Throughout Lent 2020 I have been choosing photographs of windows I have seen, looked through or looked into over the years. And each day, prompted by an image, I write some words.

Today is Good Friday. Explanations of why this day is called “good” abound. Some say it is “good” because without this day there would be no Easter. No death; ergo no resurrection or new life. Another exegesis: “good” in the context of this day simply means “holy.” In another season altogether, there is “Good Tide” which is an old way of referring to Christmas: holy season of the Nativity. One more possibility is that Good Friday is a corruption of “God’s Friday.”

The word “good” itself has root meanings that indicate the sense of gathering or bringing together, or more curiously, something “fitting.” Those meanings may miss the mark in the context of observing the dark day of Jesus’ crucifixion. Or, is there in this observance a gathering of sorts. As people gathered at the cross that day on Golgotha, we gather globally around the cross today, remembering the profound drama of an itinerant rabbi found guilty of sedition and subjected to a grisly capital punishment.

Good Friday.

The crucifixion of Jesus has been imagined and reimagined in stained glass in churches and cathedrals throughout the ages. The images are there not so much for striking decoration as light pours through, casting colors into sanctuaries of worship. The colored glass teaches and illustrates, inspires and reminds. The artists tell the stories of faith, and the stories of the life and teachings of Jesus are certainly prominent from rural chapels to massive cathedrals.

For today’s image, I did not look deeply into my files. This one just drew my attention first. We saw it in the South Quire aisle of the Southwell Minster Church, Nottinghamshire, England.Southwellminster Cathedral

This outstanding window was designed by Nicholas Mynheer in 2014. It is a memorial to the men from Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire who lost their lives in the First World War. The design seeks to reflect the need for forgiveness and reconciliation.

When I glanced through my photos looking for an image for Good Friday, I found this window depicting the removal of Jesus from the cross. That’s the central focus. But then I looked at the detail, and realized that those removing the body from the cross are not Roman soldiers, nor broken-hearted friends of Jesus. The helmets hint at World War 1. Behind the cross is a line of soldiers, headed by a wounded man being supported by a comrade. (One thinks of the song, “He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother,” but more, the teaching of Jesus: “Greater love has no one than this, but to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”)

Look at the other images here. Begin at the bottom and see the work horse pulling a plow through an English countryside, presumably in peace time. And in the background, there stands Southwell Minster Church itself, as it has stood for 900 years. At the left, a young woman reaches toward her clothesline with that clean white sheet catching the breeze. (At least, that is how I see it. We all must interpret the pictures and symbols ourselves.)

A single red Flanders poppy, symbol of dead soldiers, is just below the cross. And then there is Jesus, his uniform the same as that of the men who surround him. Is that to signify that Jesus identifies with victims of war, and by extension, any victim of violence: those suffering any human tragedy…storm, flood, pandemic, human trafficking or any exploitation, or violent conflict between nations or within households?

And now, look higher. A vision of heaven. A dove. Soldiers of different uniforms embracing. The holy communion of bread and cup, that heavenly banquet.  And music, the sound of the trumpet. Is it too early to sing of Easter? Yes. Our focus must go back to the cross for now. For it is Good Friday. We must endure the darkness before the ultimate sunrise. It is not pleasant. Warring powers vie for our very souls, and our only Savior is dying. Wood and nails have done him in, thanks to human-held hammers.

We hold out hope, though, that plowshares and white linen, green fields and sturdy poppies will once again prove that God’s peace prevails over all violence, and that all the earth will again hear a Voice that declares Creation “good.”