Which will we shout?

Our pastor's sermon this morning was based on the lectionary Gospel reading, John 12: 20-33.

As he usually does, he provided some context to set the table. It actually takes place after Palm Sunday, the entrance into Jerusalem. We were reminded that the last miracle Jesus had performed prior to the entrance into Jerusalem was bringing Lazarus back to life. Jesus was personal friends with Lazarus and his sisters, and it was upon being summoned to the place where Lazarus's body, dead four days, lay decomposing and stinking, that we read of one of those moments in which the Lord's human side took precedence: "Jesus wept." These siblings came from a well-to-do prominent family, and many people, not just Jews, had gathered at their house and witnessed what Jesus did. It got the attention of he Saducees and Pharisees, as well as the Romans. It brought the controversy surrounding Jesus' ministry to the fever pitch that characterized that last week of his mortal life.

In fact, such other groups as the Samaritans and Greeks knew what was going on.

Recall that Jerusalem during Passover was party central, and the presence of Jesus was just one more source of commotion. But some Greeks were specifically interested in checking him out:

20 Now there were some Greeks among those who went up to worship at the festival. 21 They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, with a request. “Sir,” they said, “we would like to see Jesus.” 22 Philip went to tell Andrew; Andrew and Philip in turn told Jesus.

They go to hear him, and what he has to say is yet another moment of his human side taking precedence. With perfect forthrightness, he acknowledges being troubled about what is to come as the week concludes (presaging the even greater degree of dread he expresses the following Thursday night in the Garden of Gethsemane). But he tells the crowd that not only can he not beg his father to save him from his fate, but that that very fate was what he came for.

Then comes the otherworldly voice from somewhere that can't be pinpointed as a location in the physical world. John merely describes it as being "from heaven."

Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it [His - that is, the Father's -  own name], and will glorify it again.” 29 The crowd that was there and heard it said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken to him.

Now, how's this for heavy?

30 Jesus said, “This voice was for your benefit, not mine. 31 Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. 32 And I, when I am lifted up[a] from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” 33 He said this to show the kind of death he was going to die. 

In this whole passage, we are getting a foretaste of one of the most heart-rending themes of Good Friday: people coming up to Jesus and saying, "You could stop this right now. Just tell the authorities what they want to hear," and Jesus looking at them with an expression that says, "No, I have to do this."

He and only he could fulfill this horrible mission, because he was the only human who has ever existed that didn't have an earthly father, but the father he did have had this mission for him, by which we also become the Father's children.

The sequence of events, taken as a whole, makes irrefutably clear the holiness of Jesus. His person is the Truth. All things came from him and return to him.

Our pastor wound up his sermon by posing a question: As we enter the last two weeks of Lent, which will we shout? While it be, "Hosanna!" or "Crucify him!"?

He employs occasional little pauses in his preaching style, and while I was waiting for the second choice, I kind of thought it might be "meh," in the manner of contemporary secular agnostics who regard the whole thing as of tertiary consequence at best, not something that has much relevance to anything else in life. Then he dropped the other shoe, and, once I had the chance to ponder it, I could see that "meh" and "Crucify him!" amount to the same thing.

You cannot take the attitude along the lines of, "Look, Jesus had some profound things to say, as did a lot of spiritual teachers and philosophers, but that's hardly the end-all and be-all of what we need to consider."

Some like to cite theologians who forthrightly deviate from sound doctrine and speculate that perhaps one kind of offbeat theory or another explains what Jesus said and the whole matter of his divinity. This is the assumption that we don't really know for sure what he was about, that some fresh perspective can shed light on the matter that scripture doesn't.

And that inflicts fresh wounds upon our Lord, not to mention the way it endangers our prospects for eternity.

If we hedge on unequivocally calling him Savior, declaring him so to all and any who might ask us what he was (or, more accurately, who He is), we've chosen one option in our binary choice over the other.

I'm reminded again of the dialogue in C.S. Lewis's The Great Divorce, in which a young man gets the chance to converse with an old family friend who gets a short reprieve from Hell, but looks at the time after a short, polite exchange and, of his own volition, says he must be getting back, so as to attend the weekly meeting of his discussion group, which is going to take up the question of what Jesus's mission might have looked like if he'd lived a little longer.

We remain forever separated from the Truth, and the grace it can bestow upon us, if we cling to our own cleverness.

It really comes down to this question: Which do you like better, darkness or light?