I love you this much

Diane Spearman calls Good Friday her favorite time to come to church, even above Resurrection Sunday, because it tells the story of Jesus as a love story. She begins with her five-year-old grandson Zion, who plays the game of saying how much he loves her, stretching his arms wider each time. His love was an action, and as the gathering journeys to the cross, she wants everyone to see how God demonstrated His love.

The Transfiguration: Moses and Elijah

Reading Matthew 17:1–5, Diane lingers on verse 3, where Moses and Elijah appear and talk with Jesus. Scripture does not record the full dialogue, but Luke 9:31 tells us they spoke about Jesus’ departure, which He would accomplish at Jerusalem. Diane then imaginatively explores what that conversation might have sounded like. In this illustration, Moses, who represents the law and knew every sacrifice, reminds Jesus of what He has fulfilled and what remains, since He came not to destroy the law but to fulfill it. Elijah, the prophet who trained prophets, walks Him through every prophetic word still ahead: the crown, the beating, the blood, the false trial. Jesus is not inventing anything; He is walking out purposes and plans already written. Everyone, she adds, needs a Peter, James, and John, an inner circle who walks with you to the end.

Gethsemane: the pressing

In Mark 14, Jesus again takes Peter, James, and John, tells them His sorrow almost crushes Him, and asks them to watch and pray. He throws Himself on the ground and asks whether there is any other way. Diane shares her own midnight moment as a 22-year-old, two years saved, overwhelmed by husband, children, house, and finances, sitting in a little Pinto screaming to God, “Is anybody praying for me?” If Jesus could cry out in anguish, so can we, rather than pretending we have it all by faith. Three times Jesus prays, three times He finds His friends sleeping, and finally He yields: not my will, your will be done. That is where our own trials should lead us as well.

Betrayal, trial, and scourging

While He is still speaking, Judas arrives with a crowd carrying swords and clubs. Diane reminds listeners who have been betrayed that they are in good company. Jesus is taken before Pilate, who finds no fault; to Herod, who finds no fault; and back to Pilate, who offers to scourge and release Him, but the crowd demands Barabbas and screams for Him to be crucified From Matthew 27 she describes the scarlet robe, the crown of thorns pressed down until blood streams, the spitting and mocking, and the scourge of bone and glass tearing His flesh. Isaiah 52:14 says He was so disfigured He hardly looked human, yet He never said a word. Because of this, she says, we can enter the holy of holies that the priests once approached only once a year with fear.

The seven sayings from the cross

Beaten beyond recognition, Jesus carries His own cross and falls under it, demonstrating what it means for us to take up our cross and walk in love. On the cross, Diane explains, the weight of the body pulls down on the diaphragm, so every one of His seven sayings required Him to push up in agony to speak. He asks the Father to forgive them, taking on the sin of every generation from Adam to those not yet born. He promises the repentant thief paradise. He entrusts His mother to John and John to His mother. Bearing all sin, He feels the Father’s absence and cries out, asking why God has forsaken Him. He says He thirsts so that the last prophecy is fulfilled. Diane pictures Him checking each prophecy off, waiting for the ninth hour, seeing each of us before we were born and deciding it was worth it. Then He declares it finished and commends His spirit to the Father. No one could take His life; He gave it, having fulfilled every word of the law and some three hundred prophecies.

The greatest love

Returning to her grandson’s game, Diane asks how much Jesus loved us and stretches her arms out wide like the cross. John 15:13 says there is no greater love than to lay down one’s life. The greatest love in your life is not between husband and wife or parent and child, but the relationship you have with the Father, who paid a great price so that we could sit here today and give Him honor, glory, and worship.