In the name of God ☩ Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
Tonight, as we continue considering the emotions of Holy Week, we turn to courage – both the courage that we see in Jesus and the courage that he intends to instill in us. This week which we call holy focuses on the Passion of Jesus. Passion, in Latin, means “to suffer,” which is where we get the phrase “The Passion of Jesus Christ.” But for us English speakers, “passion” more often means intense feelings and desires that are rooted in the heart. And this definition connects to courage. The root of the word “courage” is “heart.” So, when someone says “take heart,” it’s an appeal to be courageous. Ultimately, love is what drives the Passion of Jesus and so there is no Holy Week without the heart, without courage.
Jesus’ words in John show us what courage looks like and where it is founded. Now, for some, courage might not be classified as an emotion. Some would say that courage might be a trait or a quality, but not an emotion. However, courage very much is. While there is no scientific or therapeutic consensus on how to define an emotion, many people say that an emotion is a physiological response to the world around us. And so, the ability to meet challenges with optimism and resolve is the emotion of courage. Courage is the mental and emotional response of “neverthelessness,” “bravery,” or “strength in the face of challenges.”
We see this courage on display when Jesus says, “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – ‘Father, save me from this hour? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.’” It is the courage of trusting that this moment is his purpose and faithfully walking the way of the Cross. Earlier in John, at the wedding at Cana, Jesus tells his mother, “My hour has not yet come.” But here and now, Jesus recognizes that it is, indeed, his hour. Later, in the garden, Jesus will pray “Not my will, but thy will be done.” Perhaps his mother Mary taught him that prayer, as she herself prayed a courageous prayer when the angel Gabriel came to her. She said, “Let it be with be according to your word.” Jesus’ courage is in accepting that his Passion is the culmination of his ministry.
Sometimes what God gives us to do is challenging and costs us something. It cost Mary the vision of what she thought her life would look like and it cost her watching her son be tortured and executed. Obedience to God cost Jesus his life. When we dare to follow Jesus, there will be a cost. It will be financial in that we will give to the Church and the needy instead of buying more and more. There be temporal costs as we invest our time in prayer and service. There will be relational costs because when we stand up for justice, we will usually face backlash. Following Jesus is not always comfortable or convenient, and so we will need courage to follow him.
When the Greeks came to Philip, they said, “We wish to see Jesus.” When we dare to see and follow Jesus, there will be a cost. The library at Virginia Seminary has a quote at the front entrance that I’ve always appreciated and been challenged by – “Seek the truth: come whence it may, cost what it will, lead where it might.” That’s courage – to persist when the road is uncertain and challenging.
Jesus presents this courage in the form of a short parable, saying “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” Here, we see that courage is about having a sanctified imagination, a mind that can see things that the eyes cannot, a hope that is yet to be proven.
The example that Jesus uses for this courage to see more deeply is that of the seed. A seed, if it remains unplanted and unburied, is just a single seed. It has not come to the hour of its purpose, which is to go into the ground and be transformed into something new. Jesus notes that when the seed dies, it bears much fruit. When the one seed is buried, many more seeds come into being as a result. One apple seed ends up becoming many other apples. But this takes a courageous trust this process – to take the one seed that we have and bury it. It is to put things in God’s hands as we wait for new life to come.
Jesus then applies this parable to his own impending death. He says, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” It is the courage to believe, as one Prayer Book prayer puts it, that “the way of the cross is the way of life peace.” Only in the gracious imagination of God can any of this make sense. Who could have imagined that God would save the world through a shameful instrument of death? Who would have written the story of God Almighty dying at the hands of the creatures he had made? Who expects life to come from death? It takes an audacious and even belligerent hope to make this connection. It’s a courage that defies explanation, which is exactly the point we heard made in First Corinthians: “the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
This is what today’s Collect lays out for us: “O God, by the passion of your blessed Son you made an instrument of shameful death to be for us the means of life: Grant us so to glory in the cross of Christ.” This is a paradox, an oxymoron, a mystery, that we would glory in the cross. Jesus courageously faces his Passion, as he is able to see the beauty of the cross and the hope of the buried seed. And his courage then becomes an example for us to follow. He tells us to walk in the light and not stumble in the darkness. The light in which we walk is his own courage to face his hour.
Whatever you are facing, whatever fears, uncertainties, sins, or doubts you are dealing with, you are not alone. Jesus is with you and is opening possibilities that we cannot yet see or even imagine. Being courageous isn’t the same as not being afraid. We can courageously move forward in faith while still being frightened. Courage is about continuing to give, to serve, to trust even when we are scared and uncertain.
So how do we summon courage? Well, we might try a few things. For one, we keep the example of the cross always before us. It’s why we should have crosses on our walls and around the house. It reminds us of the mystery of faith: Christ has died, Christ has risen, Christ will come again. Courage comes in remembering that salvation comes from the most unexpected of places.
Another way to find courage is to, as best as we can, internalize the message of Grace – trusting that our salvation does not come from our own deserving or earning, but is a gift of love from the God who loves so much as to die not only for us, but because of us. We have courage because we know that there is nothing that we can ever do to undeserve God’s love or be abandoned.
One other way to grow in courage is to do the holy work of discernment through prayer and conversation with trusted spiritual leaders. When we come to know when it is our hour to act, courage can follow more easily. That doesn’t always make the action easy, but when we trust that we have been called, the same Holy Spirit who called us will strengthen and guide us along the way.
The author Simon Sinek knows that courage is always an external force, not something we have to go inward and dig up. He said that the parachuter gets courage not from within, but from the parachute on their back. The acrobat who is practicing out a new death-defying stunt for the first time is courageous, not because she knows that she won’t fall, but because she knows there is a net if she does. Well, for us, our courage comes from Jesus Christ, who is always with us and always for us. Our Good Shepherd is always with us and has a rod and staff to guide and protect us.
As we draw nearer to the Cross on Good Friday, we will need to all the courage we are given to see it as the beautiful sign of our salvation that it is instead only a reminder of the ugliness of human sin. Thanks be to God that Jesus demonstrates his courage for us so that we might walk the way of the Cross in faith, hope, and love.
