Palm Sunday 2023--Why should we expect anything different? Thoughts on the Passion from the Gospel of Matthew

 

“And many women were there, watching from a distance;

the same women who had followed Jesus from Galilee

and ministered to Him.” –Matthew 27:55

 

 My usually approach to contemplating scripture is to see what stands out to me as I read it—what troubles me, or confuses me; what makes me pause and wonder why.  And this morning as I was reading the Passion narrative from Matthew, there were a few bits and pieces that caught me off guard. First this passage about the women, which makes me think about how often it is the women who remain faithful, who stand up when there is trouble and never turn away: mothers, wives, sisters standing by the bedside of the dying, visiting the sick, holding the hand of the prisoner .  Why is that women are the ones who so often show this courage (or faithfulness)?  Is it because women so often go unnoticed? That soldiers and guards don’t feel threatened by their presence, don’t even acknowledge it often enough.  Them—they’re just women.  That humility and that invisibility, is it something that women learn early in life and is it that abuse or that bias that gives these women the courage to remain close to Jesus, after all the apostles (males) have fled in terror and confusion?

 

I wondered about that for a bit.  And then I wondered about an interesting image from the Garden of Gethsemane scene.  What caught my attention this time was the three disciples that Jesus took with Him when he went off to be alone: Peter, James and John (cf. Mt 26: 36-46).  The same three He took with Him when He was transfigured on the mountain (cf. Mt. 17: 1-8).  I also noticed another similarity. In both cases a cloud comes over Jesus. On the mountain it is a literal cloud (the presence of God), but here it is a figurative cloud—a sadness and anguish.  And reading this morning, I wondered: Was this moment not another kind of transfiguration? On the mountain the disciples witnessed the Godliness of Jesus through a transfiguration, and here they glimpse (perhaps only for a moment) the fullness of His humanity through His anguish. He tells the three, “My soul is sorrowful to the point of death…” And just like on the mountain, the three friends are found on the ground, there in fear and awe; here in the garden they are exhausted and have fallen asleep.  So again I wonder, why?  Is Matthew trying to tell us something with these parallels, or am I just misreading these stories through my own idiosyncratic lens? 

 

But then something else occurred to me.  The story itself: the Passion and death of Our Lord.  What does it mean to us? What does it teach us about the Love of God?  And what does it teach us about what we should expect from a Christian life?

 

“Take up your cross, the master said, if you would my disciple be…”  sings the old hymn. And so we are reminded again and again of that call to follow Christ, and what it means to follow Him.

 

But still, we hear this same story year after year, over and over again.  For almost 2100 years, now.  And yet, we still seem to expect a different ending. Every year as we read this story—a kind of strange anticipatory hope comes over me, as if this time—perhaps—the disciples won’t flee, this time, the guards won’t abuse, this time the priests won’t spit, this time Pilate won’t give in, this time Judas won’t betray.  This time, things will be different.  This time victory won’t come in the form of a cross. But that is my way, that is our way; it isn’t God’s way.

 

“Take up your cross, the master said, if you would my disciple be…”  the old hymn sings. And yet we still look for another way, an easier way.  We look for a victory that feels more safe, that seems more comfortable, more to our liking—more victorious (by our standards).  But that isn’t the victory God chose, and it isn’t the victory He calls us to. 

Each time you look at the cross, you see the victory of Christ, the throne—so to speak—of God’s victory.  So why after hearing this story for 2100 years do we keep looking, hoping, expecting something easier, something different?  Why do we keep thinking we should be able to have victory without the cross? Hosannas without the Passion? 

 

Recently I read or heard someone talking about how anti-Catholic (or anti-Christian) bigotry was the last acceptable prejudice.  I don’t know if this is true or not, but the speaker seemed quite indignant about it. And this morning I am wondering –why not? If Christians are truly following their master, shouldn’t they expect to be rejected? Shouldn’t they expect that the only crown they will receive in this world will come with thorns, and it will be bejeweled only by the drops of their own blood.

 

Instead of demanding glory, or mercy or even respect, when faced with the brutality of sin, Jesus accepted the abuse and gave "[His] back to those who beat me/ [His] cheeks to those who plucked [His] beard;/ [His] face [He] did not shield from buffets and spitting." (cf. Isaiah 50:4-7). 

 

Why do Chrsitians imagine anything else? As Jesus warned us, if they treat the Master in this way, will they treat His servants any better? (cf. John 15:20) Instead of demanding respect, perhaps Christians should follow the example given in Isaiah; stop trying to protect our faces from the spitting and our backs from the beatings, and take up our Cross and follow our King--to His throne.

 

After 2100 years, there are still so many lessons for us to learn, and I fear—none of them will come easy.

 

I wish you a blessed Holy Week and I pray that you will find, as you take up your own particular cross, that you are not alone. There is someone’s shoulder lifting it right there beside you.

 

God Bless you, and I will see you the other side of Easter!

 

 

 

 

On fear and silence and the end of Mark's Gospel

 “…and they said nothing to anyone,
for they were afraid.”

--Mark 16:8

 

 

This morning I finished the Gospel of Mark.  There is so much to say about this shortest of the gospels.  Most scholars now think of it as the earliest gospel, asserting that its conciseness is a sign of its chronological place. One theory is that the other synoptic gospels derive their basic structure from it, embellishing it with details from lost sources, including a collection of sayings attributed to Jesus. The late literary critic Harold Bloom valued Mark’s gospel for its mysterious urgency and dramatic flair.  It is often referred to as a Passion narrative with a long introduction. 

 

Like all the gospels, all of scripture—I guess—I like it for its strangeness.  With this gospel, in particular, I am drawn to the way it seems to rush along, beginning in media res, then rushing head-long into the action, with Jesus “at once…” going out, and the disciples “at once…” following Him and the demons “at once…” crying out and the sick “at once…” being healed, etc etc.  As Bloom, and others, pointed out, everything in this story happens with a strange urgency.  Some translations use the word “immediately” (cf 1:12, 1:18, 1:20, 1:42, etc etc) to express this urgent movement.  I find this element of the book compelling and strange and worth meditation.

 

But this morning I am thinking of a different element from the end of this Gospel.  In my New Jerusalem Bible there is a note on 16:8 that informs me Mark probably originally ended there with the story of the  women who witnessed some manifestation of the resurrection and, overwhelmed by it, went away in silence and fear. No “immediately,” no “at once,” but only a kind of strange quiet and stillness—as if suddenly everything stopped. Ending as it began, in media res (which is Latin for “in the middle of things”).  The scholars speculate that the next 12 verses were an addendum derived from the other gospels and added in order to harmonize Mark with Matthew and Luke.  Those kind of issues, I have no insight into.  I leave that to the historians and the scholars with their degrees and dissertations.

 

My thought today is only of that image of the women saying nothing to anyone, “because they were afraid.”  They have received the “good news” of the resurrection, of the conquering of death, of the return to life of their beloved friend… Why wouldn’t they rush off to share this news? Why wouldn’t they be blowing a trumpet and crying from the hilltops to anyone and everyone?  Yet they “said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.” 

 

Why? What were they afraid of? Looking foolish?  Being ridiculed? Rejection? I think quite often I remain silent out of fear of how someone will react. What they might say to me. How they will treat me… Or worse, that they might question me, challenge me, make me begin to doubt what I know is true.

 

I fear that they won’t really hear what I am saying, but only the weakness of my words, my failure to express myself adequately.  Often, when I am overwhelmed by an experience, my words fail me. Too often, some might say, I flounder a bit and then suddenly (at once, and with a strange kind of immediacy) I melt into tears. And feel like a fool. 

 

What was it that made the women leave the tomb of Jesus and go away in silence and fear?  What was the author (Mark) trying to say about their experience? About the experience of the early church? Why that fearful silence?

 

It forces me to remember the many times I too remained silent for fear of how people might react.  But it also makes me aware of the importance of another kind of silence. Of the willingness to listen when someone comes to you with something to say. The willingness to hear them out and even to let them have the last word.  The willingness to listen, openly and completely; the willingness to listen without feeling a need to correct, or challenge or show my own intelligence.  To just listen to the message that the other person brings, their experience, their perception, their desire to share, and their witness to the wideness of the world.

 

There are so many lessons to be found in the Gospels, and even a few to be found in the footnotes.