Good Friday Has Signs of Life
It was hard getting in the Good Friday spirit (or lack there of?) this morning. After four straight days of on and off torrential downpours, completely overcast days, and a gloomy demeanor all around, I wake up on the day that is supposed to be gloomy only to find the sun is out and the seeds we had planted in our flats have begun to sprout! While it had felt like death all week now that the day that should feel like death has come it feels like life. Ironic.
I prayed through the Stations of the Cross as the sun rose over the rooftops this morning and was struck by the prayer at Jesus’s burial: “O Jesus, whose presence, hidden and victorious, fills the history of the world.” The paradox of Good Friday, and so much of the Christian faith, is that Christ is hidden to the world, displayed only in his disciples, but he has been victorious, and rules over history.
As disciples, we are called to be hidden and victorious. We are to live quiet and peaceable lives. Not loud, not in your face, not agitating, not lobbying, but hidden. And in our hiddenness, in our selflessness, in our humility, in our acceptance of a place at the back of the line, we are victorious over death. May it be.
2 Comments
Submit a Comment
SUBSCRIBE:
I Support
Selflessness, humility, etc do not imply hiddenness. I don’t know that I necessarily disagree with you; however, I’m curious to know how you substantiate such a position that the disciples of Christ are to be hidden? At first glance, this seems to be the opposite of how the first disciples of Christ lived their lives, and how they counseled others around them.
I didn’t choose the word hidden, it’s in translated prayers out of Gaelic. I don’t know whether it’s a valid translation or not. What I interpreted hidden to mean is not like “buried treasure” or a “secret” but more like “invisible.” I guess another way to read it is that Christ’s presence is invisible and victorious. I think the first disciples lived so that Christ’s presence was made visible in their lives.