Good Friday

I moved to Long Beach in 2007 and began teaching Confirmation Classes either that year or the next, continuing until 2018.  Those 10/11 years brought me the greatest joy; some students were initially resistant to anything "churchy," but eventually came around to being not-too-unwilling participants.  A few seemed to enjoy the classes, and some never gave up their resistance but were confirmed nevertheless with the others.

One of the girls I had taught about 5 or 6 years ago called me out of the blue from Florida a few months ago.  She had been driving in her car when suddenly the car seemed to fill up with the Presence of God, and she encountered Jesus Christ.  Not knowing who to talk to after her experience, she called me.  What a gift that was, to know that a seed had been planted years ago, and was now coming to fruition!

As I entered into prayer time this morning, for some reason, all those students became intensely present to me in a spiritual way -- and I experienced a great love for all of them, the willing and the unwilling.  I could "see" individual faces, and I began to pray for all of them, wherever they were. I felt a strong spiritual connection with all of them, and then I realized that today is Good Friday.

Suddenly, for the first time, I realized that the experience I was having with my students was Christ's experience with us as He hung on the cross.  He could see each of us even then, and His love for each of us, the willing and the unwilling, was beyond words.  He prayed for each of us who would come to Him even then, and He was willing to die a painful death in order that we would not have to go through the death we deserved.

The death of the Passover Lamb, the shedding of its blood to cover and protect those in covenant with God from the plagues of Egypt, and the giving of its flesh as food for the journey out of Egypt, were all pre-figures of Christ's death on the cross, that we might experience the life of the Trinity.  As I could "see" and experience all my students from ten years of connection with them, I somehow was experiencing a small part of Christ's divine life and His connection with all of us.  He sees us; He prays for us; He has never given up hope that the seeds He has planted will eventually bear fruit.

Because we have died to the power of sin and death, we are now free to enter into the life that God lives.  We are free to love as He loves, to see what He sees, to overcome what He has overcome for us.  Indeed, today IS truly "Good" Friday.  We adore Him and thank and praise Him for what He has done for us!