Good Friday 2012

The Rev. Tommy Thompson
Good Friday Year B
6 April 2012

“Why Did He Have to Suffer Like This!?”

This past Sunday, the Sunday of the Passion, I shared the story of an occurrence that I will never forget...It happened one Saturday in Barnes & Noble.  My wife Leslie was in her favorite section, thumbing through a few of her favorite authors, and I was in the Religion and Philosophy section, getting lost in a few of my own.  There were many people there that day...but there was one father and son who really caught my attention.  They walked right past me as I was sitting in the floor reading a book in the religion section.  The little boy saw an image on one of the covers that mesmerized him.  It was the icon of Jesus’ passion...it showed the crown of thorns that had been plated on Jesus’ head and did not hide the blood that flowed from his brow...Jesus’ face was the very definition of agony and sorrow.  It was not a pleasing picture, as it shouldn’t have been...it was very truth-telling...Jesus’ death as an experience of deep agony ... deep suffering.

The little boy saw the picture and stared for a moment and then looked at his dad and said, “Dad, what happened to that poor man?!”  His dad looked somewhat embarrassed because of how loud the boy had said it, and especially because of who he said it about...talking about Jesus in public is scandalous you know...his dad, under his breath, said, “that’s Jesus on the cross.”  The boy said, “Why did he have to suffer like that?  Why?! Tell me.”  The dad just kinda kept walking, picking up his pace, urging his son to keep walking with him...i mean the place was full of people...he didn’t want to get into all that right there in barnes and noble...its far too scandalous!  But the boy wouldn’t stop.  He repeated, “What did he do to deserve it?”  and then , “Dad, did they ever catch those people that did that horrible thing to him?”

On Sunday our focus was upon that brilliant question offered by one of those Jesus has told us to pay close attention to -- the little ones.  In an attempt to answer the boy’s question, we stood as if on the other side of the window and gazed through to see all the suspects in hopes that we would identify who was really responsible for the suffering and death of Jesus.  There were many suspects who were analyzed, but in the end, we were invited to stop looking through the glass....to stop identifying potential suspects, and instead turn and look into the mirror...and then, at that realization, we had to tell the little boy the truth -- he did it.  I did it. You did it. We did it.  We all are responsible for the death of the Son of God, and it is the most horrific crime ever committed.  As the hymn we opened with today said so poignantly, “I crucified Thee.”

Today our focus is on the other question the brilliant boy so daringly asked.  Why did he have to suffer?  Why did Jesus have to die?

There have been many attempts in answering this question.  There are many theories or metaphors out there that attempt to help us understand the suffering and death of Jesus and how it relates to our salvation.  And because of this, we must be very careful not to take one theory or metaphor too far. We must remember to take each metaphor for what it is...one metaphor alone cannot sufficiently answer the question, “Why did Jesus have to die?” ...

I think it best that we allow the metaphors or theories of atonement to co-exist side by side so as to attempt to tell the story as a whole. There are many ways the death of Jesus is portrayed, and all of the portrayals, together, reveal as much light as is needed for us to respond to God’s gracious initiative.  

And Hebrews is one of those portrayals that doesn’t leave many stones left unturned in it’s efforts to deal with questions such as the one the boy in Barnes & Noble asked that day.

In Hebrews, we get a holistic portrayal of the “why” of Jesus’ death and how his suffering and death relates to our salvation and the rest of the events of his life. One would be hard pressed to read Hebrews and still believe the only event in the life of Christ that matters is his death or not have that one metaphor he or she has held on to for so long be shaken and challenged.  Today, the author of Hebrews does what any response to this boy’s question HAS TO DO...Hebrews demonstrates the continuity that exists between Jesus pre-existence as Son of God, His incarnation, His life, His suffering, His death, His resurrection, and His ascension.  It is not simply Jesus death that has brought to us salvation...it is the whole story.  If we start and stop with the crucifixion, Jesus is nothing but another would-be victor of the Roman Empire who was revealed to be a criminal and a phony.  Our response to the boy, then, would be: Jesus was one of many who was crucified outside of town for claiming to be someone he wasn’t.

Jesus is truly God and fully human. To truly help the young boy know why Jesus had to die, we must begin here.  When the author of the Hebrews Epistle talks about the death of the Christ, he cannot cease to talk about the incarnation of the Son.  I think this is what draws me to this letter more than anything else.  Hebrews looks at the little boy and says, “He had to suffer this way and die because he loves you. Because He loves you so much, he came down and did not shun the virgin’s womb, but has identified with you in your human struggle fully and completely. In that struggle, he has opened to you the gates of everlasting life.”  I think that’s really a summation of what Hebrews is all about.

I love the way Hebrews 2:14-18 lays it out: “Since, therefore, the children share flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is , the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.  For it is clear that he did not come to help angels, but the descendants of Abraham.  Therefore he had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect, so that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make a sacrifice of atonement of the sins of the people.  Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.”

We whose hosannas were the worst april fools joke of the day this past Sunday, who later on shouted crucify him, are the passion of the Son of God. As result of our sinfulness, God the Father looked on us not with anger or hatred but with love and compassion, in sympathy.  And he turned that sympathy into more than even empathy when he took upon Himself our human flesh to live our life to the fullest, yet without sin.  He took evil on head on -- for us.  He knew how bad evil had its grip on us...that’s why he went through with it from beginning to the end.  So that his sinlessness would overcome our sinfulness...so that love would overcome hatred....so that the everlasting life of God would overcome the everlasting death of human sin and unrighteousness!   That’s why Jesus chose to die...why God believed he had too...because that’ s just how strong God’s love is for us!

We are the guilty party, yes, and though it is the most horrible of crimes, it is not a bad thing for us to embrace the fact that we are all guilty.  Jesus died because that’s what evil does to those who don’t get with it’s program...  BUT, he died because in his death, he reveals to us the true power of God that God’s been trying to get into our thick skulls from the very beginning.  He dies because power is not what we thought it was.  And in his death true power is revealed...it is the only power that will last -- self-giving, other forgiving and receiving love.  Jesus has known this love since before the foundation of the world -- he is the exact imprint of the life of God, as Hebrews makes clear.  Now, love crucified reveals to us the very heart of God.  To embrace our guilt is to embrace the truth that he willingly submitted himself to our evil and twisted trial and persecution, the whole time in order to forgive us and restore us.  That’s real justice...the restorative justice of the Triune God!

On the cross, God is revealed most fully for who God is...and he ends up not being a mean God who demands retributive justice, but, instead, humility who offers grace upon grace, mercy upon mercy...who exclaims “forgive them for they know not what they do.”  God turns out to be the God of restorative grace...the God who makes what was old brand new...who reinvigorates and repurposes that which was decaying and lost.  

So on Good Friday, we are called to confess our sinfulness and our guiltiness.  Because in that confession and realization, we experience not retributive justice but restorative grace...the restorative justice of resurrection into the new creation opened to us by Jesus’ incarnation, life, death, resurrection, ascension and the pouring out of the Spirit on Pentecost.

That’s what our priest has done and is doing for us.  We who killed Jesus were the whole time His mission, His passion.  God the Father called/appointed Him to be our Great High Priest -- our representative.  Even though, or especially because, we didn’t know how to follow him, he offered the perfect sacrifice for our sins and the sins of the whole world -- his very life.  And that offering of love overcame sin and the sting of death once and for all.  I believe one of the oldest songs the church sings sums it up perfectly when it exclaims that Christ has trampled down death by death and upon those in the tombs has bestowed life.

As we live now, in the time between Christ’s resurrection and everyone else's, we, like the original hearers of the Hebrews Epistle, will be tested in every way because of this confession in Jesus Christ--the source of our salvation.  The response we’ve offered to the little boy through Hebrews will get you in trouble in this world that still holds on to it’s power which is really weakness and it’s wisdom which is really foolishness.  The first readers of Hebrews were being disowned by family, beaten, kicked out of the places of worship they knew their whole life and even killed because of this very confession & response.

And sisters and brothers, when we let the crucified One be the center of our life together, the age that is passing away will treat us as it did Jesus and his early followers.  When, not if, this happens, we are invited to remember and live in the whole life of Jesus summed up in this amazing invitation:

“Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession.  For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every way has been tested/temped as we are, yet without sin.  Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

That invitation is enough until Christ comes again.  Amen.