Who is This?

Text: Matthew 27:11-54

Focus: Jesus Passion

Function: A visceral look at Jesus' Passion

Form: GOK

Intro: Last week I mentioned my friend who rejects the idea that we can, and should, allow someone else to die on our behalf.

I didn't say that to alarm you all and some may wonder how I can then say that I am sure that I will see him in heaven.

Well. God is a lot bigger than me. And my friend loves Jesus. He loves Jesus not only because Jesus spent three years teaching us how to live and love each other.

But he also loves Jesus because on that cross, Jesus taught us how to forgive.

I, like him, find those words from Jesus: “Father, forgive them....” to be some of, if not thee, most powerful words in the entire bible.

God is love and the power of God's love is never more perfectly demonstrated than right there in those words.

1 Peter 4:8 tells us that Love covers a multitude of sins. Maybe that is how my friend comes to salvation. I don't know.

I still believe that God is powerful enough to have just wiped out every sin by decreeing it so.

I do not believe that God is mean, or angry.

The cross is a demonstration of God's love.

But the cross is a bloody image. This cross is gold, but to the reader of these texts, or the hearers of these stories when the Romans were still in power, the word “crucified” brought terror.

We need to give pause when we consider Jesus.

The questions, “Who is This?” “Who is Jesus?” may be the most important question that anyone ever asks.

That seems to be the question in Pilate's mind in today's text.

And I am convinced that faith comes when we take the time to look at Jesus.

Pilate asks Jesus: “Are you the king...?”

Essentially, Pilate's wife asks Pilate: “What are you doing with this man?”

Pilate asks the crowd who has been manipulated into some sort of blood lust: “Who do you want, Jesus Barabbas or Jesus from Nazareth?”

And finally, the declaration of who Jesus is comes at the end of the today's lesson when the Centurion declares: “Truly this was the son of God.”

The Centurion saw God at Jesus death and believed.

He saw the sky turn black.

He saw the earthquakes.

He saw the way Jesus gave up His own life.

His questions were answered. And he knew who Jesus was.

By taking the time to look at Jesus, we see who He is.

In one sense, we lose something by relying solely on sermons to inform our theology.

If the preacher succeeds, we are moved, and we connect either with a story or with 3 points to support some proposition that will either change us, help us to change others, or change the world.

But many times Jesus didn't use a sermon, He used stories, He called a child to Him, He broke bread, He pointed to buildings, He cursed a fig tree and etc.

He invited people into the lesson with things that they could hold, taste, touch and see.

So, Thursday night, you get to preach a sermon without speaking.

I am convinced that the reason why the Jewish people have been able to maintain their identity is because of the Jewish Seder dinner they hold every year at Passover.

There is a seat at the table for Elijah, a cup of wine poured in his name. There is a time of wonder for the children as they go through the room looking for a prize.

There is the retelling of the same story year after year. It has gone on for three thousand, six hundred years and it still maintains something fresh and exciting every single time the story is told.

Reliving it, reinforces it.

So, I am inviting you to Love Feast.

And this morning, I am going to preach why we believe it is important.

Love feast is our symbolic look at Jesus.

It tells us who this Jesus is.

It connects us with Jesus in a way beyond our auditory senses.

And, it is commanded.

And it is has the power to save.

In 2006, I took part in a study with 5 other Brethren pastors. We went to England to study the state of the Church there.

England, as I once mentioned has 16,000 ordained preachers and 50,000 registered mediums. It is definitely a post-Christian nation.

We studied churches who were being effective in that environment so that we can effectively lead American Churches.

At a worship service where no sermon was preached, I watched a woman get converted.

It was one of the more wonderful salvation stories that I have ever seen.

She was like the woman at the well. She was twice divorced, just recently estranged from another man and she was hurting.

An Anglican priest and his wife befriended her and brought her to this unique worship service.

Instead of being in rows and hearing a sermon, we sat at tables with a candle in the middle, 4 people to a table and 8 envelopes.

Everyone lead by opening an envelope and leading the others to participate in the envelope's instructions.

At her first envelope she said: “if this is a prayer, I am passing, I have never prayed in my life. I have never had any use for God.” Luckily, it was not a prayer.

But by the time she got to her second envelope, which was a prayer, she was quick to lead it. Something changed inside of her.

By the end of the service, we took communion. She told us that she had heard about it, but never done it. “Heard about it...” was the limit of her experience.

By then, she fully understood the symbol of communion. She told us that she was embracing Christ as her Savior that night. She said: “I believe.”

I wept.

They symbols of our Christian faith led her to Christ without a sermon.

They teach us.

So, in John 13:1-17, we read the story of the upper room, the first Love Feast.

It ends with the words: “If you know these things, happy are you if you do them.”

In the Greek text where it was originally written are the words “all of them.” “Happy are you... ...blessed are you if you do them all.”

The story is simple. It has three components.

First, Jesus washes the disciples feet.

Jesus actions are mysterious to the disciples.

When Jesus gets to Peter, he refuses.

Peter reasons: Jesus is Master and Lord, how can the Master humble Himself to wash the feet of His servants?

Jesus tells him, “If I do not wash you, you cannot have any part of me.”

This strikes home in our culture of Self-Sufficiency. We are strong. We can take care of ourselves. We can give to others. And the hardest thing for any one of us to do is to receive from others.

It is not hard to wash someone else's feet. But letting our feet, or hands be washed is difficult for us.

If we are to proud to be served by others, especially someone who we may consider less than us, we cannot have any part of Jesus.

The most effective thing we do in the prison when serving in Kairos is to respect the men enough to call them by name instead of a number and to actually listen enough to understand them. We let them pray for us.

By letting them serve us, we dignify them, we elevate them to the point where they begin to believe that they are worthy, by God's love, of God's salvation. Being served by others is true community.

The hardest part of love feast is not washing someone's stinky feet, it is letting someone wash our own.

Then we share a meal.

You may remember the story of Joseph and his brothers.

When he finally fed them, he sat them at a different table than himself because Egyptians and Hebrews dare not eat together.

One group considered themselves superior over the other.

To share a meal is to declare a common place together in humanities hierarchy.

And finally, we end with the bread and the cup.

Again, this practice is commanded: (SAY) Someone knows what is written here under this cloth... (point to altar table): “this do in remembrance of Me.”

This visceral reminder of Jesus passion is commanded in order to keep our eyes focused on what Jesus did for us.

Remember my friend and his denial of the atonement?

His view is really hard for me.

In John 6, Jesus refers to Himself as “The Bread of Life” and then tells His followers that in order for them to be a part of God's Kingdom, they must eat His flesh and drink His blood.

The text says that many, it alludes to the majority, of His followers stopped following Him after this.

Instead of thousands traveling together, we see a band of followers small enough that the authorities need Judas to betray Jesus in order to find Jesus.

The crowds left Him.

Hard words.

Eat my flesh... Drink my blood...

I cannot imagine a scenario where I would do that.

Human sacrifice and cannibalism is not permitted.

Those words sounded crazy to many.

Jesus asks His disciples if they want to leave Him also.

Peter says no. He has seen to much to abandon Jesus. But none of them understand this mystery of which Jesus is speaks.

So, let us delve into this mystery.

Jesus gave His life. BUT, we took it.

He gave, but WE TOOK HIS LIFE

In the movie Saving Private Ryan, there is this scene when a German and an American soldier are doing their soldier duties and are involved in mortal combat and finally one soldier gets the upper hand and drives a knife into his opponent.

The victor hates his duty, so after the killing blow is administered, he cradles the head of the victim and comforts him as he dies.

He hates his soldierly duty, but to him, it must be done. He had to do it.

Jesus gave His life.

But we took it.

We hate the fact that we did it. But we did.

Jesus' words in John 6 imply a willing participation on our behalf.

To me, there is a haunting echo in those words: “Unless you are willing to eat my flesh and drink my blood...”

It sends shivers down our spines.

That is why Mel Gibson, in “The Passion of the Christ,” plays only one part, and we never see his face.

It is his hand, by his hand, that the nails are driven into Christ.

He is saying something about all of us.

We too, are complicit in Jesus' death.

“Unless we eat the flesh and drink His blood...”

It was for our sins that Jesus died.

It is as if we actually killed Him.

Partaking in the bread and cup is a frightfully awesome symbol.

When we understand its mystery, it is hard for us to do.

I might agree with my friend in refusing to celebrate my, our, guiltiness, in the death of Jesus.

But remember. (pause) We could not have taken His life if He had not given it.

He gave what we take.

He did not have to give it.

In the garden, one of the other most important sentences is proclaimed by Jesus: “nevertheless, not my will be done...”

CONCL:

This is your sermon.

This is your declaration of your faith.

It is a somber service that is not intended to shame anyone. But it is a visceral experience intended for us to always remember the price of our restoration into God's family.

Too often we come to church to “get our needs met.”

But this is about God, and our thanks to Him.

You should come.

If washing feet is too difficult for you physically, or mentally, you have the option of washing one another's hands, or abstaining from that portion.

There is never any judgment here.

But I promise a meaningful worship experience that the rest of the world does not understand.