Under Suspicion
March 25, 2012
John 12: 20-33
Both of my kids like to wear hoodies. I’ve never really understood the hoodie thing—I’m more of a hat and scarf person myself. But they wear them like they are a uniform. In fact, because the winter was so mild, most days in the last few months, they’ve been able to wear hoodies without even a coat.
I’ve been glad for the beautiful and warm weather this week, but mostly glad to get rid of those hoodies. Not because I don’t like them, but because they have begun to represent the story of Trayvon Martin.
This 17 year old black child was walking to the home he was visiting on February 26th, after going to the store for a bag of skittles and a soda. On his way back, he was followed by a man. Trayvon was on the phone at the time, and told his friend that he was scared. She told him to run. He didn’t.
Trayvon was killed by George Zimmerman—a member of the neighborhood watch. George called 911 to report a person who looked suspicious—a kid in a hoodie. The authorities said they would take care of it, and told George not to follow this suspicious, hoodie wearing character. But George did not listen. George followed Trayvon, and confronted him.
Trayvon was shot and killed for looking suspicious.
I was talking to a friend this week who was lamenting that this case had become such a big deal. “There are plenty of kids who get shot on the streets of Philadelphia, because they are standing on drug corners,” he said. “When do we grieve them?” And while this is true, the harsh reality is that we see those kids on the corners as bad. They had weapons. They were selling drugs. They were mixed up with the wrong crowd. And we don’t say it like this but that kind of thinking leads us to: they deserved it.
What is so hard about this case of Trayvon Martin is that there is nothing to even indicate that he deserved it. He wasn’t doing drugs, selling drugs, he didn’t have a weapon (unless you consider a bag of skittles a weapon). He was a good kid, who looked suspicious to a renegade neighborhood watchman with a gun.
Our gospel text today comes from John. Jesus is talking to his disciples, Philip and Andrew, but just like last week’s text where Jesus talks to Nicodemus, it certainly feels like Jesus it talking more to all of us than to just Philip and Andrew.
There are some gospel accounts where Jesus seems a little clueless about what he is going to happen to him—that he will die at the hands of the powerful, the weapon-clad. Or in another gospel account, he seems like he is understanding it slowly over the course of his ministry. But here, in the gospel of John, Jesus seems pretty clear of his fate all along. He is living out his call to discipleship, and he knows it will kill him.
And here in the gospel of John, Jesus is also pretty clear that he will not be asking to be saved from his fate. Jesus says in this passage of John, “Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—Abba, save me from this hour? No. It is for this reason that I have come to this hour. Abba, glorify your name.”
Unlike other gospels where Jesus asks God to spare him from death and suffering, Jesus in the gospel of John is clear. Jesus was born human, and will die, human. Jesus does not expect that God will save him from his humanity.
Jesus’ death is because the word became flesh and dwelt among us. Just like all flesh, there is a time for it to die. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”
It feels to me like Jesus has an awful lot of faith in humanity. More than I can muster most days. Jesus believes here—without hesitation or pause—that his death will cultivate the earth and bear fruit, his death will matter, that his death will bear fruit that will feed and sustain others.
After the story of Trayvon Martin hit the news these last few weeks, my friend, Chaz Howard, the African American chaplain at the University of Pennsylvania, shared his experience of growing up black and under suspicion. He writes this in a recent Huffington Post article:
As a high school student driving with my friends in the predominantly white neighborhood our school was in, we were pulled over because we “looked suspicious.” Walking around the university in which I was enrolled, I was stopped by the police there because I “looked suspicious.” Perhaps most painfully, while I was enrolled in seminary studying for the ministry, I was walking back to campus one evening when a local policeman stopped me, made me put my hands on my head and kneel on the ground because “there had been a lot of car thefts lately and I “looked suspicious.”
I am Trayvon Martin. And anyone who has been stopped, profiled and questioned because they didn’t seem to belong in an area or they looked like they might be planning to do something illegal — when they were not — is Trayvon Martin too.
I feel such anger about the death of Trayvon. I’m angry that my friend, Chaz—one of the most compassionate and kind people I know, experienced the same fear that Trayvon did.
This is why people have worn their hoodies this week. It’s a tricky protest for many of us—we are mostly white and educated folk. Wearing hoodies doesn’t quite help us understand the fear that Trayvon experienced the day of his shooting. Wearing a hoodie doesn’t mean we relate to the fear of coming under suspicion, that Chaz and so many other man of color have experienced. But, it is an act of solidarity, heading towards empathy.
The experience of Trayvon and others is something that Jesus understood. He knew what it was like to be under suspicion, he knew that his life would end in tragedy. He knew that he be killed, and that his death would be supported by law.
And because Jesus understood the tragedy of being human—that our humanity results in death—from that place we too stand in solidarity with Jesus, with Trayvon, with Chaz, and with all other people of color that face suspicion and death. Just for being themselves. Just for being the people God made them to be.
This season of lent, this cross represents the suffering of Christ, the inevitability of his death. But it also represents the suffering and death of so many other people throughout history. This cross of suffering represents Trayvon Martin. It represents an intersection for us as well. When met with the intersection of tragedy and death, we can be changed by it. That seed, planted in the ground can bear fruit. Jesus fully expected that the tragedy of his death would make a change in our hearts and actions. In fact, he staked his life on that belief.
We meet the intersection of tragedy and death again in 2012—with Trayvon Martin’s fear filled death, with the death of hundreds of people on the streets of Philadelphia, victims of handgun violence in our city of Brotherly love. The victims of these tragedies could not be saved. Many didn’t even have time to ask to be spared.
Jesus bet his life on the cross, that it would break us open, and cause us to see anew. But we can’t let that breaking open stop at the cross of Jesus. The cross of the holocaust must break our hearts. The suffering and death of so many young black men, lynched in this country, must break us open. The death of every victim at the hands of the state should make us ache. And the death of Trayvon Martin, an innocent, young, hopeful black teenager should devastate us.
As followers in the way of Jesus, we follow because we see the world differently. Jesus and the cross did that for us. The words and actions of Jesus—everything from his healings, to his conversations with outsiders, to his death and resurrection—have begun to change our focus, our understanding of the world.
A new understanding of the world means nothing if we do not do something with what we see. Discipleship means acting on this new world view, given to us by Jesus through his death at the hands of the empire, and through his resurrection, born in hope and impossibility.
As we move closer to Good Friday and closer to the cross, let us remember those who, like Jesus, were under suspicion. Let us be broken open by their stories, by their victimization and death. And from the brokenness, may new life spring forth and bear fruit. AMEN.
The Unraveling Cross
John 3: 14-21
March 21, 2012
The cross is unraveling.
This cross behind me is literally falling apart. Colin, along with Julia and Willem, worked really hard to get geometric origami cross together as our worship focus. We wanted to put it up without tape or clips—just a little fishing wire. How naive we were! After hoisting this cross up with fishing wire we realized that the cross was coming apart. There were places on this structure that could not hold the weight of the rest of the structure. So, we tried to hold it together with a little clear tape.
But when I came in on the first Sunday morning of lent the cross had slid down the fishing line, so I tried to hoist it back up, but when I did, the straining paper structure began to unravel. It seemed like every time I put tape on something, another piece would come apart.
So I finally stopped trying. Colin and I got it to a certain place a few weeks ago, and decided that we weren’t going to tape any more. If it unraveled, it unraveled.
This pastel cross—our Lenten focus–has become a metaphor for me. This cross, so lovingly handmade by people in the congregation is just coming apart, as are our ideas about what the cross means. Perhaps, as we delve into one of the most well known scriptures out there, we’ll see this cross completely unravel right in front of us.
These verses—particularly the famous John 3:16 have become mocked by society, especially because of the one guy at every football games that holds up the “John 3:16” sign. I still don’t understand how that helps to promote the gospel, that guy is pretty convinced that by holding the sign, he is saving souls—that when people see his sign, they’ll google this verse, and saying it out loud, their salvation procured—just like that.
This year, John 3:16, got some added press from football quarterback, Tim Tebow. He’s been known to write “John 3:16” on the black stuff football players put under their eyes. And this year, in a football game against the Steelers, the Bronco’s Quarterback ran 316 yards, and averaged 31.6 yards in completion. Now I don’t know what any of that means, but it meant something to Tebow and his fans. His football celebrity was a way to get the gospel out there.
This verse alone carries a lot of heaviness and guilt with it. For God so loved the world that God gave us Jesus, God’s only son, so that whoever might believe in Jesus will have eternal life. Implied in that verse for some is the suffering and death of Jesus, and the threat that not believing might make Jesus’ death a waste.
In fact, intrinsic in Mel Gibson’s recent movie, The Passion of the Christ, is this same message. Jesus did all this for you. You have to believe. Or else. Or else…darkness, death, hell.
In looking again this week at this famous verse, I looked for signs of God’s judgement and anger in this passage, and I couldn’t find it. All I could find was my own baggage around this verse, and perhaps some residual cultural baggage.
And to focus soley on John 3:16 misses some of the most beautiful, elegant and grace-filled parts of this John passage.
So, let’s look at John 3, Verses 16 and 17—together, they go like this: “God so loved the world as to give the only Begotten One, that whoever believes may not die, but have eternal life. God sent the Only Begotten into the world, not to condemn the world, but that through the Only Begotten the world might be saved.”
Martin Luther once said, “If I were the Lord…and these vile people as disobedient as they now be, I would knock the world into pieces.”
Thankfully God chose Love. And thankfully Martin Luther was not God. God loves humanity. God loves us in our imperfection, our destructive tendencies, our idiocy. God loves us enough to give up a piece of God’s self. God loves us enough to try to understand us better.
Notice here that it does not say, God loves us enough to kill Jesus. That’s not the sacrifice John is talking about here—instead God loves us enough to try to get closer to us, to try to relate to us more personally, to break down the barriers between us and God.
And God did this so we can have eternal life—this eternal life, according to language scholars, isn’t so much about duration. It’s about quality rather than quantity. It’s not about the length of one’s life, but the kind of life one chooses. It is both present and future. It is the reign of God, the here and not yet.
Essentially, God gave up a piece of God’s self for relationship. With us. And in return we have an opportunity to see God’s reign—God’s presence—in a new way.
The giving of God’s child—God’s Only Begotten—to humanity, was not an act of condemnation but of salvation. It is an opportunity to see God breaking into the world, not an opportunity for God to judge us and condemn us.
This text comes to us from the Gospel of John, a gospel that I’ve always found to be harsh and not so easy on the ears. But here, John’s Jesus speaks lovingly and truthfully about God’s relationship to humanity. This text has nothing to do with a punishing cross and a tortured Jesus, but about a loving God.
This week, I ran across a book in my library. There are very few words in this book—it is mostly images of the crucifixion throughout history. I was surprised to learn that the first depictions of the crucifixion scene in history did not appear until the early 5th century. We did not see images of Jesus on the cross until 400 years after his death. And these earliest images were of Jesus on the cross—eyes wide open. Alert and alive. Fully present. By the 7th and 8th century, the images change to mostly images of Jesus on the cross with eyes closed, presumably dead.
The first image in the book of the crucified Jesus, carved in ivory was the most shocking. Jesus is on the cross—eyes open and face strong—and surrounded by bewildered, distraught followers. Meanwhile Judas hangs in a nearby tree—eyes closed, body lifeless, 30 coins laying beneath him. This was not the gruesome scene of mideaval Christian art. This was a juxtaposition between eternal life—the life Jesus was living, even on the cross—and the death of Judas. This was an image of John 3.
This is the choice we have too. I hate to put it in such stark terms, but this is how the Gospel of John puts it, so I’m going to go with it. We have the choice to live the way of death and darkness, with our actions hidden from view. Or we can follow the way of Jesus, taking up our crosses, with our eyes wide open to the presence of God around us. Both sound rather terrifying to me at first glance. Do I really want to live my life in secrecy, concerned only about myself? If I am to be really truthful with myself and with you, I do answer “yes” to that some days.
But this week, in light of the unusually bright and warm weather, I have felt drawn to the light—both the light of the warm sunshine as I’ve discovered new paths in the Wissahickon park, and the light of eternal life, as I’ve longed to see the presence of God in this screwed up, broken world.
It is hard for us to imagine choosing the cross, choosing the way of eternal life. Each of us has known a bit of suffering in our lives, but relative to the rest of the world, we do not know suffering. So, we face the same struggles as Nichodemus, the rich religious scholar Jesus spoke with in our John text. It is hard for us to comprehend suffering, and terrifying to imagine that it is what we are asked to choose.
But it is the choice we are given. Choose the way of Jesus, and expect to see suffering, to experience pain, to have your eyes opened to the suffering of your neighbors, and be called to bear that pain with them. But choose the way the Jesus chose, and see God at work. See God make a way when there was no way. Feel the empowering presence of God. Watch as God breaks open our world, and reveals something new and beautiful.
The cross is unraveling. Here I thought this cross was a gruesome reminder of the suffering, death, and ultimate resurrection of Jesus. But, perhaps it is a symbol of the choice we must make. God sent Jesus to be in deeper relationship with us. Jesus asks us in the Gospel of John if we will choose to accept that relationship, if we will choose to see both the suffering of our neighbors and the reign of God. This choice—ironic as it is—is the eternal life God has promised us. AMEN.
The Cross of Hope
February 26th
I Peter 1:18-22
When Reba was three, and I was just starting back to school, I took her to the seminary where she saw for the first time, a large, graphic sculpture of Jesus, hanging on the cross. She pointed in horror, and said, “Who is that?”
“It’s Jesus, honey.”
She replied emphatically, “No, mommy. That is not Jesus. Jesus is the baby in the manger.”
Then, when she realized I was serious about this man hanging in on the cross, she looked at Jesus with great sadness and empathy, and said, “Poor Jesus. He needs a doctor.”
It is a funny story that I like to tell about my girl, but it also reminds me of my own discomfort with this part of the story of Jesus. The image of an infant Jesus, a healing Jesus, a teaching Jesus, or even an angry Jesus in the temple is preferable to the part of the story where Jesus hangs on the cross, in agony, the tragic and unexpected consequence of following God’s call on his life.
I don’t think my discomfort is especially unusual. As Mennonites, we don’t tend to focus on the agony of the cross. We look at the life and teachings of Jesus, and sometimes the resurrection. But it’s those 24 hours between the last supper and the burial of Jesus that really mystify us. What do we do with this cross?
Much of the difficulty with the cross comes from what many of us were taught about the meaning of the cross. I don’t care if you we were raise Mennonite, Baptist, Catholic or Episcopalian or agnostic—you probably know a little cross theology. Many of us grew up being told that Jesus suffered and died to save us from the fires of hell.So, in order to make Jesus’ death have meaning, we must accept the violence, we must carry that weight, that burden of Jesus death.
It’s a heavy way to approach the cross, and the suffering of Jesus.
The other thing many of us heard was that God required this sacrifice. Jesus, God’s only Son, had to die to satisfy God’s anger and disgust with humanity. This makes God seem violent, angry, and mean, spiteful, even detached.
These interpretations of the cross and suffering of Jesus make our Anabaptist values feels….murky. As people of peace, who follow the God of peace, what do we do with what we’ve been told about God, and God’s violence? What do we do about God that demands sacrifice in the death of God’s only son, and how has that influenced the way we have looked at the relationship between God and Jesus, and between God and us?
I hope you are not here today thinking that this Lenten series on the cross is going to wrap this issue up with a big bow, and we’ll figure it all out. Oh, I pray that it does, but I’ve been looking at this for a few years, theologians have been studying this for centuries, and this question of Jesus’ death by Roman execution continues to confound the Church. In fact, if this symbol doesn’t leave you with questions, or cause you to squirm, I would be worried.
The problem of Jesus’ death has not been resolved.
It took the early Church a few generations to even begin to make sense of Jesus’ death and suffering. In fact, there were letters and writings about the meaning of the cross, before the story of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, had even been written down. People were trying to make sense of Jesus’ unexpected death before people knew the whole story of his life.
And we continue—two millinia later—to struggle with the meaning of this cross. Reba was more right than a 3 year old should be when she looked at Jesus, hanging on the cross, and said he needed a doctor. The image of Jesus has been tarnished, even beaten down, by these destructive ideas of what his death means. We must continue to heal the wounds of centuries of shame-laden theology about this cross that have been put on our Christian ancestors. So today, we’ll start with our text in 1 Peter, written to the Church in Asia Minor.
The church in Asia Minor was suffering. This multi-ethnic congregation, attended by both slaves and free people, rich and poor, men and women, were experiencing persecution for their beliefs in this executed and resurrected Jesus. This letter to the church in Asia Minor was a word of encouragement, hope and strength, in the midst of discrimination and persecution. This letter was written to let this church know that they were not alone.
First Peter has been described as a baptism liturgy, a worshipful, thoughtful approach to this decision we publicly make to follow in the way of Jesus. This letter called the struggling community to continue to live a holy, ordered life, even in the midst of persecution.
And this is the author’s take on Jesus’ death, even before the first gospel account had been written down. “For Christ also suffered for sins. Once. For all. The righteous for the unrighteous. In order to bring you to God.” The author packs a lot of dangling phrases into that one sentence, as is pretty common in the greek language. But, it’s an English major’s worst nightmare. “For Christ also suffered for sins. Once. For all. The righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God.”
Christ did indeed suffer for sins. We know this to be true, from all of the gospel accounts. Jesus suffered for the sins of silence, of commission, of complacency, of fear, of the empire’s stranglehold on society. Jesus suffered because the religious and political leaders were afraid and threatened, and the people that loved Jesus did not speak up in his defense. The goodness, the rightness of Jesus suffered for all those who could not see what God called Jesus to do. They could not see God’s reign breaking in.
But this is where it gets really uncomfortable for us—the author of 1 Peter says that Jesus died to bring you to God. Forget for a moment how difficult it is for you to hear this—imagine what it meant for this persecuted community to hear this word. This is a community that may never have heard about Jesus, if it were not for his death and resurrection.
This is a community that probably understood the call of discipleship more clearly and more personally because Jesus died. Because of Jesus’ death, these followers of Jesus knew without a doubt that their decision in baptism and confession of faith meant that they too may face the same consequence. They may also be killed. They may also suffer. But they do not do so alone. The spirit of Jesus was alive and present in this Christian community. It was inspiring this fledgling church to be strong, to live into the commitment they made at baptism, to follow in the way of Jesus.
How ironic that a symbol of the empire’s attempt to squash Jesus’ message is a symbol of hope for this persecuted community, a reminder that Jesus was “put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit.”
What I hear in this text from I Peter—in this early interpretation of the cross—is not a message of guilt to this struggling community. They are doing the hard work of discipleship already. They are suffering for what they believe. They do not need guilt. They need hope. And the author takes this cross—a symbol of empire power to destroy—and turns it upside down. This is not a symbol of fear, but of hope. Jesus may have died, but his spirit lives on, and continues to inspire these believers. And in their baptism, they accept the possibility that this too could happen to them.
In 1961, a group of young college students, called the freedom riders—seven black and six white—got on a bus leaving from Washington DC. Their plan was to ride through Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, ending in New Orleans, Louisiana where a civil rights rally was planned.
The Freedom Riders’ tactics for their journey were to have at least one interracial pair sitting in adjoining seats and at least one black rider sitting up front, where seats under segregation had been reserved for white customers by local custom throughout the South. The rest would sit scattered throughout the rest of the bus. One rider would abide by the South’s segregation rules in order to avoid arrest and to contact their supporters back home and arrange bail for those who were arrested.
They had some trouble on their journey, but the worst awaited them in Birmingham. There the freedom riders were attacked and beaten. The bus managed to escape the depot, but not before the tires on the bus were slashed. The bus made it a few miles out of town, where it finally had to stop. There the bus was firebombed.Those freedom riders that were injured were taken to the hospital, but were mostly refused treatment.
This is a terrible story of suffering and persecution for the right to ride an unsegregated bus. But what is incredible to me about this story is this: Before the tragic incident, where the freedom riders were beaten and nearly killed, the organizers of this event had a hard time getting volunteers. No one wanted to go on this ride. After this event, though things were no safer for anyone, it was much easier to get volunteers for the next freedom ride.
Why was that? Perhaps it was not unlike what was happening to the church in Asia minor. Though they were persecuted, though they were afraid, they a spirit of hope surrounding them. In the firebombing and beatings, the civil rights movement knew there was hope there, and that moved them on to continue the work of equality and righteousness.
This is a difficult symbol for us to face. The suffering of Christ is not something we glory in—it pains us to know that Jesus died. But this cross can by a symbol of hope, a representation of Christ’s presence with us, calling us to our baptismal vows, to following the way of Jesus, to be fully the people God called us to be, even in the face of violence, persecution, and oppression. AMEN.