As COVID-19 stealthily ravages its way around the world taking many lives, people are asking “Where is God in all of this? If God is real, what kind of God would allow such a thing?”   

This Friday, Christians commemorate the day Jesus was brutally crucified on a cross and call it good. The good Friday, over 2000 years ago provides insight and answers to our questions about God in the midst of this horrific pandemic. 

Good Friday shows us that God does not sit removed from our pain, brokenness, and death but God entered into it by becoming a human being and suffering in every way. This sacrificial love ultimately took Jesus, God in the flesh, to the cross where it killed him. God loves us and takes our pain and death seriously so much so that He sent His son Jesus into the world, not to condemn it but to save it. (John 3:16)

On the cross, Jesus took on the sins of the world. When examining the weight of this pain, one can see the depth of God’s love for the world- for you and me. 

The Bible tells us that the world as we know it- a world that groans with disease, wars, natural disasters, hate, poverty, violence, prejudice, and selfishness- was not God’s original design. God’s vision for the world, detailed in Genesis Chapter 1, was one of perfect harmony between God, humanity, and creation. It was a world of perfect love. As a vital aspect of love, God gave humanity the ability to choose His love or reject it.  As a result of this free will, human beings chose to turn away from God and follow our own devices, the way of selfishness and pride. Genesis Chapter 3 in the Bible, outlines 5 kinds of alienation, brokenness, death and destruction that ensued from our decision to reject God.  

4. Internal Alienation: Scripture tells us that Adam and Eve were naked and felt shame once they turned away from God (Gen. 3:7). They were no longer comfortable in who they were because they were no longer walking in the way of love. It is that sense of “I do not like who I am therefore I will cover myself up.” So often in life we work to cover up the things we don’t like about ourselves. We work to cultivate an image to cover our real view of ourselves. To a greater or lesser extent, all of us are caught in this trap of wearing a mask.
5. Social alienation: God questions Adam and Adam blames Eve for the disobedience. This was the beginning of rifts in relationships. This passing blame occurs on all levels of human relationships, in marriage, friendships, between parents and children, and in geo-politics.
6. Vocational alienation – Scripture tells us that as a result of the fall and sin, women will have pain in childbearing and men will engage in painful toil. The work on earth will be difficult and no longer a joyful blessing. 
7. Physical alienation – Disease like the Coronavirus, mental illness, and death enters our world. From the day you are born your body is disintegrating. God says in Genesis “For dust you are and to dust you will return.” (Gen. 3:19)
8. Spiritual alienation: The man and his wife heard God walking in the garden in the cool of the day and they hid. Adam admits hiding because he feels shame. Adam and Eve no longer felt comfortable with God. This is true for us today. Like Adam, we run from God to hide our mess-ups and our guilt. We forget that God is all merciful. 

These five alienations detailed in Genesis chapter 3 of the Bible are profoundly evident in the human condition to this day. They each represent some form of death. It is this very death that God Himself took upon Himself on the cross. Jesus, God in human flesh, took the weight of the sin of the world on Himself so that we could be free and alive again. 

Good Friday is called good because it shows the goodness, mercy, and abounding love of God as He shoulders our pain, sin, and death. Good Friday is good because as Jesus breathed His last words he said, “It is finished.” 

Indeed, the sin of the world crushed God but that was not the end. Three days later Jesus rose from the dead and broke the choke of sin and death over the world forever. 

The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ completely reverses the alienations which we experienced as a result of the Fall.

1. Spiritual alienation is reversed. We can be completely forgiven for our sins and come into union with God once again. Whatever we have done in the past we can be completely forgiven.

“For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead also comes through a man. For as in Adam all die, so that in Christ all made be made alive.” (1 Cor 15:22). The Gospel emphatically asserts that on the cross Christ “disarmed the principalities and powers and made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in him,” (Col 2:15). Death, sin, and all the evil powers were defeated by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

2. Internal alienation is reversed. We no longer need to wear a mask as we are loved unconditionally by God. We become sons and daughters of God, His beloved children.
3. Social alienation is reversed. The more we know ourselves as forgiven, the more we are able to forgive others and be agents of reconciliation in the world.
4. Vocational alienation is reversed. We are given a purpose to be ambassadors for Christ . We are called to be agents of mercy, love, reconciliation and hope in the world.
5. Physical alienation is reversed. Death is not the end. Because Jesus defeated death through his resurrection, death has no hold on humanity. We can be with God for an eternity.

This is who God is…God hears our pain, knows our pain, bore our pain and ultimately defeated our pain. Good Friday? Indeed.