deliver him. to all creation, we need to ask about the events of Holy Week and why they happened the way they did.

Transcription

1 George A. Mason Palm Sunday Wilshire Baptist Church 13 April 2014 Sixth in the series Crossing the Planes Dallas, Texas Making a Mockery Matt. 27:27-54 Last weekend Kim and I were visiting our daughter, Jillian, in New York City. On Saturday night we found ourselves on the Upper West Side trying to get into the new movie Noah. One seat left. Kim agreed I should see it with her, so we started walking back toward Columbus Circle and came upon an art house theater that was showing a film called Le Week-End. Well, we made it in just as the lights were dimming. We saw two seats near the back, and I gallantly went first to plow the way for her. Keep that phrase in mind. The couple sitting on the end didn t seem pleased that we had to go past them, and they didn t really make an effort to rise up and let us by. So I started to move past the first guy and kind of tripped over his foot. I lost my balance and started falling, right across the lap of the second guy, who had also not moved. I reached out my hand to the empty seat next to him, trying to break my fall and make it less awkward. But my hand hit toward the back of the seat, and it went up. The next thing I knew, my hand was on the floor, and I was splayed out across the lap of this man, who had by now thrown his hands up and made a face of disgust. Kim tells me the other guy was equally appalled at what was happening. She initially was trying to get me up and off the guy, but I was just stuck. I had my coat and cap in my left hand, my weight was all on my right hand, and nobody was helping me. This made Kim more embarrassed, until finally I found a way to squirm off the guy and move to my seat with my pride severely shaken. By this time I was quite the spectacle. People were whispering. And then it happened. Kim started snickering and giggling. She couldn t stop. In fact, all through the movie I would hear her suppressing a laugh at inappropriate times in the plot. She couldn t help herself. I tell you this story, of course, to gain your sympathy and a measure of revenge on my beloved wife. Is it working? I really think the bigger point is what it feels like to fall and fail

2 as we all do sooner or later. The fact is, we not only all fall and fail, but we also find sometimes that others can t help but add insult to injury. It s one thing to mess up; it s another thing to have people rub it in. It never feels good to be the butt of the joke; and in case you haven t noticed, I ve got a pretty big butt, don t you know?! Today is Palm Sunday, and I promise there is a way this story will fit by the time I ve finished bending it. On Palm Sunday Jesus was a hero. He came riding in on the foal of a donkey down the Mount of Olives and into Jerusalem. He was the man of peace, the protector of the powerless. The crowds were singing Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. They were waving palm frons like we did this morning. It had the makings of a pageant. But by the time of our text today, it s just four days later, and everything has quickly changed. Judas has betrayed him. He s been denied three times by his closest ally, Peter. All the disciples have vanished. Jesus is on his own. He s been passed around from the high priest to the governor. The people have chosen to have another Jesus released by Pontius Pilate the insurrectionist Jesus Barabbas. Can they be serious? How humiliating can it get? Well, just wait. They cry out for him to be crucified. It s hard to imagine more humiliation than being crucified. Crucifixion was invented by the Persians, practiced by the Greeks, and perfected by the Romans. It was applied almost exclusively to criminals and people of low estate. That s not so different from today, when capital punishment is disproportionately carried out against poor and black citizens and rarely against the wealthy who can afford the best lawyers. In Jesus day, to be crucified was not only to be killed in the cruelest way possible but also to be shamed in the basest way possible. Cursed is one who is hanged on a tree, Deuteronomy says. To Jews, this could mean only that Jesus was cursed by God. God would not have allowed an innocent, righteous man to be crucified if he were really a Torah keeper, not to mention the messiah. And so the logic went that we even heard from Isaiah about God not allowing the servant of Israel to be brought to shame. God would 2

3 deliver him. But there s more. When you heard this section of the passion story read, did you hear how many times the words mocked, mocking, derided and taunted were mentioned? And it s not just the words: the things they did to him the stripping, the spitting, the scarlet robe, the crown of thorns, the wine mixed with vinegar, the selling of his clothes, his carrying of his own cross, the sign over his head about being King of the Jews, the bandits on his right and left taunting him, the passersby shaking their heads and making him feel like a failure, the chief priests and scribes and elders ridiculing him about not being able to save himself, even the heavens darkening as if the whole creation had joined in the mocking. It doesn t get any worse than this. We know from the Bible that God is not mocked. Well, Jesus is mocked. And yet upon his death the soldier standing by declares, Truly this man was God s Son. What are we to make of all this? Before we rush to Easter and the glorious resurrection of Jesus from the dead that brings hope to all creation, we need to ask about the events of Holy Week and why they happened the way they did. In my oral exams for my Ph.D., one of my professors asked the question, Would it have made any difference if Jesus had died in his sleep instead of dying on the cross? And the answer is yes, I believe. The answer is yes in part because of the suffering involved in the manner of death by crucifixion. But I don t think the suffering matters in the sense that Mel Gibson s movie The Passion of the Christ suggests. In this movie, the message is that the extreme measure of violence and blood and cruelty was necessary to communicate the depth of love and sacrifice of God for us. Somehow in that way of thinking, God had to experience the worst of our inhumanity in order to save us. Nothing less would have worked, in the sense that somehow suffering had to exceed a certain threshold in order for the spell of evil to broken and the devil defeated. But I think the mockery is another way of looking at this question, because it involves another way of looking at suffering. We often think of the cross as nothing more or less 3

4 than Christ s sacrifice for our sins. Somehow Christ s death accomplishes a payment that we cannot make: a payment that at last exonerates us and sets us free. We are forgiven of our sins because of what Jesus did. But sin has to do with behavior, whereas shame has to do with our being. Sin has to do with what we do, whereas shame has to do with who we are. When Jesus is mocked, he stands more deeply in our place than simply getting in the way of our punishment for doing wrong. He isn t just whipped behind the woodshed for our sins; he is publicly humiliated as the Son of God, through whom the whole creation was formed and declared good. So what the cross reveals is not some secret required transaction that has to happen between the world and God in order for us to get to heaven. The mocking reveals the extent to which humanity is altogether distorted by the evil that has a hold on it. When the God who is not mocked is mocked, the mockery itself is exposed for the fraud it is. It loses all its power to destroy our dignity. It frees us from the fear that the opinion of others can touch our deepest souls. God s only begotten Son takes our shame upon himself in order to restore unto us the freedom and joy of being God s sons and daughters ourselves. Christ makes a mockery of mockery. By his innocent death he makes a mockery of death itself. In 1927 Eugene O Neill published a little-known and only twice-performed play called Lazarus Laughed. Ironically, it might just get to the heart of things. Lazarus, you remember, was the brother of Jesus close friends, Mary and Martha of Bethany. He had taken ill, and Jesus took his good time getting there, only to find him four days dead. Death did not deter Jesus. He called out to the grave, and Lazarus came forth to life. O Neill s play captures the upending of the world that this event represents. Lazarus has been delivered from death to the point that he can now laugh in the face of it. And this is just what the powers of the world cannot stand, because they count on the threat of death to control people. In the last scene of the last act, Lazarus begins to laugh and cries out to the crowd, O men, fear 4

5 not life. You die, but there is no death for Man! And then his laughter rises, and a stillness settles upon the hearers. The people slowly start to laugh with him. At this the emperor Tiberius, as if he realizes something is happening against his will, tries feebly to appear imperial, and he says, I command you not to laugh! Caesar commands. Then he orders the soldiers, saying, Put back the gag! Stop his laughter! But the laughter of Lazarus lovingly mocks back at him. The soldiers and the crowd seem to side with Lazarus and his laughter, as if it exposes the mockery of death itself. Tiberius can t stand it. He finally addresses Lazarus in an almost childish way: You must pardon me, Lazarus. This is my Caesar's duty to kill you! You have no right to laugh before all these people at Caesar. It is not kind. 1 that would rob us of our full freedom and complete humanity. Your sins are forgiven, my friends; yes, that is true. But more than that, your embarrassment is lifted, your shame is removed, and your dignity is restored. Whatever others now may say of you, it cannot touch your soul. The one who hangs on the cross of disgrace is the one who gives you grace. Thanks be to God. Do you see it? The powers of the world want to make a mockery of those they wish to rule but who will not bow down to them. Death is the proudest enemy of all. But if death itself is defeated, the mockery is reversed. Now it is God who mocks the powers 1 Thanks to Kenny Wood for passing this along in a private . 5