A crucifixion.

The events of Good Friday were filled with a kind of drama that we cannot fully comprehend. It was ugly. The worst of human nature spilled out into every street and every corner of the city. Jealousy and envy had blossomed into hate, and hate burned hot. All of life, nature, and the whole world collided with goodness, mercy, and love, and everything stood still.

He was despised and rejected by mankind,
a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.
Like one from whom people hide their faces
he was despised, and we held him in low esteem.

Isaiah 53:3

Despised and rejected.

The suffering he bore made him familiar with our own suffering and pain.

It was so hideous that we had to turn our faces away. This kind of suffering, we cannot truly grasp.

Surely he took up our pain
and bore our suffering,
yet we considered him punished by God,
stricken by him, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to our own way;
and the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

Isaiah 53:4-6

Did he see my face as he hung on the cross? As he was pierced through and his body hung crushed, were my sins and my failures and my pride and my transgressions on his mind? Was he thinking about me as he took his last breath?

When the angel visited Mary and gave her the exciting news that she would conceive a baby through the Holy Spirit who would be God’s Son…the Messiah…and to her question, “How can this be?”…the angel’s reply was, “Nothing is impossible for God.” I do believe that Jesus, the Son of God – God in the flesh – could see the face of every human life – past, present, and future – as he hung dying for the forgiveness of all mankind. Because nothing is impossible for God.

His punishment…the horror of his death…brought you and me the peace we long for and the healing of every wound. Forgiveness, grace, restoration, and completeness became ours through Christ’s brutal death.

The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Thank you, Jesus, for the cross on which you died…where you saw my face and you bore my sin.

He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
Yet who of his generation protested?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was punished.
He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.

Isaiah 53:7-9

Innocent, he walked the path of death.

Jesus, sinless and pure, took the grave of the wicked for the redemption of the world.

And he did so in silence…without a cry of “not guilty”…without a word of self-justification.

So many misunderstand the necessity of this part of the Easter story. They would rather bask in the resurrection than pause and reflect on the gravitas of the cross. Were it not for this poignant moment of mourning, we could not truly rejoice in the victory three days later.

Death was not the finale of this story, but it cannot be brushed over. God allowed his Son to suffer…and his Son, Jesus, chose the way of suffering. God so loved the world that He gave…and Jesus so loved the world that He gave.

Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.
After he has suffered,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge, my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.
Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

Isaiah 53:10-12

He made intercession for the transgressors.

Those transgressors are you and me. Those transgressors are any human that has ever lived, is currently living, and will live in the future. Jesus made intercession for us all.

Because Christ poured out his life unto death, and because he continues to intercede on our behalf, we have hope…we have redemption.

Good Friday is not just another date on the calendar to fill with another service, another gathering, or another ritual to observe. No. It is a sobering moment to pause and reflect on the suffering of Christ on behalf of you and me.

I do believe that He saw my face and yours as he hung, dying, broken, abandoned, and alone.

And when he said, “It is finished.” (John 19:30), he was declaring the end of striving…the end of fear…the end of hopelessness…the end of shame, and the end of death. He took our iniquity and he bore our sin…once…for all…upon the cross.

Words do not suffice for the enormity of gratitude I feel. But with words, frail and broken…limited and simple…I say to Jesus from the depths of this sinful heart, “Thank you, Jesus.”

“It seemed as if hell were put into His cup; He seized it, and at one tremendous draught of love, He drank damnation dry.”
Charles Spurgeon

Tim Keller likens our typical Christian approach to forgiveness as a type of “therapeutically- motivated culture” of forgiveness. We forgive in order to feel better – to attain inner peace – and so to also ensure forgiveness from God. Without embracing the reality of what forgiveness costs, we tend to take action for personal relief, healing, and mental rest. However, how often do we count the actual cost of forgiveness? Truly? We feel that cost deep, deep down, but we struggle to articulate the negative feelings because it doesn’t always sound Christlike and selfless. It can sound very self-preserving and, perhaps, angry.

Our Christian faith sets us apart from other religions in that we are called to forgive, and to extend love and grace, even in the face of hostility. However, we often fall short in our approach to true forgiveness. We tend to stay on the superficial level of releasing our wounds from others in order to feel better. But that is not the full picture of forgiveness. That is only a part of the process of forgiveness.

In his breakdown of the story of the wicked servant found in the book of Matthew, Tim Keller writes this in his book “Forgive”:

The request by the servant for “patience” – makrothumeo, a Greek word that literally means ‘to be slow to boil or melt’ – hints at the cost of forgiveness. The older English translation for makrothumeo was ‘long-suffering’. Patience is the ability to bear suffering rather than give in to it. To forgive someone’s debt to you is to absorb the debt yourself. If a friend borrows your car, totals it through reckless driving, and hasn’t any ability to remunerate you financially, you may say, “I forgive you,” but the price of the wrong does not evaporate into the air. You either find the money to buy a new car or you go without one. Either way, forgiveness means the cost of the wrong moves from the perpetrator to you, and you bear it.

Forgiveness, then, is a form of voluntary suffering. In forgiving, rather than retaliation, you make a choice to bear the cost.

True forgiveness is bearing the cost.

Jesus’ example to us of bearing the cost is the price he paid on the cross. Forgiveness is identifying with Christ’s sacrifice. We, thankfully, will never know the pain and suffering he experienced as he took on the sin of the world and paid the debt (our debt) of sin and evil. There is no earthly experience, not even the worst we can imagine, that can compare to the experience of Christ’s death on the cross. It was more than the physical act of suffering. It was the separation from God and the weight of sin. It is more than any of us could ever bear, and he voluntarily suffered on our behalf.

Christ is our example.

I find it fascinating that Christ, as he was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane prior to his arrest, requested that God would “take this cup” from him.

“Abba, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” Mark 14:36

In his human form, he sought some relief from the price to pay. He cried out to God, “everything is possible for you (God, find another way to do this), please take it away.” But then he committed his will to God and stated, “Not my will, but yours be done.”

What this says to me is that when we feel that pang of hurt, grief, and hesitation to forgive the one who has wronged us, we are not feeling bad or non-Christian-like feelings. We are feeling very real and normal feelings. Who truly relishes in voluntary suffering?

And yet…in spite of the cost, Christ submitted himself to the will of God. Quite bluntly, if we want to follow after Christ- to identify with him in every way- then we, too, must surrender. We must choose to suffer and bear the cost.

This, I believe, is why forgiveness – true forgiveness – is so hard. I recognize this process is often missing in our Christian worldview. We seek, as even the world does, for inner healing and the personal satisfaction that comes from “letting go”, but there comes a point when this kind of forgiveness just isn’t enough or isn’t working for us anymore. We are seeing the ramifications of this approach in our world today. It is not enough to simply say “forgive and let go.” I believe this is due to the fact that that cost must be counted. We must allow ourselves permission to identify and accept what forgiveness is costing us.

But if we stop here we are still cutting the process of forgiveness short. There is more. We must look upward. We must look to Jesus.

It is when we do this that we also recognize forgiveness cannot take place without the supernatural grace extended to us through Jesus Christ. We cannot bear the cost without that. We are too human and too selfish. True forgiveness requires both the recognition of the cost and the dependence upon Christ’s supernatural empowerment to then bear the cost.

For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

Romans 8:14-17

When we choose this voluntary suffering, we are sharing in Christ’s sufferings. Much of the work is internal as we choose to release our pain and our hurt into the hands of Jesus. And oftentimes this internal work is never known. Not very often do we see the kind of justice that we would prefer. We do this act of forgiving without fanfare and without a cheering squad. But we are not alone; Christ is with us, and he is holding us.

This is not to say that justice should be neglected. But the pursuit of justice without true forgiveness often becomes retaliation, and that should never be our motive.  We need clear discernment between the two.

To conclude my thoughts on the cost of forgiveness, I just want to add one thing. When we truly grasp the depth of Christ’s love for us when he chose to suffer on the cross for the redemption and forgiveness of mankind, it is difficult to stand in our justification of withholding forgiveness from others. I am not excusing the acts done against any person or persons, but I can only speak personally; when I encounter this transformative power of grace, love and forgiveness from God, there is nothing left in me but incredible awe and fear. Not terror or anxiety, but amazement at God’s goodness to me. And, from that goodness, I find my heart more inclined to forgive. It is a process, for sure, but a process that draws us closer to the heart of God, and deeper in identifying with his suffering. This is precious to me.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I am deeply grateful for the price that Christ paid for the forgiveness of my sins. Where I fail, he brings redemption. Where I fall short, he fills in the gaps. And I am thankful for the example he set for me.

While the price of forgiveness almost seems too high at times, he showed us how to do it. And he promises his grace to see us through.