MPC
7th January 2018.March 30 - Luke 23:32-47 - "Why Easter Makes Surprising Emotional Sense"
MPC
7th January 2018.
Peter Kutuzov
Now it's an ambitious objective, to show that the Easter Story makes good emotional sense.
And in fact I want to start by admitting that if you're not sold on Christianity that I could understand if you had a hard time believing that it could make good emotional sense.
Parts of the Good Friday story are quite dark.
Bad things happen.
And there's this idea in the story that everyone participates in that. That the darkness is in everyone.
I can see how it may seem that living by that story would be quite negative for your emotional life.
We're pretty big on having healthy self-esteem in our culture. And words like sin are a genuine threat to feeling good about yourself. Secular atheist groups, at least, felt it threatened school kids enough to use it as grounds to try to get rid of Religious Instruction in Queensland schools.
You might have seen this first hand. Have you come across Christians who spend most of their time trying to convince anyone who'll listen that they're a bad person? I have.
It's generally a pretty awkward conversation. And sometimes the Christian looks pretty darn vindictive as they try find some mud they can make stick.
But this morning I'm going to suggest that just maybe, despite all this, there are deep emotional needs that the Good Friday story satisfies deeply.
That there are longings in every human heart to be forgiven, and to be with. To have sins left behind, and to be friends with God.
Sin. It's a word that when Christians use it induces either guilt or eyerolls.
But in the hands of a good advertising exec, it can sell a lot of ice cream, cocktails, lingerie... just about anything that's got a suggestion of naughtiness about it. The problem with that is that it makes out like sin is basically anything that makes you feel just a little bit too good. Now if that's what you think sin is, essentially anything that's fun enough to make you self-conscious about enjoying it, then it makes what Jesus says in v28 sound foolish.
If sin's just indulging then it sounds like Jesus is offering to forgive you for that night when ice cream, the leftover mud cake, your doona and Netflix was just too good an offer to refuse. Which is hardly something anyone with any emotional sense thinks you need to be forgiven for. But you need to know that that kind of thing is not the reason that Jesus chose to go to a cross on Easter Friday.
Francis Spufford describes sin in a way much more true to the bible. Here's how he puts it.
For us, it refers to something much more like the human tendency to stuff up. Or ... the human propensity to stuff things up. [It's] not just our tendency to lurch and stumble and screw up by accident ... It's our active inclination to break stuff - "stuff" here including moods, promises, relationships we care about and our own well being and other people's, as well as material objects.
And I reckon that for most of us, this description DOES make some emotional sense. Some of you may even recognise yourself in its description.
Now, for many it's not until the classic moments of adult catastrophe that we fully realise our Human Tendency Toward Stuffing Things Up... things like:
But the Human Tendency to Stuff Things Up could just as easily be realised in the normal small moments. When you realise:
We just do. We don't just stuff up, we stuff things up. Relationships. Tasks. Objects. People and things God has made, and loves. Do you? I do. And it's much less comfortable and much less fun to talk about than breaking the diet this week.
But it's THIS kind of thing that Jesus says that his death on Good Friday, is for. Verse 28 of our first reading: "This is my blood of the covenant... " This cup of wine, ancient ritual symbol of the Jewish nation, is for you a reminder of a new contract, a new covenant, between God and people. An agreement, that secures forgiveness of sins. The story that Jesus tells about his death is that it's a substitute. A substitute for you. That the penalty, the fine, the price for our Human Tendency to Stuff Things Up... he paid it. And that's what the cross is. Jesus' blood, spilled for our Tendency to Stuff Things Up.
One of the challenging things about this story is that it asks you to face that for yourself. To recognise that there are serious ways we do stuff things up. That not all of the colours in this heart are whiter than white.
Does that make emotional sense?
Spending time thinking about the dark bits of your heart and your tendency to stuff things up might not sound like it would be good for your psychological well being. I think most of us have a very real fear that admitting that a part of the mixture of colours is black will give it more power over us. Make it more real. You might worry it could even lead you into depression. Just feel horrible about yourself. I suspect that this is the danger that those who oppose Religious Instruction feared for their kids hearing about sin at school.
And some Christians DO end up doing this. But it's not because Jesus asked them to. That's just because we're human and we Stuff Things Up.
Instead of wallowing in negativity, what Jesus offers is... forgiveness. The counter-intuitive thing about facing yourself honestly: including your stuff-ups, is that it's the key to getting to the other side of them. To moving on PAST them. And in fact, that's what forgiveness actually means.
When Jesus says in verse 28 that his blood will be poured out for forgiveness, the word translated as 'forgive' there in v28 means 'release'. To no longer be bound by something. Literally, to let it go. To leave behind so you can move on to something else.
In the schools of Jesus' day it was the word you'd use in class when someone's been ranting about their hobby horse (maybe it's mature age student, I don't know) and everyone just desperately wants them to sit down so we can move on. Teacher says thanks, but we need to leave that behind now. To forgive it.
Christian forgiveness means facing the truth about what's in your heart. Whatever that happens to be. Wounds. Sadness. Our own Tendency to Stuff Things Up. The way others have stuffed YOU up. And have it left behind. On Jesus' shoulders. Paid for. In full. Gone from your shoulders, onto his. Could you use some 'release'?
Just this week, in Trebes, France, Lieutenant-Colonel Arnaud Beltrame, a Catholic Christian, walked into the middle of a terrorist attack. With two people already dead, Arnaud convinces the gunman to release the woman that he's holding to use as a human shield. And take him instead. She had been held there as his shield for an hour. Can you imagine how she felt... that moment she was released.
Arnaud died not long after at the hands of the gunman. His life given, to save hers. Now, the violence of the whole situation was senseless, but what Arnaud did makes an incredible emotional sense, does it not? That kind of noble sacrifice to secure the release of another resonates deeply. It's had a huge emotional impact on that lady. She says that she just keeps thinking about Arnaud, and what he did for her.
It's what Jesus did on the cross, securing release - forgiveness - for anyone who will trust him.
There's one more bit of emotional sense that I think we see in the story. Did you notice the little exchange in our final reading? Cast your eyes over it, because it's beautiful. There are a couple of criminals on crosses with Jesus. They're there for their own stuff-ups, just as they deserve. But one of them, incredibly, can see that what Jesus is doing makes sense. That the King would die for his subjects. And he has the audacity. The genius. To say to Jesus, "Look, I know I don't deserve it. I've obviously stuffed my life up. But will you remember me? When you come into your kingdom?"
And at this point I expected Jesus to say something about forgiving, releasing this man from his considerable sins. But that's not what he says. Do you see in verse 43? "Today, you will be with me, in paradise." See, God isn't fixated on sin for sin's sake. God wants to deal with sin in order to bring his children to be HOME with him. God doesn't just want to forgive your stuff-ups so that you can move on and become a better person. He wants to be WITH you. That longing that we have to be with him, is a longing he shares.
The Good Friday story shouldn't lower a person's sense of worth. The story of Good Friday says that no matter WHAT YOU think of whether you are loveable and whether people want to be your friend and to be with you, GOD says, "Well it's not ABOUT what you think, I love you. I forgive you. And I want to be WITH you."
How much do you want to be with me God? Well I came into your world. Walked in your shoes. Befriended people, knowing the whole time that one day. This Good Friday. Even the CLOSEST ones - the ones I trusted - would betray me. They'll pretend they don't know me. They'll run when things get hard. The mob will mock me. Spit on me. Strip me naked. Humiliate me. And hang me on a cross. Blood, pouring, out.
Why'd you do it God? Because your Tendency to Stuff Things Up is super serious, but I won't let it win. Whatever you think about how valuable you are, or aren't I paid the price of Good Friday, so that you can BE forgiven, and BE with me, in paradise.
And look I really don't know what it's like for you here today. But when I connect with my heart and connect with that story, I do find it all makes surprising emotional sense.