Good Friday draws us into the depths of Christ’s Passion...
Reflections on the readings for Good Friday (April 15, 2022): IS 52:13--53:12; PS 31:2,6,12-13,15-16,17,25; HEB 4:14-16;5:7-9; JN 18:1--19:42
MISSIO offers “Preaching Mission,” as a homily help, providing connections to mission from the readings of Sundays, Feast Days and Holy Days.
Our Savior completed His task: the redemption of God’s beloved children.
The Gospels tell us that during Christ’s hours on the cross He spoke seven times. Each statement is profoundly meaningful. According to St. John, after He gives His Blessed Mother over the care of the Beloved Apostle -- and Him into hers -- our Lord is almost at the very point of death. “Aware that everything was now finished, in order that the scripture might be fulfilled, Jesus said, ‘I thirst.’ There was a vessel filled with common wine. So they put a sponge soaked in wine on a sprig of hyssop and put it up to His mouth. When Jesus had taken the wine, He said, ‘It is finished.’ And bowing His head, He handed over the spirit” (John 19:28-30). Of course, Jesus was parched and His throat ached. Yet it must have been His soul that most longed for relief; He was suffering from the burden of our sins that He took on Himself. Also, the reference to hyssop calls to mind the Passover, when hyssop was used to sprinkle lamb’s blood on the doorposts so that the Jewish people would be saved from the plague of death. Jesus, the Lamb of God, was the sacrifice for the life of the world.
Then those final words: “It is finished.” Could Christ barely whisper them? Or in that last moment before death, was He able to summon a cry that those who heard it never forgot? What matters is that His mission had been accomplished. Jesus was victorious over death, the death of every person that existed because of sin was now vanquished by Christ for us -- for us. In the Letter to the Hebrews, we hear about Jesus, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity: “Son though He was, He learned obedience from what He suffered; and when He was made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him” (Hebrews 5:8-9). Our Savior completed His task: the redemption of God’s beloved children. And now we are called to the same love, the same obedience. We join with our King in loving service to Almighty God. Whatever mission He entrusts to us, we are called to respond with the same fidelity and devotion that His own beloved Son did. Yet we need not fear. On the contrary, as we join our life with His we prepare ourselves now in time for our place in eternity.
