Whom Are You Looking For?: A Sermon for Good Friday
Good Friday Sermon – April 10, 2020
by Emily Rose Proctor
Although they come for Jesus armed with their weapons, it is Jesus who first interrogates them. Whom are you looking for?
It is such an important question that he asks it a second time. Whom are you looking for?
One gets the sense that Jesus is asking a more profound question than the one they hear.
I also get the sense that Jesus is not just asking his captors; he is also asking us, “Whom are you looking for?”
A lot of people, then and now, were looking for a warrior king, a commander in chief, poised and ready to unleash the wrath of God on their enemies and restore God’s people to greatness…or at least independence. They wanted a new King David to lead them in driving out the Roman army and restoring Jewish self-rule.
Peter, eager as always to lead the way, went so far as to draw his sword and cut off the ear of the high priest’s slave, Malchus.
I think most Americans can identify with this vision of a savior. How many of us would willingly cede our nation’s title as chief global super power to China or Russia? How many of us would really be comfortable with another nation having a bigger, stronger, better-equipped military than we have?
How many of us would vote for a commander-in-chief whose military strategy was to love our enemies? Or to forgive seventy times seventy? Jesus for President? Don’t make me laugh. Jesus wouldn’t even win an election in this country in a million years. He probably wouldn’t even make the televised debates.
I know that I, for one, would appreciate a savior skilled in the art of biological warfare right about now—one who could just wipe this Corona Virus off the face of the planet and be done with it.
“Put your sword back into its sheath,” Jesus says to Peter. “Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
Later, he says to Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world. If [it were], my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over.”
So if Jesus is not a warrior king, here to lead armed soldiers to victory and wipe all our enemies off the face of the planet, who is he?
Whom are you looking for? Jesus asks us again.
Well, if I’m really honest, I’d like someone who could guarantee me a comfortable life. I’d like to never have to worry about money or being in pain or grieving a significant loss. I’d like to always feel safe and affirmed. I’d like to have permission to do all the things I want to do and never be asked to do things that I don’t really want to do, like, for instance, love my neighbor as much as I love myself. Or be last instead of first. Or wash anyone’s feet, literally or metaphorically.
No, thank you, I’d rather have a savior who focuses on the positive and promises me wealth, health, and happiness in exchange for coming to church once or twice a week, tithing, and not committing a felony.
I’d like a savior who could guarantee that neither I nor my loved ones would get the Corona virus because we are faithful and pray sincere prayers. I’d like a savior who would say that social distancing wasn’t all that important—that just believing in him could keep me safe. I’d like a savior who told me not to feel at all guilty about my own relative comfort and privilege at time when so many are suffering.
But Jesus answered, “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.”
The truth? The truth? I’m right there with Pilate most days, laughing cynically. What in the world is truth? I’m not sure any of us knows any more. Truth. If it isn’t downright ridiculous, then it starts to sound uncomfortable. Perhaps even painful.
Whom are you looking for? Jesus asks us.
Ok, I’ll admit it, I’d like a superhero, please. If Jesus won’t wipe out the Corona Virus or at least all the potentially infected people from Corona hotspots who, I hear from a Publix cashier, are still flying into Florida on their private planes or sneaking in from Texas or Tennessee “the back way,” then the least he could do would be to protect those of us who are doing our part to social distance. Couldn’t God, if God really wanted to, create a force field around Walton County that couldn’t be penetrated. Turn some stones into masks and ventilators? Heal all the sick people, NOW. Or at least all the sick people that we know and love and are praying for?
But Jesus doesn’t protect his own loved ones from suffering and loss. His mother has to watch him hanging from the cross, struggling to breathe. The best he can do is ask one of his disciples to look after her, and her to look after him. “Woman, here is your son,” he says, as if those very words were not a sword to pierce Mary’s heart straight through.
Whom are you looking for? Have we really confessed the whole truth of it yet?
A lot of times, when I think about God. Who God is. Who I want God to be, I think I am looking for perfection. And by perfection, I think I mean no mistakes. No failures. And probably also no suffering. You know, all the omni’s. Omniscient. Omnipotent. All knowing. All powerful. All perfect. And when I think about God like that…inevitably God begins to feel abstract and far away. But that’s a small price to pay for a God who can save you from anything and everything. Isn’t it?
So what do I do with a Savior who comes into the world through a birth canal? Who has a body that can be and is tortured? What do I do with a savior, with a God, who says, “I am thirsty.” And finally, “It is finished.”
What do I do with a savior whose ministry ends in failure? Humiliation. Conviction. Suffering. Death.
I praise God. I thank God with everything that I am. Because the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ is so much better than what I was looking for.
The God revealed to us in Jesus Christ, crucified, is God with us, Emmanuel.
A God whose own insides have churned with grief and anger.
A God who knows what it is to thirst in his own parched throat.
A God who knows vulnerability and exposure in his own naked body.
A God who knows disappointment, abandonment, and betrayal in his own broken heart.
A God who knows the valley of the shadow of death, not abstractly, not theoretically, but in his excruciating gasping for breath.
Jesus told us who he is. God told us who God is.
I am, they said. I am.
Not a warrior. Not a king. Not a super hero. Not abstract perfection.
I am.
The name that God gave to Moses from the burning bush. I am.
And in John, Jesus fleshes that out for us—in seven “I am” statements—but also literally as “The Word Made Flesh.”
Whatever we might have been looking for, what we have is
“I am.”
I am the bread of life (John 6:35).
I am the light of the world (John 8:12).
I am the gate (John 10:9)
I am the good shepherd (John 10:11).
I am the resurrection and the life (John 11:25).
I am the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6).
I am the true vine (John 15:1).
But all of these “I am” statements must be understood in light of the cross. The cross, you might say, is Jesus’ final and most profound “I am” statement.
And it makes no promises. It just is. Here. With us.
I am, Jesus says. Here. Now. Nailed to the present moment[1] with you, whatever that is. Even if it is betrayal. Even if it is failure. Even if it is grief. Even if it is thirst. Even if it is unendurable suffering. Even if it is death. I am here with you.
And that is a love that is so much more than what I was looking for. A love that, it turns out, IS stronger than death. Than enmity. Than sin or failure.
When we cry out to God, “Where were you when I needed you?” or “Where are you now?” the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ cries back to us from the cross, right there with you. I am nailed to whatever your present moment is, with you. Wherever you are, I am.
Laid off, without any idea of how you are going to make ends meet? I am with you, God says.
Beside yourself with grief? I am with you, God says.
Feeling trapped, like you can hardly breathe? I am with you, God says.
Overwhelmed by the needs that surround you? I am with you, God says.
And there is nothing—neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, that can separate you from my love.[2]
Whatever you thought you were looking for, I am, says the God revealed to us in Jesus Christ. And before all this, I was.
And after all this, I will be. Still with you. Forever and ever. Thanks be to God. Amen.
[1] This phrase “nailed to the present moment” is one that struck me over fifteen ago when I read Buddhist author Pema Chödrön’s book, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times. I don’t think she related it to Jesus’ crucifixion, but I did.
[2] Romans 8:38.