Pilate then called together the chief priests, the leaders, and the people and said to them, “You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people, and here I have examined him in your presence and have not found this man guilty of any of your charges against him … Indeed, he has done nothing to deserve death.
Then they all shouted out together, “Away with this fellow! Release Barabbas for us!” … Pilate, wanting to release Jesus, addressed them again, but they kept shouting, “Crucify, crucify him!” A third time, he said to them, “Why, what evil has he done? I have found in him no ground for the sentence of death … But they kept demanding that he should be crucified, and their voices prevailed. So Pilate gave his verdict that their demand should be granted.
It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, while the sun’s light failed, and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Then Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Having said this, he breathed his last. When the centurion saw what had taken place, he … said, “Certainly this man was innocent.”
These words from Luke 23 are familiar. Too familiar, perhaps. We’ve heard them enough times … But once again it stands before us: The cross. We can’t step around it today. We can’t soften it or rush past it. It looms too large, casts too long a shadow.
It reminds us of something we often try to hold at a distance: God’s grace is free. But it didn’t come cheap; a steep price was paid.
Jesus endured on that cross, but the most striking thing of all may be that he stayed. At any moment, he could’ve stepped down and walked away. Called it off. But he doesn’t. Love holds him there.
“Father, forgive them…” This isn’t grace in theory. This is grace in action: costly, deliberate, and unrelenting.
And where are the disciples? Mostly, they’re absent. Fear has scattered them. Confusion has silenced them. The weight of what is happening is more than they can bear.
And if we are honest, we understand that. Because the cross confronts us, too.
It exposes how easily we speak of grace without reckoning with its cost. How much we want the resurrection without thinking about the suffering. The truth is, we prefer a faith that comforts rather than one that demands everything.
On Good Friday, as we stand in the shadow, may we let it remind us that God’s love isn’t abstract and that forgiveness isn’t cheap.
And we remember: He didn’t leave.
Prayer: Lord, when I’m tempted to take your grace lightly, bring me back to the cross. Teach me to see both the depth of my need and the depth of your love. Give me the courage to remember the truth about what you did for me and to give thanks for what you have done, in all its cost and all its grace. Amen.
