This sermon was preached at Glenwood & Canoe Ridge Lutheran Churches, Decorah, Iowa, on March 25, 2018. It’s based on John 12:12-19, 31-37, 44-50 and Isaiah 50:4-9a. If you’d prefer to listen to it, find it at https://soundcloud.com/stacey-nalean-carlson.
Three months ago we stood in this sanctuary singing Silent Night by candlelight. We raised our candles high, heralding the birth of the Word made flesh. In the beginning was the Word, we proclaimed, and what has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. Love’s pure light radiant beams from your holy face, we sang to the baby Jesus, Son of God. Love’s pure light.
And now, on the heels of his triumphant entry into Jerusalem, as the world is going after him, as the crowd is shouting Hosanna to their king, Jesus tells his would-be subjects, “I have come as light into the world…but the light is with you for just a little longer.” He will not be the kind of Messiah they’ve called for. He will not be the earthly king they think they need. He will answer their cries of Hosanna—save us—not as his light burns ever brighter, but as he allows his light—his life—to be extinguished.
But first, lifted up from the earth, raised high to draw all people to himself, his light shines for all the world to see, an unwavering spotlight exposing the fear, and insecurity and outright evil that it has come to redeem.
On the cross, his light becomes a spotlight that summons the whole world to look at sin, to see the suffering it causes, to see that its way is death. That spotlight exposes all that we most fear and all that we cling to, all that we idolize, in a vain attempt to save ourselves. That spotlight reveals how far we’ve strayed from the way God intended for us—not to shame us, not to judge us, but to restore us to life. “I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them,” Jesus says, “for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world.”
Still, that spotlight is painful. Who wants to see the extent of their privilege? The scope of their prejudice? Who wants to see their unconscious participation in systems that oppress the poor and destroy the earth? Who wants to see that they benefit from someone else’s suffering, without even meaning to? But the light revealing our brokenness is the light that is our life, the light that is the life of all people. Seeing sin for what it is is painful, but it’s also healing, freeing, redeeming. It’s how we are being saved.
I’m thinking about the work of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) that was established after the end of Apartheid in 1994. The commission conducted hearings that shone a spotlight on the human rights violations that occurred on both sides of that conflict. In the transcript of one hearing, in which an attack on a church was described, a spokesperson for the commission describes being “horrified.”1
We listen with horror, all of us, and realize that we are a wounded country with wounded people and seeking healing. We are an extraordinary country that has some extraordinary people. And perhaps despite ourselves God wants to hold us up as a people, as some kind of example for the world which is wrecked and torn apart by all sorts of animosities and hatred.
–TRC Chairperson
Seeing sin for what it is is painful, but it’s also healing, freeing, redeeming. It’s how we’re being saved.
The Word became flesh and lived among us not to judge the world, but to save the world. On the last day, Jesus says, the word that he has spoken will serve as judge. And that word that he has spoken is the word of the Father who sent him. And that word is life. God’s judgment on this world—God’s verdict, God’s decision—is life.
Life born of grace.
Life born of forgiveness.
Life born of mercy.
Life born of suffering.
Life born even of death.
The Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory. It’s the glory of a father who embraces his prodigal son with open arms. It’s the glory of a woman, sweeping every last corner to search for her lost coin. It’s the glory of Jesus, feeding thousands, by way of a child’s humble offering. It’s the glory of the good shepherd laying down his life for his sheep.
It’s the glory of love’s pure light, unwilling to condemn, born into our lives only to save, shining a spotlight on all that oppresses us in order that we might live.
It’s the glory of an anticipated Messiah who rides into town on a donkey.
It’s the glory of the Word who persists in sustaining the weary.
It’s the glory of a King lifted up on a cross to draw all people to himself, to answer the cries of all who shout Hosanna, save us.
Three months ago we stood in this sanctuary singing Silent Night by candlelight. If there is no cross in the manger, Ann Weems writes, there is no Christmas. And if we cannot go now even unto Golgotha, there is no Christmas in us.2
As we look ahead to the rest of this Holy Week, as we anticipate all that stands between now and Easter morning, we pray: Love’s pure light, illumine our way. Amen.
1See http://www.justice.gov.za/trc.
2The Cross in the Manger by Ann Weems, included in Kneeling in Bethlehem. https://www.wjkbooks.com