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Good Friday
Almighty God, we beseech thee graciously to behold this thy family, for whom our Lord Jesus Christ was contented to be betrayed, and given into the hands of sinners, and to suffer death upon the cross; who now liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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Good Friday
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Scripture citation(s): Luke 23:34, 43, 46; John 19:25-27, 28, 30; Matthew 27:46
A Sermon by
Fr. Daniels; Fr. Spurlock; The Rev. Canon Carl Turner;
on
Luke 23:34, 43, 46; John 19:25-27, 28, 30; Matthew 27:46
✛
Meditations on the Seven Last Words of Christ
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The First Word
The Reverend Carl F. Turner, Rector
“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
Making one’s confession is a very private thing and the priest is bound by the seal of the confessional. But making one’s confession is at the same time not at all a private affair; first we share with a priest the things that we have done wrong and, secondly, in that sharing we discover how much our sins affect others – perhaps our friends or our families, our work colleagues or even people we do not really know, the world around us and, of course, our relationship with God. What confession teaches us is that our sins, although very personal (after all, the middle letter of the word sin is ‘I’) affect our relationships. That is why the proper name for making one’s confession is reconciliation.
I am very fond of one of the traditional prayers used by the priest at the end of the rite of reconciliation:
“May the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and of all the saints, whatever good you do and suffering you endure, heal your sins, help you to grow in holiness, and reward you with eternal life.”
It reminds me that this reconciliation takes place on my journey of life and that I am not alone – the prayers of the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints means that my state of life affects the Church which is the body of Christ. It also encourages me because whatever good I do or suffering I endure is part of that same journey accompanied by saints known and unknown. But, ultimately, what is it that heals my sins, helps me grow in holiness and gives me the promise of eternal life? The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Over these three hours, when we reflect on the Lord Jesus, crucified and dying on the cross, we reflect on the difference this has made to you and to me, to those who have died and to those yet to be born. The death of Jesus on the cross is more than an historical event; it is a sign of God’s power and the turning upside down of human values and human expectations.
We know very little of the first 30-something years of the life of Jesus but of the last days and hours we know a great deal. The Gospels devote almost half of their accounts of the life of Jesus to his passion, death and resurrection. If the word ‘Gospel’ means ‘Good News,’ then it means that the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus is Good News. It would be easy to think that only the Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus is the Good News bit, as if it were all leading up to that – and, certainly, that is the way that the secular press of today would look at it. But for the Gospel writers, the passion and death of Jesus are as much Good News and, writing to the Corinthian Church, Paul says “In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.” (2 Corinthians 5:19)
Sometimes we might want to forget something bad that has happened in our lives; a tragedy, an embarrassment, a betrayal, a difficult period or even a death. At other times, and often on our own, we might go back over the details of what happened, reliving the experience; trying to understand it or come to terms with it. Sometimes we then ‘put the lid back on it,’ put on a brave face, and go back to the real world. The passion and death of Jesus is not like that for the Christian Community and here is one powerful difference between our personal struggles as human beings and what we do as a community of faith. For we not only remember the passion and death of Jesus, we celebrate it and celebrate it as a community and not just as individuals. This week of the Church’s calendar is given a special title – Holy Week – together we enter into the mystery of the love of Jesus Christ and his redeeming love.
The late Fr Ken Leech used to say, “The cross is not a problem to be understood, but a mystery into which we enter.”
This yearly remembrance, this ‘entering into the mystery of the cross,’ roots Good News in the lives of the faithful – in you and in me – and changes the way that we live our lives and deal with our memories. Above all, it affects our relationships and gives a particular character to our lives.
Today, we meditate on the seven last words of Jesus from the cross. The Gospels give us these intimate moments for a reason; the death of Jesus is not recorded as simply an execution of a condemned man; if it were, the evangelists could simply gloss over it in one line – “The Roman authorities took Jesus away and crucified him,” and then get on with the rest of the story. The fact remains that the death of Jesus is the story and every detail matters. As we read in Psalm 22, “They pierced my hands and my feet; I may tell all my bones.”
On the Cross, Jesus speaks to his heavenly Father and to those near him; his words affects each one of us.
The first word uttered from the cross in one sense sums up all the others and gives meaning to the passion and death of Jesus. The first word is that which changes everything and gives us hope; it is at the heart of the sacramental life of the church; it is there in our baptism; there in the sacrament of reconciliation; there in the Eucharistic meal; there in the life of the believers:
“Father, forgive them.”
Throughout the ministry of Jesus, he had taught his disciples and challenged the authorities with his understanding of forgiveness and this was constantly at the heart of the controversy with the Pharisees and the scribes: “Who is this who is speaking blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Luke 5:21). Jesus, himself, exemplified the forgiving love of God and, significantly, linked that with his healing ministry. Time after time, he released people not only from sickness or disability, he released them from the burden of sin. From the paralytic to the sinful woman who washed his feet with her tears, Jesus freed people from their burdens and gave them hope. In touching a leper and healing a blind man, Jesus not only healed, he restored relationships with the community and with God. The law separated people one from the other because of their state of life or their physical need and determined who was in the community and who was outside. The forgiving love of Jesus opened up new possibilities and he entrusted that forgiving love to his closest friends and, therefore, to the Church and those who bear his name. “Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.” (Matthew 18:21-22)
On the cross, deep from his heart of love, deep from the relationship that he had with the Father, came the words: “Father, forgive them.”
And the one who had been forced to die – who had carried the beam of the cross on his shoulders, stripped, tied and nailed to the cross – still said “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” The Gospels seem to imply that they certainly knew what they were doing; Roman Crucifixion remains one of the most carefully thought out methods of execution in history, that allowed for public spectacle, minimal blood loss and yet excruciating pain.
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
In his prayer life with the Father, Jesus had prayed for his friends and he had taught them how to pray. In the Lord’s Prayer forgiveness is at its heart: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
Henri Nouwen has said: “Maybe the reason it seems hard for me to forgive others is that I do not fully believe that I am a forgiven person. If I could fully accept the truth that I am forgiven and do not have to live in guilt or shame, I would really be free. By not forgiving, I chain myself to a desire to get even, thereby losing my freedom. A forgiven person forgives. This is what we proclaim when we pray, ‘and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us.’ This lifelong struggle lies at the heart of the Christian life.” (The Road to Daybreak)
This lifelong struggle we do not do on our own; remember the words of the priest I mentioned at the beginning – “May the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ…” Our life-long struggle to know forgiveness is united with the struggle of Jesus as he died on the cross for our sake and for our salvation. Forgiveness does not come easily to many of us; hurt can cloud our intentions. We know we should forgive, but feelings of hurt and betrayal confuse our motives and can drive forgiveness far away.
The parable of the prodigal son reveals how Jesus saw forgiveness; when the younger son was still a far way off, the Father rushed to meet him. When we make our faltering steps towards God by truly confessing our sins we discover that the Father has already met us. Sadly, we are too often like the older Son, who stands outside the house and whose hurt and sense of injustice prevents him from celebrating with his Father. If we examine our own lives we may well find that our difficulty to forgive lies with the fact that we might not truly believe that we are forgiven ourselves.
What was the response of those near the cross in Luke’s Gospel when Jesus said these words? The bystanders scoffed; the soldiers mocked, and one of the thieves railed at him. Forgiveness is hard and costly. Jesus brought forgiveness through the ultimate price – his death. When we doubt our forgiveness or our own hurt stops us from offering forgiveness, we should turn to the cross and hear again the first words of Jesus as he died:
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
+ + +
The Second Word
The Reverend Michael D. Spurlock
“Today you will be with me in paradise.”
Having been nailed to the wood of their crosses, two convicted criminals and the convicted but innocent Jesus are fixed in place for a time. Guards have been assigned to them to execute the sentence handed down from Pontius Pilate, but there is not much for these guards to do once the business of nailing these men to their crosses and raising them up is done. They are at leisure to bide their time in a game of chance and perhaps to win some loot off this particular duty. If the game proves an inadequate diversion they can always taunt the prisoners. After all, nobody is going anywhere for several hours.
Civilian bystanders are free either to weep and mourn, or got vent their spleen by mocking the helpless Jesus. How many times before had some of them wished to lay hands on him, or to stone him, or to kill him only to be intimidated by the fervor of his followers or to watch Jesus slip through their hands? He’s fixed in place, not going anywhere. They have their man, but now can do nothing more than taunt him until he gives up the ghost.
At first, the criminals join in this mockery. To what end, no one can imagine. To hold someone else in derision because of their fate when you yourself are suffering in the same way makes little sense. Perhaps that’s nothing more than a glimpse into the depravity of man to be so mindless of one’s own lowly state as to ridicule a fellow for suffering in the same way we do.
Unlike the criminals, Jesus is not crying out. He does not curse his executioners, he does not scream back at his deriders, he does not answer the taunts of his fellows who hang in agony along side him. Since this ordeal began he has been heard to say only one thing: Father forgive them their ignorance. And then silence.
He [is] oppressed, and he [is] afflicted,
yet he open[s] not his mouth:
he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb,
so he openeth not his mouth. Isaiah 53.7
What is to be made of such a creature? This business is maddening. The physical agony alone is unimaginable, but the psychological weight of the knowledge that you have been nailed to a tree and you will not come off it until you are dead must be raged against, rage, man. But not Jesus, he is silent and waiting.
And one of the criminals must turn from the contorted face of his fellow criminal to the suffering but silent face of Jesus, and begin to contemplate, to wonder, and then to begin feeling not just his gaze turn from one to the other, but his heart turn also.
The one criminal rails at Jesus, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!”
But the other has turned for certain, and rebukes him, saying, Don’t you fear God? You are under the same condemnation as this man, and yet you condemn him. You and I are guilty, but he is innocent. You are hanging on a cross too; those people down there are not. It may be well and good for them to mock us while they can, but we three are all just an hour or two from death and eternity, don’t waste what time you have mocking someone to whom you are no better off. Do not be so reckless of the judgment to come.
In that moment, its as though a crown passes from one to the other. The first criminal finds this crown a light and ridiculous thing. (Are you not the Christ?) But his companion takes the crown from him, feels its weight of glory and places it upon the head of Jesus with reverence and a holy fear. He turns derision into reverence. “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Jesus had spent three years in the presence of his closest friends and disciples. Those men and women had walked with him, talked with him, broken bread together. More miraculously they had watched their friend and master raise lame people up from off the floor, restore sight to the blind, open the ears of the deaf, heal the sick, raise the dead. Yet, in their Lord’s darkest hour where were they? Hiding behind locked doors within the gates of the city.
But now Jesus is being killed next to a seeming stranger, who has spent no more than an hour of agony next to the dying Jesus and yet begins to express his faith in a kingship that to all intents and purposes Jesus cannot exercise. He is not going to come down off this cross, rescue this criminal and steal off to some kingdom, some place. He cannot see the evidence of the kingliness of the man, nor the realm he rules, but he declares his faith in it. He speaks as though Jesus has the absolute right to dispose of his kingdom to whom he will, to exercise an authority in it as he sees fit.
Also, unlike two of Jesus’ disciples who once asked for a place in Jesus kingdom on his right hand and on his left, just where one of these criminals is now fixed, this man asks for no place, or position in the kingdom, just to be remembered there. Lord, when you come into your kingdom, think on me, and that will be sufficient. Lord, I will be content just to know that when you are crowned in glory in your glorious realm, that you are thinking about me. It is enough.
The disciples, wherever they are, despair of Jesus. But this dying man puts all his hopes on Jesus. In spite of all appearances, and having heard no word from the Lord but to forgive men their ignorance, it is enough to turn this man from derision to reverence, from despair to hope. Was ever faith like this exhibited upon earth?
In answer to his faith, Jesus breaks his silence. He hardly spoke to the priests who accused him. He would not speak at all to Herod the king, he had little to say to Pontius Pilate. But now he says what few words he has to say to a bloodied and writing wretch raised up next to him on his cross. “Truly, today, you will be with me in paradise.”
The criminal might have expected a long delay, and hope only for a passing thought, but feeling even that would be enough. Jesus gives him so much more. This very day you will be where I am, and it will be where mankind has always longed to get back to. It will be Eden, and you will be there with me. There will not be a moment from this moment on that you will not be in my company, that I will not be your companion, that you will not know my love and mercy.
Jesus said, “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. Thomas saith unto him, ‘Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?’” John 14.1-5
Jesus and two companions are fixed on their crosses. To all appearances, they are fixed there, with nowhere to go. Between bouts of mockery, a game of chance is played at the base of their crosses. And yet, above the heads of the soldiers, a game of certainty has played itself out. Jesus is pressing on ahead of them all, and one companion is following close behind. He is loosed, and set free. He has found the way, his truth and his life.
+ + +
The Third Word
The Reverend Joel C. Daniels
“Woman, behold thy son…behold, thy mother.”
I spent one summer, a decade ago, as a chaplain at a nearby hospital, as a component of priestly formation. During that period, I spent a good deal of time with the wide cross-section of humanity that finds itself in hospital care. Illness is no respecter of persons, and the diversity of this city is reflected in the occupants of the beds of its hospitals, the great and the good wearing the same drab hospital gowns as the humble and meek.
As would be expected, many there were of advanced age, and some number of those were probably in the hospital for the last time. Sitting by their beds, I would ask them, “How do you think about what you’re going through right now? How does it feel to be here?” And we would talk about death, their deaths, what they expected, what they feared, as the waters of the Jordan River lapped against their ankles, quietly but insistently.
I heard stories: in a city of immigrants, a lot of stories about coming to New York, coming from Germany, from Ireland, from Latin America and the Caribbean. Stories of the triumphs and defeats that make up a life. And then, after the stories were told, more frequently than I ever would have predicted, there was said some version of this: “I’m not afraid of dying. I look forward to seeing my parents again.”
In a summer full of unexpected things, this was one of the most surprising. The parents of whom they spoke had usually been dead by that point for fifty years, or more. Some had brothers and sisters who had predeceased them, too; husbands and wives; friends past counting. But it was their parents they looked forward to seeing again.
There is something primitive about relationships with parents, something that sits on the inside. Parents who are present can be superabundant with meaning, whether those meanings are positive or not; parents who are absent bear their own significance.
Of course, it goes the other way, too. A child bears an outsize prominence in the life of a parent, when affections are rightly ordered. And so, one of the most upsetting things that happened in the course of that same summer in the hospital, was to be close to a family whose child died. In its wake, that family was not so much grieving as traumatized. The effect of that death was of a different order altogether; a difference in kind, not degree. I found that there was very little common ground between the death of the nonagenarian and the death of, in this case, a teenager. There is very little shared experience between the two for those left behind. One can see with perspective that the death of a parent, however terrible, is the way of the world; generation succeeding generation, being begat and begetting, in turn. a terrible loss it may be, but one within the realm of normal human experience.
The loss of a child, though: that seems almost unnatural, as if it should be against the laws of nature themselves. The old predecease the young; parents die before children: that is the way of the universe. The reverse is almost morally unacceptable. The mind convulses in protest. It should never be so, ever.
John 19:25: Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother.
It’s a unique feature of the gospel of John that we are never told Mary’s name; we depend on the other gospels for that. She is called only “the mother of Jesus.” That’s how John refers to her here, and how he refers to her in the only other place in John’s gospel where she appears, at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee, the first recorded miracle of Jesus.
This biblical reticence about her identity is reflective of the fact that, in the fourth gospel, the depiction of the relationship between the two lacks the intimacy that is found in parts of the other Gospels. Both in Cana and here at the foot of the cross, Jesus calls to his mother by saying, “Woman.” Not “mother,” but “woman.” “Woman, what have I to do with thee?” he asks in Cana. “Mine hour is not yet come.”
By the time of Good Friday, that festive wedding event must have seemed long in the past. In Cana his hour had not yet come, not yet. Now, hanging on the cross, it was the very hour; the hour of truth; the reason for which he was sent. So, even as he hangs on the cross, he discharges his final responsibility: to care for his mother, yes, but also to care for those of his followers he was leaving behind. To his mother he says, “Woman, behold thy son,” the beloved disciple. And to the disciple, ‘Behold thy mother.”
The argument has been made that the gospel of John is less concerned with recording how Jesus feels about the things that are happening to him than about what those things mean for the lives of those who follow him. We see less anguish in the person of Jesus depicted in John than in the accounts of the other evangelists, for example, but more descriptions of what the future is going to be like for them.
Likewise, this exchange, showing a concern about the future well-being of his mother and the community of disciples when he wouldn’t be present with them in the same way. Ensuring their relationship is one of the last pieces of unfinished business that has to be wrapped up as Jesus faces his last hour.
With his death, and their relationship, a new period of history begins: that of the Church, new brothers and sisters, new parents and children, with members living new kinds of lives. The fact that Jesus’ mother’s name is not given, nor the name of the beloved disciple, actually opens up that possibility for the generations of disciples who would follow them: their real names are yours and mine, giving us responsibility for one another and the ability to depend on each other. The Church that came into being that day is one that can manifest God’s love and participate in God’s work in the world, guided by the ever-present Spirit.
The Church that is called into being here is a holy reality, even if it isn’t an ideal one. What separates this origin from the origin stories of other communities is the fact that it is brought into being not in a moment of glorious self-revelation, or as a negotiated political settlement, or as a utopian dream come true. Christ himself establishes the Church when he speaks thus to his mother and disciple, but he calls it into being while dying on the cross. The cause of his death is divine love interacting with human sin. The cause of his death is human blindness, the misrecognition of good with evil on the part of those whom he came to save. The fact that it’s the crucified Christ who is doing the calling—the one who died the death of human sin—undermines ecclesiastical triumphalism. On the contrary, the Church is identified as precisely the ones who need to be saved because of their own sin—our own sin—which necessitated the Cross in the first place. The Church is made up of no one else but sinners, sinners whom Christ died to save.
Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother. … “Woman, behold thy son!” … “Behold thy mother!”
In that Good Friday time of human violence and human loss, as the human life of Jesus reached its end, a new kind of reality came into being: the Church. In between the tears and crying of the grieving mother, herself plumbing the depths of grief, the Lord of life ministered to those whom he called his own, those whom he loved, those whom he loves still.
+ + +
The Fourth Word
The Reverend Carl F. Turner, Rector
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
I must confess that these words of Jesus are some of the hardest to hear; of all the words, they seem the most in tune with human emotion. They may say something of the dereliction of the cross but they also speak powerfully for the human condition and the fearful prospect of being alone and unloved.
The context of these words is equally foreboding; Mark’s Gospel, from whom Matthew seems to base his account, says that “When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon.” (Mark 15:33). To understand the next words of Jesus we have to put them into the context of this dark place that Jesus now found himself. All three Synoptic Gospels make the point that there was darkness over the whole land from the sixth hour, which is noon, until the hour that Jesus died. To be in the darkness and to be alone must have been a terrible thing.
The words are, of course, words that Jesus would have learned as a child; psalm 22, a sad and lonely psalm that begins with this heartfelt cry: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?”Perhaps, as has been suggested by some commentators, Jesus recited the psalms and prayers that he knew off by heart as he hung dying on the cross; this is a very human thing to do – we all have our ways of dealing with anxiety or fear – it would be very natural during his agony on the cross for Jesus to have used the prayers and psalms that he knew so well and would have given him comfort.
Mark tells us that Jesus was crucified at the third hour, that is, nine o’clock in the morning; this means that Jesus hung upon the cross for six hours. We are told that he was mocked and shouted at during that time but, significantly, in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the mocking seems to stop at noon – at the time the darkness came. None of the synoptic gospels relate anything being said or done between 12noon and 3pm, the time that Jesus died. Had the crowds had enough? Had everything been said that needed to be said? Death by crucifixion could last several days – in spite of the imminence of the Sabbath and the Passover feast but, all four gospels relate that Jesus died quite quickly and did not even need his legs broken – the Roman soldiers’ way of quickly dispatching a crucified person by preventing them being able to raise themselves us to breathe.
I find the lack of anything recorded in the three hours leading up to the death of Jesus very profound as we ponder what it means to feel forsaken. Perhaps it is a reminder of the power of Jesus exercised in silence, as Archbishop Rowan explored with us earlier in this week.
The action of Holy Week moves Jesus from being at the center of crowds on Palm Sunday and in the Temple to being abandoned even by his closest friends. In the upper room, Judas left in haste to set in train the events that would lead to him betraying his Lord and Master. John’s Gospel adds the foreboding words, “And it was night.” (John 13:30b). It is as if the darkness was already descending round Jesus. Earlier, speaking of his death, Jesus had said, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” (John 12:35-36). He who was the light of the world – ‘the light that shineth in the darkness’ – was soon to be enveloped by darkness.
This was to be the longest night for Jesus and he chose the night time to go to the Garden to pray. The Garden of Gethsemane has always been associated with suffering. There, in the darkness the betrayal happened – the crowd arrived, as bullies often do – hiding their actions from others. In the night, Jesus was taken and his trial began. Exhausted, with no sleep, beaten, abused and tortured, he was led to Golgotha.
We may ponder on the betrayal of Judas and the fact that it is poignantly linked to a kiss; but the betrayal of Judas also prefigured the betrayal of Peter and the other disciples who fled from the scene under cover of darkness. “If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going,” said Jesus to his friends. Only, the disciples did not walk in darkness…they fled.
The authorities had acted decisively and sensibly as, indeed, has happened throughout history and even in recent times – death squads taking prisoners in the middle of the night while people are asleep; people herded into trains and taken to concentration camps; darkness can be terrifying and Jesus experienced it in many different forms.
In the High Priests’ house, while Jesus was being examined, Peter crept slowly back through the darkness. What was it that made him do this? Was there a glimmer of hope that the one whom Jesus called the rock might stay with his Lord and Master to the very end? In fact, it was to become even more terrible for Peter as he stood in the courtyard of the High Priest warming himself by the fire. Twice he was recognized and twice he denied the Lord, a third passer-by accused him and Peter denied Jesus a third time. Luke writes: “At that moment, while he was still speaking, the cock crowed. The Lord turned and looked at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said to him, “Before the cock crows today, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly.” (Luke 21:61-62)
Peter’s dark night of the soul filled him with guilt and remorse; he was truly unable to see through the darkness. We, too, have moments in our lives that are overwhelmed by darkness; fearful times when we can feel lost, alone, and unloved. The great saints and mystics of the church experienced darkness sometimes as fear of separation from God. In her journal, Thérèse of Lisieux, expresses for all of us the sense of abandonment that we can sometimes feel: “When, weary of being enveloped by nothing but darkness, I try to comfort and encourage myself with the thoughts of the eternal life to come, it only makes matters worse. The very darkness seems to echo the voices of those who do not believe, and mocks at me: “You dream of light and of a fragrant land; you dream that the creator of this loveliness will be your own for all eternity; you dream of escaping one day from these mists in which you languish! Dream on, welcome death; it will not bring you what you hope; it will bring an even darker night, the night of nothingness!”
This night of nothingness Jesus had experienced in Gethsemane and took to the cross; Jesus felt abandoned in Gethsemane, abandoned in the High priests’ House, abandoned in Herod’s court, abandoned in Pilate’s quarters; and he took it to the Cross. Jesus took to the cross all the world’s darkness and separation; Jesus took to the cross our fear and our sinfulness; Jesus took to the cross our pettiness and our hurtfulness and he stared darkness in the face: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” is, therefore, a cry for all of humanity.
This sense of being forsaken becomes a symbol of the estrangement between humanity and God the creator. It is tempting to think that his Father had abandoned him, “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” But that is to interpret psalm 22 only in the context of its opening line which is a cry of loneliness and despair. The Psalmist expresses a sense of loneliness that cuts to the heart but the psalmist never loses sight that God is there. Jesus felt loneliness from those he had come to love and used those anguished words of desperation:
“My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
The psalmist rehearses verse after verse the plight of one who is suffering and feeling alone but then, dramatically, leads to these verses – cries of hope that come from knowledge that in God will not abandon his child “Be not far from me, O Lord; thou art my succor, haste thee to help me.” (Verse 19). “Deliver my soul” (verse 20). “Save me” (verse 21) And as the psalmist prays those words he moves even more confidently into praise of God: “I will declare thy Name unto my brethren: in the midst of the congregation I will praise thee. O praise the Lord…”(See verses 22ff)
If Jesus knew this psalm he not only knew the verses of abandonment and desperation, he also knew the verses of hopefulness and praise; he was still a light, shining in the darkness.
Some words of Michael Ramsey:
“Through our realization of the world’s darkness and the power of God within it we go on to learn of the divine love which pierces the scene and of glory as the final interpretation. Darkness, love, glory, such is the way of God to us, and such is the way of our response.” (The Cross and the World)
What will be our response to Jesus when we are engulfed in darkness and feel forsaken?
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The Fifth Word
The Reverend Michael D. Spurlock
“I thirst.”
Jesus is nearing the end of an agonizing experience. Not only is it taking its physical toll, but must tax his spirit in ways we can only imagine. Here we see the vulnerability of the incarnate God. In the account of his temptation in the desert we read that after Jesus resists the temptations set before him, the devil departed from him until a more opportune time. Had there ever been a more opportune time than these several hours of arrest, abandonment, trial, and suffering.
Confine yourself to the physical for a moment. We might assume that Jesus’ last meal had been supper with his disciples. The last bit of moisture to pass between his lips was the cup of wine he shared with them. After dark he and his disciples set out on a not very long walk through the city, outside the gates, down the steep slope of a valley and up another slope to a garden where he prayed with such intensity that he sweated blood. If his view was unobstructed he might have been able to watch the torches of the Temple guards coming to arrest him. They would have emerged from the city gate, made their own way down the slope into the Kidron and begun their ascent to where he was. Having found Jesus and bound him, they would have returned the way they came. Jesus would have been taken to the Temple for a night trial. By morning he was questioned by Pilate, led through the city to Herod’s palace, then back to Pilate again. Would anyone have tended to his physical needs, would anyone have shown him mercy? After being sentenced he was handed over to Roman guards this time, and whipped so mercilessly it was a wonder he survived if it weren’t for the fact the soldiers had to deliver him alive for crucifixion. They placed the cross on Jesus’ back and goaded him on towards calvary where we might imagine it was all routine at this point. The three men would have been nailed and raised up in as business-like a fashion as possible. No sense dragging this thing out. The sooner they died the sooner all concerned could get on to whatever things they were being kept from by this spectacle.
Here we find Jesus stripped, flogged, nailed, literally nailed to a board, hanging there exposed to the elements, the spring chill of the day, perhaps the wind, and of course exposed to the mockery and derision, of mankind: spitting, insulting, taunting. Throughout this ordeal, Jesus was deprived of every basic necessity: food, water, clothing, but also mercy, love, and dignity.
Jesus had known better days. One day, not that very long ago Jesus was sitting beside a water well, (oh, to be sitting by that well now) and a Samaritan woman came to draw some water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a cup of water to drink.” The woman marveled that Jesus, being a man, and a Jew would have anything to do with her, a woman, and a Samaritan. But he persisted, “If you knew the gift of God and who I am, you would ask me for a drink, and I would give you living water and whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst again; it will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” John 4.7-15
That day must seem like a mirage on this day, had there ever been a time when there was water to be given and water to be received? But today there was no one who would even offer him enough to wet his tongue. And so Jesus says, “I thirst.” Is it any wonder?
A welsh clergyman by the name of R.S. Thomas wrote a poem (“The Coming”) that speaks of a different kind of thirst than the body’s craving for water. The poet paints a picture in words of a small globe of scorched land marked by light and shadow. The land is bisected by a serpentine river radiant with slime. It is an unattractive place made more so by a bare tree on a bare hill. Many people hold out their arms to this tree with such longing that some life return to its dead boughs. A Father held this globe in his hand, and asks his son to look at it. The son looks. He watches. “Let me go there,” he said.
Jesus said from the cross, “I thirst.” But is this just a desire for water to wet the lips, cool the tongue, quench the body’s thirst? Or is this the longing for something deeper and eternal? Jesus is coeternal with the Father, knows the deep goodness of creation, and he feels the very deep separation that sets in when sin rends the fabric of creation. He senses our desire to take back whatever we have done to infect creation with alienation and death, and he knows the futility of our actions to try and set things right on our own. The further away we drift, the louder we cry out, the more strained our reach. He knows our longing, like the hart that longs for the water brooks; like those blessed who hunger and thirst for righteousness sake. He has heard us cry out, “My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh also longeth after thee, in a barren and dry land where no water is.” So throughout his ministry Jesus spoke to this longing, our hunger and thirst. “In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” John 7.37-38
But even in the midst of Jesus prepared to fulfill our yearning for him, do you see also how Jesus himself has a longing, a hunger or thirst. What does Jesus long for? He longs for you. Only you will satisfy him. Your body and soul saved for all eternity to rise with him in the resurrection of the dead is what Jesus longs for, will satisfy him, will fill him up, slake his thirst. Jesus has a longing beyond our imagining, and he will be satisfied.
You hear it in the final words of Thomas’ poem. “Let me go there.” The son is beseeching the father: Let me go there. That is where I am needed most. I must be there in that scorched shadowy place, I must purify its waters, I must hang on that tree, I must bring life out of its crossed boughs, I must save those people longing for a forgotten April. I must go there. I will not have it any other way.
And so he comes among us in this great humility, but with all the healing, saving power pent up in his mortal body. And in the fullness of time, in a dark garden, his father comes to him again in their own private means of communing with one another, and without a word sets a cup in front of his son. And the son knows, if he is to do what is demanded to save this people, to save the ones who spit, and mock, and yet long and thirst in spite of themselves, if he is going to save these people he is going to have to drink this cup of suffering.
No man would blame him if he asked if this cup might pass from him. Indeed we don’t blame him for the asking, do we? But our eternal fate hangs in the balance. Will he drink it? And here is as opportune time as any for the devil to revisit the vulnerable Jesus. “This cup is bitter. It galls one to drink it. Look at them— you know they’re not worth it. Come down, and pass through their midst of them just one more time, and you will be free from this sad hill on this scorched earth. Let this cup pass.”
We are told that Jesus hung on the cross for three hours, and in those three hours he had very few words to say. It is to our eternal benefit, and salvation, that in the midst of an agony that did not have to be, it is recorded that Jesus lifted up his head, and said, I thirst!
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The Sixth Word
The Reverend Joel C. Daniels
“It is finished.”
One of the most evocative of the parables that Jesus tells in the course of the gospels is that of the Good Samaritan. An injured man, presumably a Jew, lies on the side of the road that ran from Jerusalem to Jericho. He had been beaten by robbers; they had stolen his clothes; wounded him; left him “half dead.” Two different fellow Hebrews came upon him in his state: first a priest, then a Levite. They avoided him, crossing to the other side of the road. Perhaps from a distance they couldn’t tell the difference between dead and “half dead” and so feared the ritual contamination that would come from handling a dead body. Perhaps they were afraid that stopping would put them at risk of robbery as well. Or perhaps they were just in a hurry, as busy and in a rush as we denizens of the modern world, as willing as we are to put out of their minds the needs of the world that confront us.
The care of the “half dead” Jew was a responsibility taken on instead by a good Samaritan. He had not only compassion in his heart for the beaten man, which perhaps the others had as well, but the initiative to do something about it: he cleaned and bound the wounds, and brought the man to a place of rest and, with luck, recovery. He compensated the innkeeper for the day’s stay, and promised to reimburse him for whatever else he had to spend to care for the man.
The parable, as Jesus tells it, ends there, with this act of neighborly mercy. It is an unexpected mercy, of course; one of the significant aspects of the story is that the Jews and the Samaritans were at odds with one another in the first century, divided over where right worship of God was to be performed. The antagonism was mutual, and it burned hot. Allusions to it are found throughout the gospels. For Jesus to recount a story about the Samaritan performing this act of kindness across the boundaries of group membership would be provocative to his listeners.
In a sinful and fallen world, perhaps this act of mercy is the best we can hope for; a temporary war-time truce brought about by a recognition of a common humanity. That’s no mean feat. But we might imagine what would happen if the parable didn’t end there. We might imagine what it could look like if the “bonds of affection” that formed between the two did not dissolve with the dawning of a new day. If we did that, we might imagine that a new kind of life could began for that Jew and that Samaritan. The purest reflection of that, if it came to pass, would be the development of a deep and true friendship between them. Not just charity in the superficial sense, but reciprocal love with integrity. For a Jew and Samaritan to form that relationship would be for them to establish a new reality and, perhaps, an serve as inspiration for those who saw them. And this would all have been due to the initial reaching out of the Samaritan toward his bruised and bloodied rival. It was due to his initiative alone, undertaken with no guarantee of gratitude. While the Jew was “half dead,” unable to reciprocate, while they were still enemies, in this ideal and imagined ending the good Samaritan would make their relationship possible by his own love and sacrifice.
John 19:30: “When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, ‘It is finished’: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.”
“It is finished.” Commentators as far back as Origen and Augustine have remarked on the allegorical significance of the parable of the good Samaritan, as it potentially speaks of Jesus. In Jesus’ death on the cross, we see the real-life example of the possible end of that parable, if it was finished, if it was brought to fulfillment. In Jesus’ death on the cross, the journey of the son of God into the far country of human sin had reached its terminus; there is no farther to go. In Jesus’ death on the cross, the story of incarnation, God made flesh, that had begun at his conception reached its climax: God reaching as far into what it means to be a human as could possibly be done. In his death, enemies become friends; the separation between Creator and creation is dissolved; a new world begins that was previously unimaginable. In a world of enemies of God, with no guarantee of gratitude, friendship had been effected by sacrifice, the sacrifice made by the Christ. It is finished.
And so it should not be a surprise when we notice that it is just after he has drunk the vinegar from the sponge that Jesus announces the completion of his work. “If it be possible, let this cup pass from me,” he had prayed in Gethsemane. Nevertheless, “thy will be done.” On the cross, God’s will for communion with his people was done. Jesus took the cup from the hand of the Father and the contents were bitter, as bitter as wine gone sour, as bitter as vinegar. The one who could turn water into wine drank the cup of wrath instead, drank it all, and cried “It is finished.” The mission was accomplished; the creature’s reconciliation was effected at the initiative of the creator. The friendship between God and man that had been intended from the foundation of the world, the reunion at which all history received its culmination, had finally been accomplished by the pure offering of Christ: it is finished. A cry of triumph; a shout of victory.
In the moment of his death, the cup of wrath was emptied. There was no more of it to drink, God’s will being done. The savior who said “I thirst” now offered to his people a different cup. His final end having been accomplished, the soldiers pierced his side, and blood and water came out, the blood and water of the Eucharist, which we celebrate because God’s will was done, and salvation was effected, and the wall between Creator and creation formed by sin was dismantled, utterly destroyed. The wall fell and now people could stream across the former absolute border and into the land of promise, the new Jerusalem, our heavenly home. There they would find a heavenly banquet, cups full of the fruit of the vine.
But before that could happen, Jesus had to drink the cup of bitterness instead, there on the cross. And having done so, he bowed his head, and “gave up the ghost,” that is, gave up his spirit. He gave it up just as he had given up everything else, all in order to save the half-dead men and women, to bind up their wounds, and pay whatever the cost. There on the cross, he gave up his spirit to the Father, head bowed as if in prayer, as if it is one last act of worship; head bowed as if in submission to the one who had sent him and whose will he had done. One last act of worship of God, and one last act of gift-giving to God’s people: the spirit given back to the Father was then ready to be given again, this time to the apostles on the day of Pentecost. He bowed his head and gave up the ghost, one last act of love for his Father, and for sisters and for his brothers.
But that reception of the spirit is to come. There are miles yet to go before we arrive there. For now we wait at the foot of the cross, and we put our trust in its promise of a new world to come, its promise that we can have a deep and true friendship with God. Because, there on the cross, the work to effect it is done. It is finished.
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The Seventh Word
The Reverend Carl F. Turner, Rector
“Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”
In Matthew and Mark’s gospels, we are told that Jesus cries out with a loud voice when he dies; John says that he dies after uttering the words “It is finished.” Only Luke suggest what that loud cry was: “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”
Those of us who have had to watch people suffer as they die know that death is not always beautiful. Even when someone knows that they are dying and have all the care of the hospice or palliative care nursing team, they can still die in a dramatic and shocking way. I have witnessed it several times and, once, in someone’s home when the nurse was taking a break and I was left with the teenage children. On that particular occasion it was, frankly, frightening and it was messy, and the horrified faces of the children are still engrained on my mind; all that preparation and involvement of the hospice in explaining to those children that their mother would not die in pain seemed a lie and a cheat that night. For that reason alone, I often pray that my own death will not be a struggle or painful and certainly not difficult for my family to watch.
With those thoughts, I turn back to the cross of Jesus and think of this death which was far from easy. Yes, it was beautiful for the Son of God stretched out his arms of love and embraced the whole world; but it was hard. Luke may give us beautiful words of commendation, but he also says that they were spoken after Jesus had cried out with a loud voice; Luke is not hiding from the pain of the cross and perhaps not even from the dereliction of the cross. The words of Jesus bring all that he has suffered directly and intimately into the relationship that he had with his Father in heaven.
But this is not new. Elsewhere in the Gospels, Jesus had shown how his prayerful relationship with the Father overcame fear and testing: In his wilderness experience, hungry and thirsty in the desert, Jesus had to make choices which would shape his life and ministry in the future.
Similarly, in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus revealed his fear and his very human desire to avoid pain and suffering. Luke’s gospel gives the most dramatic accounts of the agony in the garden, with some ancient authorities describing how his body was racked by fear: “In his anguish he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down on the ground.” (Luke 22:42-44). Yet, in the garden, in his fear, Jesus was still able to accept the cup of suffering. Luke reveals that even in the awfulness of a painful death, Jesus was still attuned to the Father’s love.
“Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”
Father.
Throughout his ministry on earth, Jesus had taught his disciples as well as the crowd about the relationship that they could have with the Father. We see this most of all in the prayer life of Jesus and the way he spoke so beautifully to his Father. When his disciples asked Jesus how to pray, he taught them a prayer that began with an intimate and familial phrase: Our Father. In Luke’s Gospel, many ancient authorities make the phrase even more direct: “Father! Hallowed be thy name.” When Jesus prayed to the Father we know that he used an intimate term, “Abba” in Aramaic – translated ‘Father’ in the scriptures, but closer to the child-like word of endearment, ‘Papa’ or ‘Daddy’. This intimate and natural relationship that Jesus had with the Father he wished to share with his friends. Writing to the Galatians, Paul explores the relationship that the believer has with the Father once united with the Son. Through baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus, we become his brothers and sisters and, therefore, adopted into the family of God. As some of you know, I am an adoptive parent and my wife and I remember the awfulness of hearing an insensitive social worker once ask us “Did your children ever know their real parents?” We were stunned to think that our relationship was anything less than real! And in the bible, adoption is a very real relationship – legally as strong as a blood relationship. In this case, the blood of Jesus shed on the cross makes it possible for us to be truly his brothers and sisters and the relationship we thus have with the Father is real and powerful:
“When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. And because you are children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So, you are no longer a slave but a child, and if a child then also an heir, through God.” (Galatians 4:4-7)
In an earlier meditation, I reflected on the parable of the prodigal son. The parable of the prodigal son has often been described as the parable of the two sons – one who repents and returns to the Father and the other who struggles with forgiveness and a sense of injustice. We can identify so easily with both of those sons; the times when shamed and remorseful, we turn to the Lord and ask for his forgiveness. Equally, we can be like the older son, resentful and angry that forgiveness is seemingly lavished on someone undeserving of such love – who has not paid the price. But Jesus paid the price and it was more than 30 pieces of silver – it was for the enormity of sin that separates human beings from the God. The more I reflect on the parable of the prodigal son, the more I want to rename it ‘the parable of the Father’s love.’ Do you remember when the younger son, penniless, hungry and ashamed, returned home and how the Father saw him afar off? The Father rushed to meet his son and embraced him. That is the relationship that Jesus had with the Father and that he wanted to share with his friends. It is the relationship that becomes apparent as we examine the prayer life of Jesus and which he encourages us to develop. As we read in the first Letter of John, “our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.” (1 John 1:3)
Thus, this relationship, this perfect union, is at the heart of the self-offering of the Lord on the cross for our salvation. Luke brings the intimate relationship that Jesus has with the Father to the very center of the act of salvation. In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus brought his fear into his prayer and Mark, the earliest Gospel writer, showed how, just before his betrayal, Jesus spoke to the Father: “Abba, Father, for you all things are possible; remove this cup from me; yet, not what I want, but what you want.” (Mark 14:36). But his relationship with the Father also gave him strength for Jesus also knew that his suffering and death would bring reconciliation and reveal the glory of God. As we read in John’s Gospel: “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Father, glorify thy name.” (John 12:27-28)
As Jesus died on the cross, heaven and earth touched for a moment; no wonder Matthew described an earthquake. As Henri Nouwen once said, “When Jesus was moved to compassion, the source of all life trembled, the ground of all love burst open, and the abyss of God’s immense, inexhaustible, and unfathomable tenderness revealed itself.” (‘Compassion’)
His perfect relationship with the Father was revealed on the cross: “I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father.” (John 14:31)
On the cross, after the suffering and the pain and the feeling of abandonment, God’s immense and inexhaustible love was revealed in the relationship he had with his Son, Jesus Christ and would have with each one of us.
Just as the cry of dereliction came from enormity of the gulf between humankind and God so his final prayer came from the heart of that reconciliation offered; Jesus reversed the enmity between us and our Creator and offered his life to make it so.
Some words of Michael Ramsey: “The fact is that there is in all our race a deep self-interest, self-centeredness, more than we realize, and the motive of self-interest goes deep and dies hard. So, the message of Good Friday can still strike home humbling us all in the sight of the Jesus dying on the cross.” (The Cross and the world).
On the day of our own death, no matter how little we think of ourselves and no matter how little we think we have done good in our lives and no matter how burdened we feel with the multitude of things that have gone wrong, we can join the Lord in his final prayer from the cross, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.”And discover that the Father has already seen us from afar and has come to meet us.
