Isaiah 52:13 – 53:12

Psalm 22:1-21

Hebrews 10:1-25

JOHN 18:1 – 19:37

Good Friday, 2003

“Here is the man.”

Now we come to the awesome majesty, the great solemnity, of Good Friday. And each Good Friday at this service we read the Passion Story (so named after the Latin word for “suffering”) from the Gospel according to John. The Passion Narratives from Matthew, Mark and Luke are read on Palm Sunday, in rotation over three-year periods; we read Mark this year.

John is read every Good Friday. Matthew, Mark and Luke are called the “Synoptic” Gospels (from the Greek words for “seeing with the same eye”) because they are all more similar to each other than any of them are to John.

All four tell the same basic story: Jesus ate a last supper with his disciples, went out at night to a garden where he was arrested, was tried without benefit of a defense attorney and was executed by the authority of the Roman governor, by crucifixion.

Beyond that, each Gospel has variations of detail and emphasis, with John’s the most distinct of all.

John covers the scene before the arrest in the garden—which he does not name—in two verses: he does not mention any prayer there by Jesus, any anguish (Jesus publicly alluded to anguish in John 12), any sleeping disciples, nor any kiss by Judas. Jesus, as elsewhere in John, is regal, and completely in control. Jesus allows himself to be arrested—and by Temple Police and by Roman soldiers, in contrast to the other accounts that omit the Romans at this point.

John’s focus after Jesus’ arrest is on Jesus’ “trial” before Pontius Pilate, representative of the Roman Emperor. John emphasizes that the Jewish religious leaders, however they may oppose Jesus, have no authority to execute anyone. Pilate hands Jesus over to be crucified after two dialogues with Jesus but no trial as such, but rather pressure being put on Pilate to choose between setting Jesus free and being a servant of the emperor. Pilate chooses power over truth.

Pilate displays Jesus, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe put on him by the soldiers, to which the chief priests and police reply, “Crucify him, crucify him.” Later, his words dripping with irony, Pilate displays Jesus to the crowds with the introduction, “Here is your king.”

The way of the cross is telescoped by John into 1 ½ verses, during which John emphasizes that Jesus carries the cross by himself. No help, no stumbling, no weeping women: just the King going to be “enthroned” on the cross.

John alone declares that the inscription over Jesus’ head on the cross—“Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews”—was inscribed, on Pilate’s orders, “in Hebrew, in Latin, and in Greek.” Anyone passing through first century Jerusalem who could read could have read at least one of those languages, and with those languages a person could have read and conversed all the way from Jerusalem to the Atlantic Ocean. Jesus is enthroned as King, not only of the Jews, but of the world.

John points out that Jesus’ tunic was “seamless, woven in one piece from the top”—just like the tunic of the High Priest (though of far plainer material). So Jesus goes to his death as both King and High Priest, the one supreme over all who feared and condemned him.

Jesus, as he predicted, is lifted up from the earth to bring all people to himself, to worship him and love and serve each other, to experience radically new quality of life now, whatever their past experience had been, and to prepare for eternal life with him.

Let us pray. “Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in Your Spirit that we, reaching forth our hands in love, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name.” (Amen.) (BCP, p. 101)

(The Rev.) Francis A. Hubbard

St. Barnabas Episcopal Church