Good Friday: In Jesus Christ, God’s love was make real, visible, tangible.

A homily by Rev. Bernard Turner, a guest preacher at Saint David's for Good Friday.

We have arrived at Good Friday. We began this long journey 40 days ago and now, having shared the Lord’s Supper and having washed each other’s feet, we arrive at the foot of the cross. So what do we do now? The Hebrew testament reading from Isaiah talks about the suffering servant as “disfigured”, “without majesty”, “without beauty”, “no looks to attract our eyes”. The servant has to suffer in order that all might be redeemed. Jesus is therefore offering himself as the servant in an act of worship.

Our reading from the Christian scripture mirrors the sacrifices offered in the Holy of Holies. Yet those sacrifices were insufficient and Israel would have to offer the same sacrifice year after year. Jesus’s sacrifice in his life for us on the cross, was full, complete and sufficient and it was literally once for all. Jesus is like Moses, but greater than Moses. Jesus is like Melchizedek but greater than Melchizedek. Jesus is the true High Priest and has offered a sacrifice, his self-sacrifice on our behalf and God accepted it. Remember that the tabernacle and the temple were considered to be the meeting place of heaven and earth and Jesus is now that meeting place.

Understanding all this as best we can, we look to the cross at the center of our worship this day. We stand in the shadow of the cross as a forgiven sinner. This cross has endured through the ages as a powerful symbol because it depicts and represents the turning point of humanity and life in this world as we know it. This Savior of our world, the Lord God, was put to death by us, by those He came to save, the saddest admission that we can make. Nothing more important has ever happened in the history of the world than the moment of His death. And we who believe, who have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, also know that His death was not the end of the story. This Lord, our King, knew that love is stronger than hate, life is more powerful than death, relationships are more powerful than accomplishments, faithfulness more important than effectiveness and being is more important than doing.

Think for a moment about the cross; two beams of common, simple wood. Originally, it had no other purpose than to be an instrument of death. What brings those beams together, what makes the cross a sign of hope, is not the intersection of wood upon wood. What brings those beams together and makes the cross such a strong symbol is the intersection of wood and flesh: a body stretched on a vertical wooden beam, arms outstretched on a horizontal wooden beam, a body with its furthermost extensions attached by nails. This instrument of death was reserved for criminals and those considered unworthy of human life and human breath.

The cross that shadows us today held the body of the one whose only crime was that He loved us without condition or reservation and that He was willing to show the depth of His love with the ultimate sacrifice. John says it best: “Greater love than this no one has than to lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) It was He, this criminal who was considered unworthy of human life and breath and, so, put to death on a cross, it was He whose death made all human life worthy; whose sacrifice made every human breath holy.

In Jesus Christ, God’s love was make real, visible, tangible. God’s love makes no exceptions. As Jesus walked to His crucifixion, He carried the weight of the wood and the weight of us all. “It was our infirmities he bore, our sufferings he endured….he was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins…the Lord laid upon him the guilt of us all.”

My brothers and sisters, the cross is the most powerful reminder of the greatest love the world has ever seen; one wooden beam pointing from the earth to the sky, pointing our attention to God; another wooden beam pointing from east to west, pointing our attention to each other. And what brings those two wooden beams, those two directions together, is a single body, His Body, Jesus Christ, whose life to suffering and transforming love was a life and a love for all; a crucified love that has endured and will continue to endure. A love that turns the wood of a tree, the tree of defeat and death, into a tree of life and victory.

We need not stand in grief and silence this day. The journey is not quite over. We now move to the tomb together as a faith family and wait.