A Faithful End and a Triumphant Beginning Easter, April 8, 2007
"It is Finished" John 19:30 "Father into thy hands I commend my
Spirit" Luke 23:46
1 Corinthians 15:1-11, Luke
24: 1-12
A few years ago I learned,
much to my delight, that among some Orthodox Christian groups it is customary
to tell jokes on Easter – in honor of the great cosmic joke that God played on
the devil and the forces of death on Easter day. They thought they’d won, that they’d defeated
God and life, but God had the last laugh.
So – in that spirit – before I say anything serious, let me tell you a
joke about Easter.
There
were three guys who died and went to heaven, three guys who were well-meaning
but not too bright. St. Peter greeted
them at the pearly gates and said “We want to welcome you to heaven, but before
you come in you need to answer just one question, namely, ‘What is Easter?’”
The first
guy thought for a moment and then he said “I know what it is! Easter is that big holiday when you get your
family together and you roast a big turkey and everybody wears pilgrim
hats.......” And St. Peter said “No,
that’s Thanksgiving, not Easter!”
The next
fellow said “Wait a minute, I’ve heard of Easter! That’s when you bring a tree into your house
and decorate it with lights and give out lots of presents......” And St. Peter said “That’s not Easter! It’s Christmas!”
But then the
third guy spoke up, saying “I think I’ve got it. I think Easter has something to do with when
Jesus died on the cross. They took him
down and buried him in a tomb, with a stone rolled across the opening. But on the third day he came out......” St.
Peter was just about to say “Yes, that’s Easter,” when the guy finished his
sentence: “He came out of the tomb, and
if he sees his shadow we have six more weeks of winter!”
We hear the Easter message in many familiar ways today - in the music; in the beauty of flowers, these signs of new life; in the scriptures that have been read. But in this sermon I want to speak of God's resurrection power with some words you might not expect on an Easter Sunday, the final two sayings of Jesus from the cross. As I said 6 weeks ago at the beginning of this sermon series, these "Seven Last Words" instruct us not just about Jesus' death, but about the essence of his life. They're kernels of truth, reflecting who Jesus was, what he believed, and why he came.
As a reminder for those who have listened to these words as we've journeyed through Lent, and an update for our guests today, here are the words from the cross: First, "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do," words in which we see Jesus’ divinity, his God-likeness, in his amazing willingness to ask pardon for the ones torturing him....... Similarly, we see Jesus, the redeemer in the words to the thief who was crucified with him: "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise......" We see Jesus, fully human, sharing the human love we have known, as he commends his mother into the disciple's care: "Woman, behold your son; son, behold your mother......"
Then we begin to see the deep despair and pain that Jesus felt, his complete identifying with humans in their sin, in the painful words "My God, why hast thou forsaken me?......" And, in the only words we could surely have said were we in his place, we see the humanness of our Jesus, who said "I thirst......."
And now the sixth word from the cross, as we find it in John 19:30: "When Jesus had received the wine he said 'It is finished.' Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit."
Read in a certain way that may sound like anything but word of triumph for Easter. We could take the words "It is finished" to mean a weary surrender: "It is finished - my life is done and I give up..... I tried to bring a vision of God's kingdom but I failed...... I tried to live with a victorious love, but it didn’t work..... It's finished; it’s over…....." If we read with a bowed head and a feeble voice, that sounds like the white flag of surrender.
But I don't believe that's how Jesus said it. Those who have carefully studied the original language of the New Testament report that the Greek word which we translate "It is finished" - tetelestai - is always used in a context to mean something like an accomplishment, a completion or an achievement. Tetelestai is a word that suggests a marathon runner crossing the finish line in first place and crying out "Finished!" ..... It suggests a wrestler getting up from the mat, celebrating a victory and crying "Finished!" It suggests a ship sailing into the harbor with all its flags flying, its journey done, its mission accomplished.
So on this Easter morning, as we hear Jesus' words from the cross, don't hear them as his whisper of defeat, nor as the last feeble dregs of his life being siphoned off in sorrow. No, hear them as a bold declaration: "Tetelestai! It is finished! The work God gave me to do has been completed. It is finished!"
Even as a boy of twelve Jesus had been conscious of the work God had
assigned him.
When Mary and Joseph lost track of him in
And what was this work of God that Jesus had to complete on the
cross? Human words are never quite adequate for completely explaining God's
mysteries, but here's one attempt: Jesus' work - the work God sent him to do -
was to bridge the great, wide gap between a just and holy God and a fallen
human race. Jesus' task was to bridge the chasm
between God and us.
Jesus, the divine one, had to cross
the gap from heaven to earth, representing God to us. He came to reveal God's nature, to teach us God's
truths, to demonstrate in the most tangible ways the depth of God's love for
us. He came as God to share in every dimension of human living and to bring
God's presence into all that is human. He brought God's presence into places of
joy and happiness and beauty - into families, into wedding feasts, into scenes
of nature's beauty, into deep and loving friendships. He brought God's presence
into the ugliest and harshest places of earth - into places of prejudice and
bigotry, into circles of sickness and mental illness, into Pilate's judgment
hall and the soldiers' place of torture, and onto the cross. He drew the
perfect image of God, so that we could see and know - see and know who God is
and what God expects; see and know what depth there is in God's love. He
crossed the gap from heaven to earth, representing and revealing God to us.
But he had to cross in the other direction as well. This Jesus, fully human, had to represent us
before God. Like an animal offered up in an ancient temple sacrifice, like the scapegoat who bears the sins of one who seeks
forgiveness, so Jesus bore the sins
of the world before God. Scripture gropes at expressing this truth with varied
images. It says Jesus "gave his life as a ransom for many;" that he
was "the lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world," that
"we were bought with a price;" that "with his stripes we are healed......" He had to
represent us, us sinners, as he crossed the gap to
God.
Some of you who are from my
generation will remember an old Simon and Garfunkle song that begins this way:
When
you're down and out; when you're on the street;
when
evening falls so hard, I will comfort you.
I'll
take your part.
Oh,
when times are hard, and friends just can't be found,
like a
bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down.
Like a
bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down.
I have no idea who or what Paul Simon
was referring to, but whenever I hear the song I know what it means to me. Jesus was a
bridge, a bridge over troubled water. He bridged the gap from heaven,
representing God to us. He bridged the gap from earth representing us to
God. That was his work, his mission, his Father's business. He was faithful to the
task, and on the cross, having fulfilled the work God sent him to do, he cried out, not
in surrender but in victory: "It is finished!"
Which leads me, on this Easter day to ask this question of you: If Jesus has finished his work and done everything that is necessary to bridge the gap between you and God, are you willing to do your part? His task was to build the bridge; ours is to walk across it to God. He completed his work for the sake of the whole human race, doing for us what we could not do - but he can't do our part of the process. Our task is to walk across the bridge by accepting his grace, by living a life of faith, and by serving and emulating our Lord. On Easter we can say "Christ's work is finished," but also "And ours goes on.”
And now, very briefly, the last words of Jesus from the cross: from Luke 23: 44 we read
"It was now about noon and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, while the sun's light failed; and the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Then Jesus, crying out in a loud voice said "Father into thy hands I commend my spirit.” Having said this he breathed his last. "
"Into thy hands I commend my
spirit......." The words are from a Psalm, Psalm 31:5, to which Jesus
added the word "Father." It's not surprising that Jesus quoted from
the Psalms, the hymnal and prayer book of
But there is something more you
should know about this last word from the cross. Some of us as children were
taught to pray a simple prayer at night, "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the
Lord my soul to keep......." or perhaps some other similar words. In ancient
What a victorious way to face death! What a simple, trusting, expression of resurrection faith! Jesus died, as we all will die, but when the work was completed and the suffering concluded, he died with the serenity of child going to sleep, and with the confidence that there are hands - trustworthy hands - into whose care he can be given.
These last words of Jesus are not just a goodbye. They are a final expression of Jesus' convictions about life and its meaning - his conviction, soon to be verified by the resurrection, that in life and in death our lives are held firmly but gently in the strong grasp of God.
I know that life is often full of difficulties. Some who are here today have suffered many losses - unexplained illness, death of loved ones, setbacks and disappointments in work and relationships, dimming of dreams. We wonder why life has to be so hard, and don’t always have clear answers, but our Christian faith declares that no matter how dark the path, or how deep and chilly the stream, there by your side, if you will grasp it, is the hand of Almighty Love.
So, do we face problems that we can't
begin to solve? With Jesus on the cross we can say "Father, Into thy
hands....." Do we face sorrow that
seems too heavy for anyone to bear? Into thy hands....... Are we up against
temptations that seem overpowering? Into thy hands..... Does the world, with its
injustice and evil and harshness seem too much for us to cope with? Into thy hands.....
Are we looking at the great sea of death, anxious about sailing into the unknown
regions of life? Into thy hands...... We
put ourselves
into the mighty hands of God, trusting that our human strength, our best
efforts, and our most faithful striving, can be undergirded by the power that
brought Jesus from death to life. That's
resurrection faith. That’s Easter hope. That’s the core of Christian life. (again borrowing freely from Hageman, We Call This Friday Good, pages 80-82)
Jesus completed his work and cried out
the victorious words "It is finished." With a child-like faith he placed
himself in God's care: "Father into thy hands I commend my spirit."
And then he died. And now on Easter
Day we remember the empty tomb, the angelic messengers, the words "He is not here,
he is risen!" and the appearances of Jesus.... These are all confirmations
of his victory. They are signs that the work he finished was well finished, and that his trust in
the hands of God was well founded.
Christ is Risen! We give thanks that his work was completed, as ours goes on. We give thanks that God’s hands were strong enough to save Jesus, and his presence is with us today. Christ is risen! Thanks be to God! Alleluia. Amen.