Great Friday
There are sins that cause problems with people, or personal problems, or social problems, or health damage… but the most exhausting thing in sin is that it pains the heart of the Lord. And we will see the pains of sin on Great Friday.
Great Friday
A gathering of the pains of the Lord:
Every time we sin, we wound the heart of God and cause Him pain.
And what is the Holy Week but a gathering of all the pains of the Lord from sins, so that we may remember them on one occasion… all the pains that were caused by all the sins of all people in all generations are concentrated together in Holy Week, especially on Great Friday, so that Christ may bear them once…
Therefore do not think that committing sin is merely an offense to yourself or to people. The matter is far more serious: you wound the heart of God, cause Him pain, and distance yourself from Him and from His love.
Sin is extremely sinful:
Sin is a lack of love for God, because He says, “He who loves Me keeps My commandments.” It is also disobedience to Him; rather it is rebellion and revolt against God, pride, and separation from Him and from His Kingdom.
It is separation from the fellowship with God, for what fellowship has light with darkness, or Christ with Belial?… The person who sins is as though he says to the Lord: I do not want You, and I do not want Your companionship. I do not want You to dwell in my heart, nor do I want to dwell in Your heart…!
It is rebellion against God—against His love, His commandments, and fellowship with Him.
It is pride of the human self against the divine Self.
If you are a member in the Body of Christ, then by sin you wound this Body, hurt the rest of its members, grieve the Spirit of God, and resist Him.
For the Scripture says, “Do not grieve the Spirit of God who is in you.” And by sin you resist the Spirit of God and His work within you…
Indeed, sin is betrayal of God—the God who loves you and cares for you.
God who created you, redeemed you, granted you all your blessings, no longer called you a servant but made you His son and a temple for His Spirit, provided you with all the holy mysteries, and treated you with gentleness, love, and tenderness…
This God—you betray Him through sin, and you betray His love, His fatherhood, and His care…!!
When God spoke about the sin of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel in ancient times, He would say “treacherous Judah” and “treacherous Israel”…
And in the same way He considered sin a form of “spiritual adultery.”
In the Old Testament, the ugliness of sin was depicted by the blood of the burnt offerings and sacrifices presented for it. The blood was sprinkled in the Tent of Meeting and around the altar, and some of it was burned with the sacrifice.
The sight of blood poured everywhere, and the smell of blood and fat burning on the altars, revealed the ugliness of sin… sin is connected with death and with blood…
Therefore the prophet David, when he remembered his sin, would cry out saying: “Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, God of my salvation.”
This ugly sin is what Christ carried on Great Friday.
Some think that the sufferings of Christ were in the cross, the scourging, the thorns, and the insults. These are the sufferings of the body, and they are the least of them. The greater suffering was bearing these ugly sins: “He who knew no sin became sin for us.”
All the iniquities of the world were placed upon the head of the Lord—from the sin of Eve to all the sins throughout all ages, with all their ugliness and impurity. The Lord bore them and stood before the Father as a sinner, as a substitute for sinful humanity.
The ugliness of these sins stood before Christ as a sorrowful and extremely bitter image. He saw them all before Him: how humanity fell, how it was defiled and polluted, how it weakened and was led, surrendered, and lost…
How did humanity that was created in the image and likeness of God collapse?! Here He says, “My soul is very sorrowful, even unto death.”
When I created man in My image and provided him with all spiritual possibilities, I did not desire for him to end in this ugly state…
If there is joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, how great must the sorrow be over millions who perish!…
On the cross, all sins stood before Christ—hidden and manifest, voluntary and involuntary, sins of deed, sense, word, and thought, sins of the spirit and the soul, and sins of the body… sins against people, against nature, and against God Himself (such as blasphemy and atheism).
Christ bore them all. Truly this is the cup which He had to drink, fulfilling the will of the Father and accomplishing His justice.
Christ did not die only for the sins of people in the past or in His days, but for the sins of the whole world—from Eve to the end of ages. Among them are our sins as well, which we had not yet committed at the hour of His crucifixion, yet they were clear before Him and He died for them, because He sees the future just as He sees the present and the past.
Thus our sins were bitter drops in the cup that the Lord drank. They were painful thorns upon His brow. They were sorrow and bitterness to His heart.
We do not see sin in its true ugliness because of the lack of our spiritual sensitivity. But God, the perfect and holy One, sees the ugliness of sin in a way that never occurs to our minds… just as a stain on dirty clothes may not appear clearly, but the same stain on a pure white garment appears painful to the sight—so sin is in relation to us and in relation to God.
All these sins—with all their ugliness—and all these pains were borne by Christ alone. No one shared with Him… He trod the winepress alone…
And of course it was not possible for anyone to share in the matter of salvation…
But even in the sufferings, Christ was left alone. In the trial, for example, He stood alone; no one defended Him—He who defended the worst of sinners. At the time of His arrest the disciples fled. Even in the crucifixion the two thieves at first both reviled Him…
Yet it was not enough that we left Christ alone; we also placed our problems upon Him, even in the most critical moments of His sufferings…
The Lord concerned Himself with Peter and said to him, “I have prayed for you that your faith should not fail.” He concerned Himself with the safety of His disciples at the time of His arrest. He concerned Himself with His mother the Virgin and with His disciple John while on the cross. He even concerned Himself with the right-hand thief and promised him that he would be with Him in Paradise. More than all this, He cared for those who crucified Him and asked forgiveness for them…
Before Christ being left alone in His sufferings, the Apostle Paul insists on sharing in the sufferings of Christ: “If we suffer with Him, we shall also be glorified with Him,” “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings”…
Christ, who is able to do all things, on Friday delivered Himself into the hands of His servants: He gave His back to the scourgers and His cheek to those who plucked the beard…
Christ the humble left Himself in the hands of the proud. He did not wish to defend Himself because it was our sins that He was defending against. He stood as a criminal in order to make us stand as righteous. He did not come down from the cross as they challenged Him, because by this He could grant us life.
This Friday—the day on which we obtained salvation through redemption—was the worst day in regard to the actions of treacherous and unjust humanity…
They rebelled against the One who went about among them doing good. They led Him outside the camp, counted Him with transgressors, accused Him falsely, brought false witnesses against Him, and preferred a murderous robber over Him… They complained about Him to the rulers and dealt with Him with inhuman cruelty.
Yet it delights me on this day to say that the image of humanity was not entirely dark… rather there were some bright white points within it.
Indeed, where sin abounded, grace abounded much more… grace was working, and some responded to it.
The Apostle Peter was moved by zeal and courage when he cut off the servant’s ear, although his method was not spiritual. Pilate tried in every way to release Christ and testified that He was righteous, though Pilate’s fear prevented him from taking advantage of the work of grace within him.
Grace even worked in Judas Iscariot himself; he regretted and confessed his sin, saying, “I have sinned by betraying innocent blood,” and he returned the money. But his problem was that his regret was not mixed with hope, so he hanged himself.
On Great Friday we are pleased to remember spiritual personalities who performed beautiful deeds. We remember foremost among them the Lady the Virgin Mary, with Mary Magdalene, Mary the wife of Clopas, and with them John the beloved.
Those who stood beside the cross and feared no one.
They stood beside Christ in His sufferings, not in His miracles…
We also remember the women who beat their breasts and wept for Him, and the women who carried spices and perfumes early to the tomb…
We remember Joseph of Arimathea, who boldly asked for the body of Christ and who gave Him his new tomb, and with him we remember Nicodemus.
Nicodemus did not agree with the members of the Sanhedrin in their opinion and judgment.
We also remember the centurion who, despite his connection to the military and its rulings, believed and said: “Truly this was the Son of God.”
On this day we also remember another saint—the right-hand thief.
He who believed in Christ while crucified beside Him, defended Him against the other thief, and asked the crucified Christ to remember him in His Kingdom, so he deserved to enter with Him that same day into Paradise.
We also remember from outside humanity—the nature that showed its feelings:
We remember the sun that darkened, the earth that quaked, the graves that were opened, and the veil of the temple that was torn… nature which showed its displeasure at the injustice of the wicked.
This day, despite its darkness, shone with a light stronger than the sun, coming from the Lord Himself—the great redemption: salvation and atonement.
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An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – Al-Kiraza Magazine – Year Eight (Issue Fourteen) – 8-4-1977
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