Good Friday Devotional – Following Jesus From the Edges.

Good Friday Devotional

by Pastor Calvin Cook

Read Psalm 22         

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

Good Friday doesn’t clean things up. It doesn’t rush past the pain or tie it up with a bow.

I am thinking how many times I have prayed, said out loud and under my breath the opening verse of Psalm 22 “my God my God, why have you forsaken me?” These words starts the way real prayers often do, out loud, honest, and a little shaky. It’s the prayer you pray when you don’t know what else to say. When faith is still there, but answers aren’t.

Those words David cried out long ago became the words Jesus prayed from the cross. Not because He was putting on a show. Not because He had lost faith. But because He was stepping fully into our hurt. Jesus knew what it felt like to be misunderstood, mocked, and watched while suffering. Left alone when it mattered most. On the cross, Jesus stood right in the middle of everything that to this day damages us, hurts us, distracts us, attempts to draw us away; and shouted on our behalf what we must be thinking some days.

Psalm 22 names things we don’t like to talk about: shame, weakness, being stared at, feeling like God is quiet when you need Him loud. Good Friday tells us God isn’t scared of those prayers. He welcomes them.

What hits me all the time is God didn’t save us by staying safe. He saved us by showing up where it hurt. Jesus didn’t explain suffering away. He carried it, every insult, every wound, every lonely breath, and every sin. When He cried out, God wasn’t far off. God was right there bleeding love into a broken world.

And then, without the pain magically disappearing, Psalm 22 shifts. Not because life got easier, but because memory kicked in. “Yet You are holy… our people trusted You.” Sometimes hope doesn’t come from change, it comes from remembering who God has been.

Good Friday faith isn’t loud, it whispers “I don’t understand this…but I’m still here with You.”

The psalm ends simply: “He has done it.”

Not “I escaped.”

Not “I figured it out.”

Just God has done what needed to be done.

Good Friday invites us to sit awhile. To bring our real selves, our grief, our questions, our worn-out prayers. If today feels heavy, you’re not alone. Jesus has been there. He’s still there. Stay close. The dark doesn’t get the last word.