Be Brave.

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Even This.

A sermon for Good Friday.
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Good Friday 2016

March 25, 2016

Mark 15:16-39

Grace to you and Peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Pilate asked, “Are you king?”

The people mocked “Hail, King of the Jews!”

The inscription of the charge against him read, “The King of the Jews.”

They knew he saved others… they thought the King of Israel could not save himself.

What kind of King is this? In what kind of kingdom does he reign?

From Mark chapter 1: “Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’

Where is God’s kingdom now?

All of these questions swirl around as we hear the story.  The story of Jesus the King, who triumphantly rode into Jerusalem, then offered his own life as the new covenant, and ends up here, on a cross. 

We can’t help but ask: Why?

Why is this how it has to end? What was God thinking? Is this God’s will?

Our king hanging on a cross.  The defeat of God’s kingdom could not be more clearly defined. 

So is this defeat of God’s ways in the world?  This cross on which our king hangs?  Has evil had the last word?  Have we been right to fear death all along? 

As we discovered last night, memory matters when it comes to God’s will.  We need to know what God has done in the past to see what God might be doing now… or to determine what God might do in the future.  This is the struggle: to seek God’s will, to seek God’s kingdom over and above the evil forces of the world that seek to destroy people, relationships and community.

What we know from our remembering of the Passover, and the whole Israelite story since the garden of Eden, is that God’s will is to make and fulfill promises.  We re-member the covenants, the promises, God has made with God’s people.  The covenant marked by the Passover in Egypt and the new covenant Jesus is enacting this holy week. And in between, God wills the covenant over and over again. God finds ways to wake us up – to open our eyes – to the ways in which God is already working in our world.  Working to redeem creation to the harmony for which it was made.  Working to bring us back, again and again from the selfish, broken state we cannot escape.

I was reminded of this during the recent tragedy of a police officer killed on the Pike.  There is no good explanation for this tragic death than that humans are broken people.

I was reminded of this when I heard of the fire at the publick house, most likely set ablaze by a cigarette butt somewhere.  Humans fail to be vigilant. 

I was reminded of it with the latest attack in Brussels… there is evil in the world, and it is easy, it is natural, it is sadly normal, for us humans to be lured into it.

I am reminded of it every time I hear public figures in our place and time talk about registering people of one religion, and torturing people God has created, and killing wives and children of people who commit heinous crimes, and refer to women as if they are objects.  As in Jesus time, our public conversation is looking for someone or something to hang on a cross.  We want it to be true that if we just pinpoint the cause of our fear, anxiety and pain… someone or something… that we can get rid of our struggle with evil.

But, then, I am reminded of Paul’s words to the Romans… “For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.”

Tonight, of all nights, is the moment in our sacred story that we face evil, the evil even within us.  We learn that God’s will is that evil may never win, and yet it does.  For God allows the brokenness and sin of humanity to continue to exist.  Remember when he promised not to wipe it out again after the flood?  God just keeps acting into our war-torn world with persistent love.  God keeps moving so that we might have hope.  God keeps using those who trust him, and even those who don’t, to show grace and goodness in the world.  On the day Jesus died, evil won… or thought it did.  Evil killed Jesus, the insane, consistent, persistent evil that catches us all up in the mockers and murderers and leaves blood on our hands. 

But that blood, put there by evil is just one more tool for God.  For God takes this death, this humiliation, this horrifying reality that we continue to recreate in our world throughout history: in Syria, Libya, Iraq, every country, just as much in the United States.  We hang our brothers and sisters on the lynching tree and though God never intended the violence, God takes that violence and does something we could never do: transforms it, and transforms us with it.  For we stand with the Centurion at the foot of the cross, or at the site of a car crash, or watching a building burn to the ground, or hear that mean-spirited talk, and we look for God.  We see God, right in the middle of the violence and destruction, dying with those who have been robbed of their lives.  There is God, at the side of every hurt, every injury and death, of every grief and pain.  There is God, dying along with us… For in dying himself God shows us the way to new life. 

This is a night of deep despair, and we must allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by it.  Overwhelmed by the brokenness and human pride.  The conceited idiocy that led to this beautiful man being killed.  Because we could not stand the possibility that God’s kingdom is for more than just me.  That God’s kingdom is for more than just my family and my people.  What Jesus taught throughout his life: that all people are loved by God.  That teaching disrupted the society in his day, just as much as it does ours.  Because if we actually live as if everyone is loved by God, we have to examine our assumptions and tendencies and our judgement of others.  So instead we kill the one who is more than the messenger, he is the message.  We kill the one who embodies the wholeness, the healing, the love of God’s kingdom.  And with our violence, we help along the purpose for which he came.  Because in his death, Jesus the king proclaims once again, this is How Much God Loves You and you and you and you and you and everyone.  This is how much God loves you and wants you back on the side of blessing the world with his love. 

In being the king who suffers, sacrifices and dies, God says… even this.  EVEN THIS.  Even THIS I will use.  Even This I WILL Redeem.  Even this I will make NEW.  Even this I will turn around.  Even this I will make into more than you ever intended.  Even this I will turn… just wait and see.  This is God’s great and gracious will. 

Where is God’s kingdom?  Hanging on that cross.

The kingdom of God has come near, repent and believe in the good news that even this horrifying scene, God will make new.

Amen.

Holy Joy... in Holy Week.

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It was the beginning of a new year when they found that borrowed room. The Jewish year begins with The Passover.  A holiday of Holy Joy!  The holiday that celebrates the great liberation God has given.  It sounds quite strange to our ears, especially the bloodiness of the remembering. The moment itself, the moment of freedom was surely mixed with anxiety and fear as the people awaited on God’s promise.  We might feel the same, for in the re-membering, the re-living of this historical moment of freedom, we know the end of the story: both the evil of the cross and the final great victory over death.  The covenant that God makes with God’s people: first in the Passover, then again in Jesus.  For us, a life of promise and hope, a life of justice and breaking oppressive forces.  A life of joy and freedom!  To get to the fullness of that promise, we must understand something of what the Passover was like for Jesus and the disciples. 

As we hear in Exodus, that first Passover was a meal, but it was far more.  Each household slaughtered a first born unblemished lamb.  The innocence, perfection and value of the animal mattered. They carefully drained the animal of its blood out of respect for the life of the animal.  The blood was seen as the source of life – literally “lifeblood” – as we say.  The blood was used for a sacred purpose.  They put some of the blood on their doorframe.  They marked the entrance to the house they lived in so that the angel of death would know that God’s faithful people were there.  Who would do this if they were not trusting in God to save them?  It was an outward sign of the invisible God.  A foretelling of the covenant that named and claimed them as God’s people.  This is the night they remembered their identity.  With this lifeblood, marking the doorway to their homes, they claimed the promise God made to them: that they would be set free! 

It is helpful to remember that this festival is full of anticipation and joy!  It is easy to lose this feeling tonight.  It all sounds very earthy, and maybe horrifying to us.  But we hold the same sacred attitude towards blood, if you think about it.  A bloody scene makes us recoil, it tells us that life is in danger here, and we move immediately to keep the blood where it belongs.  This act of using animal blood was a great sacrifice, an act not in one’s own self-interest if you wanted to keep your flock growing.  This very human act was not for the sake of gore, but a sacrificial offering to honor God as the one who gives us life in the first place.

The blood was first put on the doorways the night that God showed God’s power with the 10^th plague.  It was extreme.  But it was the 10^th.  Nine signs had been given before this to Pharoah and to the whole people of Egypt.  God commanded that the oppressors stop oppressing.  God demanded that the slaves be let free.  And God showed God’s power 9 different ways before this so that they might be sufficiently warned.  So that they might clearly understand that God meant for the command of freedom to be obeyed.  A parent warning a child 9 times is either ineffective or incredibly patient.  In either case, grace, not punishment, is clearly the goal.  And so on the 10^th plague, arguably the most horrific of God’s actions in scripture.  God allows the killing of all the oldest sons in every household in Egypt.  Every household who does not have the blood on a lamb on their doorframe.  Every household who is not faithful to God’s command of justice, freedom, grace and love.

The blood in itself is a powerful reminder of salvation from this death toll.  Yet, the remembering doesn’t stop there.  In this holiday called The Passover, the Jewish people roast the lamb and eat a very special meal where each dish on the table symbolized the experience of the people.  They eat bitter herbs which represent the bitterness of the slavery in which the faithful people are trapped.  They eat flatbread, because there is no time for waiting on yeast to rise when they await the call to flee.  They drink from four cups of wine, at the beginning, the middle, the end of the meal – each time focusing on what God is about to do.  The lamb itself is consumed, every bit of it, any leftovers are to be burned, for this is a sacred meal, not to be boxed up in Tupperware for the next day.  There is no next day in this memory.  Only this moment of faithfulness. 

There is no next day in this place.  Not even time for yeast to rise!  No tomorrow in the depths of hell on earth.  Tonight we will be set free.  Tonight we will escape the trap of our bondage.  Tonight we will leave this existence where we are worked to death and broken by the oppressive forces that hold us back from seeing God’s created humanity in one another.  Tonight we will leave Egypt.

This is the meal that Jesus was eating for his Last Supper as we call it.  This is the remembrance he and his disciples were enacting.  Faithfully, they lived again the moment of salvation.  The moment when God took away the chains of hopelessness and despair and gave them a new life! 

This is the bread that was on Jesus’ table.  These are the cups that were poured out.  This is the blood that the disciples had drained from the lamb. 

The same bread of life Jesus gave to them, saying this is MY BODY.  Now this is more than bread in a hurry. This is bread that graces our table with the urgency of the new life that is coming !  This bread that nourishes your body, your actual body, and our actual community.  

The same cup of life Jesus lifted up, saying this is MY BLOOD of the covenant, poured out for you.  Now this is more than blood from a precious lamb.  [More than the blood of the Saini covenant for Atonement.]  This is blood from God’s firstborn.  Now this cup is more than remembering the salvation of God from Egypt, it is the salvation of God for the slavery to sin. 

{Joy} In this meal Jesus brings us in to experience the Passover of the plague and freedom from Egypt by his Passover from the death which is on our doorstep to the new life that is promised, once again. In this meal, Jesus transforms US.  By eating and drinking his very body and blood, a thing we would never do otherwise, this is what makes us one with the one who embodies the kingdom.  This is where we know God shows up – each time we gather around Christ’s table. By eating and drinking we become the Body of Christ in the world!

Standing at the door, waiting to take a life, is the evil that God has not stopped.  The killing in which God will not intervene.  The violence that God has entered with a body just like ours.   God’s very kingdom has come near to the earth in flesh and blood, and yet we have rejected it.  Betrayed it with 30 pieces of silver and a kiss on the very night when the joyous kingdom is lived out in this Meal!  Fell asleep when we were to keep awake for this kingdom.  Denied the kingdom three times while it was on trial.  Shown our allegiance is still handcuffed to the belief that we know best.  Our loyalty is found where our security is best served, rather than our neighbors. 

And so the story of Jesus and his followers continues tomorrow… the story of what happened when God’s heavenly kingdom showed up on earth. The story of God making yet one more cosmic covenant with us: the promise of freedom, redemption and hope.  Let us listen, receive and pray…

Holy and Gracious God you have given us the gift of this new covenant in your blood.  You have given us the story of your people and grafted us into it, even us who were not of Abraham’s line until the baptismal waters hit our head.  Thank you for making us your people.  Thank you for your continual promises that evidence your deep and abiding love. 

Amen.