Prayer Prompt April 3

SCRIPTURE

John 19:28-30

After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), I am thirsty. A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the wine, he said, It is finished. Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

REFLECTION

It is finished. Not abandoned. Not defeated. Finished — as in completed, accomplished, brought to its intended end. Three words that changed everything. What was finished? The separation. The debt. The long, grinding distance between God and the people God would not stop loving. On Good Friday we do not look away from the cross. We stand beneath it, as the women stood, and we let it tell us the truth: that the love of God has no bottom, and that the worst thing we can do to each other and to God is not the last word. He finished it. We did not. He did.

PRAYER

Lord Jesus, on this solemn day we stand at the foot of the cross. We do not try to rush past it to Sunday. We stay here. We let the darkness be dark. We sit with the women who would not leave. And we receive what only you could give — the finished work, the opened way, the love that refused to stop. Thank you. We have no other words sufficient. Thank you. Amen.

-Anon