Mark 15:42-47, CEB - Since it was late in the afternoon on Preparation Day, just before the Sabbath, Joseph from Arimathea dared to approach Pilate and ask for Jesus’ body. (Joseph was a prominent council member who also eagerly anticipated the coming of God’s kingdom.) Pilate wondered if Jesus was already dead. He called the centurion and asked him whether Jesus had already died. When he learned from the centurion that Jesus was dead, Pilate gave the dead body to Joseph. He bought a linen cloth, took Jesus down from the cross, wrapped him in the cloth, and laid him in a tomb that had been carved out of rock. He rolled a stone against the entrance to the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where he was buried.
In the
reflection on Jesus’s death, we noted that one of the issues Mark was
addressing was the rumors shortly after Jesus’s death that Jesus didn’t
actually die. This matter continues to
be addressed in the recording by Mark of the specific details of the burial of
Jesus’s body. Furthermore, this account
of the burial also confronts other rumors that Jesus’s body was stolen which
would explain the empty tomb three days later.
These “theories” persist even in our time thousands of years later.
The
custodian of the body was Joseph of Arimethea, a member of the Sanhedrin. This was the same Sanhedrin that played a critical
role in having Jesus crucified. Joseph
had opposed the plan, but kept his belief in Jesus secret until this point. This
why his action of asking Pilate for the body was described by Mark as “bold.” His allegiance to Jesus would no longer be a secret. He is a case study in brave faith in the face
of dangerous opposition. Thank God for people like this lesser-known Joseph.
Once again,
the death is confirmed to Pilate by a Roman Centurion before the body is
released to Joseph. Joesph handles all
the burial arrangements quickly before sundown when the Sabbath began. Nothing could be done after that. The tomb sealed with a large rock (it’s size
is noted in Mark 16). This was witnessed
by the two Mary’s.
Why is
Jesus’s death so important? The quick
and easy answer is resurrection isn’t resurrection without a real death. The resurrection is not a conspiracy, elaborate
hoax, or outright deception. The victory
over death is only victory if the death really happened. But the importance of Jesus’s death goes much
deeper than this. It speaks to the deeper
and more relevant question? What does
Jesus’s death accomplish? This is what
theologians call atonement. To make the
question even more precise, how does Jesus’s death save us? Perhaps millions of pages have been written
on this very question, so I begin by saying
that I offer no definitive answer.
This theological debate concerning atonement continues today and I have
no aspirations to somehow “solve” it. I
simply share my most basic and overarching convictions about. I invite you to read others’ opinion on this
core question of Christian thought and practice.
First,
this was a sacrifice to end sacrifices.
We are meant to look upon God’s Son being violently and crudely murdered
on a Roman cross and see just how hopeless our proclivities as human beings are. If humans would sacrifice even the very Son
of God for others’ sins, who would not be submitted to the same? Christ’s battered body and His shed blood are
meant to convict humanity of intractable guilt.
This is why we remind ourselves of these details every time we conduct the
sacrament of communion. We can’t be delivered
from these proclivities until we see them exposed for what they are in graphic detail. This why all four gospels all include
them.
Next, I
see in Jesus’s death the limitless nature of God’s love for humanity. God voluntarily makes a shocking sacrifice
instead of simply condemning humanity for its intractable sin. We are meant to see this and turn from our
self-destructive ways. When we do so, we
find God waiting to help us live a different love-driven life. As more of humanity is brought into this way
of living, the world is transformed and redeemed.
Taken
together, Jesus’s sacrifice exposes the root problem of our world and offers an
alternative path of redemption and deliverance.
Jesus submits to death to expose just how corrupt and unjust humanity has
become. Jesus’s opponents meant to
scapegoat their own violence by sacrificing Him. His death, however, served to accomplish the
opposite. They, and their system of
scapegoating, is condemned. The nail in
the proverbial coffin of this system is driven when Jesus’s rises from
death. Death is defeated along with all
the “dealers” and “systems” of death. A
revolution began on the day Jesus died.
The
revolution continues even now this new approach to humanity’s flaws is lived
out by others. Gandhi submitted non-violently
his oppressors to expose the evil of their regime. Gandhi may not have been a
Christ follower, but he emulated Christ’s approach to injustice. Non-violence becomes the very vehicle to
expose and convict the perpetrators of violence. MLK championed the same approach to resist
the injustice of systemic racism. Countless
examples of from history abound. Heroic
love and a refusal to respond to sin with more sin is the how the world is
changed. We are invited to join the revolution.
. . the revolution that began when Jesus really died.
Question: How do you
understand Jesus’s death to be an essential part of how we can be saved?
Prayer: God, we
unknowingly, and sometimes knowingly, participate in systems of scapegoating and
death. You died to help us see that truth
clearly. Show us the way forward. Deliver us from habits that simply exchange
one sin for another. Amen.
Prayer Focus: Pray
for people who are imprisoned unjustly for crimes they did not commit.
Song: Glorious Day
(Living He Loved Me) – Casting Crowns
