Sermon of March 16, 2008

Palm/Passion Sunday
Matthew 26:15-27:66
March 16, 2008

Cross and Key

Each of the Gospel writers tells the story of Christ’s passion a little differently. Mark’s telling is sparse an unadorned. John’s portrays Jesus as always in control. Luke begins his gospel by tracing Jesus’ lineage all the way back to Adam. Jesus’ death on the cross, Luke makes very clear, is for the sake of the whole world. As his arms are spread to receive the nails, Jesus prays, “Father, forgive . . .” As he shares the fate of two criminals, he promises, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”

Matthew is more specific but no less inclusive in his way. He traces Jesus’ lineage back to Abraham. He is keen to show that Jesus fulfills God’s promise to the chosen people, who were called to be a light and a blessing to all nations.

There are many things we might say about Jesus’ death. It was unjust. It was brutal. Behind it lay both religious and political motivations. All of these things are true, but none of them is enough to make sense of Jesus’ death. All the theological theories of atonement notwithstanding, this death makes little earthly or heavenly sense.

The King of the Jews dies a common criminal. God’s Messiah does not save himself. The one who called disciples saying “Follow me” ends up with only one follower -- an officer in the Roman army of occupation. So far as the cross makes any sense at all, it makes some sense as the key to a door, a door that we keep wanting to shut and God keeps wanting to open.

The cross has, through the centuries, become a symbol of just the opposite – of doors closed and strangers turned away. People have, and still do, kill other people for the sake of the cross. It is for many today a symbol hatred, hatred especially for the Jews, who are no more culpable for Jesus’ death than the Romans, the disciples, or the thieves on their crosses. There are no good guys in Matthew’s Passion story, except Jesus himself, who, as the centurion points out, really is God’s Son.

But the cross is not symbol of hate. It’s a symbol of love – God’s love for the whole world. God took what makes no sense and used it to open the door between us and God and between us and other people.

We read the Passion story this morning so that we would not find ourselves going from triumphal entry to triumphal Easter without passing through this valley of blood, tears, and death. With the men and women in Matthew’s Gospel who followed Jesus from Galilee, we also must stand at a distance and watch these things, for this cross is our door, too -- our open door to God.

It makes no sense, but it does point us to the Messiah. And that, beloved, is the wonder and power of the gospel.

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