Sermon for the Chief Service of Good Friday

‘They will look on him whom they have pierced.’

+INJ+

The ancient historian Thucydides wrote that in war, everything is backwards. The father must bury his son.

Indeed, on this strangest of days, everything is, in fact, backwards.

The Creator of the world, who witnessed the making of all
things has died with the world as His witness; the Lord who made the world in
glory shall by the world be recognized in His pain. The Peace of heaven is
betrayed by the kiss of deceit. The One who held all is held fast, the Bond of
all is bound, the One who draws all to
Himself is led forth before all.

He Who is Truth is accused by falsehood, and the One for whom all things stand
at His service, to make an account to Him, is made to stand trial, to make an
account to all.

The Jews, who have not dealings with strangers, hand Him over to gentiles; the
gentiles, who have no agreement with Jews, return Him to the Chosen People.;
Pilate sends Him to Herod, Herod sends him back to Pilate, that piety may be
made the business of impiety, and holiness is brought to the market of cruelty.

Forgiveness is beaten, Pardon is condemned. Clemency is damned, and damnation
given clemency. Majesty is mocked, Virtue is ridiculed.

The Bestower of Rain is drenched in spittle, the Giver of milk and honey is fed
with gall. The One who makes springs of living water flow is given vinegar to
drink.

And when all this is over. When every punishment has been inflicted, death
walks away, for death does not notice anything left there to be taken, for all
is death, for everything is backwards: death has overtaken life.

‘And he was crucified under Pontius
Pilate.’

It is difficult to understand why this must have happened. Some refuse to
believe that there was any meaning to the crucifixion at all, besides pure
human malevolence. Some modern theologians have even equated the fact that God
would allow Jesus to be killed to ‘divine child abuse.’ They accuse the Father
of unspeakable cruelty, torture, malice, for the mere satisfaction of His own
seemingly petty code of goodness.

They know nothing of what they speak. We are a captive people, an occupied
nation, an oppressed race, conquered in Adam by Satan and left to be guarded by
our infernal torturers.

As captives bound in chains in a procession, waiting to be funneled into our
prison cell, so are we as slaves being marched down the road to hell, there to
spend our eternity, for we have been vanquished.

Yet the Lord Christ would not allow this to come to pass. In loving kindness
towards His lost sheep, this broken humanity, He cannot let the devil plunder
our world and drive us into His hellish death camps.

Therefore, He chose to liberate us. It was not enough that He merely become
man. He must become sin for us, that
He too might march into Hell, yet not as a captive, but as a conqueror. He must
descend into the strong man’s house
there to bind him, in his own citadel. In his own camp. In his own Hell. That
Hell prepared before all time for the
devil and all his angels.

For this reason, He dies, that He might finish
the war which He began, the invasion which the Christ alone has led. That He
might descend into hell.

This confuses many, and seems like foolishness to the unbeliever, but we
who are lost should not question it too closely; for if anything is to be
reversed, it is the fate of the sinful with the fate of the righteous. If we
are to trade our destiny with anyone, let us trade our Hell for His Heaven,
that in Christ taking on what was not His by right, we might enjoy what was not
by right our own.

Yet, even if we benefit from the death of Christ, we, who are evil, it does not answer the question, How could have God
allowed Christ to die in this way, for us, who must look upon him whom they have pierced? How could He have allowed
such agony to overtake His Messiah?

But be quiet, Christian. This is a war, and in war, everything is backwards:

‘The Father must bury His Son.’

+INJ+

Preached by Pastor Fields

Sermon Texts: Isaiah
52:13-53:12; Hebrews 4:14-16, 5:7-9; John 18:1-42.