Good Friday Homily

                                                            Luke 23:33-43

                                   

God’s way is different.  It is different from anything we can understand or relate to. Throughout our religious history, God has been trying to tell us this.  Don’t do it like that.  Do it with love, do it with forgiveness and compassion and the courage to care for everyone – even those who don’t care for us, even our enemies, even those who hate us.  We didn’t listen when the prophets told us this, and when we could not live it based on what God said to us through scriptures and stories and people and history,  finally Jesus came.  God sent Jesus to show us this other way, this different way.  Jesus came, the ultimate king, who acts nothing like we expect or understand rulers or leaders to behave.  He doesn’t walk around with body guards protecting his every step.  He doesn’t insist on taking from the poor to feed himself or his family or his profession or the services he offers us.  He doesn’t build a strong defense system or walls. He doesn’t push anyone out, push anyone away. He shows us something very, VERY different.  He feeds anyone who comes to him hungry.  He heals anyone who comes to him sick (and sometimes even dead such as Talitha and Lazurus).  He listens and allows even the most rejected, the least “acceptable”, the least “worthy” to physically touch him.  He includes children, women, people of different nationalities and backgrounds such as the Syrophoenicians and the Samaritans, he includes tax collectors and prostitutes.  He doesn’t reject them because they aren’t “the chosen ones” or part of his nation, or part of what we deem acceptable.  He doesn’t take their wealth and live in a big mansion.  He lives poorly, simply, and asks for nothing in return.  He relies on the kindness of strangers and does not worry about his own survival or well-being.  He leads with TRUTH rather than threats or bribery.

And when THIS king, this king that we cannot understand, this king who acts completely differently from what we want or expect or demand from our human rulers, when this king is killed, as of course he would be for teaching such a radical, outrageous, different way of being; this king still, on the cross, in his dying moments, behaves completely differently from any king we can imagine.  He doesn’t send for his troops to rescue him.  He doesn’t call for war or seek violence or revenge in any way.  He doesn’t threaten to end or kill or even incarcerate or punish those who did this to him.  He doesn’t shout out “you will be sorry”, “You will pay for this”, and he doesn’t fight back. He does not jump off the cross to save himself, despite the pain, and the inevitable death that he faces.  He does not “negotiate” or play politics.  He does not play numbers games, he does not lie, he does not try to scare everyone or do what would inevitably boost his popularity.

Instead, as he hangs there on the cross, as he dies, as he suffers the deepest pain, he continues to think about others, others who are suffering.  And again, it isn’t the “good” people he worries about in that moment. It isn’t those who support him, those who love him, those who are kind to him.  It isn’t those who believe in him or who send money to his cause. It is anyone, anyone at all who is suffering.  He is hanging on the cross next to two people who have done wrong, who are being killed as criminals for some atrocity or another.  Maybe they were both murderers.  Maybe they killed children.  We aren’t told.  What we are told is that in that moment Jesus doesn’t ask.  He doesn’t care what they have done.  What he cares about is that they are scared and suffering.  And in that moment, this king, who does not “rescue” them or himself, even when he is goaded on to do so, instead, in that moment, as he suffers, hanging on the cross – he offers to the criminal crucified next to him the promise of paradise.  He reaches out with the strength of knowledge and love that goes beyond any personal suffering, and he offers life beyond life to the scared and dying person next to him. He also prays.  And his prayer, too, is not the prayer we would hear out of the mouths of earthly leaders.  It is not a prayer for victory.  It is not a prayer of revenge.  It isn’t a prayer of “show those people what they’ve done!”  His prayer is not one of anger or hate.  Instead, he asks God to forgive the people who are torturing him to his death.

This is the man who shows us who God is.  He lives life following God to the fullest, and he pays for it with death, a death he accepts even while he loves and cares for those around him, even those whom, like this criminal next to him, we would probably not deem worthy of that love or care.

This is the man who shows us who God is.  More, this is the man who calls us to go and do likewise.  Can we be so forgiving?  Can we put aside our need for vengeance, for revenge?  Can we put aside anger and hate?  Can we put aside our need for others who have hurt us to hurt as well?  God shows us what to do.  Jesus shows us what leads us into life.  All we have to do…all we have to do…is choose love.  

Good Friday Mini-Homily on 3rd Last Word

I was deeply privileged to be part of two amazing Good Friday services today.  The second one was led by our truly wonderful choir.  24 strong voices leading worship with the Tenebrae "Song of the Shadows" by Joseph Martin.  Incredibly beautiful.  Left me with goose bumps.  Such a gift to be in our darkening sanctuary listening and experiencing those words sung and spoken.

The first service today was an Ecumenical service, once again held at our local Catholic parish.  Each of four of us pastors/priests took one of the last 7 words and spoke on it.  So for the second time in three months I preached in a Catholic church.  Truly an honor to lead with my brothers of other faith traditions today.  Here is my sermonette on the words "Woman, here is your son....(Disciple), here is your mother."

John 19:23-27

               “And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.”  And it was right and good that he did so. And yet, it also shows a continuing misunderstanding of Jesus.  He had very little breath left.  He could not again spend it explaining everything he had taught to them, once more, from the beginning.  So he summed it up as concisely as possible with these words, “Woman behold your son.”  And to his disciple, “Behold your mother.”  And they made a start towards understanding it.  But they didn’t go far enough.

               The reality for women at that time was that they were supported by the men in their lives.  Unattached to a male, their lives were nothing.  Without Jesus, without her first son, it is likely that Mary would have had no living, no life, no support.  But perhaps more than that, she had lost this person whom she loved, her child, her everything.  And Jesus was trying to comfort her, trying to reassure both her and the disciple whom he loved that they would not be alone, that they would not be without support.  I’m sure it was a huge comfort to both to have each other, to have one another, to be together.  But it was only part of the picture. 

               Mitch Albom in his book, Have a Little Faith: A True Story (Hyperion, New York, 2009) shared that the Reb, or the Rabbi, whom he loved and who was the focus of the story, struggled with what seemed to be an increasing lack of community.

               “When I was growing up in the Bronx,” the Reb said, “everyone knew everyone.  Our apartment building was like family.  We watched out for one another.  I remember once, as a boy, I was so hungry, and there was a fruit and vegetable truck parked by our building.  I tried to bump against it, so an apple would fall into my hands.  That way it wouldn’t feel like stealing.  Suddenly, I heard a voice form above yelling at me in Yiddish, ‘Albert, that is forbidden!’  I jumped.  I thought it was God!”  Who was it? I asked. “A lady who lived upstairs… (the point is) We were part of each other’s lives.  If someone was about to slip, someone else could catch them…. We’re losing that now… everyone has a car.  Everyone has a million things scheduled.  How can you look out for your neighbor?  You’re lucky to get a family to sit down for a meal together.” (p 62,63)

               Again and again, Jesus called us to love one another.  Again and again Jesus reminded us that this is what our call is all about: caring for each other.  And not as an abstract concept but as a concrete, real idea, practical and necessary.  Jesus tells us later in John 17:20-23: "...that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, … The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one.”  Jesus’ whole ministry centered on how to do that, how to love one another.  He healed, he fed, he touched the untouchable, he uplifted the down trodden, he cared for those no one else even SAW, he talked to and honored women, children, Samaritans, Syrophoenicians, Gentiles – anyone and everyone he encountered. He stood up for those others would reject. But people still didn’t get it.  They still treated each other as strangers, as people we encounter but don’t really, truly LOVE.  So Jesus said it again, here, at the end of his life, in the most practical way he could to those who loved him the most.  “This is your mother.”  “This is your son.” 

I say those words to you again, for all to hear, “The woman sitting in front of you whom you do not know is your mother.  The child sitting in school struggling to understand his math is your son.  The man in prison whom you have never considered except to condemn or fear is your brother.  And the woman who hears voices, who talks to herself, is unbathed and uncombed, the one who lives on the street - she is your sister.  This is your family.  This is our family.  And we are called to love one another in that same way.

               “Woman, behold your son.” 

               “Disciple, behold your mother.”