In the name of our crucified saviour, Amen.
Tonight we weep, and lament, our churches are bare, we will shortly extinguish the light of Christ, and the whole church contemplates the events of today, and now sits in the darkness of the realisation of the death of our saviour, and the time of mourning and desolation we now face.
We have just listened to the passion from St Johns Gospel, and we remember the brutality, and sheer inhumanity that Christ faced; first in his arrest, then the torture, and finally the long walk to Golgotha, which ultimately led to his agonising death.
We heard how Christ was treated as a criminal, how the people spat on him and jeered. Most were there to watch the spectacle, and to revel in his misery, they didn’t really care who he was, he was just another criminal sentenced to death, Roman style. Alongside them were the Chief Priest and the rest of his enemies, not only had they been able to rally the crowd against him, but no doubt they also felt satisfaction they had achieved a great victory.
There was only a mere handful of people in the crowd who felt genuine compassion and heartfelt sadness for what was happening. But even they were hidden, out of sight, distraught and tormented by all they had experienced in the past 24 hours, and no doubt frightened and fearful for their own lives.
However, the pain and sorrow they had already endured was nothing compared to what Christ felt, as they witnessed him being flogging and enduring utter humiliation, but even this was nothing compared to what was to come next.
Crucifixion was not a pleasant punishment, It was one of the most painful, disgraceful and barbaric methods of capital punishment ever performed; it was slow, raw, violent, painful and gruesome. After Christ had been sentenced to death he endured the long and painful walk up to the place of crucifixion with his cross, this was then put on the ground and he was forced to lie upon it.
Spikes about 7 inches long and 3/8 of an inch in diameter were driven into the wrists and feet. Remember that these nails wouldn’t be like the smooth nails that we have today, they would have been coarse and uneven. The rough spikes would have hit the nerves, causing shocks of pain up the arms to the shoulders and neck. Then the lifting of the cross, being raised up high for all to see, and the immeasurable pain that would have been felt as the base of the cross found purchase in the hole that would keep it steady.
The position of the nailed body held the victim’s rib cage in a fixed position, which made it extremely difficult to exhale, and impossible to take a full breath. Having already suffered from the scourging, the beatings and the walk, the gospel tells us that, Christ was described as extremely weak and dehydrated.
It was also likely that he was losing significant amounts of blood. As time passed, the loss of blood and lack of oxygen would have caused severe cramps, spasmodic contractions and possibly moments of unconsciousness.
Ultimately, the cause of death in crucifixion was suffocation. To breathe, Christ was forced to push up on his impaled feet to allow for inflation of the lungs. As the body weakened and the pain in the feet and legs became unbearable, then he was forced to trade breathing for pain and exhaustion. Eventually, he became utterly exhausted, so that he could no longer lift his body and inflate his lungs, and death followed.
In many ways this is the PG rated version of what happened, and even this explanation would make the strongest person wince uncomfortably.
For those who may think that this sounds too extreme, I can assure you this is not merely a story made up to shock; this description comes from anthropological experts who have researched the methods that the Romans used to crucify, however I have left a few of the more intricate, gruesome and detailed parts out.
But it wasn’t just the pain that caused the suffering; Crucifixion was also designed to be public, humiliating, degrading and offensive.
It wasn’t just a way of dealing with criminals, it was a way of holding down revolutionaries, a way of showing how utterly contemptible they were and that in the end they were miserable failures. It’s very hard to keep your dignity when you are nailed to a cross naked and in agony and left to die a lingering death in full view of everyone, and there’s nothing you can do, once you are up there, death is inevitable.
And yet this is the way that God chooses to reveal his ultimate glory, by taking this suffering, humiliation and curse upon himself.
It was the reason he became human, to go to the cross. The cross is where we find the ultimate display of God’s glory. This place of humility and humiliation is the place where God reveals himself most fully. It is on the cross that we gain a full understanding of who Jesus is and so who God is, and so we see in this act that the ultimate glory of God is displayed.
But why this act and not another?
Surely the great miracles, the transfiguration, the resurrection or the ascension would have been where the glory of God was shown in its fullest?
However, in reality the fact that the cross had to be endured shows us the deep profound nature of our Loving Father, the cross, more than any other event, even the resurrection shows us who God is and what he is like.
The cross shows us just how far God was prepared to go to love humanity, and it is the ultimate demonstration of his love.
The cross was part of God’s way of dealing with sin objectively. It was about facing the reality and consequences of sin and dealing with them. Along with the incarnation, the life and ministry of Jesus, his resurrection and ascension, it all demonstrated how God was dealing with humanities problems.
But at the lowest, most painful and degrading part of the process it was also a demonstration of God’s love, that he was prepared to do whatever it took, no matter the cost to achieve our redemption.
He showed us the full extent of his love by going all the way to the end for us. This is what is meant by the revelation of God’s glory, that Jesus stayed on the cross for us and this can only make sense to us if Jesus was the son of God, the messiah.
If Jesus was a mere man it doesn’t demonstrate anything, he was caught through a betrayal, and the crowds were stirred into a frenzy to encourage the authorities to do what his enemies wanted to happen. If he was just a mere mortal, then there was nothing he could have done about the situation. But, he wasn’t just a man.
Christ was also God, and at any moment he could have stopped it and set himself free. He said to Pilate you have no authority over me except that which was given you by God. He chose to stay and suffer because he loved us all, more than we can ever comprehend. This is the amazing glory and grace of the God which we serve. He not only loved till the end but he loved to the uttermost.
It’s ironic that Jesus demonstrates the full glory of God in his ultimate identification with sinful man. In suffering this death in our place, by taking on the full weight of humanity’s sin, with all the alienation, guilt, hate and shame that we carry. Through this amazing act Christ demonstrates to us, how far God is willing to go to bring us back to him.
It also brings us one of the most challenging statements of the Bible. One that we heard in our services yesterday “A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”
The command to love was not new, but to love as Jesus, as God loved, that was something that had never been seen before in human history.
It was a love that offered friendship, even when it knew it was going to be betrayed, a love that would sacrifice everything to identify with the one to be loved, a love to the end, a love to the uttermost, a love that would display the ultimate glory of God.
That is the love we are called to love with.
Impossible, yes. But part of the reason for the crucifixion was to make it possible, to allow God to dwell within us, that we might love as he loved us.
Tonight, we will not be processing the cross, instead our focus will fall onto the Lenten Cross, and we will offer a short reflection and prayer as we extinguish the paschal candle, as we remember Christ dead in the tomb.
I will then silently prepare the altar with the sacrament, as we prepare to receive the body and blood of our precious saviour, which we consecrated and sat vigil with last night.
Perhaps tonight as we silently receive the sacrament that we may like to say a prayer of thank you, for sacrifice he made, and for the gratitude we feel for the love that he gave and still gives us, so that we may share it freely with others. Amen.
