My Alibi A Sermon by Rich Holmes on Acts 3:12-19 Delivered on April 15, 2018 at Northminster Presbyterian Church in North Canton, Ohio One of the first things I learned in Seminary is that every sermon should be about scripture. Now, not every sermon is about scripture, but every sermon should have something to do with the part of the bible you re preaching on, and if it doesn t it isn t a good sermon no matter how well it is liked or received. But not only should sermons be about scripture, sometimes we have sermons within scripture and that is what we find today. In the third chapter of Acts we have a sermon. The disciple Peter is the one who is the preacher of this sermon, and the occasion is not Sunday morning worship, but a miraculous event. You see, Peter and the disciple John have just healed a disabled beggar outside the gates of the Jerusalem temple. There is a rather large crowd who did not necessarily see this miraculous event, but they recognized the man as someone who used to beg at the temple gate because he could not walk. Well, this occasion seems to call for a sermon because the crowd is so amazed by what they have seen and while we aren t told this, for all we know they want to bow down and worship Peter and John. But in his sermon Peter tells the crowd not to be amazed at what he and John have done, as if the power to heal came from the two of them and not from God. He goes on to say that this power to heal comes from faith in Jesus Christ, whom all of them crucified, even though he was holy and righteous. What we have today is a sermon, but it may strike you as being a strange sermon. For as Peter is addressing this crowd, just how does he know that this crowd is the same group of people who crucified Jesus. Does he recognize all their faces? And wouldn t it be some strange 1
coincidence if this crowd were the exact same crowd that demanded Jesus be crucified on Good Friday? Well, I doubt that Peter recognizes all the crowd s faces and I doubt this is the same exact crowd. So what does Peter mean to say that this crowd of people crucified Jesus? It reminds me, quite frankly of when we gather together for our Maundy Thursday service each year and we sing Were you there when they crucified my Lord? No, I was not there. I have an alibi. I wasn t even born yet. And if I wasn t even born yet, then how in the world can I be guilty of crucifying my Lord. And how can Peter say that this crowd he is addressing is guilty of crucifying their Lord? Now, as you are hearing my defense to what Peter is likely to charge me of, you may ask me, Pastor Rich, don t you ever feel guilty about Jesus crucifixion? Well, sure I do, but my feelings of guilt do not make me guilty. If I were superstitious I could feel guilty for stepping on cracks because I would worry that my stepping on a crack is going to make my mother break her back. But my superstitious feelings of guilt would not make me guilty. If your mother who lives two states away happens to break her back in some terrible accident it has nothing to do with where you stepped in Northeast Ohio, regardless of how you might feel about it. Way back in 1963, there was a young woman who lived in New York named Kitty Genovese. Late one March night of that year, Kitty was pursued by a man with a knife, who attacked her three times in a period of thirty five minutes. Kitty screamed throughout that thirty five minute period but no one did anything. And this attack did not take place on some remote country road but in Queens, in New York City, where, in fact, Miss Genovese s screams were heard by 38 people, but not one did anything until it was too late, and then by the time it 2
was too late, only one of the thirty eight called the police. Now, why not? How could people be so uncaring? I saw an interesting documentary about this not long ago, and some of the witnesses defended their actions by saying that you have to understand their bystander apathy in its historical context. This wasn t just some garden variety neighborhood in the year 2018. The neighborhood in Queens where Kitty Genovese was murdered in 1963 was a Jewish neighborhood, and it wasn t just a Jewish neighborhood, it was a neighborhood of many Holocaust survivors. 1963 after all, was only eighteen years after the Holocaust, and many of these people living in this neighborhood had fresh memories of SS guards in the camps of Dachau and Auschwitz. Now why is that important? It is important because the people in this neighborhood were frankly a little afraid of the police as they were afraid of any government authority. And they didn t want to get involved. I think there is probably some truth to that. But Holocaust survivors or not, 38 people heard screams for thirty-five minutes, that s three of these sermons. Three of these sermons back to back to back. Why didn t people get involved? Why didn t anyone call the police? I am sure that part of the reason has to do with the historical context as the witnesses now say, but that is only part of the reason. The other part is that people can do things in groups that they could never do on their own. People who would immediately call the police if they heard Miss Genovese screaming on a lonely country road simply won t do it when they re living in a large metropolis with millions of people. They say Let someone else do it. Why is it my responsibility? And so long as I am talking in this sermon about the Holocaust, you should also know that this week marked international Holocaust Remembrance Day, and you may wonder why on earth we would want to remember the Holocaust. Why should we remember something the 3
memory of which is so painful and so horrible. Well, I think we should remember the Holocaust, because it is a reminder that a nation of people can do things that very few people in that nation could ever do on their own. The German people in the Second World War were not monsters. I think if you would to go into almost any of their homes you would be amazed at how nice they were, at how friendly they were. And on their own none of them could force someone into a gas chamber and turn on the gas. But they can vote for someone who would. They can applaud someone who would. They could give orders to someone who would, or they could follow orders from someone whom they had taken an oath to obey idea. So was I there when they crucified my Lord? Yes, I was there. I was there because it took a lot of people to crucify my Lord, none of whom would do it on their own. It took Judas to betray him, who was no different from all of us as we often sell each other out for money and material things. It took Peter to deny him out of cowardice who was no different from all of us as we are often fearful and cowardly when it comes to standing up for what s right. It took Pilate to wash his hands who was no different from all of us, as we too often blame others for our own wrongdoing. It took the disciples to abandon him, who were no different from all of us as we often abandon and neglect those to whom we have promised our love and friendship. It took fickle crowds who cheered for him on Sunday and demanded his death on Friday, who were no different from all of us as our loyalty is often only skin deep and based on what you will do for us. It took soldiers who played games while he died who were no different from all of us as we often play games and focus on the silly and the trivial, without giving a moment s thought about the serious issues in this world of mass starvation, mass poverty and mass homelessness. Yes, I was there when they crucified my Lord. 4
In this Easter season, it is so odd to me just how many people there are in this world, people that I know, many of whom I have talked to, who can tell you that they have no problem believing that God could forgive everything wrong they ve ever done, but they have so much trouble believing that God could raise a man from the dead. You say to them, Do you believe God could forgive you for everything you ve ever done? Do you believe that God could wipe the slate clean on your whole record of wrongs? Oh sure, why not? Why not? They don t even spend two minutes reflecting on it. But do you believe that God raised Jesus from the dead? Oh well, I don t know about that. Maybe that s just a story. Or maybe that was just an illusion, or a dream, (like Thomas believed, as I said last week). Even theologians will say such things. But if you believe that God can forgive you for everything you ve ever done, then how in the world is God raising someone from the dead any more miraculous? How? We don t have an alibi. We were there when they crucified our Lord. If you believe that God could forgive you for killing the only one in this world who was ever completely innocent, then why on earth can t you believe that God could raise Jesus from the dead, or that God could raise you from the dead? You know, when I was in grammar school, I can remember the principal of the school was a woman named Ms. Greene, and I know that every kid in grammar school is terrified of going to the principal s office, but actually everybody in this school loved Ms. Greene. They did, Ms. Greene was the best. The assistant principal, though, was a woman named Ms. Bradfield. Now, I wouldn t say that kids were terrified of Ms. Bradfield, but if Ms. Bradfield had worked in a medieval dungeon no one in that part of history would have ever done anything wrong. Ms. 5
Bradfield knew how to terrify children like few people in the history of the world ever have. She knew how, and one of Ms. Bradfield s techniques was this, you see she wouldn t always paddle, and she wouldn t always give detentions and she wouldn t always call parents, but she had this very sinister looking leather bound book that was as black as coal, she called it her black book and whenever you came to see her, she would peer at you over her reading glasses and she would slowly take out a fountain pen, and she would so carefully and methodically etch your name into her black book. I think my heart stopped for a full minute every time she did that. I mean, it really stopped. Somehow in all her knowledge of how to torture children, Ms. Bradfield knew how psychologically terrifying it was to have your name written down in something that looked so official, and so horrible, something which you thought could be passed around for all the judges at the highest court in the land to review and see your name in there for all eternity. In the cross and empty tomb of our Lord, God has erased Ms. Bradfield s black book. God has no memory of anything wrong that we have ever done. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! 6