Dean’s Note: Where You There?

Dear Western Friends,

 I see that the choir will be singing “Where You There?” in worship this coming Sunday, the 17th. It’s a powerful spiritual, isn’t it?

 Here’s what Luke Powery, the author of our Lenten Bible Study resource, says about it:

 Were you there? We were not there, historically. But this spiritual takes us there, to the place of grotesque suffering and the death of the Christ. They crucified him. Nailed him. Pierced him. The sun refused to shine because the Light of the world was murdered and laid in a tomb, dead. It should make us tremble, tremble, tremble, if we sit with it, if we ponder it, if we allow ourselves to go there.

 I realize some don’t like to go there. They want a bleached Christ who has no blood, no pain, no misery. They want a triumphant Christ without a cross, but the wounds of the crucifixion will not be erased by the resurrection. This is the truth. And it should make us tremble – that the religious and civic leaders killed God in Christ and at that moment it looked like the Savior needed to be saved.

 Ponder what all of this means to you. Don’t shy away from the cross. Go there and view his bruised and bloodied body. Go there and see God hanging from a tree. Go there and learn from this suffering God. Go there and tremble. Tremble before this terror. Tremble before the One who was torn apart for you. Tremble at this kind of cruciform love. Were you there? I hope you will go there.

 I hope you will be able to attend next week’s Good Friday “Music and Meditation” Service at noon in the sanctuary when we will focus on Jesus’ cross. If you can’t be there, listen to this as you ponder his death https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhGYD1svTM4, and think on this passage from the Book of Hebrews 2: 14-18:

Since, therefore, the children share flesh and blood, he himself likewise shared the same things, so that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,  and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by the fear of death.  For it is clear that he did not come to help angels but the descendants of Abraham.  Therefore he had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make a sacrifice of atonement for the sins of the people.  Because he himself was tested by what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.

In his name,

Dean