Let’s Talk

Last Friday I watched the Twilight movies with a group of friends. I’ve tried now twice (unsuccessfully) to read the books, but since so many of my friends are so deeply enchanted by these stories I felt I should have a passing knowledge of them. During our video party last week I finally put my finger on what it is about these stories that bothers me so deeply.

And yes…this IS a Good Friday post.

All stories are driven by tension and concluded by resolution to the tension. That tension can be a physical or mental journey, the search for a killer, the search for a lover. The main tension driving the Twilight stories seems to be born out of everyone’s desire to communicate as little as possible while still seeking the outcome they desire. The drama comes from people, vampires and werewolves not being upfront about their personal agendas.

As a direct, plain-spoken person I find this horribly frustrating.

My courtship with my husband lasted seven weeks. There were indeed moments of “does he like me?” but I put paid to that by simply saying “I think I’ve got a crush on you. How do you feel about that?” He felt just fine with it. Since then, we’ve had twenty years of marriage marred only on a few occasions where we stopped communicating.

There are lots of ways for bloggers to memorialise Good Friday. We can focus on the pain of sacrifice, the gift of God’s love. And I have done that happily in the past. But those are all discussions of the journey. Of things which have already happened. It puts the events of that first Good Friday firmly in the past. Like the signing of the Declaration of Independence, focusing on the event as an historical occasion makes it just that. History.

But the fruit of that sacrifice–the gift–is not merely what we were told it was in children’s Sunday School. Yes, we get to go to Heaven because of Jesus’ death and resurrection. But that is only the smallest part of the gift.

We now get to talk with God. Because of the magic of Jesus’ blood sacrifice, the barrier between us as humans and God as our creator, lover, author and friend has dropped. Our lives don’t have to be a frustrating dither of wondering what God thinks or why God did this or that. We can ask for ourselves. We can talk with God. We can come to know God and God’s mind. There doesn’t need to be any dramatic tension, any unresolved question. By the time we make it to Heaven, it should be like a trip to visit an old friend whom you’ve kept in touch with via email. The point of Good Friday isn’t just eternal life. It’s eternal conversation with the Divine.