Reflections on good friday

“The wind blows where it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the spirit.”

Today is Good Friday. In the Christian religion, this is supposed to be the day when Jesus died. Having come from this tradition and having spent a large part of my life studying theology and teaching about these things, I thought I'd reflect a bit on this.

The typical interpretation of this event is that Jesus died for the sins of the world, that he was the sin bearer, the sacrificial lamb. The usual evangelical Christian interpretation of this event is usually that people are 'sinners' and cannot access God because of this. God then sent his son, Jesus, to die in our place. Now in my early teens this meant a great deal to me, that I could no longer have to worry about whether I would go to 'heaven' or 'hell' when I died because this had now been sorted by 'the blood of the lamb'.

This started to bug me a bit, though, later on in life. Was it God that needed the sacrifice, or was it people that needed a scapegoat? I started thinking that perhaps it was the latter - that it wasn't so much that people needed someone to save them from an angry God, but that people needed ‘saving’ from their own guilt.

This would probably explain why Jesus was able to say to people that they were forgiven long before the crucifixion event. In fact, when you look at it, it was this that started to really piss off the religious people of his day – the fact that he went around telling people they were forgiven. His whole message seemed to be built around this – ‘The kingdom of of God is at hand’ – ie. ‘All the fullness of life is available to you, change the way you think about yourself and believe this good news!’
This has usually been translated “repent and believe the good news” and most often taken to mean “be sorry for your sins” – but I think “repent” is a very bad translation, because it implies penitence, whereas the Greek word ‘metanoia’ means to change your mind.

So – perhaps the message of Jesus was really all about freedom – that God (or The Universe, Life, the Source of all Being) doesn’t have anything against us – so go and live to the full! If there’s anything that you’ve done that you feel prevents you from experiencing this – then sort it out, make amends, but certainly don’t see it as God holding it against you. Be Free!

Now whenever I start talking like amongst religious people I get myself into trouble. If one looks at the life of Jesus - his biggest opposition wasn't 'the devil in the wilderness' but the religious people of the day. This is why they had no choice but to kill him – it was the only way they could nail him down because he didn’t fit into their religious box where they could control him through fear. You can’t control the wind!

So reflecting on today I need to remind myself that this man, Jesus, doesn’t need to be defined by the religion that named itself after him. I also come to the conclusion that I want to live just like he did – so full of life and love for others, and a passion for freeing people from the illusion and lie that we need this or that to be Good. Being born of the spirit of Life – I too want to be like the wind – free and blowing where I please, without religion or guilt weighing me down and preventing me from delighting in this dream we call our lives!