[Mcgregorpage] McGregorPage 549, Palm/Passion Sunday, 4/1/07

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Palm/Passion Sunday – (April 1, 2007)

Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm 31:9-16
Philippians 2:5-11
Luke 22:14 – 23:56 or 23:1-49

The Death of The Loved One

Before there could be the Easter proclamation there had to be the death 
of Jesus. Everyone who lives long enough experiences the death of a 
loved one, but when have so many experienced that dreadful feeling over 
one person’s death. We know that twelve men had left father, mother, 
sister and brother to follow him and there were probably many more 
including the women. It was a bond as intimate as marriage. It was a 
loss like that of losing a spouse – worse, this person was to save them 
from death for life.

Is the death of Jesus not also the death of a loved one for us too? 
Here was a loved one we loved to share. He could be ours and yours at 
the same time like the sun shine. He was the center of acceptance, ours 
and yours, an acceptance that went all the way down to the depth of our 
being and all the way up to the depth of being itself. “Daddy” he said, 
his and ours. His love expanded our love, made us more sensitive to the 
cry of the needy and the place of children in God’s care. He 
interpreted the Scriptures for us, put the sting where it belonged and 
the promise where it is needed. He reoriented our lives. Some of us 
were blind but now see, some lame but now walk, and all of us heard 
good news when he spoke.

Then they came and got him like the thief in the night that he had 
mentioned, got him like the Gestapo, like the Taliban, like a car wreck 
or pancreatic cancer. Yesterday he was here and today he is gone, and 
look what they are doing to him. This person who was the most powerful 
person in the world to us looks helpless – helpless except for the way 
he bears the pain. Mercifully, he dies quickly, only nine hours or so 
on the cross. People could hang there for days. The ones who engineered 
his death got caught in their own law and needed him down early, but it 
turned out that God needed him sooner than they. There was a protocol 
for taking the crucified down early, for hastening their death. The 
Roman’s would break their legs or cut open their viscera and let them 
bleed to death. That would be fast. Still they were too late to take 
him themselves. The process of death had already set in breaking down 
the fluid to water and blood.

Now there would be those who accused us of wanting him alive so badly 
that we somehow arranged to get him down before he died or that the 
Romans were negligent in their duty. But considering the length to 
which his enemies had gone to get him on the cross in the first place, 
it is not logical that they would neglect to certify him dead when he 
came down. We don’t need to do that for they them. They did it for 
themselves.

So, the soul of mercy came to a merciless end – our soul of mercy, that 
is. Some say he commenced to raise hell immediately, and others have 
indeed raised hell over it, but the original disciples simply hid and 
grieved. That is the right thing to do on Holy Thursday and Good 
Friday. These are not seeker services. These are the services for those 
who have lost the loved one.


May these thoughts strengthen you.

An Open Letter to Fellow Pastors
>From Roland McGregor, United Methodist Pastor
(an e-mail service)

[See Web Page address below for a Children’s Message coordinated with 
these lections.]

http://www.webspawner.com/users/ChildPage/

Multiple Sermon Starter Essays are available at
http://www.webspawner.com/users/McGregorPage/

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