Christ’s Suffering Calls us to do What?
M.B. Oliver
A sermon for Year C, 2nd Sunday in Lent, Evening Prayer
Preached at St John the Evangelist, Cold Lake, Alberta, 1900 11 Mar 01.
Gen 41:14-45
Psalm 8, 84
Mark 14:27-52
A young girl was speaking with her Grandfather and asked, “Granddad, did God make you?” Her grandfather answered, “Yes, he did.” After thinking for a while longer the little girl asked another question, “Did God make me as well?” Again her grandfather answered her, “Yes, he did.” She thought some more, looked at her Grandfather closely, looked closely at her reflection in the mirror and said, “Granddad, I think He is doing a better job these days.”
How many times is this attitude made true in our lives? Not that we think God is doing a better job today, but that we assess whether or not his action in our lives is good or bad? What standard by which do we judge God?
This reading from the Gospel according to Saint Mark ends with a very funny statement – it seems so out of place, “Amoung those following was a young man with nothing on but a linen cloth. They tried to seize him; but he slipped out of the linen cloth and ran away naked.” It is suspected that this person is the writer of the gospel, John Mark himself, and this footnote is added as sort of a personal note as to his witness of the events in the Garden.
There is some symbolism here as well. Regardless of what we may cloth ourselves in – our success in our work lives, our families or our community, we appear before God as we really are, naked. For he knows the private thoughts of our hearts, before we even think of them ourselves.
We do not like grief and pain. I know that I frequently dread the first part of Lent – those days prior to Easter Sunday. I would much rather focus on singing joyful hymns on Palm Sunday with all the others outside of Jerusalem, and the joy of the resurrection instead of the weeks of mourning and grieving leading up to it. As each part of this mystery unfolds, this story that we all know so well, do we not ourselves walk along with the crowds who welcome Christ with palm leaves and shouts of Hosanna! And only a few days later with shouts of ‘crucify him!’. This is the most important part of the Lenten walk that we must take, for us to grow as Christians we must share with our Lord in this time – both as the accuser and as the accused, as the mocker and the mocked, and finally as the one hanging on the cross. The events in Gethsemane lead Christ into his walk along the via dolorosa – the path of sorrow that ends on Golgotha.
In this reading from Saint Mark, with whom do we identify more? Jesus as he prays in such anguish that Luke tells us that he sweats drops of blood and finally only gains sufficient strength through the grace of the Father to say “…Yet not what I will, but what thou wilt.”. Or do we see ourselves in the disciples – either as Peter boldly saying “I will never disown you” regardless of what any of these other apostles do, or as James and John sleeping through the hour of their Lord’s greatest need, “…were you not able to stay awake for one hour?” Or do we become even more aggressive, as Peter did and physically attack, finding it easier to fight for Jesus, than to die for Him. Unfortunately, I am too often asleep in the garden while my Lord needs me. At the best of times, we see “…as in a mirror darkly…” as Saint Paul said, and we sleep as our Lord prepares to die on our behalf.
Christ first asked, ‘…take this cup away…’ And then, and only after being strengthened through intense prayer he gives himself over totally to the Father’s will. This path, he knew, would end in agony for him. In our situation, this giving ourselves over totally is often countered by us being caught up in humankind’s myth of control. I think that we as a culture have forgotten much of our place in this world as we have moved away from the farms that form the family heritage for many Canadians. As a tiller of the earth or a raiser of animals you gain an intimate appreciation for how little control over our world we actually have – If there is not enough rain for the wheat, can you will the sky to provide more? If the sun does not shine brightly, can you increase the length of the day?
Not only have we as a society moved away from our roots, but science tells us today that we will eventually be able to accomplish anything we set our minds to. Science’s majesty over the physical world can lead us to think that we are ourselves becoming like gods – not through the death of self that Christ commands, but because we can or will soon be able to control the world. In my more secular days I was asked to define for one of my friends what was the role of the engineer. Fully believing in science’s myth of control I answered her, “To make greatness out of nothingness.” A frightening perspective, particularly so since science is on the verge of defining and thereby controlling the code that defines what we are. (I have since, through God’s grace, redefined my thinking and answer that question quite differently now).
One of the scientists who announced this past week that they were starting a project to clone the first human said, “Now that we have crossed into the third millennium, we have the technology to break the rules of nature.” (National Post, 10 Mar 01, p. A12). This past week has shown how well we have mastered nature, and particularly the mystery of human nature: two students killed in yet another school shooting, and the tragic accidental death of three teenage boys in Newfoundland. A member of the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary lamented on this loss and said, “The sea is the great equalizer…” (National Post, 10 Mar 01, p. A13). We have many great equalizers in our world – the things that make us all equals for they affect princes and paupers alike. Like Mark, so we are naked before the Lord, Our Father in heaven is the greatest equalizer of them all. Before God, is anyone loved more or valued more than anyone else? Before the throne of the Heavenly Grace we all arrive, hat in hand and stained with sin. And so, as Christ was called to physically die to exit this world and ascend in his heavenly glory, so are we to give ourselves up totally, and to die in Christ.
Is dying the worst thing that can happen to us? The lessons of the Holy Martyrs suggest to us that they all went to death gladly, for they knew that the pains of this world, that the changes and chances of this fleeting world would be left behind, and they would be with Christ. An even more interesting question is why do good people suffer? Rabbi Harold Kushner answered the question of good people suffering by saying that he believed that God had limitations to what he could achieve. What a frightening thought! I can not accept his reasoning – God, by his nature must be unconstrained in everything except his constant goodness. Suffering does not occur because God is limited in action. In many cases I believe it is beyond us mere mortals to understand the why of suffering and the impact of God’s will on us.
In many cases, we are to carry our crosses with little understanding of why we are in pain and suffering. There are many theological reasons for suffering, but they all basically end with the same conclusion – we are to look to Christ’s cross and Christ’s supreme suffering as our solace. Oswald Chambers said, “As long as we get from God everything we ask, we never get to know him.” This thought was echoed in a book I recently read, written by Jehu Burton whose 12 year old son had suddenly died. His perspective was that “…people blessed of God are those who experience trial and tribulation. This conclusion is the exact opposite of what our worldly minds would seek to conclude.” We assume that those who have the best lives are the ones most richly blessed, but perhaps that road to the illuminated life is one of suffering. The prophet Jeremiah states this again, “I know, O Lord, that man’s ways are not of his own choosing; nor is it for a man to determine his course in life.” (Jer 10:23 NEB).
There is a story told of a caged tiger. For its whole life the tiger had lived in a cage, so that the cage was as much as a part of the tiger as its stripes. At the death of the tiger, God comments to him, ‘…well done, true and faithful servant, I will now show you the reason for your life...’ What the tiger sees is that the only reason for its existence was so that one day, a man could walk by, see the tiger in the cage, and be inspired to write a poem about a caged tiger, a poem that would change the lives of many (source unknown).
This then is our ultimate solace – we can not understand God’s will for us or why we are made or allowed to suffer. Indeed, the entire purpose of our existence - short or long - may to be to smile at a stranger we pass on the street one day, changing that person’s life in a way that we will never know. Not at least until that day we join Christ. Our solace and our greatest joy is in knowing that we are all allowed to share in some small way in God’s work on earth, and all is equally valuable – from that small smile, to the work of the great evangelists. We must give ourselves over completely to His will, and trust that God will use everything – even the most terrible of suffering, for the good. Is death the worst thing that can happen to us? No. As Christ went through that trial to be transformed into a heavenly creature, so we to must pass through those doors if we are to see Our Father’s face in heaven.
As we continue our walk through Lent with Christ, ending with him on that dreaded hill known as the Place of the Skull, let us remember that we are given the great honour of sharing in some small way the pain of Christ’s passion. May this in turn inspire us to live our lives as faithful disciples of Jesus, bearing happily the cross that he has given to each of us. For only in dying with him on the cross, may we share in the glorious mystery of the resurrection. Only in leaving behind these tattered physical bodies may we taken on the heavenly body that he has promised us.
I speak to you in the Name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, Amen.
