Lectionary Commentaries for April 3, 2026
Good Friday

The drama of the Passion in John 18:1–19:42 is a difficult and gruesome progression to witness. It recounts betrayal, arrest, interrogation, crucifixion, and burial, shifting between locations, conversations, and confrontations. Throughout this narrative, Jesus remains focused, speaking the truth, while those around him—disciples, crowds, religious and political leaders, and secret believers—offer varied responses.

In the betrayal and arrest (18:1–11), Jesus calmly identifies himself to the soldiers and police: “I am the one you are looking for, Jesus of Nazareth.” He discourages violence, but Peter, impulsively, wounds the high priest’s slave, Malchus. Jesus then commands Peter to put away his sword (18:11).

Jesus is subsequently taken to the high priest, Caiaphas, who had previously advised the Jewish authorities that it was expedient for one man to die for the sake of the people. This perspective represents a flawed theology and a pragmatic, yet cynical, political calculation that advocates sacrificing an innocent individual for the perceived benefit of the masses. Jesus, however, refuses to be reduced to such a scapegoat.

Unlike Jesus’s unwavering resolve, Peter shows cowardice by denying any connection to Jesus on two occasions. It highlights how much more Peter still has to learn about the true meaning of Jesus’s Passion.

The scene then shifts to the high priest questioning Jesus about his disciples and teachings. Jesus responds that he has spoken openly and publicly to the world, teaching in synagogues and the Temple. He emphasizes that he has said nothing in secret. This reveals the high priest’s ignorance or indifference toward Jesus’s message. Later, one of the guards strikes Jesus across the face, believing he has shown disrespect to the high priest. Jesus immediately protests, asking, “If I have spoken wrongly, testify to the wrong. But if I have spoken rightly, why do you strike me?” (18:23). This demonstrates that nonviolence does not mean passively accepting abuse from those in power or authority.

In 18:28–38, Jesus is brought before Pilate, who initially seeks to ascertain the charges brought against Jesus by the Jewish authorities. Pilate inquires, “Are you the King of the Jews?” (18:33), likely aware of the potential implications of such a claim under Roman rule. Jesus responds, “My kingdom does not belong to this world” (18:36). This statement is both evocative and multifaceted. On one hand, it affirms Jesus’s divinely ordained mission to love and save the world by referring to “my kingdom.” On the other hand, it assures Pilate that Jesus poses no direct threat to Roman authority, as his kingdom is not of this world. 

Regarding “my kingdom,” Jesus never claimed to establish his own earthly kingdom. Instead, his primary focus is on fulfilling the works of God (4:34; 10:37); he is sent by God (3:16); “the Father is greater than I” (14:28). Even when he declares, “The Father and I are one” (10:30), it signifies their unity in purpose and action. Otherwise, the point is not that God and he are the same.

Jesus refutes the notion of a worldly empire because his kingdom’s purpose transcends this world, including the Roman Empire. While he operates within the world, his mission is more profound and extensive than any earthly empire. God desires all people to dwell in the light and experience an abundant life by following the Son’s way. Therefore, Jesus asserts that his kingdom originates not from this world, but from God.

Pilate presses Jesus further, asking, “So you are a king?” Jesus answers, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth” (18:37). Here, Jesus reiterates that his mission is not self-serving but is dedicated to bearing witness to the truth of God. Pilate, however, remains unconvinced and cynically asks, “What is truth?” In reality, he has no genuine interest in divine truth because, for him, the only truth is the power of Rome.

Ultimately, Jesus is condemned to death (18:39–19:16). Despite Pilate’s attempts to release Jesus, as he finds no legitimate grounds for conviction, the crowds demand his crucifixion. The Jewish authorities assert to Pilate: “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has claimed to be the Son of God” (19:7). This claim is strange because the Son of God is not a divine title per se. After all, in the Old Testament, some humans are called the son of God, including Israel as a whole, sometimes. Finally, Pilate, fearing the potential repercussions of the Jewish authorities’ accusations that Jesus’s kingship constitutes treason, reluctantly consents to Jesus’s crucifixion.

The scene shifts dramatically to depict the crucifixion of Jesus (19:17–37). Jesus is led to Golgotha, the place of the skull, where he is crucified. The inscription placed above him reads “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews,” which may be interpreted as a form of ridicule by the crowds and Roman authorities. However, for those who genuinely follow him, the inscription reflects the truth, albeit with the understanding that his kingdom differs fundamentally from Rome.

Following his final interactions with his mother and the disciple whom he loves, Jesus utters, “I am thirsty” (19:29). After receiving the wine, he declares, “It is finished” (19:30). From the narrative context, it is evident that what is finished is the mission that God entrusted to him. Jesus has demonstrated his love for the people and the world to the fullest extent of his ability, per God’s will. God sent his Son to save the world (3:16). That mission is done. After him, new generations of believers must continue with him and through the Advocate sent by God.

Following these events, Jesus is buried in a new tomb (19:38–42). In this final scene, two secret believers emerge: Joseph of Arimathea, who requests Jesus’s body from Pilate, and Nicodemus, “who had at first come to Jesus by night, [and] came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, weighing about a hundred pounds” (19:39). It is important to know that these people believed in Jesus, even though they were hesitant to show their faith openly before. They are “good” believers. Regardless of the past, they are still with Jesus.

Setting the stage for this lectionary reading is the prophetic command, “Depart, depart, go out from there!” (Isaiah 52:11). For Second Isaiah, “there” carries a clear point of reference: exile, the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Sadly, the place of empire and forced migration is a recurring place for Israel—first, their migration (lāgûr šām, verse 4) to Egypt, the place of their enslavement; second, their subjugation (“oppressed them without cause,” verse 4) under the Neo-Assyrian Empire; and lastly, the prophet’s “now” moment (verse 5), extending this traumatic history into Israel’s present life under yet another unjust empire.

Before turning to the assigned text, the preacher would do well to attend to the prophet’s “now” moment in the preceding verse. The “there” is not an isolated time or place but part of a recurring cycle of imperial violence enacted “without cause” against vulnerable people. Indeed, this is the world surrounding the assigned lectionary reading—a world marked by displacement and captivity (verse 5). It is this trauma-inducing world, born of imperial violence, that the prophet commands Israel to leave: “Go out from the midst of it” (52:11).

A new exodus in view

With a new exodus liberation in view (52:11–12), the preacher enters the world of Isaiah 52:13–53:12. Although the servant/slave (ʿeved) stands at the center of the text, the violent atmosphere that surrounds him warrants interpretive pause. 

In verse 14, a group of bystanders looks on, “astonished” at the servant’s disfigured appearance. Their presence gives this encounter a public dimension. It is the public’s shock that gives visibility to this mangled male slave. Rather than appearing fully human, he is seen by the public only as “beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of mortals” (verse 14). For this public, it is the only way a slave draws attention—when he is tortured, disfigured, and dehumanized. Without a gory spectacle, he is as the prophet describes in 53:2: “He had no form or majesty that we should look at him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition).

Seeing and not seeing

In considering the preacher’s public, are there similarities between the witnessing public in the text and that of today’s society? What does it reveal about a society when people of low status are brought into public view only as nonhuman? Or even more troubling, what does it mean to be seen only as disgust—to exist solely within the public’s feelings of revulsion and shock? In such a context, empathy is misplaced. It is directed not toward the wounded, low-class person who suffers violence but toward the public’s own discomfort at being confronted by that suffering.

The text’s context of exile and empire invites a connection to the ways contemporary migrants and exiles are made visible only when detained or deported. Their humanity is reduced to criminality, erasing the full reality of their lives—their labor to harvest food, care for the sick, build homes, clean spaces, and sustain society’s everyday rhythms. In the public imagination, they are seen only when “led to the slaughter” (53:7)—when their suffering becomes a social nuisance. Their pain is overshadowed by the public’s outrage at the spectacle of their removal (verse 8).

An indictment of all publics

In this lectionary reading, the public within the text indicts all publics that see people of low social and economic status—the servant, the slave—as less than fully human. The “we” in the text points to a collective way of being that benefits from their servitude, yet is incapable of seeing their suffering (verse 3), their oppression, and their affliction (verse 7). What registers emotionally for this “we” is disgust (verse 3), not the “perversion of justice” that incarcerates, displaces, and annihilates the poor servant (verse 8).

Public desire (verse 2) is misplaced when people of low social status are afforded little worth (verse 3). Their social apathy is rooted in the binary logic that sustains empire-building—a world divided into “we” and the servant “other,” the valued and the disposable, the powerful and the powerless. As the text reads, this is a world in which the “we” enjoys health (verse 4), freedom, wholeness, and healing (verse 5) at the expense of the servant’s dehumanization.

Leaving the empire’s mindset

The “we” in the text is a public that sees as empire sees—viewing its servants, slaves, and people of low status as mere objects to be exploited and then discarded. In many ways, it is this collective failure to see the servant “other” as fully human that prompts the prophet’s command to “go out from there” (52:11). 

Extending the “there” into the assigned lectionary reading, the place of empire also contains a public “we” that sustains its own life by extracting it from vulnerable people. By devaluing the servant “other” (53:3), this public “we” creates the conditions that make collective violence against him possible. Their rejection of him as a human being renders their public witness to this violence void of empathy. Fixed on their own well-being, they lack the capacity to feel the pain and suffering of those of low status.

Such an environment points to the place of empire itself—a collective mindset that converts public witness into self-comfort and, in doing so, perverts justice. Whether in the text or in contemporary society, the poor, the migrant, and the servant “other” suffer public displacement, deportation, and erasure. Leaving such a public—one desensitized to the suffering of lowly people—is itself part of the new exodus liberation envisioned in 52:11.

St. Athanasius once observed: “Most of Scripture speaks to us; the Psalms speak for us.” Indeed, no texts of Scripture, perhaps in all of world literature, speak so directly and frankly to the uncensored and often painful rawness and realities of life as do the Psalms. That is, at least, if we will allow them to do so.¹ 

If we are honest with ourselves, we will realize that, at least as often as not, we live and exert considerable energy and preoccupation in the midst of what Walter Brueggemann calls “deep discontinuities.”² On occasion, life feels oriented and perhaps mostly free from threat or trouble. But for most, such a (perceived) reality is the exception, rather than the rule.³

The subject matter of the Psalter testifies starkly to this imbalance. There are certainly psalms that affirm life as symmetrical and well-proportioned. However, it is a life-perspective that Brueggemann (and others) identify as “minimal” and a “minor theme” in the Psalter.⁴ Instead, the prevalence of the lament identifies the disoriented life as that which overwhelmingly gives rise to the speaking of the psalms. 

Over one-third of the Psalms are laments, with even more containing a lament motif within a larger form structure. Unfortunately, typical worship and proclamation tend to grievously underutilize this trove of life-candor. There are 45 psalms that do not appear in the Revised Common Lectionary (for Sundays and high festival days); 30 of those un-included psalms are laments. The number of excluded lament psalms rises higher if we note the laments that appear as “alternates” (which are rarely used) or only as options for semi-continuous readings. If we narrow our survey to the time outside the Lenten season, then the use of the lament in our psalmody grows even more paltry.⁵

How can the Psalms speak for us if we underutilize the most prevalent genre of the Psalter, which speaks to what may be the most pervasive and shared of human experiences? The foregoing illustrates why the opportunity to read in its entirety and proclaim Psalm 22 is such a precious one, particularly at such a pivotal time in our world and faith journey.

The form of a lament contributes to its expressive power. With variations, laments will generally include the following elements, usually in the following order: complaint, confession of trust, request for help, praise. Psalm 22 begins with a particularly sharp complaint—perhaps the most memorable in all of Scripture: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”⁶ The suppliant goes on to ask why God is so distant and, in verse 2, in rather accusatory fashion, chastises God for failing to answer in the day and in the night.  

Only the psalms of lament give such bold voice to feelings of fear, anxiety, and abandonment. If we largely fill our worship with expressions of the “happy-clappy” variety, these feelings experienced by virtually all in the pews will scarcely be addressed in the very place where they, more than anywhere else, should be, and thus will only deepen.

Questions regarding the value and genuineness of the gathered community are likely to follow, often culminating in distancing from an atmosphere that is so tone-deaf to the experiences of real life. Uncomfortably wearing the mask of a manufactured smile, and feeling the need to do so, is never healthy or healing, particularly in the church.

No such masks are purveyed or allowed by the lament psalms, however. Psalm 22 continues to explore and express the depths of human suffering. The suppliant confesses feeling only as a worm, not even a human, in verse 6, a self-perception exacerbated by the scorning, despising, and mocking of those around.⁷ Even God is the subject of a subtle swipe in verse 8!

The imagery of verses 11–18 is particularly evocative: the encircling of bulls and wild dogs, feelings of being poured out like water, bones feeling out of joint, a heart as wax melting in the chest, a mouth as dry as a piece of broken pottery to which the parched tongue sticks. It is no wonder Jesus himself resonated with this psalm as he gasped for air upon the cross before a mocking crowd. Such, however, is precisely why God took on flesh and journeyed to Jerusalem: to know firsthand the darkest depths into which human experience can plunge us and, further, to win victory for all over such depths.

It is for this reason that we should not shy away from engaging in such barbed dialogue with God as we find in Psalm 22. God, not only apparently but clearly, wants to know and be with us in all the depths of our humanity. If our piety prevents us from being blatantly honest and expressing even anger with God, then we have a perverted piety. Thus, the lament, and even the complaint therein, is far less an expression of doubt than one of faith.

The lament psalm is, furthermore, an act of faith in that it includes, in the midst of deeply painful cries, professions of trust. We find such professions here in verses 3–5, 9–10.

God is enthroned on the praises of Israel, praises generated by the trust and deliverance experienced by the ancestors, who cried to God and were not put to shame. On a more personal level, the suppliant confesses being taken from the womb and kept safe on the mother’s breast by God, who has continued to be God ever since! The confession of trust suggests that since God has acted for the good of the people, often in response to cries in the past, God can and most likely will continue to do so. And so, again, we have a statement of faith within the psalm of lament.⁸

Out of these perspectives of faith, the suppliant can make the move to petition God for intervention.⁹ Thus, we find addressed to God in verse 11, “Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help.” Verses 19–20 repeat the request for God to be not far away, adding petitions for God to “come quickly to my aid,” “deliver my soul,” and “save me.”

Because God has an openness to and desire for hearing our cries, and because God’s faithful action in the past suggests continued saving action now and in the future, these petitions rise to God in anticipation of there being a response—yet another expression of faith. 

Thus follows what may be the most startling piece of the lament form, which occurs in and is a significant portion of almost every lament psalm: the expression of praise.¹⁰ In Psalm 22, the expression of praise comprises a full one-third of the text (verses 22–31).  Not only does the suppliant pledge to tell of God’s name to brothers and sisters, and to praise God in the midst of the congregation, but also exhorts others to praise, glorify, and stand in awe of God.

The scope of the praise continues to expand in verse 26, with the declaration that “the poor shall eat and be satisfied,” and even further in verse 27, saying that “all the ends of the earth” and “all families of the nations” shall remember and turn to and worship the Lord. 

But even more startling and expansive is what we find in verse 29: Those who would typically be excluded from any kind of activity, let alone praise of God—the dead, “all those who sleep in the earth”—will also be included in this laudatory chorus. Thus, “posterity” will serve the Lord (verse 30) so that God’s deliverance will be made known even to those yet unborn.

What a journey these 31 verses undertake and invite us into. Perhaps at this end of the Lenten journey, someone may hear the words of this psalm and breathe the relieving sigh of finally knowing that they are not alone in their experiences—that this ancient text and even the words of our Savior resonate and connect with the depths of their emotions. 

Tragically, you may have limited opportunity to offer on Good Friday these words of life to many who desperately need them, because in much the same way as our calendar of readings dodges and avoids the laments of the Psalter, people of faith tend to skip from Palm Sunday over the darkness of Holy Week and straight to the brightness—dare I say “happy-clappiness”—of Easter Sunday. This is to say, perhaps your proclamation of Psalm 22 need not be restricted to Good Friday.¹¹ It may need to be the departure point of your proclamation on Easter Sunday, for without Maundy Thursday and Good Friday, the tomb, occupied or vacant, is meaningless.

Notes

1. Commentary previously published on this website for April 15, 2022.
2. Walter Brueggemann, Praying the Psalms: Engaging Scripture and the Life of the Spirit, 2nd ed. (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2007), 6.
3. Accordingly, the director of Clinical Pastoral Education with whom I studied once commented that when we stand in the pulpit to preach, above all, we should see seated before us individuals who, most likely, are experiencing some kind of pain in their life—and it is that pain that we must address.
4. Brueggemann, 2007, 3–4.
5. I chose not to add to the length of the above introduction by also referencing the many times when the lectionary does include lament psalms but omits some of the verses that most poignantly indicate the pain of the suppliant.
6. Citations are from the New Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted.
7. How often has such a scenario resulted in the mental distress and even suicide of our young people who were left feeling they had no place in or means by which to express and have earnestly heard their deepest angsts and apprehensions?
8. Anderson points out the crucial difference between a lament and a dirge. The lament expresses a measure of confidence that the situation can be remedied by the intervention of God, whereas a dirge grieves over a calamity that is perceived as irreversible. Bernard Anderson, Out of the Depths: The Psalms Speak for Us Today (Louisville: John Knox, 2000), 60.
9.  Note that we dare not perceive this move as an easy one resulting from a neatly linear process! There is clearly tension and inner struggle in this suppliant, evidenced by the vacillation from cry in verses 1–2, to trust in verses 3–5, to cry again in verses 6–8, to trust in verses 9–10, to cry yet again in verses 12–18.
10. Psalm 88 is among a few rare exceptions in which the suppliant is in such a depth of darkness as to render the expression of any praise impossible.
11. While I get and appreciate the theological cleverness of the designation “Good,” I wonder if we also inadvertently sugarcoat the darkness and tragedy of this day, which needs to be experienced on its own terms rather than as some kind of flavor-enhanced snack.

The book of Hebrews is a homily with one main point: Christ is the high priest who has offered his very self as the perfect, sufficient sacrifice on behalf of sin, a sacrifice that never needs to be repeated. This theme is evident from the very first sentence of the book, which describes the Son as making purification for sins before demonstrating the completeness of that work by sitting down in the place of honor at the right hand of God, the Majesty on High (1:3). It continues with the declaration that the exalted Son is Jesus, who tastes death for everyone (2:9). 

But what kind of priest is Jesus? He is a priest who shares in the real human experiences of life, including suffering. This enables him to be “a merciful and faithful high priest” who can “help those who are being tested” (2:18). 

This high priest has “passed through the heavens” (4:14). The author of Hebrews envisions heaven as the true reality where Christ enters the very presence of God. These verses point again to a high priest who is able to sympathize with weakness and who experiences trials and temptations. He shares in every aspect of being human, except for sin (4:15). 

In 5:7, the reader sees more of his human suffering. Jesus prayed with “loud cries and tears.” Scholars debate about whether this refers to the scene in the garden of Gethsemane or to another, unrecorded time in the life of Jesus, but Jesus, like other humans, cries out in agony to the One who has the power to save him from death. And it is also clear that even though God heard his pleas, Jesus did not receive the answer he wanted. Instead, Jesus learned obedience to God. 

Learning involves growth and change. Humans come to understand things they did not know or understand before. They gain the capacity to do things they could not do before. Like other humans, Jesus grew. He grew in wisdom (see Luke 2:52), and here we see that he learns (or grows) in obedience. Jesus had never known or faced death before: death—the great judgment of God against sin, beginning in the garden. Now, he pleads to be saved from death, but the God who hears him does not spare him from dying. Instead, through his death, he becomes “the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (5:9). 

Throughout the book of Hebrews, the priesthood of Jesus will have implications for those who place their faith in him. It is not just a theological concept rooted in both the Jewish Scriptures and the broader culture of the ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman world. Instead, the perfect offering by the perfect high priest is the condition that makes a new relationship with God possible. 

The preacher gives the audience two instructions: “Let us hold fast to our confession,” and “let us approach the throne of grace with confidence.”

Let us hold fast: In Hebrews 2–3, the preacher has already made clear that those he is speaking with are tempted to drift away from the faith (2:1) and to rebel against the God who has rescued them (3:7–4:11). In the remainder of the book, it becomes clear that these believers face persecution that tempts them to return to a former way of life that feels safer and more comfortable (10:32–36). But here, the preacher instructs them to hold fast to their confession. They are to be willing to speak out loud in public and private the good-news message that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the one who shares in the weaknesses of humanity, has become the great high priest whose sacrifice of himself makes salvation possible for everyone who believes. 

Let us approach with boldness: In the Jewish Scriptures, God instructs Moses to have a tabernacle built where God will dwell with the people of Israel (Exodus 25–40). At the heart of the tabernacle is the Holy of Holies, and inside it is the ark of the covenant with the mercy seat, God’s throne, on top of the ark. The Holy of Holies was separated from the Holy Place and from the rest of the tabernacle by a curtain, and only once a year was the high priest allowed to enter that space. There, he would sprinkle blood on the mercy seat to make atonement and bring the people into right relationship with God. No one else was able to enter without being destroyed. Even the high priest wore a rope around his leg so that if he died, he could be pulled out and no one else would enter. 

The throne room was a place where sins were forgiven and mercy dispensed, but it was also a fearsome place to enter, a place where the power of God could burst forth and bring death. But now … now, through a new high priest, who has offered a permanent sacrifice that never needs to be repeated, believers can come boldly into the very presence of God. Any believer can approach God in prayer with openness, speaking frankly and truthfully the things on their hearts. And what believers find coming from the throne of God is mercy (God’s compassion toward those in need) and grace (God’s gift of favor to those who are unworthy) to help in a well-timed and suitable way (note: the word “need” found in many translations is not in the Greek text).

This Good Friday, we remember the perfect sacrifice offered by the perfect high priest, Jesus Christ, which makes possible our ability to hold onto our confession of faith and enables us to enter the very throne room of heaven to seek there the help God is so willing to give.