Listen here.
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.
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