Friday, April 14, 2017

April 14, 2017 - Good Friday


In the name of the Crucified God. Amen.
            One recent theologian, when writing on the Crucifixion has written “The cross must always be interpreted and re-placed at the center of Christian faith. There is a centrifugal force at work in human nature; we want to spin out and away from the offense of the cross.” And she’s correct – all you have to do is compare Good Friday attendance to Easter Sunday attendance to see that the Cross is a challenge. Another theologian has said “The Cross is not and cannot be loved.” The Cross is bloody, it is repulsive, it is a disgusting instrument of violence. And yet, St. Paul is able to say “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.” The Cross really is at the crux of our Christian faith.

            My advice for this day is to approach the Cross with your heart, not your head. Don’t worry about understanding how the Cross “works,” rather trust that it does. I’m currently about half-way through a book called The Crucifixion by Fleming Rutledge. It’s a 700-page book, which despite its length, I cannot recommend highly enough. But I’ll tell you that I’m no closer to understanding what the Cross is all about from having read the book. Rather, what happens when we focus on the Cross, either by reading about it, by gazing at our Crucifix, or through our Good Friday liturgy is that we come to appreciate the Cross. Even if we do not understand it, we can value Jesus’ death for us and the sins of the whole world.
            If you’re interested in reading about the Cross but aren’t sure that you can commit to 700 pages, then I’d recommend The Sign and the Sacrifice by Rowan Williams. At only 100 pages, it’s a more manageable read. Today as we reflect on the Cross, I’ll use these title of that book as a way of appreciating what the Cross is about.
            So first, the Cross is a sign. The Cross is the fullest revelation of God in Christ Jesus. While some complain that the Nicene Creed only mentions Jesus’ Crucifixion and Resurrection as it ignores his birth, teachings, and ministry, there is a deep wisdom in this sole focus on the Cross. The Cross is the epitome of Jesus’ mission – as it is a sign for all that Jesus did in his ministry and service to God.
            In Israel during the time of the Roman Empire, crucifixion was extremely painful, humiliating, and disgraceful. In fact, in Deuteronomy it states “For anyone hung on a tree is under God’s curse.” Even within Jewish understandings, being crucified was a sign that you had been cursed by God, that you were Godforsaken. Yet, in John we read of Cross as the glorification of Jesus – the event where God’s glory is most clearly seen in Jesus.
            So what is it that we see in the Cross? What glory is there to be found is such a repugnant sign? It is this: that the love of God will not be defeated, scared off, or minimized by anything that we can do. The chief priests and Pharisees, and Pontus Pilate pushed Jesus to edge. But Jesus pushed back by doing what he did throughout his life: forgiving, healing, loving. The Cross is a sign of God’s ultimate freedom – that nothing we can do is going to make God stop doing what God does. No sin of ours will change God’s mind, no obscenity of ours will make God retreat, not even our murder of God will diminish God’s love. God will save us, and there is nothing that we can or must do in order to deserve it or receive it.
The Cross is a sign that shows and points us towards something – namely the possibility of our reconciliation to God. The effects of sin, death, and fear, while still being very present, are no longer obstacles. The Cross gives us the possibility of a radically different sort of relationship with God – one of unconditional love. It is a love that is intended by God to transform our world, to transform our relationships, to transform our soul.
In his book, Rowan Williams tells the following story: In 19th century France, a young soldier makes a bet with some of his colleagues that he’d be able to get some sort of reaction out of a priest. So he goes to Confession and pours out every sin that he can think of in the most vivid and detailed of terms. This solider thought he was quite clever and expected to get some sort of reaction out of the priest. But there was a silent pause after his Confession. The priest then said “Now, my son, I want you to go to the middle of the church and stand in front of that large Crucifix and say to Jesus ‘You died for all of those sins, and I don’t give a damn.’ And I want you to keep saying it as many times as you can.” So the young soldier went out to Crucifix and looked up at it and started to open his mouth. But as he looked upon the Crucified Jesus, he couldn’t muster a word. He then left the military and joined a monastery. This story exemplifies the power of the sign of the Cross.
On the Cross, Jesus made himself a symbol, a communication, of God’s love. If we can dare to look at the Cross, we too can be transformed. As the great hymn proclaims “When I survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died, my richest gain I count but loss, and pour contempt on all my pride. Were the whole realm of nature mine, that were a present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.” The Cross is a sign of this love so amazing.
In addition to being a sign, the Cross is also a sacrifice. By sacrifice, I mean that it did something, that it was more than just a senseless murder. I realize that in many circles, there has been a deemphasizing of sacrificial language when it comes to the Cross. But to ignore the sacrifice of the Cross is to ignore most of Scripture. Throughout the Old Testament, we can read about the practice of making sacrifices to restore the relationship to God. Not only did these animals sacrifices have an element of forgiveness, but in a very practical way, they provided meat for the community to eat in a shared meal. Is this not what the Eucharist proclaims – that through Jesus’ death we have been reconciled to God and have fellowship with one another?
So as the faithful Jewish followers of Jesus struggled to comprehend the notion of a crucified Messiah, they could not help but see Jesus’ death as analogous to their religious traditions which provided both forgiveness and sustenance. Jesus’ death was a sacrifice in that it broke the chain of consequences between evil actions and evil consequences. Certainly, torturing someone to death on a cross is evil. And yet, what comes out of Jesus’ death is not more evil, but the salvation of the world.
What the sacrifice of Jesus does is to do what we ourselves cannot do. Because we are captive to the realities of Sin and Death, we can never be fully obedient to God. But Jesus, as perfectly human and perfectly divine, could. Jesus’ obedience to the Father opens up what had become closed off because of Sin. Jesus’ life of obedience to God and ultimate sacrifice remakes what it means to be a human, it reframes what is possible, it gives us a new possibility. This is what we read today in Hebrews, that the sacrifice led to “the new and living way that Jesus opened for us.”
Even if we find the imagery of sacrifice and bloodshed to be archaic and offensive, nevertheless, Jesus’ death did something – namely giving us a bridge to God that crosses the chasm of Sin and Death that we ourselves cannot cross by ourselves. The ancient Church Father, Gregory of Nazianzus wrote “For that which He has not assumed He has not healed; but that which is united to His Godhead is also saved.” In other words, because Jesus sacrificed his life to God in the face of the powers-that-be, because Jesus went all the way down into the depravity of human sin, into the God-forsakenness of crucifixion, into the darkness of death, then we are raised with him all the way back up into the glory of God..
Now you might wonder – what difference does this sacrifice mean for me? When I think of the “so what” of Jesus’ Crucifixion, I think of the saints of the Church. There have been people who have lived their lives in the glory of the Cross. Being aware of God’s all-surpassing love they have become unafraid of Death and resolute in standing up against Sin. I think of people who risk their lives to save others. I think of people who have died for their faith. I think of people who have dared to stand up against injustice, people like Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, St. Teresa, St. Perpetua, St. Stephen, St. Alban. Their ministry was enabled by the sign and sacrifice of the Cross.
One of most over-used and misapplied Biblical passages comes from Philippians – “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” It doesn’t mean that you can throw touchdowns, pass a test, or anything like that. Rather, it means that because of Christ’s sacrifice and beating down of Sin and Death, that we can partake of that new and redeemed way of life.

And that is why the Cross matters and why, as gruesome as it is, that it must be at the foundation of our faith. The Cross is a sign, showing us of God’s deep and abiding love. The Cross is a sacrifice, restoring us to the full stature of our humanity. The Cross is not to be understood, it to be appreciated. May the love of the Cross transform your soul and our world. Amen.