Palm/Passion Sunday Rev. David Inglis

Part 1: "In the Garden"

Oh dear God, you have anointed me with your Spirit to proclaim your good news. I have given it my all. I've let your Spirit flow through me in every way I could, to try to reach people with your truth, your forgiveness, your healing, and your compassion. I’ve been amazed at the power you have given me. And I’ve been amazed at how some people harden their hearts and react with fear, judgment, and jealous spite. But together we have planted seeds of your kingdom wherever hearts have been receptive, and I thank you for doing this great work through me.

But now you are asking something more of me. You are asking me to carry your love right into the burning fire of hatred, malice, vindictiveness, and evil. And to do that, I have to drop every defense, every resistance, every ounce of divine power– and human power too. I have to walk right into those burning flames until they utterly consume me. And through it all, I have to show only the face of love.

My Abba, my Abba, do you know what you are asking of me? Can you know what it feels like to suffer in total helplessness? Every part of my brain is working out strategies for evasive actions. Every fiber of my body is recoiling in fear, or rising up to defend itself? Do you feel my soul gasping for breath as it prepares to absorb the heights and depths of evil and hate that will be unleashed on me? Can you know what it feels like to be utterly despised, rejected, and alone, powerless over the forces that gloat in your suffering? Abba, I don’t feel ready for this!

Is there no other way to usher in your kingdom, God? Can’t you unleash your power against the evildoers, instead of inviting them to unleash their power against me? Can’t I just keep teaching and healing and doing miracles? Won’t they wake up and get it if we give them more time? I feel so helpless. I feel so alone. Abba, you are all-powerful. Can’t you find another way? Can’t you take this bitter cup from me, and give me an easier one? After all I’ve done, don’t I deserve a little consideration?

What am I saying? God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know that your kingdom can’t be manifested through any act of selfishness, no matter how justified it seems. I know that only forgiving love has the power to set people free from the forces of darkness that possess them. I love you with all my heart, soul, and mind. Help me love you with all my strength too. And help me to love those who want to destroy me with all the power and compassion and totality of your love for them. Help me to walk into that fire on fire with your love for them, so that they might see their sins and fears and dark shame consumed by your unwavering love. If this is the cup you have prepared for me, Abba God, please give me the strength to drink every drop of it, down to the bitterest dregs. I yield to you my will, my body, my life, my all.

(Jesus looks up over the congregation, listening.) What’s that noise? They must be coming for me now. (Stands up, facing the back of the sanctuary.) Abba, your will be done in me. God, give me the eyes to see them as your children, and to give myself to them as your sacrificial love offering. (Jesus walks down the center aisle and exits.)

Imagine that we have the courage to follow Jesus through the betraying kiss by Judas, his disciples’ desertion, his midnight trial by Caiaphas, Peter’s denials, his excruciating scourging, the cruel mocking and abuse by the Roman soldiers, his trial by the bloodthirsty mob at the hands of Pilate, his stumbling steps through Jerusalem bearing the cross on his lacerated shoulders, and the nailing of his outstretched hands that have healed so many and of his feet that have faithfully walked so many dusty roads. And now we stand beneath the cross of Jesus, and we see him looking down on his executioners and his accusers, looking down on all of humanity, looking down on . . . us–on you and me.

Maybe we didn’t lend our voice to the mob crying out, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" Maybe our hand didn’t touch the whips that tore open his flesh. Maybe we had no part in nailing him to his cross. And yet. . . and yet on some level that is deeper than human logic and that transcends time and space, we know that this innocent son of God bears wounds that are our own doing. When we betray someone’s trust, he feels the sting. When we desert someone who counted on us, he feels the pain. When we deny our truth, he feels the light dim. When we reject someone, his heart hurts. When we mock someone, he feels the distress. When we strike out at someone, he takes the blow. We can hear Jesus saying, "Whenever you have done it to the least of these my brothers and sisters, you have done it to me." Do we have the courage to look at him now, and see in his suffering the wounds we have inflicted on Jesus’ brothers and sisters–other sons and daughters of God? . . .

We had reasons for what we did. We thought we were justified, or we had problems of our own, or we were stressed or anxious or preoccupied. But there Jesus hangs, suffering just the same.

Jesus opens his mouth to speak. . . what? Words of condemnation and blame? Listen to the words that come out of his parched mouth: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

Jesus knows that we are limited by our own needs, our own fears, our own restricted view. He knows that life is a continual process of growing beyond our own needs, our own fears, our own restricted view, so that we can see each other and touch each other and love each other more and more as he does. And he knows that the way we do that is not through shame and condemnation, but through a heart that is growing in awareness of what we do, and the pain it causes, and the destruction we create through our blindness.

And so he speaks to us words of forgiveness. He offers us here beneath his cross a sanctuary of unconditional love, where we are invited to look at the truth of what we have done to God’s sons and daughters. But in the light of his compassion, our eyes are opened to another truth about us. In his eyes, we too are beloved sons and daughters of God, often lost, confused, and blind, yet always beautiful, precious, and infinitely loved.

What a gift we find here beneath the cross of Jesus! It is a gift that is offered to each of us, no matter how shameful our sins. It is the invitation to embrace the fullness of the truth–the truth of the effects of our sins, and the deeper truth that all can be forgiven, all can be healed, all can be embraced in the outstretched arms of Christ’s unlimited love. When we know the truth, Jesus said, it would set us free. What is required of us is the courage to take response-ability for our sins–to respond to those we have wounded with our ability to say we’re sorry, to make amends, and to see them as the son or daughter of God that they are.

Paul said, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself." Beneath the cross of Jesus, we can experience that reconciliation taking place within us, between us and those we have wronged, and between us and God.

This reconciliation, this peace, this amazing grace, is Jesus’ wish for us as he gives us the gift of his body broken for us, and his blood shed for us. Will you receive this gift that he suffered and died to give you?