April 13, 2003
Isaiah 50:4-7 + Philippians 2:6-1– + Mark 14:1-15:47
It only takes Mark 23 verses to get to the point. In the firstchapter, verse twenty-three a demon shrieks: “Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are – the holy One of God!” With that, the great struggle begins between the Holy One and the Evil One. Fifteen chapters later, the struggle comes to an end. By all appearances at the time, the Evil One has the victory; but it is only a matter of appearances. This time, someone else knows who he is and says so. A centurion speaks the words of the first and the primitive creed; words that acknowledge salvation and confirm our best hopes: that God has come among us and is among us in our most desolate and desperate moments.
Death in this gospel is real. It is neither symbolic nor theological. It is cruel, unjust, swift, and merciless. Death embraces us all. No one shall escape. The death story Mark gives tells of the cruelest death of all. The one closest to the dying Jesus is the enemy – the executioner. Gone are the friends, companions, and loved ones. Shame and fear have had their way. There is no one to comfort him. Innocence is what has been proven by this silly trial, not guilt. There is no justice! Yet right in the middle of this mess, we find God says the centurion:
A God who takes a failure to make a Messiah;
A God who takes a death to make Life Everlasting;
A God who takes injustice to make Mercy;
A God who takes sinners to make Saints.
So the end is not the end. The victory does not belong to the demons of chapter one or the Romans of chapter fifteen. It belongs to those who know failure, suffering, death, injustice, and sin. It belongs to those who are abandoned as well as those who hide in shame and fear. This Gospel is as much a story of disciples as it is a story of Jesus. It tells as much about how slow they were to believe, and how they got it wrong again and again as much as it tells about how Jesus got it right.
We have this Gospel to proclaim not just because of the victory of Jesus; but also, because those disciples finally got it right. May it be so for us, who are slow to believe, nowhere to be found when there is need, and quick to deny when their risk or danger. My friends, let us make this week Holy, every day of it, not because of what happened in the past in Jerusalem, but because of what is happening now in our own lives.