Sermon by the rev'd. John Bauerschmidt

Good Friday

Good Friday
April 13, 2001
Christ Church, Covington

"And every priest stands day after day at his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, ‘he sat down at the right hand of God’… For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified" (Heb. 10:11-12,14).

Good Friday tells the story of a human tragedy, the sort with which we are all too familiar. Jealousy, conspiracy, betrayal, faithlessness, and murder, all find their place. This death is like many deaths in the history of the world; in fact, if we look closely, people are still being put to death in our world in the same squalid way. It is tragic, it is human, and it is familiar to us.

Yet Christians look to this story and see something more. They see Jesus Christ, who in John’s Gospel is portrayed as the one who is supremely calm in the face of torture, and who seems in spite of all to be in charge of what takes place. Christians see not a tragedy, but the story of salvation, as unique events unfold which redeem the world. God’s People see a loving God at work, giving himself for his People in the person of his Son.

On the cross, Jesus offers himself for the sins of the world; his work is sacrificial and priestly. Jesus is not simply a victim on Golgotha; he is the one who makes the offering of himself. When Jesus says, "It is finished" (Jo. 19:30), he is not marking the end of his life, but the completion of his priestly act of self-offering.

It is in terms of priesthood and sacrifice that our second reading, from the Letter to the Hebrews, understands the events of Good Friday. "Since we have a great priest over the house of God" (Heb. 10:21), our writer says, referring to Jesus; "And it is by God’s will that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all" (Heb. 10:10). He is the offering and the one who offers, and through his action we have been made one with God.

The Letter to the Hebrews contrasts Christ’s work with the work of the priests of the Old Covenant. In the ancient world of the Hebrews, God and the People were reconciled by an offering made each year, repeated and renewed over the centuries to bridge the gulf created by sin. Yet, as our reading points out, these sacrifices cannot take away sins, but only neutralize them for a time. The author of Hebrews sees the death of Jesus Christ upon the cross as the sacrifice foreshadowed by these others; the single sacrifice which takes away sin for all time, and reconciles God and humankind.

It is this sacrifice that brings us here today, to contemplate the acts by which salvation has been won, and ourselves to enter into the ongoing priestly work of Christ. In one sense his work is finished and completed; yet the Letter to the Hebrews also speaks of a continuing work of intercession that is part of Christ’s priestly work. "…He holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently he is able for all time to save those who approach God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them" (Heb. 7:24-25). This intercession that Jesus Christ our Great High Priest makes for us is rooted in the great atoning sacrifice of himself that he makes upon the cross. It is not a different work, but in some sense builds upon the sacrifice upon the cross. But now Christ has entered the heavenly sanctuary, of which the Temple in Jerusalem was only a copy, and taken his place at the right hand of God.

This is why we gather around the cross this afternoon; because we recognize that Jesus’ death has taken away our sins, and made us God’s People and inheritors of the promise. We believe that Jesus has offered himself upon the cross, and that he forever lives to make intercession for us. We, who are "in Christ" (Gal. 3:26, et al.), gather to enter into his priestly work of prayer through our own prayer, which we offer today in an ancient and very full form. We pray for ourselves, God’s People whom he has gathered; for the world that God has created, and for which his Son gave his life; for the hungry, the homeless, and the sick; for those who have not received the Gospel and those whom we have driven away from it. This is priestly work, sacrificial work, the work of the Church to which we are called, in intercession and in other ways: to be agents of reconciliation and healing in the shadow of the cross.

Today there is a human tragedy; but more importantly to us there is the story of salvation, played out among us in this drama. Here before our eyes is the one great sacrifice by which we have been reconciled to God; the perfect offering and the one who offers it for the sin of the world. Here we share in his work of intercession, which he ever offers for us and in which his People join.

The Rev’d John Bauerschmidt is Rector of Christ Church, Covington.

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