Hey guys, I wrote this over two days. It is now Good Friday. This is part one of a two part letter.
It is early in the morning of Maundy Thursday. It’s a weird name, huh? Maundy Thursday is part of Holy Week. It is the day that Jesus sent his disciples ahead to find a room to celebrate the Passover, At dinner that night, he washed his disciples’ feet, he foretold Judas’ betrayal and Peter’s denial. They went out to the Garden of Gethsemane so Jesus could pray. He asked the disciples to pray with him. They couldn’t stay awake.
The gospel writers tell us that Jesus was so stressed out that he actually sweated blood. Then Judas brought the religious leaders and their guards. They arrested Jesus and took him back to one of their estates for a mock trial. This is the night that Peter denied Jesus. This is the night that Judas betrayed Jesus. This is the last night Jesus lived on this rock before we executed Him.
Given that background, and given all that I’ve already said about Him; it is fitting that we talk a little about what Jesus did.
Nothing breaks my heart as much as people who make fun of the cross. For to me, the cross of Jesus is where everything I’ve written points. Everything I’ve said in all my previous letters to you comes to a confusing climax at the cross.
It is confusing because it is the place where Jesus actually lost. He was beaten and killed. His followers went into hiding, and hope died a long breathless death. It is confusing because God doesn’t die. And yet, for us, he did.
The question is why?
In December 1987 I travelled back to a Missions conference in Urbana, Illinois simply called, Urbana. It is an amazing conference. It occurs every three years and the three times that I attended it was held at the University of Illinois. Over 18,000 college age students literally took over the campus. We stayed in dorms and fraternity and sorority houses. Speakers from all over the world came.
The first night my friends and I were sitting in the second row of Assembly hall. It was the last time Billy Graham addressed Urbana and the only time I ever got to hear him preach live. Everyone knew that this was his last address to an Urbana assembly and as if on cue, when he was introduced all of us in Assembly Hall and the overflow hall stood. He must have received a five minute standing ovation. Rightly so. No one did more for the Kingdom of God in the 20th Century than Dr. Billy Graham. I remember his eyes that night. I can still see them. As he preached you could see them piercing into his audience. I watched the spittle fly from his mouth as he preached. Having said all that, I can’t remember a thing he said that night.
Two days later – this time from high above the Assembly Hall floor in the nosebleed seats – I heard a little Irish lady named Helen Roseveare introduced. I’d never heard of her before. She told her story: She was a medical missionary in a country that was then called the Congo. A Civil war erupted. The Blacks (oppressed for so long by their white colonial masters) wanted to expel the wealthy property owners and reclaim their own land. Dr Roseveare was captured by them. For a week she was held and repeatedly raped and beaten before being set free and returning to Ireland. After the rebels completely won and Congo became Zimbabwe, Dr Roseveare returned. As you can imagine, what we now call PTSD was overwhelming for her. She was struggling, unable to forgive – unable to find a freedom to minister effectively. I cannot imagien her horror. I don't understand how she went back at all.
A black pastor informed her that he and his wife were taking her away for awhile. They reached a retreat center and the pastor told her to go into her hut and not to come out till she sorted it out with God. Days passed and things weren’t any better. She came out to see the pastor. He said
to her, “Do you know what your problem is, Helen?” She indignantly replied, “No. If I did I wouldn’t be stuck in my hut!”
At this point in the story Helen looked around the Assembly Hall and said, “The pastor took his foot and drew a vertical line in the sand – an ‘I’ – ‘This is your problem, Helen,’ he said. ‘And Jesus came to cross out the I.’ As he said this he drew a horizontal line two thirds of the way up across the I.”
When Dr Roseveare finished speaking the Assembly Hall rose as one to give her a standing ovation. I will always remember this little Irish lady’s message: “Jesus came to cross out the ‘I’!”
From every conceiveable angle the problem Dr Roseveare faced was not in herself. How couild anyone blame her for the abuse and the torture she endured. But that wasn't her point. She had spent all her time focusing on what others did. And it wasn't about what they did. I was about what was inside of her. God can only deal with what's inside of us when we have the courage to stop looking at others as the source of our problems and begin seeing that the real problem is in ourselves. That is the most outlandish thing I could ever say to you. But it is true.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is Good Friday now. This is the day of the cross; the day we killed God. Remember how I gave the metaphor of forgiveness requiring death. When we wrong each other the one wronged, to truly forgive must have a piece of themselves die in order to forgive.
I believe the cross is about that. All the death that all of the wrongs committed by billions of people throughout history; whether Hitler’s, Stalin’s, Mother Theresa’s, Billy Graham’s, or my own were carried by Jesus up that hill called Golgotha so that forgiveness could happen.
I know I am guilty. From the lies I told in my childhood, to the betrayal of your Mother, to the little white lies told while trying to sell a car, or the anger at the Subaru driver in front of me going 3 miles an hour under the speed limit in the fast lane.
I am guilty. I’ve lied, cheated, stolen, coveted, lost control of my anger, committed adultery, written plagiarism, been a glutton, ignored the poor and the outcasts, acted selfishly, coveted my
neighbour’s wife, sworn, violated the Sabbath, taken the Lord’s name in vain, worshipped other Gods, provoked my children to anger, and a whole lot more. The only one of the Big Ten I haven’t violated is murder, and then Jesus has to go and say if I’ve been angry with my neighbor, I’m even guilty of that.
So this is the day, Jesus took all the guilt I carry for all that I have done, and all that I will do and he took it from me, carrying it up a hill on his back; getting nailed to it and dying on it for me. That is what is good about this day. In the end, he yelled, “It is finished!” Truly it was. My guilt was taken and killed with Jesus.
This is only one picture of what happened that day over 2000 years ago. A lot more was done and a lot of other metaphors give us glimpses of what Jesus did. This is the metaphor that explains my life to me though. Though we can’t theologically correctly say, “A part of God died.” (Jesus is not a
part of God, He is God.) As a metaphor it still points to truth.
Forgiveness requires death. Our ultimate forgiveness requires God to die, and so he did, at our hand, for us. Now that is love!
Comments