“I gave
my back to the smitters . . . I did not hide my face from insult and spitting.” From Isaiah 50
With
Palm Sunday and the story of the Passion of Jesus we reach the peak of the history
of our salvation accomplished by the power of God. From the triumphal arrival of Jesus in
Jerusalem we immediately turn to the depth of human suffering and human
savagery in the passion and crucifixion of Jesus.
What
has been anticipated in the Old Testament and promised by God is our salvation from sin and death. This is fulfilled in mystery of Holy Week and Easter, the death and resurrection of Jesus, the Messiah.
The
Passion of our Lord is the story of Jesus' work of redemption accomplished for us in the New Covenant
which is written in his blood and his broken body on the cross at Golgotha, the
place of the Skull.
“All this
has come to pass that the writings of the prophets may be fulfilled,” Jesus says in today’s
Gospel (Matt. 26:56).
Jesus
is “counted
among the wicked,” as Isaiah had foretold (Isaiah 53:12). He is
revealed as the Suffering Servant, whom the prophet announced. Jesus is the
long-awaited Messiah whose words of obedience and faith ring out in today’s reading from Isaiah.
Counted
among the wicked, Jesus becomes the scapegoat for human sinfulness as have so
many before him and so many since been used as a focus for collective sin. In fact, in
every civilization at its very cultural root is this tragedy of fallen human
nature and the collective desire to find a scapegoat, as Rene Girard has
pointed out so powerfully.
More
of this on Good Friday as we think about the Passion of Jesus and the
distinctive nature of his suffering, death and resurrection which exposes and
puts to an end the legitimizing of guilt through human scapegoating and human sacrifice.
The
taunts and torments we hear in these readings today punctuate the Gospel as Jesus
is beaten and mocked (Matt 27:31). His hands and feet are pierced, as
enemies gamble for his clothes (Matt. 27:35). His enemies dare him to prove his
divinity by saving himself from suffering (Matt. 27:39-44).
However, Jesus
remains faithful to God’s will to the end and does not turn back. He gives
himself freely to his torturers, confident that, as we hear today from the
Prophet Isaiah: “The Lord God is My help . . . I shall not be put to shame.”
Destined
to sin and death as children of Adam’s disobedience, we have been set free for
holiness and life by Christ’s perfect obedience even to innocently bearing the suffering of a scapegoat for the sins of humanity (Romans
5:12-14,17-19; Eph. 2:1-2; 5:6).
This
is why God greatly exalted Jesus. This is why we have salvation in the Name of
Christ. Following the example of his humble obedience in the trials and crosses
of our own lives, we can trust that we will never be forsaken.
With the Suffering Servant we must at times say: “I gave my back to the smitters . . . I did not hide my face from insult and spitting.” (Isaiah 50)
We can do so only because, as the centurion said,: “truly this is the Son of God” ( Matt. 27:54).
With the Suffering Servant we must at times say: “I gave my back to the smitters . . . I did not hide my face from insult and spitting.” (Isaiah 50)
We can do so only because, as the centurion said,: “truly this is the Son of God” ( Matt. 27:54).
Isaiah
50:4-7;
Psalm 22:8-9, 17-20, 23-24;
Phil. 2:6-11;
Matt. 26:14-27:66
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