Why Is This Day Different?

Good Friday – St. Paul’s, Smithfield, NC April 14, 2017

Jim Melnyk: “Why is This Day Different From All Others?”

During the Passover Seder, the youngest child at the table asks those gathered, “Why is this night different from all other nights?”  The answer, of course, is that on that night – on every night of Passover – God leads the people of Israel from their bondage of slavery in Egypt into freedom.

As followers of Christ we may feel led to ask a similar question.  “Why is this day different from all other days?”  The answer: because on this day Jesus, the incarnate presence of God – Emmanuel – God with us – on this day Jesus – lovingly gives his life to call us back to freedom and life – to call us back into the heart of God.

Just as our Jewish sisters and brothers listen to the story of the Exodus at Passover, considering themselves to be participants in that ancient story, we listen to the story of Christ’s Passion on Good Friday, and consider ourselves to be active participants in that fate-full day. As we listen to the telling of John’s version of the story we are struck by the violence of crucifixion, and perhaps we are struck by the various roles people play in this horrible drama – harsh words and dismissive mindsets which accompany the so many violent actions surrounding the death of Jesus.

But it’s not the mind-numbing violence surrounding the death of Jesus that makes this story so important to our faith.  There is nothing remarkable about hate.  We see too much of it, don’t we?  Rather, it’s the willingness of Jesus – who sees clearly the handwriting on the wall well ahead of time – it’s the willingness of Jesus to stay true to his message of reconciliation, and the inclusivity of the kingdom of God, even in the face of betrayal and death, which strikes us as remarkable.  And make no mistake about it - regardless of how much John's Gospel seeks to be an apology for Rome - Pilate was by note a tyrannical ruler - the Judean leadership could not have made Pilate do something he wasn't fully willing to do.  The cross is Rome's doing.  The power of the story is the willingness of Jesus to submit to the might of Rome, to the puppetry of Herod, and to the duplicity of Caiaphas.  “No one has greater love than this,” Jesus tells his disciples, “to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13).  Ultimately, the power of Jesus’ gift is his willingness to give his own life as a way to bring a broken world to its senses.

We tell these stories time and time again and I think that every once in a while we need to stand back and ask, “Why do we keep telling them?  What do they mean for us after nearly 2,000 years of life and faith in this world?  Why are they such compelling stories for some of us – so compelling that we come here year after year to hear the same drama again and again – and yet seem to hold so little power or meaning for others?”  My guess is that for as many of us who are here today there are equally as many reasons this day holds meaning. 

For each of us, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus holds some particular significance – even if that significance is hidden from our hearts and minds at this moment in time. Still, there is something significant for us about this particular young man, Jesus, as he hangs dying – stretched out on the hard wood of a cross.  Somehow – across the vastness of time – somehow in the mystery of our faith and our own spiritual universes – this self-giving – this suffering – this death – holds meaning for each of us.  And this day, as we stand before the cross of Jesus – and perhaps even take a turn holding or carrying the cross before us – we bring something of ourselves – we bring something of our own hearts and souls – in an attempt to find a way to stand with Jesus, and to stand for Jesus, in our own day. 

We come, possibly, to find meaning in one person’s willingness to give everything in an attempt to show us – in an attempt to make real for us – the power of God’s love.  Perhaps we come hoping to find meaning for our own suffering – our own sense of feeling lost and alone – hoping that this one selfless act by Jesus will give us a clue.

But in our wrestling to make sense of the crucifixion, or the suffering in our own lives, let us never fall into the trap of thinking anyone’s suffering and death – even the death of Jesus – is God’s will for this world.  How can we ever believe that the God who brings all of creation to life – the God who somehow becomes incarnate in the life of Jesus – would demand that anyone’s life must be sacrificed, or that the shedding of blood is somehow pleasing in God’s sight?  Perhaps this once worked for those whose way of life was centered in warfare and bloodshed – who saw their God or gods as angry deities who were always in need of appeasement. 

In his book, The Heart of Christianity, Marcus Borg asks the question, “Was the cross God’s will?”  That’s a question I struggle with every time I recite Eucharistic Prayer “A” saying, “He stretched out his arms upon the cross and offered himself, in obedience to your will, a perfect sacrifice for the whole world” (BCP, 362, italics mine).   Borg’s answer is a resounding “No.” “It is never the will of God,” Borg writes, “that an innocent person be crucified.  Yet retrospectively,” he adds, “the community can affirm the providence of God in the events of Good Friday and Easter.”  The cruelty of the cross is human cruelty.  The will of God is reconciliation and love.  Jesus is obedient to the will of God’s love – and although it grieves him deeply, in the end he sees in the cross a way to finally get our attention.

Good Friday, in effect, is the political and religious leaders’ “no” to Jesus and all he proclaims – the means of consolidating power when threatened with its loss.  The crucifixion is the handiwork of systems set in place to keep the powerful in power and the weak on their knees. Pilate, Herod, and Caiaphas stand together – unlikely and unlovely allies – allies who stand against the One who preaches Good News to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed, and who binds up the brokenhearted (Luke 4, Isaiah 61). On Good Friday the authorities say “no” to Jesus, and perhaps that response was so predictable we are tempted to call it God’s will; because how could God’s will be bent to the will of this world?  But the cross is the act of human beings – the nightmare of this world standing in defiance of the dream of God.   

Easter will be God’s “Yes!” to the Good News proclaimed by Jesus; and come Sunday we will find ourselves standing in the presence of love so great, that even the hard face of death cannot stay its course.  But for now, we stand with Jesus who says “no one takes my life from me, but I lay it down willingly.”  This is Jesus – “the heart of God made flesh” (Nouwen quoted by Borg).  This is Jesus – who is for us the revelation of God, and who shows us – who is – the human face of God.  This is Jesus, whose very death brings life.  This is Jesus, who even as he breathes his last breath proclaims, “God is…God is…God is!”  Amen.