The day we call Good Friday had come.
And it was over.
What had begun so beautifully ended anything but beautifully.
It was over.
Today, as we think about that moment,
I want you to hold two images in your minds and hearts.
Images of beginnings and endings.
Images of life and death.
Images of great joy and unspeakable sorrow.
This is the first of those images.
A child was born.
A boy.
Yet we aren’t told any of the details of that birth
that seem so important to us in our day.
We don’t know how big he was.
Was he 8 pounds 6 ounces?
Was he 7 pounds 7 ounces?
Was he 21 inches long?
Or 19?
We don’t know if his mother had an easy delivery or if it was difficult.
We don’t know the colour of his eyes?
Were they brown? Or blue? Or hazel?
We don’t know who he looked like.
Did he look like his mother? His father?
Was he bald when he was born, like most babies?
Or was there a little bit of soft down?
And if there was, was it black … or brown … or fair?
We don’t know.
We are never told.
We do know that he was the first born child of Mary and Joseph.
We do know that Joseph was a carpenter
and that he grew up in the town of Nazareth.
And we are told that he was a boy of promise …
a boy whose life would change the world in which he lived …
a boy whose life would change our world too …
a boy whom the scriptures say would be given another name ~
Emmanuel ~ which means “God with us.”
I would guess that his mother cradled him in her arms the night he was born
and gazed into his sleepy eyes
and held him to her breast to feed him
and held him to her heart to love him
and sang to him a lullaby
as every mother would.
And as she sang her lullaby
we are told that angels sang a heavenly song
announcing that the Saviour had come.
A child was born. And they named him Jesus. And they loved him.
And this is the second of those images.
It is now some 33 years later.
The child has become a man …
a man like no other …
a man whom our scriptures say was full of grace and truth.
He proclaimed that the love of God was for anyone who would embrace it.
It was a for everyone love
He healed the sick.
He blessed the children.
He instilled hope in hopeless hearts
and peace in troubled ones.
He forgave their sins.
And all the while he loved them.
And he called them to a new way of living.
He spoke against the injustices of his day.
He challenged them to love and care for each other.
He told to set aside old prejudices and tired ways of thinking.
He urged them to be what God created them to be
and to be the change they longed for in the world.
And all the while he loved them.
The name given at the beginning of his life
seemed to unfold gloriously in the living of his life.
There was so much of God in him that, indeed, he was Emmanuel.
He was “God with us.”
Although he won many to him he did not win everyone.
He spoke truth to power, and power didn’t like it.
He spoke about the power of love, but the love of power didn’t like it.
And all the while he loved them.
And it was those he didn’t win …
those who didn’t understand …
those who were afraid …
who brought about that Good Friday moment.
And all the while he loved them.
In a moment of shame and cowardice and tragedy,
after his arrest and trial,
he was executed in the Roman fashion.
He was crucified.
Put to death between two others on a hill called Golgotha ~ which means “Skull.”
And all the while he loved them.
And when he was taken from the cross
his mother, who had first cradled him in her arms all those years ago …
and gazed into his dreamy eyes …
cradled him in her arms again,
his eyes closed in death.
She held him at the beginning.
She held him at the end.
But now there was no lullaby.
There were only the tearful wails of a mother whose boy was dead.
And there was no angel choir singing that day.
The heavens were silent.
Tradition says it rained the afternoon Jesus died.
I prefer to think that the heavens were weeping.
Tradition says there was an eclipse of the sun that day …
that darkness covered the earth …
not unlike the darkness that filled the hearts and minds of many.
Both were moments when I’m sure
Mary thought her heart would burst:
once for joy … once with sorrow.
Someone wrote that we grieve because we love
and the more we love the more we grieve.
I’m sure that’s what it must have been like that day.
And now Jesus’ life as over.
It seemed as though the darkness of sin and self
had overcome the one whom many called the light of the world.
And all the while he loved them.
In and of itself it was a great tragedy -
for Mary and Jesus’ friends
and for the others who had found God again through him
and who discovered that the grace of God was for them -
for all of them.
But why is it so important for us?
What does it all mean?
A birth and a death so long ago and so far away?
What could it possibly mean to us today, some 20 centuries later.
A favourite story I know tells us why and what in a most simple and profound way.
It took place years ago …
before there were social agencies to look after such things …
a time when communities rallied and looked after their own.
It is a story about a little girl whose parents had died.
She lived with her grandmother
and slept in an upstairs bedroom of her grandmother’s house.
One night there was a fire in the house
and the grandmother perished
while trying to rescue the child.
The fire spread quickly,
and the first floor of the house was soon engulfed in flames.
Neighbours called the fire department,
then stood helplessly by,
unable to enter the house because flames blocked all the entrances.
The little girl appeared at an upstairs window, crying for help,
just as word spread among the crowd that firefighters would be delayed
because they were all at another fire.
Suddenly, a man appeared with a ladder,
put it up against the side of the house,
climbed to the second floor,
and disappeared inside.
When he reappeared, he had the little girl in his arms.
He handed her to the waiting arms below,
then disappeared into the night.
An investigation revealed that the child had no living relatives,
and weeks later a meeting was held in the town hall
to determine who would take the child into their home
and raise her (as their own).
A teacher said she would like to raise the child.
She pointed out that she could ensure a good education.
A farmer offered her an upbringing on his farm.
He pointed out that living on a farm was healthy and satisfying.
Others spoke, giving their reasons why it was to the child’s advantage to live with them.
Finally, the town’s richest resident rose and said,
“I can give this child all the advantages you have mentioned here,
plus money and everything that money can buy.”
Throughout all this, the little girl remained silent, her eyes on the floor.
“Does anyone else want to speak?” asked the meeting chairman.
It was then that a man came forward from the back of the hall.
He walk was slow and obviously painful.
When he got to the front of the room,
he stood directly before the little girl
and held out his arms.
The people gasped and then were silent,
for the man’s arms and hands were terribly scarred.
And the child, who had been the object of everyone’s attention, cried out,
“This is the man who rescued me.”
And gently she wrapped her arms around the man’s neck,
holding on for dear life,
just as she had the night of the fire.
She buried her face in his shoulder and wept.
Gratitude and joy and love were in those tears.
And pulling back she looked up at him, and he at her,
and they smiled …
and in that smile they knew that they were one forever.
And the chair of that meeting, a witness to the moment, said, “This meeting is adjourned.”
(Chicken Soup For The Soul #2, Rescued, p.128,129)
What does it all mean?
A birth and a death so long ago and so far away?
What could it possibly mean to us today, some 20 centuries later.
This is the measure of God’s love for you.
Like the man who risked his life to rescue a child,
and bore the scars to prove it,
Jesus, whose death we remember today,
not only risked his life …
he gave it,
gave it because your life was worth saving.
He, too, has the scars to prove it.
His love values us that much.
He gave his life
that we might all be saved …
that we might all be forgiven …
that we might know that the glorious love of God never quits
and that it is for us all.
All the while, even on the cross, he loved them.
It seemed, to those who were there, that it was over.
And all the while he loved them.
It seemed that the light of the world had been snuffed out.
And all the while he loved them.
It seemed that love was no match for power and injustice and hatred …
that goodness loses and the wrong wins.
And all the while he loved them.
His friends, those who loved him the most,
denied him
betrayed him
in fear ran out on him.
And all the while he loved them.
Our scriptures bear witness to this love.
In the book of Isaiah, written about 700 years before Jesus’ birth,
these incredible words are found.
“He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.” (Isaiah 53:3a NIV)
“Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows.” (Isaiah 53:4a NIV)
“But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:5 NIV)
And the wonder of it all …
the wonder of it all …
is that all the while he loved them.
SOLI DEO GLORIA
