{"id":2849,"date":"2019-04-19T16:35:04","date_gmt":"2019-04-19T20:35:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2849"},"modified":"2019-04-19T16:35:12","modified_gmt":"2019-04-19T20:35:12","slug":"good-friday-homily-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/good-friday-homily-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Good Friday Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Good Friday<\/a>
Isaiah 52:13-53:12
Psalm 31:2, 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17, 25 (Luke 23:46)
Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9
John 18:1-19:42
April 19, 2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cKnowing\neverything that was going to happen to him<\/em>,\u201d Jesus first went off with his\ndisciples.  Since He knew what was going\nto happen to him, He could have chosen to go off to a secret or new place that\nJudas did not know about.  Jesus didn\u2019t\ndo that.  He went to a place where He\noften met with his disciples.  Jesus did\nnot hide.  In fact, when they came\nlooking for him, He went out to them and spoke first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He is not afraid for himself.  He knows what must happen but He is always\nconcerned for his people.  With their\nprotection in mind, He says to Judas and the soldiers, \u201cSo if you are looking for me, let these men go.<\/em>\u201d  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus is arrested and put on trial.  It begins with him being questioned by the\nhigh priest \u201cabout his doctrine<\/em>.\u201d  Jesus\u2019 response is to stand firm in what He\nhad been saying all along.  He does not\nchange his words to save his skin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They then take Jesus from the high priest\nCaiaphas to Pilate to have him executed. \nPilate continues the questioning, first asking the people, \u201cWhat charge do you bring against this man?<\/em>\u201d  Their response is, \u201cIf he were not a criminal, we would have not have handed him over to\nyou<\/em>.\u201d  Essentially, they don\u2019t have\nany charge the Romans are concerned with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pilate then begins to question Jesus, \u201cAre you the king of the Jews?<\/em>\u201d followed\nby \u201cWhat have you done?<\/em>\u201d  Pilate is trying to figure why the Jews are\nso upset with Jesus, what\u2019s really going on here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jesus responds with \u201cYou say I am a king.  For this I\nwas born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth<\/strong><\/em>.\u201d \nYes, Jesus is all about the truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But as Pilate asks, \u201cWhat is truth?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Pilate asks a great question.  On a surface level, he is just trying to\nunderstand what the Jews have against Jesus. \nYet, I doubt that is all that he is thinking when he asks, \u201cWhat is truth?<\/em>\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My bet would be that Pilate spent a lot of\ntime trying to keep everyone happy and not fighting.  This probably isn\u2019t the first time the Jews\nhave come to him with some problem that he isn\u2019t concerned with.  On the other hand, he also has to keep Caesar\nhappy.  Each side says things just trying\nto look righteous like when the crowd against Jesus says, \u201cWe have no king but Caesar.<\/em>\u201d \nThey want a messiah.  They want a\nnew Jewish king.  Jesus just isn\u2019t who\nthey wanted to suit their desires.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pilate will go on to speak words of\ntruth.  Three times he said about Jesus,\n\u201cI find no guilt in him.<\/em>\u201d  That is the absolute truth.  Jesus is innocent.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortly before Jesus\u2019 passion begins,\nCaiaphas, the high priest who is the first to question Jesus, is the one \u201cwho had counseled the Jews that it was\nbetter that one man should die rather the people.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caiaphas meant these words in human\nterms.  The way he saw it, they (the\nJews) had a nice comfortable relationship with the Romans.  He was afraid that Jesus was a threat to that\nas the people believed him to be a king. \nSo, Caiaphas thinks it is better to have Jesus killed than to upset the\nRomans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caiaphas is right that it is better for\nJesus to die than the people but not in the way he thinks.  Jesus\u2019 death is not to keep the peace with\nthe Romans.  Jesus dies so that we<\/em><\/strong>\nmight not die in our sins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The truth<\/em><\/strong> behind Jesus\u2019 death is found\nseveral times in our reading from Isaiah:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. \u201cYet it was our infirmities that he bore, our\nsufferings that he endured.<\/em>\u201d<\/li>
  2. \u201cBut he was pierced for our offenses, crushed\nfor our sins<\/em>.\u201d<\/li>
  3. \u201cbut the LORD laid upon him the guilt of us\nall.<\/em>\u201d<\/li>
  4. \u201cThrough his suffering, my servant shall\njustify many.<\/em>\u201d<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Jesus\ndied for us<\/em><\/strong>. \nWhat more can we ask before we place our trust in him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Caiaphas and those with him found Jesus \u201can object of reproach.<\/em>\u201d  When we hold fast to the truth<\/em><\/strong> of our faith today,\npeople may not want to hear what we have to say.  They might find us a \u201claughingstock<\/em>\u201d or a source of dread.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    They may ridicule us but we are not to\nfear.  We are not to abandon our faith to\nkeep the peace.  We are to trust in\nJesus, giving it all to God as we pray as Jesus did, \u201cFather, into your hands I commend my spirit.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Good FridayIsaiah 52:13-53:12Psalm 31:2, 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17, 25 (Luke 23:46)Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9John 18:1-19:42April 19, 2019 \u201cKnowing everything that was going to happen to him,\u201d Jesus first went off with his disciples.  Since He knew what was going to happen to him, He could have chosen to go off to a secret or new place …<\/p>\n

    Continue reading ‘Good Friday Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[26,82],"tags":[27,167,588],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-JX","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2849"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2850,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2849\/revisions\/2850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}