Good Friday--The Third Word

I was humbled to be asked to share my reflection on one of the seven last words of Jesus at our church's Good Friday service a couple nights ago and found myself really enjoying the preparation, deep study of Scripture and commentary, and prayerful meditation on these few verses as I sought after what Jesus said those 2000 years ago and what he may be saying to us now. Since it ties in with our journey that I've been writing about here, I thought I'd share and let y'all in on what Jesus has been speaking to me the past couple of weeks.

“Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.” John 19:25-27 NIV

Although I have read this passage a couple dozen times, three things stood out to me as I read it again this year.

1. Historical context: Who was present. And who wasn’t. 
1. The notably absent: The disciples (except John). Those who call themselves Jesus’ best friends. I’m not going to dig further into what this means tonight, but want us to take a minute to reflect on how often you and I are absent from the foot of the cross when the going gets tough or risky.
   
2. So who was there? Those present were the ones the world saw as not valuable; the less-than. Women and John. Some commentators say that’s who the soldiers allowed to be there because they didn’t view them as a threat. Women in this time we’re not influential in the public sphere; how could they possibly cause any problems? And John may have been too young of a man to be viewed as anyone with power-probably a man in his late teens/early 20s. I think it continues to speak to the importance of women and young people in God’s hope for the world—keep in mind that these are some of the same women that the resurrected Jesus chose to reveal himself to first at the empty tomb just three days later. The last to see him alive and the first to see him resurrected. These “unimportant” people are the very ones that God invites into his kingdom. Who Jesus chose throughout his life to interact with up to one of his very last breaths—the outcasts, the ones the world doesn’t think are a threat are the ones we find most near to the cross, the very first in the kingdom of Jesus.
   
2. What this tells us about Jesus’ (and thus God’s) character 
1. This word continues to reveal the humanity of Jesus—he had 33 years of turning to his mother when he scrapped his knee or was laughed at in Temple for being different. Mary was there to congratulate him for finally building a chair all by himself or rebuke him for wandering off to talk with the elders while she was worried sick. And 33, laugh-filled, tear-streaked, Instagram-story years later, that same mother is witness to her son’s death first hand, close up. That’s real human stuff right there. So now, Mary, in all her humanness waits at the deathbed of her son on the cross, agonizing over fulfilling Simeon’s prophesy that Jesus will be a sword piercing her soul. Too often I breeze over the pain and anguish of Good Friday in anticipation of Easter Sunday, but this word forces us to remember that while Jesus is fully God, he is his fully human as well.
   
2. More poignantly, Jesus, even in his deepest pain and darkest hour took care of those he loved. In the midst of suffering on the cross, he was not consumed by his own pain; he ensured that his mother would be cared for after he was gone. I don’t know about you, but when I’m in pain, I can hardly think of anything beyond the inside of my eyelids and underside of a blanket, let alone care for someone else. But that’s not who God is. New Testament theologian, N.T. Wright, shares about Jesus’ compassion this way, “A new sort of power will be let loose upon the world, and it will be the power of self-giving love. This is the heart of the revolution that was launched on Good Friday.”
   
3. Finally, what does this say about who we should be now as the church? 
1. Jesus’ words here give us an expansion of the definition of family. They begin to set the expectation of what being the church means. Many of you know, but we are in the process of adoption. We are expanding our family beyond how the world has typically defined family. In this exchange, I hear Jesus telling me someday (hopefully soon!), "Woman, here is your son or daughter." And to our future child, “son or daughter, here is your mother.” Several ladies went to women’s retreat a few weekends ago and we had a rich night after the service on Saturday praying and sharing in vulnerability with one another as women at Mission; as family. I hear Jesus telling us, "Kim, Angela, Nancy, here is your daughter. Aleta, Michelle, Judy, here is your mother." And I hear Jesus telling Mission Church, "Church, look to the broken in the chairs beside you, here is your son and daughter. Church, look to those the world has called outcast, here is your mother. Take care of one another, get to know each other, act as you would if you were born of flesh and blood. From this time on, take each other into your homes."

Friends, are our definitions and constructs and ideas of who should be present broad enough? Let us look to who was there when they crucified our Lord. Are our compassions turned towards others, even in the midst of our own pain and suffering? Let us look to Jesus who took the time to make final arrangements for his mother as he hung there, gasping for his last breath. And do our actions as a church reflect Paul’s prayer over the Ephesians, that we “being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ?” Let us look to some of Jesus’ last words which usher that vast love into practical reality.

I’ll leave my reflection on this word tonight with a confession from St. Augustine of Hippo, "The house of my soul is too small for you to enter; make it more spacious by your coming."