Why Is Good
Friday Good? Because We Hate God.
I hate God.
So do you. If you’re an adamant proponent of gay
marriage, a feminist, a Marxist, or Richard Dawkins, you probably knew that. If
you’re a Christian, I sincerely hope you know that. If not, I do encourage you
to reflect on the Word (I would start with Isaiah 64:6 and 1 John 4:7-12).
If you’re not a staunch anti-Christian or a
follower of Christ, it’s quite possible you have no idea you hate God. Some of
you don’t even know Him, so how could you possibly hate Him? Aside from hating
God for not existing or hating God for existing and not acting the way you
think He ought to, I would like to posit a few things from the perspective of
God (note: the canonical scripture professes to be God’s word and I will treat
it as such, i.e. I will take God at His word. You can reject the validity of
those claims, but I suggest you do some rigorous study. I’d be glad to assist on
you on that journey, knowing full-well about confirmation bias and being quite confident
that some people will take up study and come to different conclusions than I
do, but I’m very trusting in the Spirit.)
For starters, God asserts quite often and quite
vociferously that we (i.e. people) hate him. You’re not likely to find it in so
many words, but to give you a sense of things, God makes it pretty clear that
He thinks we’re pretty evil[1],
and much of the recorded history of ancient Israel takes a path of “let’s not
do what God thinks is good.”[2]
To make it clear that ancient Israel is merely a microcosm of our hatred and
rebellion of God, the Bible also records that no one does what God thinks is
good and in fact there are no good people[3].
(For any Christians in the audience, bear in mind the language that Peter and
Paul use about how once we, too, were dead in our sins, walked in ignorance,
were objects of wrath).
Paul, who met Jesus personally and wound up dying
for his sake and writing half the New Testament, even goes so far as to say
that we are enemies of God[4].
The point being, we hate God. Another instance of this is what Good Friday is
all about. Christians celebrate Good Friday as commemorating the day that we
(people) killed Jesus, who himself claimed to be God[5].
This point is not insignificant: people hate God so much that we killed Him.
So, why is Good Friday good? Why do Christians celebrate the murder of their God? A few reasons. First, it’s not quite accurate to say we killed Jesus--that assumes we have enough agency and power to destroy God. God actually allowed himself to be killed. Willingly let us kill Him[6]. What Christians celebrate during Easter weekend is that God, creator of the universe, sent His only Son (being in essence God) to die. This act was not divine child abuse-Jesus willingly laid down his life and was in cahoots with God His Father all along-from before we humans even had a chance to offend a holy God[7].
Bear in mind that God is good. Like, really good.
I’m not talking MLK good. Like, hasn’t ever done the wrong thing good. Like,
creates an entire universe out of nothing and makes it good. So
offending/angering/making enemies of God is to actively reject that which is
ultimately and totally good. It is in essence to be bad, evil, as the
philosophers might say. So, we’re bad people, and God’s good, so His right and
proper response is to be rid of evil—after all, isn’t that what we want? Why
else did we go to war against Germany in WWII? Why do we rally against
genocides and in justices? Why do we continue to be enamored by movies where
the good-person wins? Because evil is bad, no one wants it around, evil ruins
goodness. So conditional on the premise that God is actually truly and purely
good, our rejection of Him puts us in the evil category and necessitates our
removal. Thus, the consequence for sin is death[8].
Not a vengeful, vindictive, evil, punitive “YOU SHALT DIE” kind of death, but a “You are evil, evil is bad, I’m good,
and I must preserve good, so you must die or else good shall suffer” kind of
death.
Anyway, remember how good God is? He is not only
good, but He loves His creation very much, e.g. people. God loves the people He
created so much that He sent His son, God incarnate, into the world to die in
the place of evil humans[9].
Nothing says “I love you” more than dying
so that someone else might live[10].
And Jesus outdoes all other great lovers in history: remember, he’s not dying
for people who have been particularly nice to him, or who are even good people
in general, he died for his enemies.
So what makes Good Friday so good? Unfortunately,
it stems from the fact that we hate God, that we were His enemies and deserve
death. The upshot is God is so good
and loving that He died instead that we might have eternal life. Good Friday is
a celebration of how good God is in light of how awful we are. And ultimately,
that’s far more glorious than if God had only been good to us when we were good
to Him. After all, that’s what (almost) everyone does[11].
God is unique in that He legitimately loves everyone He created (and he created
everyone[12]).
Love is this: that God died for us, His enemies.
And the most amazing part (as if it wasn’t amazing
enough already) is that He rose from the
dead. By His own power, God raised himself
from the dead. The entirety of Christianity is predicated on that historical
fact, that Jesus actually rose from the dead—if He didn’t, there’s really not a
whole lot of Hope for Christians. Our hope is that Jesus died and rose again,
and called us to follow him—in death
and resurrection. We die to our sinful selves--the selfish, evil, enemy-of-god
self, and come to life through Christ. That’s what Easter is all about-dying
and rising again. Not metaphorically in some kind of self-righteous asceticism or
moralism, but by allowing Jesus’s death to suffice for the one we deserved—and letting
the evil die with Jesus—and allowing His life to be the one we now live.
Christianity is all about death. Jesus’s death not
only demonstrated the need for our own mortification (putting to death) of sin,
but also fulfilled the requirement of death for sin, the righteous for the
unrighteous. Jesus’s death is not symbolically but actually the only means by which we gain access to a relationship
with God[13].
Jesus’s resurrection is therefore only effectual for those who willingly trade
in their lives for His, who willingly die to themselves for His sake to gain
the pardon He earned. It is absolutely universal in scope and available to
literally any person, and demands a response from whoever hears of it. I
encourage you to meditate on this amazing story, and if you find yourself wanting
it to be true but doubting certain elements, that’s good. Doubt is healthy, but
should be followed up by rigorous investigation.
There’s clearly so much more to discuss about this
amazing story (the Bible is long for a reason). I would love to chat with you
about it. Happy Easter to all. He is risen, hallelujah!
[1]
Gen6:5
[2]
E.g. 1 Samuel 12:9, Judges 17:6 and 21:25, the rest of the Old Testament
[3]
Psalm 14:3, Ecclesiastes 7:20, Romans 3:23
[4]
Romans 5:8
[5]
Mark 2:1-2, Mark 14:60-62, Matthew 26:63-65, Luke 22:67-70, etc.
[6]
John 10:15-18
[7] 1
Peter 1:17-22, Ephesians 2:8-10, John 1, the old testament
[8]
Romans 6:23, Gen. 3, Ezekiel 18:20,
[9]
John 3:16
[10] 1
John 3:16, 1 Peter 2:24, 2 Corinthians 5:15
[11]
Matthew 5:44-47
[12]
John 1:3
[13] John
14:6, Acts 4:12
