“How Did We Come to This?” Reading: John 18-19 Written and preached by Luke Richards How did we come to this? How is it that things can change so quickly? How is it that Jesus, the Light of the world who brought healing and hope to those in darkness, can go from being the man of the hour to a beaten, spat-upon criminal on a cross? How is it that the first humans can go from living in contented communion with God in His perfect creation to scratching a living out of the dirt, cast out because of their ambition and deceit? How is it that Cain can go so quickly and so inexplicably from being a farmer to being the man who killed his own brother, the world’s first murderer? How is it that the great king David, so full of promise and faith, a man after God’s own heart, can suddenly be covering up his crimes of adultery and murder? You could fill in the blanks with any number of other Bible stories, or any number of your own stories of times when things go so wrong so quickly and we’re left standing there, confused and out of breath, asking how it came to this. How? The church has a word for it. A little word, a word that many people don’t even take seriously: sin, of course. Sometimes sin looks like a choice, sometimes it looks like the devil, sometimes it looks like an addiction, and sometimes it works through structures or authorities that are too big and nebulous for us to understand. A lot of people chuckle at an outdated concept like sin, avoid talking about it, deny its reality, or just plain ignore it. But we can’t ignore it today. It stands right in front of us on Good Friday, because this is what sin does: it infects us, it breaks us, it blinds us, it twists our best intentions, it clings to our generations from Adam and Eve until today, so that when we are presented with our God Himself, emptied and incarnate for our sakes, healing and teaching and preaching, we plot against Him, lie about Him, betray Him, abandon Him, put Him on trial, beat Him and mock Him, and crucify Him. It is so appropriate that our churches gather together in worship on Good Friday, because if there is one place we ought to be united, it is at the foot of the cross. We’re all in the same boat today. There’s no denying our sin and its consequences here. Our different traditions could easily stay up until the wee hours of the morning discussing our different theological and historical perspectives on the meaning of the cross, and in fact even the writers of the New Testament described what exactly happened on the cross using a variety of different images, but one thing is certain: we are all sinners in need of a savior. Whatever title you have, whatever headquarters you answer to, whatever saint you claim as your theological grandparent, today there is no denying that we have sinned through what we have done and what we have failed to do, and we need a savior. It’s amazing how often and how consistently we try to get away from that truth. While I was preparing for this service I came across an ancient liturgy known as the Reproaches, which is written as the words of Jesus Christ chastising His faithless people in light of His faithfulness. The ancient versions follow the setting of God’s faithfulness in the Exodus story to ask us how we could crucify Christ when He had done so much for us. What surprised me was that some people had historically taken these Reproaches and made them anti-Semitic: how could the Jews have crucified Jesus after all God did for them? But to blame the sin of other people for what happened on Good Friday is to miss the point completely, because if you had been there on that day, you wouldn’t have done any better. We have sinned through what we have done and what we have failed to do, and we need a savior.

It is the same story played out countless times in a thousand different ways in an unbroken line from Adam and Eve to each of us today. It remained unbroken in Abraham’s family, when each generation was touched by tragedy and heartache brought on by the effects of sinful choices. It remained unbroken in the time of Moses, when the people rebelled against God. It remained unbroken in the time of the judges, when everyone did what was right in their own eyes. It remained unbroken in the time of the kings, when those who should have been shepherds to the people led them astray. That story of lives damaged by sin remained unbroken all the way down to your generation and mine, your family and mine, your choices and mine, so that every one of us, if we’re honest, could tell stories of how our sin has ruined what could have been so good. So how did we come to this? As relentless as our sin is in destroying that which is good and beautiful and holy, our God is just as relentless in pouring out His grace. That line of generations damaged by sin remained unbroken except when God in His love stepped back into His rebellious creation as one of us. It is here on the cross of Good Friday that we see a cosmic collision between human sin and God’s grace. Humans are doing what humans do: we lash out recklessly and then rationalize it later. God is doing what God does: reaching out in loving grace to offer holy hope to those in darkness. We wonder, on Good Friday, which side will carry the day. Is God’s plan enough? Is God’s grace effective? Are His promises really unfailing? Is one man, Jesus, God incarnate in human flesh, enough to overcome all the forces of darkness arrayed against Him? The answer to those questions remains ambiguous on Good Friday, while we are confronted with the magnitude of our sin. No getting around it. No ignoring it. No overlooking it. We are united at the foot of the cross. We are all sinners in need of a savior. Each of us is just as capable of betraying Him, abandoning Him, mocking Him, raging against Him, murdering Him. We are the reason that Jesus Christ was entombed after a sham of a trial and a violent death. Yet even as we wrestle with the magnitude of our sin on display before us, we also have to wrestle with the audacity of the grace we see on that cross. It was one thing for God to be patient through the generations, and it was amazing enough that He would empty Himself to become incarnate as one of us. But when our sin attacks Him and He responds with more loving grace…? When He would have had every right to lash out in response, to retaliate against us, to remind us of our place, and yet, while we are murdering Him, He breathes out, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they’re doing”? When He neither fights back nor runs away, but He shows us something we have never seen before, we have to wonder about this sort of grace. It is not clear, on Good Friday, which one will win in the end. Today, when the nations gathered to rage against their God and they succeeded in putting Him on trial and murdering Him, it looks like our sin has gained the upper hand. And yet, with such audacious grace, we have to wonder…

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