Sermon for November 14, 2021 Sermon Series: Week 6 House of Prayer Lutheran Church

“The Walk: The Five Practices from the Cross” Rev. Karl-John N. Stone

Luke 23:33-46a; Psalm 22:1-5, 24; John 19:25b-30

Imagine yourself, for a moment, in the shoes of Michelangelo, the famous Renaissance artist. You’ve just spent four years standing on scaffolding, craning your neck and lifting your arms up while you paint every inch of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel—that’s 118 feet long by 46 feet wide. This work has taken you away from your true love, which is sculpture. Yet in taking on this monumental project, you have created a masterpiece and earned the reputation as the greatest artist of your time. When you finally climb down from the scaffolding for the last time, clean up your paint brushes, and look up to admire the finished product, what do you say? Maybe something like “It is finished!”

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that none of us has the artistic ability of Michelangelo. But most of us have had the experience of finishing a big project—something that you’ve poured your blood, sweat, and tears into. Something that took a long time to complete, and when you finally put the finishing touches on it, you were able to step back and look at it with satisfaction, and maybe say something like, “It is finished. I fulfilled my goal. I completed the job. My mission is done.”

And this is the sense of things that I hear behind the last word Jesus spoke from the cross. Right before he bowed down his head and gave up his spirit, he said, “It is finished”—I have completed the job that my Father sent me to accomplish. As we look to Jesus on the cross, and see how he completed his mission to bring forgiveness, healing, new life, and salvation to all people, we can also see how committed he was to the five essential spiritual practices of the Christian life that we’ve been looking at during this sermon series: Worship & prayer, listening for and studying God’s Word, serving others, giving generously, and sharing our faith.

Throughout his time on earth, these five basic spiritual practices shaped Jesus’ life and ministry. They shaped the way he interacted with others, and because he was grounded in these spiritual practices, he was able to bring all kinds of new life, joy, hope, forgiveness, and healing into the lives of the people who met him, whether they just met him one time, or whether they took on a lifelong commitment to following him.

These five spiritual practices shaped Jesus’ life to such a profound degree that he was still living by them even as his life ebbed away on the cross. These practices were so important to him that even with all the pain he endured during his crucifixion, he still spoke of them with the last bits of energy and breath that he had left.

The first thing he turned to on the cross was prayer, even as he suffered and felt abandoned by God. In this case it was a prayer of lament, a prayer of questioning and doubt, a prayer that was seeking answers from God in the face of cruelty and injustice. Jesus prayed, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” In this prayer, Jesus was directly quoting Psalm 22, which during his lifetime he would have spoken many times during worship. This Psalm was originally written by King David when he himself had felt abandoned by God. As Jesus prays this prayer from the cross, he’s letting us know that we can bring anything, any feeling, any experience—no matter how difficult, or sorrowful, or overwhelming—we can bring it all before God in prayer. God will accept all of our prayers as an offering of worship.

We also see in Jesus’ last words from the cross, how greatly his faith was shaped by God’s Word, specifically the Old Testament, which was the only part of the Bible that existed in Jesus’ lifetime. The Old Testament sometimes gets a bad reputation, because there are some difficult, violent, and disturbing things that we read in it. Yet the overall message, that we are constantly called back to by the prophets and by Jesus himself, is a message of the grace, mercy, and love of God. And these are the parts of scripture that Jesus emphasizes while he’s on the cross, and as he quotes Psalm 31 saying “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” A God of love, mercy, and grace is a God you can trust for the safekeeping of your soul.

During his lifetime, Jesus was always finding ways to serve others, and his time spent on the cross was no different. By the time Jesus was lifted up on the cross, most of his friends and followers had run away to hide in fear. There were just a few who stayed with him to the very end, and this included his mother Mary and “the beloved disciple” who is actually not named but we assume to be John. Jesus knew that within a few short hours he would no longer be there in the flesh to help and support his mother and his dear friend. But he could encourage them to support one another in the difficult days ahead. So Jesus looks to Mary; he looks to John; and as he’s struggling there on the cross he says to Mary “here is your son” and to John, “here is your mother”. With these few words, Jesus was encouraging Mary and John to keep serving and caring for one another—and he was also encouraging us to always find ways of expanding our own serving and caring for others. We are to look upon everyone as brothers and sisters within the greater family of God—no matter who you are, where you’re from, what you’ve been through—and to serve one another, especially those who are most vulnerable or struggling.

Jesus was also a generous person. He even described his purpose for coming into the world as “I came that you may have life and have it abundantly.” He described himself to the woman at the well as someone who would give her “living water, springing up to eternal life.” Jesus was always finding ways to be generous and self-giving. So when we hear him say, “I am thirsty” while he’s on the cross we hear him saying that Jesus, the source of living water, has finally run dry. By going to the cross, he gave all that he had to give—he poured himself out completely for us and for the world—so that we might have new life for today and for eternity.

And finally, with his last words from the cross, Jesus was still trying to share his faith with others—a faith that would point people towards a relationship with a loving God. As he hung from the cross most of his friends and followers had abandoned him, but he was not there alone. The Roman soldiers were there to put the nails in and stand guard. They were cruel, yet Jesus looked on them with compassion and offered them forgiveness by praying “Father, forgiven them, for they know not what they do.” Two criminals were also being crucified with Jesus, one on either side of him. One of them mocked Jesus, yet the other asked in all humility: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus wanted these criminals to know that God loved even them when he said, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

With his final words from the cross, we hear Jesus revealing the depth of God’s love for each and every one of us—no matter who you are, what you’ve done, or what you’ve been through. Jesus has prepared a place for each of us in his kingdom, and he invites us to follow him by growing in the five spiritual practices that he lived by, and making them part of our own lives so that God will keep revealing his deep love for all the world through each of us. Amen.