Good Friday Meditation
April 1, 1994
Good Friday Meditation
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church
Hebrews 10:1-25
Throughout lent it is our tradition to begin each celebration of the Lord’s Supper with a reading of the Ten Commandments. After each commandment is read or sung, the people respond, “Lord, have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep this law.” And after the last, the tenth commandment, the people respond in a slightly different way; “Lord have mercy upon us, and write all these thy laws on our hearts we beseech thee.”
God, of course, had promised centuries before Jesus to do just that, to write his laws on our hearts. The prophet Jeremiah told us six-hundred years before Christ that God would give us a new covenant, that he would write his laws on our hearts under this new covenant, and that he would forgive our sins and not even remember them anymore.
It is of this promise to which the author of Hebrews refers in the lesson we just heard. This lesson from Hebrews reminds us on this day of shame and sorrow that the victory has been accomplished, that the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross was final, that Jesus was both priest and victim, that Jesus is still the priest, seated at the right hand of God interceding for us, and that forgiveness is complete – God keeps no more remembrance of our sins.
As Christians when we gather to celebrate the Lords’ Supper, regardless of how frequently or how infrequently that gathering might be, we affirm this central truth. We remember the sacrifice of our Lord and celebrate with praise and thanksgiving the taking away of our sins. The Greek word that is translated “Do This in Remembrance of Me” is anamnesis. It really means more than just remember. It means to reach into the past and seize the essence of a memory, bring that memory into the present, and allow the present and the future to be changed by that memory. It is the centrality of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross that we celebrate at the holy table. It is this sacrifice and our anamnesis of this sacrifice which has the power to change our present and our future.
“By a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.” The grace of that holy sacrifice comes to us not through the mumblings of a priest or pastor but flows to us through time and history directly from the event itself to our present and our future.
“I will put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds.” Jeremiah and Hebrews both remind us that our faith is not simply a product of the will and the mind but also an experience of the heart.
“I will remember their sins and their misdeeds no more.” God has not only forgiven our sins, he has forgotten our sins. It is this central truth, which we are then asked to remember. We celebrate in spite of our sins, which have brought about the Good Friday’s of life.
Why is this Friday, Good Friday? Because we are forced to see the awful nature of our rebellion, that is good. Friday is good because we can rejoice in our Lord who is victor not only over his own death but ours as well. Friday is good because God has forgotten our sins. The New Testament only makes sense when we understand the cross. Good Friday is an opportunity for us to try and do just that, to understand the cross.
But that is not enough. Hebrews reminds us in the last few verses of this lesson, that there are consequences to this new covenant. There are consequences to believing in a God who will sacrifice his son for our sins and then forget our sins. We are called to be people of faith in a world still broken and full of cruelty and despair. “Let us be concerned for each other to stir a response in love and good works.” The writer of Hebrews has told us why this is Good Friday but also what our response must be – “Let us be concerned for each other to stir a response in love and good works,”
In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Amen