Good Friday

There was once a bridge which spanned a large river. During most of the day the bridge sat with its length running up and down the river paralleled with the banks, allowing ships to pass through freely on both sides of the bridge. But at certain times each day, a train would come along and the bridge would be turned sideways across the river, allowing a train to cross it. A switchman sat in a small shack on one side of the river where he operated the controls to turn the bridge and lock it into place as the train crossed. One evening as the switchman was waiting for the last train of the day to come, he looked off into the distance through the dimming twilight and caught sight of the train lights. He stepped to the control and waited until the train was within a prescribed distance when he was to turn the bridge. He turned the bridge into position, but, to his horror, he found the locking control did not work. If the bridge was not securely in position it would wobble back and forth at the ends when the train came onto it, causing the train to jump the track and go crashing into the river. This would be a passenger train with many people aboard. He left the bridge turned across the river, and hurried across the bridge to the other side of the river where there was a lever switch he could hold to operate the lock manually. He would have to hold the lever back firmly as the train crossed. He could hear the rumble of the train now, and he took hold of the lever and leaned backward to apply his weight to it, locking the bridge. He kept applying the pressure to keep the mechanism locked. Many lives depended on this man’s strength.

Then, coming across the bridge from the direction of his control shack, he heard a sound that made his blood run cold. “Daddy, where are you?” His four-year-old son was crossing the bridge to look for him. His first impulse was to cry out to the child, “Run! Run!” But the train was too close; the tiny legs would never make it across the bridge in time. The man almost left his lever to run and snatch up his son and carry him to safety. But he realized that he could not get back to the lever. Either the people on the train or his little son must die. He took a moment to make his decision. The train sped safely and swiftly on its way, and no one aboard was even aware of the tiny broken body thrown mercilessly into the river by the onrushing train. Nor were they aware of the pitiful figure of the sobbing man, still clinging tightly to the locking lever long after the train had passed. They did not see him walking home more slowly than he had ever walked: to tell his wife how their son had brutally died.

This story is told to make us appreciate how much God has sacrificed in order to free us from our sin. But this story can be deeply misleading regarding the events that we are celebrating today. The first point to note is that the son of the bridge controller died unwillingly, he did not know what was going on. Jesus on the other hand went to his death knowing full well what was happening, and freely chose this path. Many theories of our salvation focus on God and what God did in sacrificing his son, and they make short shrift of the agency of Jesus as a full human person. A more satisfactory account of our salvation will seek to do justice Jesus’ freely choosing to lay down his life in order to fulfil the Father’s will. God was not forced to save us through the death of Jesus on the cross, and could have chosen another way to save us. If God did chose this way, there must be a reason for it that we would do well to reflect on. I would suggest to you that one of these reasons would be to teach us something about the place of suffering in human life and how to approach suffering in a redemptive manner. For herein lies another problem with this story in that it suggests that Jesus died in our place, meaning that we no longer have to suffer. The passengers in the train pass glibly over the bridge without so much as a second thought to the suffering endured by the bridge controller and his son. The notion that Jesus takes on the suffering of our sins so that we don’t have to endure it simply does not do justice to our human experience.

This point is no more apparent to me than when people pour out their hearts in confession. I am particularly struck by how so many people are caught up in a deeply complex web of sin that not at all of their own making. They have been robbed of their freedom by the selfish actions of those that surround them, and they simply do not know where to turn. Take the example of a mother whose son is caught up in an alcohol or drug addiction and is a menace around the house, often disappearing for long periods, and with him, things around the house also start to disappear, taken presumably support his habit. Or the example of a spouse whose spouse is cheating on them, and poisoning their marriage. So they lash out at God, and allow themselves to become bitter, claiming this is not fair. As I listen to their stories, my heart goes out to them in compassion. They were flying around enjoying their freedom, when one day, bamm! they flew into the spider’s web. Now they are struggling to get free and the more they struggle and lash out they more they get trapped in this web. They started out innocent and pure, but spending so much time in the web of sin has robbed them, not only of their freedom, but also of their innocence. They feel God has led them down a cul-de-sac, and they have lost the desire to be the bigger person. Where is God’s salvation for such people?

When we look at Jesus and the way he endures his cross, Jesus gives us the amazing witness of someone who is able to enter into the web of sin, but does not lose his innocence as he does so. And this is where Jesus is different from us – he does not let himself become angry or bitter with God. Ronald Rolheiser, one of my favourite spiritual writers, says that when you carry someone’s cross for them, you should not send them the bill. Jesus does not send us the bill for carrying our cross, for it was indeed our sins that Jesus bore, as our first reading from Isaiah tells us. But Jesus is not unique in having to carry someone else’s cross, mothers, fathers, wives and husbands do it all the time for one another and for their children. But perhaps what is unique about Jesus is that he does not send the bill, and this is perhaps where the redemptive power of his suffering emanates from. Instead of being focused on the situation of sin that has got him to this stage he keeps his eyes focused on his Father and his Father’s will. At no moment do we ever see any hint of resentment generated in Jesus for having to carry our cross.

When we are caught in the web of human sinfulness, especially one that is spun by other people, we can quickly lose our bearings, we can become afraid like Peter. As Peter senses he is getting too close to the web of sin and might be caught himself – he tries to avoid this web of sin, and in the process he loses his bearings and he denies the one person he loved most in the world. We all know about this, we all know that there are times in our lives where we have been led to hurt the people that we have loved the most in our lives because we lost our bearings. Once Peter realizes the enormity of his sin, he weeps bitterly. His pride will not allow him, like Mary, to go and weep at the feet of Jesus.

Judas, like Peter, is also struck by the enormity of his betrayal, but his pride is so much bigger than Peter’s that he cannot even bring himself to shed any tears for his wrong doing. Judas remains the dictator of the action from start to finish – and he even dictates own death. It is ironic that the sign of Judas’ despair is that he decides to remain an actor, he decides that he should still be the one to determine the events of his life and so he orchestrates his own death. Judas’ refusal to be passive, his refusal to surrender paints a striking contrast for us with Jesus. What should be most arresting for us on Good Friday is Jesus’ passivity. All his life, Jesus’ has been the one to set the agenda, and control the action around him, whether through his preaching, healing or altercations with the Pharisees and scribes, he is always the one controlling the narrative and everyone else is merely reacting. On Good Friday, this dynamic is flipped and Jesus becomes passive. Normally passivity is an indication that all hope has been lost. But in Jesus’ passivity we see an intense hope. Jesus’ passivity is not fatalistic, it is rather the expression of his trust in his Father. Jesus has done his part, he can now trust that the Father will somehow redeem this senseless suffering. Jesus’ ego or pride do not prevent him from humbly submitting to his oppressors and letting violence, envy and lust for power take its course. For all this Jesus does not become a door mat. He does not lose his dignity, he retains an incredible dignity in his suffering. In this manner Jesus models the way we should approach suffering in our lives. When we have done all we can to witness to the truth and take a stand against evil, and the suffering still does not abate, our final avenue is to surrender and leave our cause with the Lord. This is why Jesus’ final words from the cross are “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” May we have the same grace to trust that the Father will redeem our own suffering as we unite our suffering to that of Christ on the cross.

Questions for reflection

1. Do I believe in a God who saves me unilaterally, in spite of my humanity?
2. Am I like Peter, too proud to weep at Jesus’ feet, preferring to weep alone in a pool of self-pity?
3. Am I like Judas, obsessed with activism, never prepared to be passive, to admit that maybe it is time to surrender my cause to God and entrust myself to the Lord’s mercy?