• "Strangers and Pilgrims of the World "
• A Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent Commonly Called Passion Sunday
• March 25, 2007
• The Reverend Stephen C. Scarlett
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The lessons for Passion Sunday set the table for the last two weeks of Lent by telling us who Jesus is and giving us some Old Testament background for understanding the Cross.

In the gospel (John 8:46f.), Jesus said, “Before Abraham was, I am.” I am is the name for God that was revealed to Moses. God told Moses to rescue Israel. Moses said, “Who shall I say sent me?” God said,  “I am who I am...say to the children of Israel, ‘I am has sent me to you’” (Exodus 3:14). Thus, when Jesus said, “Before Abraham was, I am,” he was saying, “I am the God who appeared to Moses.”

The gospel makes it clear that the opponents of Jesus understood that this was a claim to divinity. They picked up stones to throw at Jesus. The punishment for blasphemy was stoning, and claiming to be God was considered blasphemous.

Today’s epistle (Hebrews 9:11f.) tells us that we should understand the Cross in terms of the sacrificial ritual that took place in the Old Testament temple on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement (cf. Leviticus 16).  There was an offering of a bull, a goat and the ashes of a heifer. The High Priest, on that day only, went behind the veil into the Holy of Holies to present blood for the forgiveness of the people.

Hebrews tells us that Jesus followed this pattern. He offered himself as a sacrifice on the cross. Then he took his own sacrificial blood into the very presence of God, the Holy of Holies in heaven. Hebrews asks, If the former animal sacrifices, offered according to the will of God, effected a certain ritual cleansing of the people, how much more will the sacrifice of Christ make us completely clean from sin?

These are the lessons for Passion Sunday because these are two necessary parts of the salvation we will rehearse in Holy Week. If Jesus was not the Son of God and had died on the cross, the cross would be but one more tragic human death. If Jesus is the Son of God, but has not offered the necessary sacrifice, we would not be saved. Jesus saves us because of who he is and what he did.

These essentials are enshrined in the liturgy.  The Nicene Creed affirms that Jesus is “Begotten of his Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, Very God of very God; Begotten, not made; Being of one substance with the Father.” In the Eucharist we remember that Jesus is the “full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world.”

The divinity and perfect sacrifice of Christ are the foundation for the Good News. Jesus is not just another voice, like one more opinion on the economy or foreign policy. He speaks with the very authority of God. Therefore, we can put our faith in him. In a world that stumbles about for an answer to the human condition, we know that the Cross makes us clean and reconciles us with God.

Of course, the Good News has an edge to it. If God speaks, we must listen. If God shows his love for us by sending his Son to die for us, we must respond to love with love. If we listen and respond, we will be saved. If we close our ears and our hearts, we will be as culpable as the Good Friday crowd. As Hebrews says, “See that you do not refuse him who is speaking” (12:25)

Let us prepare our hearts for the coming feast of Easter by listening to the Son of God and doing the things he commands us to do. Let us prepare our hearts for Easter by confessing our sins and receiving the forgiveness and cleansing he died to give us.

“Before Abraham was, I am.”

“How much more shall the blood of Christ...purge your consciences from dead works to serve the living God?”

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