross. It’s where it always ends. We may think the end is Easter, or at least fix our eyes on Easter, but before we get to Easter we have to travel through Good Friday. We have to travel to the foot of the cross, witness its horror, and then sit in the nothingness that follows. Every year, Lent leads us to the same place: death and silence.
One of the first sermons I preached was based on the last words of Jesus when he looked at his mother and said, “Woman, here is your son,” and to his disciple John, “Here is your mother.” In many ways, it is a touching scene of compassion and care. But I have to wonder if that’s how Mary understood the moment? I wonder what the other women standing at the foot of the cross were feeling? I wonder what the disciples who were frightened and scattered were thinking?
God sometimes you just don't come through
It may feel blasphemous, but I think Amos’ refrain captures the essence of Good Friday. Standing at the foot of the cross, watching the man you thought to be the Son of God be crucified—how would you not feel like God wasn’t coming through?
In our most honest moments, I think we’ve all had that feeling. We’ve felt it when a loved one is diagnosed with terminal cancer and the community of faith surrounds them in prayer but the healing never comes. Or when we pray safety and wisdom over our children day in and day out only to have them fall into the pit of addiction. Or when our prayers for children are met with the isolation of infertility.
God sometimes you just don't come through
We believe in a transcendent, all-powerful God who has the ability to stop evil and suffering. Despite the ability, it often feels as though God is reluctant to use those abilities. That God has the power and doesn’t use that power, that God is sovereign over all things, means there is only one being to blame when suffering lingers, when illness ravages, when evil reigns: God. The psalmist understood this. “Why do you hold back your hand, your right hand? (Psalm 74:11).” “Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? (Psalm 22:1)” We could go on. The psalmists consistently holds God responsible for the hardships they’re subjected to. This is true lament: crying out to God about what’s not right in the world. That God has yet to act leaves us simultaneously disappointed and hopeful. We blame God because we expect and trust that God can and will act and God has not. We are not alone in wondering why God has yet to intervene. Our cries join with the voice of Jesus on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.”
The temptation is to rush past Good Friday to get to Easter. But if we don’t allow ourselves to feel the forsakenness of Good Friday, Easter’s surprise will be robbed of its glory. So may we hear the invitation Good Friday is offering; be brutally honest with God. God can handle it. Courageously show up, bringing all of who you are to all of who God is as you expect God to make good on God’s yet-to-be-delivered-on promises.
Links
Lyrics
God sometimes you just don't come through
God sometimes you just don't come through
Do you need a woman to look after you
God sometimes you just don't come through
You make pretty daisies pretty daisies love
I gotta find what you're doing about things here
A few witches burning gets a little toasty here
I gotta find why you always go when the wind blows
Tell me you're crazy maybe then I'll understand
You got your nine iron in the back seat just in case
Heard you've gone south well babe you love your new four wheel
I gotta find why you always go when the wind blows
Will you even tell her if you decide to make the sky fall
Will you even tell her if you decide to make the sky
God sometimes you just don't come through
God sometimes you just don't come through
Do you need a woman to look after you
God sometimes you just don't come through
Whoa! That was intense.