Have you ever been with someone as they approached death? Though it is sometimes difficult, people will often speak in their final days or hours. They may simply be expressing a need, “May I have a drink?” or “could you please move my pillow?” Sometimes the words will express a concern for others; “Everything will be okay,” or simply, “I love you.” A person’s final words reveal what is on his or her heart at the time, and sometimes they reveal the nature of the person’s faith and hope. Methodism’s founder, John Wesley, is said to have uttered these words as he died, “Best of all, God is with us.”
In the case of one being crucified, the very act of speaking was painful and required great exertion. Death by crucifixion was planned so as to make the criminal suffer in great agony for a good length of time before finally succumbing to death, usually through some combination of exhaustion, shock, and asphyxiation. To speak while being crucified would require great effort as the victim would have to pull himself up by the nails in the wrists in order to expand the diaphragm enough to speak. For all of these reasons, words were scarce among the victims of crucifixion.
Yet, the gospels record seven statements that Jesus made from the cross. Tonight, we begin together our Lenten sermon series, which will take us through these last words that Jesus spoke in the final hours before his death. These are commonly known as the “Seven Last Words,” but really it’s seven phrases. We will work through them more or less chronologically, at least as best as we can determine the order in the from the four gospels, and also making allowances for special observances, like this evening and Palm Sunday.
Indeed, Jesus’ final words fall in the episode of his crucifixion, which we usually only bring up in the final week before Easter. So it is unusual to spend all of Lent talking about Jesus’ hours on the cross. And yet, in these final words, we learn something important about Jesus. We know that Jesus went to some effort and bore great pain to speak these words, and that these words were most important of all because Jesus made that extra effort to speak them. Taken together, as we will do in the coming weeks, they offer a powerful and moving picture of what was on the heart and mind of Jesus as he died. And they also tell us something about who we should be in our relationship with Christ.
So we begin tonight with the first words from the cross as recorded by Luke, words uttered by Jesus just moments after he was hung on the cross: “Father, forgive them; for they don’t know what they’re doing.” These first words, not surprisingly, were a prayer. But what is surprising is what he prayed: “Father, forgive them.” So, for whom, exactly, is it that Jesus is praying? Who was the “them” Jesus was asking God to forgive?
It’s not terribly difficult to deduce that Jesus was praying for the soldiers who had tortured him and crucified him and who were now standing at the foot of his cross and preparing to gamble for his clothes. Jesus was also most certainly praying for the crowd. This was the crowd that had called for Barrabas’ release and yelled for Jesus to be crucified instead. Luke notes that even with Jesus hanging on the cross they were still deriding him, shaking their heads, mocking him. Then there were the religious leaders – jealous and spiritually blind, they conspired with the Romans to kill Jesus. For all of these people – the brutal soldiers, the mocking crowds, the jealous religious leaders – for all of these Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them.”
But it wasn’t just them, you see. There is someone else included in Jesus’ prayer, someone for whom Jesus was pleading from the cross for God’s mercy to be extended; that’s each of us. We are among the “them” Jesus was praying for as he said, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” Sure, we may not have been standing there when Jesus was nailed to the cross. We may not have called out for Jesus to be crucified. We may not have put our hands on him and beat him. We may not have mocked and derided him as he hung there. And yet, in some sort of profound spiritual sense, we were there. The entire human race was there at the crucifixion. The death of Jesus was an event that transcended time. Jesus’ prayer gave voice to what Jesus was doing on the cross. He was giving himself to God his father as an offering of atonement for all people. This sacrificial act was for those who had come before and for those who would come after just as much as it was for those who heard his words that very day!
You and I were there when they crucified the Lord. In a sense, Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive Clair. Forgive Joe. Forgive Jane. Forgive those in our churches and those on the streets. Forgive those in the suburbs and those downtown. Forgive those in our country and those on the other side of the world. Father, forgive them…” This is the power of the words Jesus cried out from the cross: They were prayed not only for those who stood by at the cross, but also for all of us—for all of humanity.
And the simple fact is, we need forgiveness. Jesus would not have devoted his final words to a prayer for our forgiveness if we did not need forgiveness. We need forgiveness because we struggle with sin. Sin is a word we prefer not to use, but that doesn’t change the fact that whatever you may call it, sin dehumanizes others and us, and it separates us from God by means of guilt and shame. When we sin, we hurt others and keep ourselves from doing the things God intends and being the people that God intends. And that’s why we are here this evening; to repent, to acknowledge our sin and our need for forgiveness.
Some may say that Christians spend too much time dwelling on sin and making people feel guilty. Indeed, that may happen from time-to-time, but sin is not the central focus of the gospel. The central focus of the gospel is God’s mercy and unconditional grace. But we cannot fully and truly appreciate that grace and mercy until we are aware of just how very much we need it, how much we need forgiveness. Put another way, the gospel’s focus is not on sin; sin is simply the diagnosis. The primary focus of the gospel is the cure to sin, which is God’s grace and gift of salvation, made possible by Jesus’ very sacrifice on the cross.
This is what the season of Lent is all about. Over the next forty days, excluding Sundays, we will examine our hearts and minds and lives to see why we need what Jesus prayed for and died for: our forgiveness. Before you and I were even born, God knew the sinful things we would do, and he forgave us in advance. On the cross, Jesus suffered and died to save us from our sins and to redeem us. Every part of Jesus’ life was God’s word, God’s self-revelation to God’s people. On the cross, all the sins of the world—all the hatred, unfaithfulness, bigotry, poverty, violence, and death—all of those things were placed upon the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” When we see Jesus hanging there on the cross, we are meant to see the costliness of grace. Our sin is not a trifling thing. The Son of God was crucified for it. Yet even still, we are to see on the cross God’s willingness to extend mercy and grace.
But that mercy and grace means nothing if we do not accept it. God has already done everything necessary to save us and to forgive us. We don’t earn our salvation: it is pure gift. We are saved by God’s grace—saved from ourselves and from our sin. Never have human beings done anything so dark as to condemn, torture, and they crucify the Son of God, and yet Jesus prayed for them even as they were in the midst of their sin, asking that they might receive mercy. If mercy was available to them—and it was—then I promise you it is available to you. We have been reconciled to God. God, through Jesus, has already forgiven us. Our task is to accept the gift. And we can begin that process for the first time, or for a second third, forth, even fiftieth time tonight.
So as you come forward tonight to receive the sign of the cross in ashes, come knowing that you are redeemed. Know that Jesus’ prayer, “Father, forgive them,” was for every sinner who has ever lived, and no less you. We need only acknowledge our sin, repent of our wrongdoing, and accept the gift that God in Christ Jesus so freely and generously offers to us.
In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven. Glory to God. Amen.
