Tuesday, March 29, 2016

The Passion of the Christ

Easter Sunday, 2016
Isaiah 65:17-25
The first five Easters of my life as a minister of word and sacrament I served as an associate pastor in congregations of more than 500 members. Like most women and men serving in such roles, I longed to preach the high holy day sermons – Easter, Christmas Eve – the feast days that form the foundation of the story around which we center the church.
Now, however, like most women and men who have preached the story each year for a decade or more, I find myself wondering what else can I possibly say that hasn’t been said, oh, about 2,000 times before.
In that state, I’ll confess, I entered Holy Week feeling considerably less than passionate about the whole thing.
In a post written about a year before his death, entitled “Easter Again,” the late theologian Marcus Borg reflected this challenge. He said,
“I sympathize with clergy who preach about Easter to the same congregation for several years. Of course, you say what you think is most important the first time.
So what do you say the second time and the third time and more?”[1]
That got me to wondering what I thought was most important way back when I first preached an Easter sermon. What was I so passionate about that I saved it up for that first Easter Sunday here? I certainly don’t remember, and I would be shocked if anyone who was here in April of 2004 remembers what I thought was so important on that Easter Sunday.
Anybody remember? Anybody? Bueller?
I didn’t think so. On this 13th Easter Sunday I’ve been privileged to preach here, the fact that no one recalls what I was passionate about in 2004 strikes me as perfectly, wonderfully appropriate.
What matters on Easter is not what I am passionate about, nor what you are passionate about. What matters on Easter is what Jesus was passionate about. Because what Jesus was passionate about is what God was and is and ever will be passionate about: life – in all of its power and possibility, all of its daring and diversity, all of its longing and its love.
Jesus was passionate about life, and about ensuring that all of God’s children, sprung from the tree of life, might find a place at the table of grace.
It is, thus, beyond ironic, that the symbol of the movement that grew out of Jesus’ life should be a reminder of state-sanctioned death. It’s important to remember that, and thus to remember the passion of the Christ – that is to say, his suffering and his death. We do not lift high the cross to celebrate or sanction suffering. We lift high the cross to proclaim that the power of God is precisely the power of life in the face of suffering and of death.
Easter is God’s great “yes,” in the face of the powers and principalities that would have us believe all of the world’s loud “nos.”
“No,” terrorists and fundamentalists tell us, “It is not possible to have peace.”
“No,” those who believe that power flows from weapons tell us, “It is not possible to live without militarized borders and wars without end.”
”No,” bigots and reactionaries tell us, “It is not possible to have just and diverse communities.”
“No,” those who profit from a fundamentally unfair global economy tell us, “It is not possible to have economic justice.”
“No,” white privilege tells us, “It is not possible to proclaim that Black Lives Matter, and it is all the more impossible do something to transform the systems that reinforce that tragic truth that, for far too long, they simply haven’t.”
“No,” the talking heads tell us, “It is not possible to have women in positions of power and authority and to judge them on what they accomplish there, instead of on whether or not they smile enough to please the men.”
“No,” the governor of North Carolina tells us, “It is not possible even to figure out restrooms such that transgender sisters and brother can pee in peace.”
I bet that if I’d uttered that phrase on that first Easter Sunday here some of you would still remember it!
What I hope we remember, though, is that this “yes” vs. “no” is not an opposition of us vs. them. It’s an opposition, instead, of us vs. God. You see, some of these voices of negation belong to each of us; all of them belong to some of us. After all, affluence, appearance, power and profit – these are the idols we worship.
Nevertheless, all of these things that the world teaches us are impossible – that we teach ourselves are impossible – are precisely the things about which Jesus was passionate: peace, love, justice.
One might cite Elvis here, and ask, “what’s so funny about peace, love, and understanding.” Costello has always been my personal favorite Elvis.  
For the higher churchers among us, we could cite Michael Curry, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church. The Rev. Curry, in his Easter address, noted that much of the time we look at the passions of Jesus and conclude that they amount to “a great hope, a wonderful ideal, but not realistic in a world like this. Maybe,” he went on, “parts of us … wonder, maybe the strong do survive, maybe might does make right, maybe you better look out for number one. [… But] how’s that workin’ out for the world? The truth is, the way the world very often operates is not working out. It’s not sustainable. It’s not the way to life.”[2]
The way to life. The way to life is what the Easter story is ultimately all about. The way to life, as Jesus’ life demonstrated, is not a way of denial and avoidance of the broken places of the world, but, rather, a way of engaging that which is broken and transforming it, a way of finding new life out of the dust of that which has been destroyed, a way of getting to “yes” when all around us – and even, sometimes, within us – the world shouts “no!”
From beginning to end, Jesus’ life was about taking the world’s expectations, and turning them upside down; of hearing “no,” but speaking an insistent, challenging, loving “yes!”
In his first public sermon, according to Luke’s gospel, Jesus took down the scroll of the prophet Isaiah and read, “the spirit of the Lord is upon me, for God has ordained me to proclaim good news to the poor, liberty to the captives, restored sight to the blind, and the year of jubilee to those who live in debt.” God has called me, in other words, to speak “life” where the world says “death.”
Isaiah concluded his prophetic writing with a clear vision that informed and motivated Jesus from start to finish:
“For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in what I am creating. … Before they call I will answer, while they are yet speaking I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox …! They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.”
This is the passion of the Christ. May it be our passion as well. On Easter, and on every other day until all have life, and have it abundantly.
Christ is risen! Let us rise up as well! Amen.