Holy Week

Walking uphill to church in light rain -  Good Friday 2015 - NYC

Today is Good Friday. It is noon and the sun has come out. This is the time many churches commemorate the suffering of Jesus on the cross. Some have a Friday evening service.

 Last year I was in New York City and went to a performance of the Seven Last Words of Christ at Brick Presbyterian Church at 12:15, which featured professional soloists and a "million" dollar organ that rumbled ominously with loud pedal sounds that represented the death of Christ and the rending of the temple veil.

 I have nothing scheduled today. Maybe I will stream part of the Brick service, which has a long tradition. Or maybe I will head out into the sunshine and enjoy.

Often Good Friday is dark and rainy, even though it can occur now, in March, or later in April. We have a lot of dark days in West Michigan in the spring.

Our church chooses to celebrate Maundy Thursday with a Communion service--which the husband says is all wrong, because what happened on Thursday (at least according to John's gospel) is that Jesus washed the feet of the disciples and celebrated the Passover in the Upper Room, where he instituted the Lord's Supper, which can only be celebrated (commemorated) if he actually did die and rise again.

Next year maybe I can persuade the pastor to do a foot washing thing instead of holy communion. And, of course, sing sad songs. I love the sad Lenten songs in minor keys! Somewhere down deep I have a soul that resonates with the sad and minor modalities.

It was a miserably dark and rainy Thursday. And we had our somber service, featuring the choir I participate in this year. The choir members wore black and/or grey. I was black from head to toe. I know how to do black, since it is my favorite color! I even put on dangling black earrings and wore my black glasses, so I could see the music and the screens. I don't always trust my multi-focal contacts to work in dim evening light.

Maybe it was a good thing we did a commemorative service on a dark and rainy night, since today is bright and sunny--and it might have been more difficult to identify with Christ's dark time of suffering and to get into the mood of the Lenten hymns.

When we visited Israel in the nineties, we were in the actual garden of Gethsemane, with its ancient olive trees. We walked up the actual old steps in Jerusalem, to the house of Caiaphas. We went into a stone pit, probably like the one they put Jesus in while he awaited his trial. We sang sad and somber hymns down in that "cave." A typical "upper room" which we visited was pretty stark, not like anything you have seen in an Old Masters painting.

The images of the places where Jesus walked on earth imprinted deeply in my brain.

There is no doubt that Jesus suffered on earth and died. The fact that he rose again, ate fish, passed through solid walls, ascended to heaven to be with his Father God again--and saved all who believe for eternal life, so that we can live forever in some sort of new heaven and new earth (or perhaps even a fabulous mansion with streets of gold) ... all that is really, literally, incredible!

But yet, that is what we celebrate on Easter!