Good Friday 2018
Today we are gathered around the memory of a brutal event, a punishment reserved for criminals, schemers and rebels.
An event which scored itself into the psyche of a few followers, and then over time into the emerging churches, and finally into the fabric of Western culture, before overflowing into the nations of the world.
Were you there when they crucified my Lord? sings the Afro-American hymn.
My song is love unknown … love to the loveless shown sings a 17th century believer.
Here hangs a man discarded, a scarecrow hoisted high sings a 20th century Christian.
Once to everyone and nation comes the moment to decide sings a 19th century poet.
An enormous array of meditations, paintings, music and books have been created as believers and doubters have sought to plumb the significance of the death of Jesus.
It is a single death, no more brutal than the way that many others died in the ancient world, and although incredibly painful that is not the significance, or the reason that people have remembered this event and shaped one day of the year around it – Good Friday.
Mark’s Gospel is the earliest written testimony to the crucifixion. The events that lead up to Jesus’ final cry, an echo from Psalm 22 “My God, my God why have you abandoned me? echo down the centuries.
He trusted the call of God from that moment he exploded onto history at his baptism. His actions, his healings, his teachings, his disputes bring him into conflict with those who were God’s representatives. They plotted to do away with him.
His followers were variable in their responses. They gave up everything, and were often mystified and puzzled by their Lord. They promised much, but often failed. Those who followed in their wake were little better, and in the end – at the cross – it is only a handful of women who watch mute with grief.
One of the presently living followers, a women named Fleming Rutledge, wrote a big book interpreting the crucifixion. At the beginning she claims:
To often, today’s Christians are lulled into thinking of their own faith as one of the religions, without realising that the central claim of Christianity is oddly irreligious at its core.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer ( who died in his expression of discipleship) wrote that the weakness and suffering of Christ was and remains a reversal of what the religious man expects from God.”
Why irreligious? Because the cross – its betrayal, abandonment and significance doesn’t fit into any sensible notion of love.
A Sri Lankan hymn sings “The great love of God is revealed in the Son” – and none of us would want to see our own children suffer painfully, indeed we would do all we could to prevent such a thing happening.
Each of the gospel writers tell of the last words of Jesus differently, as they seek to grasp the significance of his death.
“It is accomplished” says Jesus’ John.
“ Into your hands , I commit my spirit” Matthew and Luke both report. Each of these have a sense of trust even in his darkest hour.
But, Mark places on the lips of Jesus agonizing words –
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
It is the beginning of Psalm 22 in which a broken man eats the dust of death.
For the gospel writers Jesus is the Man who bridges God, the Man for others who embraces humanity.
As we gathered together on Good Friday we are asked what we choose, how we respond to the crucified One. Here hangs a man discarded ….
Rev David Carter