Good Friday has to provoke a reaction in us. Imagine you were there on that Friday, watching from a
distance. Imagine coming home and writing a diary entry. What does seeing Jesus
on the cross do to you? What will you do with Jesus called the Messiah? Will
you like the crowd at Pilate’s question, shout “Crucify him!” Is he too much
trouble for you, unsettling your life, your plans, your church even? Is he
offering you a religion that is too radical, his claim to be God too much?
What will you do with Jesus called the Messiah?
Will you run away like most of the disciples, too scared to
hang around, a cross too bloody, too nasty to even look at. A lot of people
stay away from church today.
They don’t want to think about murder, and blood and death. I
got the children at St Helens last Sunday to shout the words of Holy Week. We
shouted Hosanna first, then I wanted them to shout Crucify. Evelyn said “I
don’t want to” and so she didn’t. She told me it was too sad. We want to walk
away from the horror of crucifixion and not be involved. What will you do with
Jesus called the Messiah? Abandon him. Alone, abandoned, forsaken, Jesus dies
on the cross. Alone, because we walk away, turn our backs.
We want to make our cross look pretty and look nice, but a
crucified man should shock us, barbarically got rid of in this way. We’d rather
not be there.
What will you do with Jesus called the Messiah? Perhaps on
this Good Friday you will stay with him, you will stand with him, you will let
him love you, for here, on this cross is how far in love God is prepared to go
to convince us we are worth something. Perhaps on this Good Friday you will see
a Jesus who identifies with the world and its pain because he is in the world
and suffers the pain with the world.
He is
crucified not once but today, many times. The Iona book of reflections I have
been using in my own quiet times this week says in the reading for today:
“Crucifixion – we shouldn’t be too surprised – we shouldn’t really be
altogether shocked, either.
I mean it’s what we do, you know, to the pure in heart, to
the folk naïve enough to think that their one brave act can change a system,
bring down an unjust empire, and make a difference in the course of history.
They are crucified, not just stopped, or silenced, or shut down, but crushed,
humiliated, made an example of, power does not like to be challenged. This story
is harrowing because it is so familiar.” What will you do with Jesus called the
Messiah? Can you offer a God to a world that is crucifying others, a God who
knows what it is to suffer, a God who suffers but who will have the last word.
What will you do with Jesus the Messiah? Will you stand at
the cross this morning and worship him? Will you understand how much he gets
what you are going through, and knows what people you meet are going through,
bereavement, tragedy, sudden pain, uncertainty, questions, doubt, fear,
abandonment. Will you in your church offer this Jesus to others, a God who
walks with people. We call Jesus Emmanuel at Christmas, God is with us. We
should call him that today – God is with us right where we are, where the pain
is, and he transforms that pain having entered it. Today is not about some
wishy washy nicey nice Christian sweetness that denies the reality of the
world. Today reminds us that real Christianity costs. People need to know it
can deal with hard complicated stuff.
I watched the Leaders Debate last night, and then got into a
huge Facebook debate with my friends because I suggested that Nicola Sturgeon
was the most down to earth, natural, credible, genuine of the bunch. I know her SNP views. I wasn’t commenting on her policies. I was commenting about someone maybe who lived real life
rather than spouting at us from on high. Real leadership has to be messy and
has to suffer to understand the messy suffering people around it. On Radio 4,
at 3pm this afternoon, when they always do a powerful half hour programme,
there are testimonies of staying in the suffering – someone in West Africa
staying despite the Ebola virus and people in Eyam in Derbyshire during the
plague. It is easier to be aloof or to scarper.
I pray on Good Friday we will be prepared to stand by
Jesus. By his dying, we are brought into relationship with God. By his dying,
we are cared for where we are. By his dying, the price of our mistakes has been
paid. We go forward and we anticipate Easter but first we have to stop here and
consider who Jesus is and what we will do with him as a church.
I always like to read Jurgen Moltmann in Holy Week. He talks
about hope this week and why today is called Good.
“The ultimate reason for our hope is not to be found at all
in what we want, wish for and wait for; the ultimate reason is that we are
wanted and wished for and waited for. What is it that awaits us? Does anything
await us at all, or are we alone?
Whenever we base our hope on trust in the divine mystery, we
feel deep down in our hearts: there is someone who is waiting for you, who is
hoping for you, who believes in you. We are waited for as the prodigal son in
the parable is waited for by his father. We are accepted and received, as a
mother takes her children into her arms and comforts them. God is our last hope
because we are God's first love.”
Pilate said “what do you want me to do with
Jesus called the Messiah?” On Good Friday, your answer to that question
matters.
O Lord and Master Jesus Christ, Word of the Everlasting
Father, you have borne our grief and carried the burden of our human frailty,
by the power of your Holy Spirit renew in your church gifts of healing and send
out your disciples again to preach the Gospel of your Kingdom, to heal the
sick, and to relieve the sufferings of your children, to the praise and glory
of your holy name.
By your passion protect us, by your wounds heal us, by your
death, raise us up, and bring us to life eternal. Amen.
(David Adam)
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