Year C, Palm Sunday Luke 22:39-23:49 In my first church, we had an elaborate drama for Palm Sunday. There were costumes and props. It was my job to orchestrate it all and it was not my favorite job. Recruiting the people to play the various parts was always tricky. People would complain if they got Judas or Peter, Pilate or the soldiers... I remember one year someone asked, “Why do I always have to be the bad guy?” I replied, “They are all bad guys, except Jesus and no one want to be him either.” Now, that’s not really true. Peter wasn’t a bad guy, just someone who was weak, as many of us are. To some degree everyone in the passion play (besides Jesus) acted poorly (sometimes cruelly), but they weren’t evil. In my experience directing this drama, it was always hardest to find someone to play Jesus. One year a young father was Jesus and as the soldiers dragged him away, I heard his 4 year old son ask, “Why does my dad have to be Jesus?”
Each
Gospel writer tells the story a little differently. Every year in the Episcopal Church, we focus
on a different Gospel writer---this year it’s Luke. In Luke, Jesus seems to handle it all with a
bit more composure. For instance, the other
Gospels have Jesus getting a lot more frustrated when the apostles fall asleep
right before his arrest. In Luke, Jesus only checks on them once and then
acknowledges that they are sleeping because they are grieving. When he is walking to his crucifixion and the
women are weeping, he turns to them and tells them not to weep for him, but to
weep for themselves. It wasn’t a comforting statement, but it showed that even
in the midst of his own pain, he was able to acknowledge the pain and grief of
others.
What
really blows my mind in the Gospel of Luke is how he acts when he is hanging on
the cross. A few years ago I was in the ICU in extraordinary pain and I have to
say, I was not thinking about anyone else.
All I could think of was my pain. It was complete tunnel vision. After
that when I was writing my book of irreverent prayers I thought a lot about the
pain that Jesus must have been experiencing on the cross. He was nailed to a
cross, (and this was after being beaten).
He was in agony, barely able to breathe. Speaking would have been excruciating. And
what did he do with his few remaining breaths? He forgave the people who
crucified him and provided comfort and paradise to the criminal who was dying
beside him. In the other Gospels he
cried out to God asking why he had been forsaken. In Luke, his last words were, “Father, into
your hands I commend my spirit.” In other words, I give myself to you.
There
is a part of me that prefers the other Gospels where Jesus’ agony feels a
little more like my own experiences. I can identify with the Jesus who gets
irritated and then feels abandoned when he is in extraordinary pain. Then I
remind myself that I am not Jesus. I want to be like Jesus, but I don’t want to
be Jesus. I can just barely pull off
being a little bit like him. I doubt any of us wants to be Jesus. But I am so very grateful that this Jesus who
experiences agony and still loves and forgives us the God we worship. This Jesus we worship is a God who knows
pain—not just on the day of his crucifixion— but every day. Despite that pain,
his compassion for us runs deep and wide.
Another part of Luke’s version that I love is the
moment after Peter denies Jesus for the 3rd time, Luke says “The
Lord turned and looked at him.” That is all it says. I want you to think of that
look that Jesus gave Peter. Luke doesn’t
tell us what the look was, but I believe it was a look of love and
forgiveness. It was a look that said,
“You kind of screwed up there, but I still love you.” It was a look that saw
past Peter’s fear and into his heart, a heart that was broken, but also a heart
that would serve God as long as it was still beating.
A lot of my sermons remind us all of why it’s not easy
to be a Christian, why we have to commit ourselves to our faith, try harder, be
better. But today, in the midst of this story of pain, betrayal, denial, and
sacrifice, I want to lift up the God who loves us through it all. I know we are in a time when many of us feel
powerless, helpless, like we can’t possibly do enough, even if we knew what the
right thing to do was. We just don’t
know and that feels horrible.
God sees the pain in you and God sees the joy. God sees it all. Right now, in this moment, I
pray that you can release your fear, anger, disappointment, insecurity, grief—whatever
is weighing you down and feel God’s compassion and love. That’s what this story,
this story we call “The Passion”, is all about. It’s about the way that Jesus’
compassion superseded his pain. It’s the
way that he loved us and still loves us.
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