Christ's Positive for Our Negatives

Rebecca Sheridan
Friday, March 29, 2024
John 18:1-19:42

    For our midweek services this Lent, we focused on the Seven Last Words of Christ on the cross.  Tonight, we meditate on those words at the foot of the cross in silence.  We have a chance to get away from the noise and clamor of the world which seems to always be pulling us in different directions and dividing our attention away from Christ.  I asked you to place yourself there on that first Good Friday when all of these events that we just read about took place.  What did you see, feel, and especially hear?  There is a swirl of voices around Jesus as he is betrayed, arrested, denied, accused, sentenced, and executed.  As Pastor John Krahn observed in one of his sermons a few weeks ago, we hear in Jesus’ words his care and concern for others – for us.  “Woman, here is your son.  Here is your mother.”  “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”  Jesus’ words even on the cross point us toward love and care for others, trust in God – but the words from others on Good Friday tell a different story.
The “seven last words” of the crowd, of Pilate, of Peter, of the High Priest, try to negate who Jesus is and what he has come to do.  In the events of Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion we hear the noise of the world trying to confuse us about Christ’s mission and make us doubt.  Peter says, “I am not.”  Pilate asks, “I am not a Jew, am I?”  and “What is truth?”  The crowd shouts, “not this man, but Barabbas.” And, “we have NO king but the emperor.”  One of the criminals crucified with him taunts, “Are you not the Messiah?  Save yourself and us!”  Not, no, can’t.  No way. No truth.  No life. These negative words of the crowd dominate.  We confess that we have been there like these very human people in this story of the suffering and death of our Lord. We have doubted, negated, accused, rejected, and blamed.  These words have been our words.  We confess we put Jesus here on the cross tonight – along with Peter, Pilate, Judas, the high priest and the crowd.  Our reaction to the good news of the son of God arriving among us, the Messiah who has come to save us has been to reject and even kill the possibility of hope, faith, and love.  We confess our participation in Christ’s crucifixion and the ways we buy into the negativity of the world that tries to convince us that this is how things are – no life, no truth, no way.  We bury these thoughts and feelings at the foot of the cross of Christ, because Jesus has said it is finished.  All is accomplished. All that noise is over.  We turn to Christ and pray that forgiven and freed by his death on the cross we might trust that his word, the Word of God in the flesh, is more powerful than all the voices of distraction, negativity, and dissent around us.
For every “you are not,” Jesus answers, “I am.”  For every person who says, “dead is dead, there’s nothing after death,” Jesus is raised to new life.   For every “you can’t,” Jesus reveals possibility where we thought it just wasn’t possible.  Jesus shows us through his words and actions tonight that light is more powerful than darkness, goodness stronger than evil, that there is life beyond death and that the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord always, always wins.  Jesus takes our negatives and turns it to a positive.  What looked like despair and defeat on the cross becomes life and salvation for we who believe.  And we believe because Jesus shows us over and over again that he indeed is the way, the truth and the life, especially, especially, when no one though it was possible.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.