God Is Dead

"God is dead." Friedrich Nietzsche made the saying famous. But Nietzsche borrowed it from Hegel. And Hegel took it from a line in an old Lutheran hymn for Holy Saturday. O Great Desolation, God, yes God, is dead! The hymn doesn't mean that the God who is Father in the Trinity suffered death. But it does saying something very bold: Whatever it means for a human being to suffer and die, God in Christ has fully experienced. On Good Friday the crucified God becomes the God who dies, the God who is dead.