From X:
Why is Good Friday good? Good Friday is all about the good news.
It’s good because this is the day Jesus accomplished our full and free redemption. This is the day Jesus laid down his life for us. His life was not taken, but given – he gave his life for ours, willingly, out of sacrificial love. Had Jesus not wanted to die, they could not have killed him.
Good Friday is good because on this day Jesus drank the cup of wrath so that we might drink the cup of blessing. He gave his life as a sin offering, as a substitute, taking upon himself the wrath, curse, and Godforsakeneness that we deserve. He died that we might live, and live forever with him in the glory of the new creation.
Good Friday is good because this is the day the God-man revealed the deepest love in the universe. This is the day the God-man was crucified for us. This is the day of “Amazing love! how can it be, that thou my God should die for me?”
Good Friday is good because this is the day Jesus crushed the serpent under his feet. At Golgotha, the place of the skull, Jesus trampled underfoot the skull of the dragon. At the cross, Jesus won the great victory for us, over the world, the flesh, and the devil. He took away the penalty of sin and broke the power of sin for his people. Ultimately he will take away the presence of sin.
Good Friday is good because on this day Jesus became the Savior of the nations, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. On the day, he bore Adam’s curse that the nations might be blessed.
Good Friday is a good day indeed. It’s a good day for deepening our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, our Hope, our King.
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The call to worship from our Good Friday liturgy:
Pastor: Let us worship God! We are gathered in the name of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
People: Amen.
Pastor: The Lord be with you!
People: The Lord bless you!
Pastor: Let us call upon God together:
People: Almighty God, graciously behold this your family, for whom our Lord Jesus Christ was willing to be betrayed, to be given into the hands of sinners, and to suffer death on the cross; who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Pastor: In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God in three Persons, to whom be glory unto the aeon of aeons; And upon us, weak and sinful, be mercy and compassion until the hope of redemption is fulfilled. Amen.
People: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He that comes in the Name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
Pastor: You are Holy, O God. Hear us, O Father:
People: Holy and mighty, holy and immortal, who gave your only Begotten Son for the salvation of the world: have mercy on us!
Pastor: You are Holy, O God. Hear us, O Son:
People: Holy and mighty, holy and immortal, Eternal Word made flesh, who was crucified for us: have mercy on us!
Pastor: You are Holy, O God. Hear us, O Spirit:
People: Holy and mighty, holy and immortal, who was poured out on us that we might know the Father through the Son: have mercy on us!
Pastor: O Christ, hear us! O Christ, our Savior and Victor, hear us and have mercy on us! O Christ, our God and King, hear us and have compassion on us! O Christ, our Lord and Redeemer, crucified for us, pour out your grace and love upon us!
People: Have mercy on us, O Christ, who was slain for our sins and crushed for our transgressions.
Pastor: O Christ our God: our God in the cradle and our God on the cross, our God in suffering and our God in victory, at this hour we remember the hours of your agony and passion; for at this hour you did stretch forth your hand to take on death and the curse for us, conquering death for us and rendering Sheol empty of the righteous. You were bruised for our iniquities and by your stripes we are healed. Glory be to you for your redeeming love, a love stronger than death.
People: Amen.
Pastor: We are gathered to remember the death of God in human form; to remember the agonies of the Word made flesh, and crucified for us; to remember that Jesus bore the wrath and curse due to us because our sin in Adam, and the sins we commit each day as we live in this fallen world. As we hear the story told of Christ’s passion and death, as we sing of his pain and weakness on the cross, let us be mindful of God’s love: the love of the eternal Father, who sent his only Son to reconcile the world to himself; the love of the Word made flesh, who endured the cross for the joy set before him; and the love of the Holy Spirit, through whom Jesus offered himself to the Father on our behalf. Let us now sing together…..
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Even as Jesus was crushed at the cross (Isaiah 53), he was crushing Satan’s head (Genesis 3). Even as he was bruised, he was doing some bruising of his own — namely, the serpent’s head.
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It is interesting and noteworthy that a huge proportion of Good Friday/passion/atonement hymns are inescapably theopaschite. That is to say, they insist the the one who suffered on the cross is truly the God-man, and so on the cross the impassible God suffered in human flesh. Many theologians have been uncomfortable stating this truth as baldly as the church’s poets. But there is no doubt that it has been a common theme among Christian hymn writers from the earliest days of the church.
Of course, theopaschism is also built into creedal orthodoxy. The Nicene Creed speaks of one who “was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate; He suffered and was buried…” But who is the subject of the verbs “crucified” and “suffered”? The one who is “the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father” and who also “was made man.” And so the conclusion is inescapable: the one was crucified and suffered and died was none other than God in the flesh. If we try to “protect” the deity from the crucifixion, we end up committing either the Nestorian error (separating the deity and humanity, in denial of the hypostatic union) or the Arian error (denying that Jesus was fully God, in denial of the incarnation). It is true that God is impassible in himself. But in the incarnation, the impassible God becomes passible in human form. The impassible God becomes passible because only the passion of God can save us. If we somehow extricate the deity of the Son from what happened on Calvary, we either minimize what God did to save us (e.g., we are saved by merely human suffering) or we deny the possibility of salvation altogether (since a creature cannot save sinners). The reality is that sin is so great, only the death of God could undo it. Sin deserves Godforsakenness, and so God endured Godforsakenness on the cross. “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” is the cry of the incarnate Son to his Father; it is an intertrinitarian cry.
It will not do to appeal to a distinction of natural properties, e.g., only his human nature suffered because divine nature is immune to suffering. This Nestorian tendency does not do justice to the incarnation and the unity of Christ’s person. Natures do not speak, persons speak, and the person cried out in agony. The whole point of the Son of God assuming a human nature is found in this truth: God has now experienced human life (and death) in the man Jesus. God became precisely so that as the God-man he could do everything needful for our salvation. While each of his natures retains its own properties, everything Christ does, the whole Christ does.
But back to the hymn writers. Here’s a small sampling of hymns that can be found in most orthodox Reformed hymnals, in which we sing the truth of the theopaschite gospel:
- “And Can It Be” by Charles Wesley includes this refrain: “Amazing love! how can it be, That Thou, my God, should die for me!.” It also includes this line: “‘Tis mystery all! Th’Immortal dies! Who can explore His strange design?”
- Isaac Watts wrote, “Alas! and did my Savior bleed, and did my Sovereign die!” The one who is Sovereign bled and died on the cross.
- Consider Thomas Kelly’s famous hymn: “Stricken, smitten and afflicted, See him dying on the tree!” The one who suffered and died on the tree is “David’s son, yet David’s Lord.” Who bears the “awful load” of sin’s curse? “‘Tis the Word, the Lord’s anointed, Son of man, and Son of God.”
- The entirety of “O Lamb of God Most Holy” teaches a theopaschite gospel:
“O Lamb of God most holy!
Who on the cross didst suffer,
And patient still and lowly,
Yourself to scorn did offer;
Our sins by You were taken,
Or hope had us forsaken:
Have mercy on us, Jesus!”
- Johann Hermann’s marvellous “Ah, Holy Jesus, How Hast Thou Offended?” includes these lines:
“Lo, the Good Shepherd for the sheep is offered;
the slave hath sinned, and the Son hath suffered.
For our atonement, while we nothing heeded,
God interceded”
“For me, kind Jesus, was thy incarnation,
thy mortal sorrow, and thy life’s oblation;
thy death of anguish and thy bitter passion,
for my salvation.”
Note: The Son suffered. The incarnate one endured “mortal sorrow” and made his life into an “oblation.” The “death of anguish” and “bitter passion” is not attributed to a nature but to a person.
- John Ellerton’s “Throned Upon the Awful Tree” should be better known. This underrated hymn includes these lyrics:
“Lord, should fear and anguish roll
darkly o’er my sinful soul,
Thou, who once wast thus bereft
that Thine own might ne’er be left-
teach me by that bitter cry
in the gloom to know Thee nigh.”
The hymn speaks of the “King of grief” and describes the “Lamb of God” dying as he wrestles with evil powers and deals with human sin.
- The great Scottish Presbyterian Horatius Bonar wrote in “Thy Works, Not Mine, O Christ” sings out a glorious theopaschite gospel. The message of the hymn hits its peak in this verse:
“Your cross, not mine, O Christ, has borne the awful load of sins that none in heave’n or earth could bear but God.”
Only God could bear sins away and God has done that on the cross. Just as Paul could speak of the “blood of God,” so we can speak of the death of God.
- The Southern Harmony hymn “What Wondrous Love Is This” claims “the Lord of bliss” bore “the dreadful curse.’
- The medieval classic, “O Sacred Head Now Wounded,” expresses substitutionary atonement and the theopaschite gospel in these words:
“What Thou, my Lord, hast suffered
was all for sinners’ gain;
mine, mine was the transgression,
but Thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Savior!
‘Tis I deserve Thy place;
look on me with Thy favor,
vouchsafe to me Thy grace.”
On and on we could go with similar examples of the gospel-in-poetry. Sometimes we talk about how we need to “preach the gospel to ourselves.” But we also need to “sing the gospel to ourselves.” And each of these hymns is a wonderful, God-and-cross-centered way to do that.
Postscript: I have preached on theopaschism many times. My evening and morning sermons from December 1, 2002, found here, are good examples. I’ve preached on Philippians 2:5-11 many times, and often hit on this theme when I deal with that text. My numerous sermons on the atonement from Mark’s passion account (chapters 14 and 15) is probably the most complete treatment I have given this topic. Those sermons were preached in late 2016 and off and on over much of 2017. In the course of dealing with Mark 15, I gave extended treatment to Jesus’ use of Psalm 22, which is probably the key to this teaching.
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