Good Friday Sermon
Dear friends, as we meet together
I want us to take a moment to recognise
that our current situation is a strange one,
though perhaps not a unique one.
Normally at this time on Good Friday
we’d have had our walk of witness
and now be gathered in Church to share in the Good Friday liturgy.
Today we find ourselves separated by space,
but joined together on the internet,
as well as in common spirit and intention.
In that sense we are like the Disciples on the first Good Friday
separated from one another physically,
filled with uncertainty as to the future,
but also joined together in a common friendship with Christ.
And it is in that friendship we have with Christ
that we gather today to mark and remember our friend’s death.
[---] From the Cross Christ cries out ‘It is finished’.
In the name of God …
What is it that is finished? What is it that has come to an end? Is it his life? Most certainly it has come to an end, but there is yet more still that is ended, that is nothing less than the Old Creation of our ancestors Adam and Eve, that of sin and death, and a new creation is coming into being.
This old creation – new creation theme is one that has deep roots in the Gospel of St John, which is the Gospel which provided our Passion reading for us today. You will remember that the Gospel of John begins with the words ‘In the beginning’, as does the account of the first creation in Genesis. Secondly there are 7 miracles, or signs in John, which correspond with the 7 days of the creation story. Stepping away from the Gospel of John the connection with Christ and the creation story continues. Paul in Romans describes Jesus as the second Adam, who undoes the sin of the first. This Genesis-Jesus connection runs deeper still. In ancient tradition the wood of the Cross comes from a sapling, planted by Adam’s son Seth over his father’s tomb.
That connection between Christ and Adam continues: if you were to visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, which my first training Vicar likes to call the Church of the Resurrection, deep under the site of the Cross is a chapel said to be the site of the tomb of the first man, Adam And whilst we are looking at correspondence between Christ’s death and the story of creation: Christ dies on the 6th day, and on the 7th, the Sabbath Jesus rests in the tomb, just as God rested on the 7th day of creation. As the sun sets later we will be leaving that 6th day, and entering into the 7th, that Sabbath day of rest.
But there will be an 8th day, a new day of the week, and with will come a new creation. One where sin and death no longer have the victory. On this new of the week we will meet someone who may or may not be a gardener (like his ancestor Adam) at work in a Garden. But that is yet to come, we are at present still under the shadow of the Cross. and we are called now to abide in the mysterious now but not yetness of the Passion story.
So those words of Christ, ‘It is finished’ remind us that the old creation, the creation of sin and death has come to an end. The age-old battle between God, sin and death has finally come to an end. In the Cross we see the victory of God. But it is a paradoxical victory, an unusual one, one which turns the world and its assumptions on its head: victory comes through defeat; life through death. The strength of God is manifested in weakness, and Christ reigns triumphant as King, not in a royal court, but on a dusty hill, crowned with thorns and enthroned upon the Cross.
[---] I want to end with some words from Christ that we read at the beginning of the book of Revelation where he says ‘Behold I make all things new’. So it is today, as Jesus cries out ‘It is finished’, so it is, and so with the passing of the old will come in the new. But for now we must abide with Christ and rest with, just as he rests in the tomb, and wait for the coming of the new week and the new Creation.
[---] From the Cross Christ cries out ‘It is finished’.
In the name of God …
What is it that is finished? What is it that has come to an end? Is it his life? Most certainly it has come to an end, but there is yet more still that is ended, that is nothing less than the Old Creation of our ancestors Adam and Eve, that of sin and death, and a new creation is coming into being.
This old creation – new creation theme is one that has deep roots in the Gospel of St John, which is the Gospel which provided our Passion reading for us today. You will remember that the Gospel of John begins with the words ‘In the beginning’, as does the account of the first creation in Genesis. Secondly there are 7 miracles, or signs in John, which correspond with the 7 days of the creation story. Stepping away from the Gospel of John the connection with Christ and the creation story continues. Paul in Romans describes Jesus as the second Adam, who undoes the sin of the first. This Genesis-Jesus connection runs deeper still. In ancient tradition the wood of the Cross comes from a sapling, planted by Adam’s son Seth over his father’s tomb.
That connection between Christ and Adam continues: if you were to visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, which my first training Vicar likes to call the Church of the Resurrection, deep under the site of the Cross is a chapel said to be the site of the tomb of the first man, Adam And whilst we are looking at correspondence between Christ’s death and the story of creation: Christ dies on the 6th day, and on the 7th, the Sabbath Jesus rests in the tomb, just as God rested on the 7th day of creation. As the sun sets later we will be leaving that 6th day, and entering into the 7th, that Sabbath day of rest.
But there will be an 8th day, a new day of the week, and with will come a new creation. One where sin and death no longer have the victory. On this new of the week we will meet someone who may or may not be a gardener (like his ancestor Adam) at work in a Garden. But that is yet to come, we are at present still under the shadow of the Cross. and we are called now to abide in the mysterious now but not yetness of the Passion story.
So those words of Christ, ‘It is finished’ remind us that the old creation, the creation of sin and death has come to an end. The age-old battle between God, sin and death has finally come to an end. In the Cross we see the victory of God. But it is a paradoxical victory, an unusual one, one which turns the world and its assumptions on its head: victory comes through defeat; life through death. The strength of God is manifested in weakness, and Christ reigns triumphant as King, not in a royal court, but on a dusty hill, crowned with thorns and enthroned upon the Cross.
[---] I want to end with some words from Christ that we read at the beginning of the book of Revelation where he says ‘Behold I make all things new’. So it is today, as Jesus cries out ‘It is finished’, so it is, and so with the passing of the old will come in the new. But for now we must abide with Christ and rest with, just as he rests in the tomb, and wait for the coming of the new week and the new Creation.
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