• "Silent Suffering"
• Sermon for the Sixth Sunday in Lent (Commonly Called Palm Sunday)
• April 4, 2004
• The Reverend Stephen C. Scarlett

In the Prayer Book scheme of communion readings for Holy Week, Matthew's Passion is appointed to be read today, Mark's on Monday and Tuesday, Luke's on Wednesday and Thursday and John's on Good Friday. Each Passion narrative gives us a different window into the same event.

One unique emphasis in Matthew (and Mark) is that Jesus is notably silent. Pilate said to Jesus, "Do You not hear how many things they testify against You?" "But," Matthew tells us, "He answered him not one word so that the governor marveled greatly" (27:13 NKJV).

In the whole of the trial and crucifixion in Matthew, Jesus says only two things. In response to the question, "Are You the king of the Jews?" Jesus says, "You have said so." And then, on the cross, Jesus says, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?"

In highlighting the silence of Jesus, Matthew presents Jesus as the fulfillment of the suffering servant prophecy of Isaiah 53. Written hundreds of years before Jesus, Isaiah 53 describes in some detail the servant (52:13) who suffers on behalf of the nation. Isaiah says, "He was oppressed and afflicted, Yet he opened not his mouth. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So he opened not his mouth" (53:7).

Silent suffering is also a theme of Lamentations, which we have been studying in our Bible classes during Lent. Lamentations says "It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. It is good for a man to bear the yoke in his youth. Let him sit alone and keep silent, because God has laid it on him" (Lamentations 3:27-8 NKJV).

The yoke that the Father laid upon the Son was the sins of the world. As Isaiah 53 says, "The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all." This is how we understand the words of Psalm 22, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" How can the eternal Father forsake the eternal Son? He can, and must, in this: that as the Son takes upon himself the sins of the world, he must experience the real consequence of sin.

For a moment on the cross the Son of God tastes death for us. The death he tastes is not merely the departure of the spirit from the body; the death he tastes is also spiritual death, the separation from communion with the Father that is the consequence of the fall of man. He experiences this on our behalf in order that he might reconcile us with the Father. As 2 Corinthians says, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him" (5:21).

The silent suffering of Jesus in our Palm Sunday gospel calls to mind the words of a Christmas carol, which take on a deeper meaning in the light of the cross: "How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given." As Isaiah says, "He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5).