Before you write me off as a pathetically boring man desperately in need of a life, this weekly repartee is my wife’s creative way of reminding me to set the trash bin at the end of the driveway for trash pickup. And 9 out of 10 times her reminder is effective, and I will have dutifully stationed the bin at the roadside several hours before the trash truck comes.
Occasionally, I get wrapped up in my study of Scripture – I work from home – and forget this essential responsibility. The rumble of the truck and the noise of the neighbor’s bin being emptied wakes me from my study and galvanizes me into action. Of course, I’ve missed the pickup on my side of the street, but in about 20 minutes, the truck will be back to empty the bins on the other side of the street. My bin chums up to the neighbor’s bins across the street and “my favorite day of the week” remains favorable.
I suspect that as strange as my wife and I calling trash day my favorite day of the week, it sounds even more strange to the uninformed to hear Christians refer to the day that Christ Jesus died in agony on the cross as “Good Friday.” What twisted people we Christians must be!
We do not refer to that day as “good” because we take perverse delight in the agony that Christ Jesus endured in his dying. The day is rightly called good because of what Christ’s death accomplished for those who, by God’s grace, believe God’s gospel – eternal life in sweet fellowship with God.
The Scriptures portray Christ’s death for us as the demonstration of God’s love. Such a statement can trigger disgusted reactions from the uninformed and accusations of cosmic child abuse. But this Jesus is God, he is God the Son. God the Son became like one of us to satisfy God’s own perfect justice. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us; he took the just penalty for sin that should have been ours.
Christ endured the agony and shame of the cross, the Scriptures attest, “for the joy that was set before him.” That joy was the completion of God’s redemptive purposes, the full and final redemption of his people according to his will.
Knowing the marvelous salvation that Christ’s righteous life, his vicarious death, and his glorious resurrection accomplished, referring to the day he died as “Good Friday,” seems to say too little. May I suggest we call it “the incomparable goodness, grace, and love of our holy, righteous, sovereign God, who, in Christ, freely gives salvation to all who believe” Friday? But that is a mouthful. I think I will stick with Good Friday.
