On several occasions I have read or printed for you what I think it is the most true thing I have ever written with regards to the theology of Good Friday. It was a letter to my daughter when she was just three years old (she is seventeen now) after she had grabbed the cross on my key chain. Little did I know that years later she would be diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, and this letter would serve as a connection for us in a new way. More so even than when I wrote it, I think it is one of the most important letters I have ever written. I know you may have read it before, but I ask you to read it again on this Good Friday.

"Hannah, hold on to the cross. The world will not always be full of Easter bunnies and Easter eggs. Someday, somebody close to you will die.  It may be a close friend or it may be me. It is then that you will need to know about the cross.  When the tragedy comes, well-meaning people will work hard to fix you so that you feel better.  You may hear a lot more about resurrection than the cross. They may even tell you how you should feel when you are hurting, but remember that this is not what God did.  God did not come in and fix the world. God encountered the pain of the cross before the healing of resurrection. God come into the world and went to the cross and felt all of the anger and sadness that you feel.  Instead of fixing things, God comes into the world and gets on to the cross and enters into your suffering. God feels all of your feelings. God hurts and grieves and suffers with you.

The model of what God does on the cross is not only good when times are tough but also a good model for life in general. Whether you are in 4th grade or 40 years old, most everybody will judge you in terms of your "upward mobility", but the way of the cross is "downward mobility".  Jesus said this is the way to life and peace.  When everybody else is worried about being liked by the popular kids, spend some time to see how the kids sitting alone at lunch feel.  While everybody else worries about a thinner waist or a larger chest, take some time to visit a hospital and talk to a woman dying of breast cancer.

I know that you have already seen some violence in cartoons and you can even be a little violent at times. Remember though, you do not have to fight violence with violence. There is another way, and it is the way of the cross. It is the harder way, but what Jesus taught us through his death was that love is always more powerful than violence.  Jesus started this non-violent movement, but Ghandi, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King and many others brought it down through the ages. Practice what they have to say about non-violence and encourage your little brother to practice non-violence. Boys sometimes have a harder time understanding non-violence.

While I believe that the cross is the door to life, some well-meaning religious people will use the cross in a way that may scare you to give you a distorted view of God.  As you get into middle school, they may tell you that Jesus died for your sins and that you have to be "saved" or you are going to hell. This is not what I believe. Your salvation is in God's hands - not in the hands of religious people.  Salvation is a gift that only God can give. There is no prayer we can pray to earn it. While it is true that you are a sinner and so am I, Jesus did not bribe an angry God with his death so that God will love you and rescue you from hell. God was not up in heaven waiting to be paid off by Jesus. God is the one who dies on the cross in Jesus Christ. God in Jesus Christ does not come to save us from the wrath of God but, instead, loves us so much that God saves us from our sin.  Jesus did not come to change God's mind but to express God's ongoing love for us.  Always remember that God loves you and will never stop loving you. God is for you and you can't do anything to lose God's love.

Hannah, someday I hope you can understand what I am trying to say. You will go through life in a world that either doesn't want to think about the pain of the cross or uses the cross to scare people.  You may not hear much about the cross we have been talking about, even in churches, but I believe it can be your best navigating tool through life.  The way to resurrected life goes through the cross.  Hold on to the cross."