Jesus said, the Son of Man “…must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation” (NRSV, Luke 17:25)
The wounds of Christ are the unmistakeable evidence of his sufferings that Good Friday.
Suffering is both a fact and a problem of life. The problem has been stated by saying that if God is all-powerful and allows suffering, then he is not all-good; if he is all-good and allows suffering then he is not all-powerful. But there are certain factors which raise the problem to a level where, for the Christian, although it remains a mystery, it ceases to be a problem.
Much suffering is caused by the carelessness or the malice of others. And if we ask why God allows them to inflict suffering, the answer must be that God made us as real people with a real freedom of choice. He could have given us no option but to carry out his will to the minutest detail – to be no more than computers programmed by himself. As it is, we are real people and he allows us to be real people by respecting our freedom.
The effect of suffering is to make some people better and others worse, according to their attitude and reaction to it. We see this at the time of the Crucifixion. The bad thief was made worse by suffering and died cursing Christ; the good thief was made better and he accepted his death as a just punishment and turned to Christ in penitence and faith and hope.
Suffering can also do good by rousing compassion in others. That is most obvious when there is a dramatic accident or disaster, whether it be a pot-holer trapped deep underground, or a community struck by an earthquake. People work without thought of self in order to rescue and help the victims, and they become better people as a result.
So at the Crucifixion, when Jesus said, “I thirst” (RSV, John 19:28), one of the soldiers on duty gave him some of the wine he had brought for himself. That act of compassion made that soldier a better man.
And so we come to the sufferings of Our Lord, and there we see God himself actually sharing in human suffering in his own Person. And it is that fact above all others which transforms the whole problem.
Let us consider the human and historical context of Our Lord’s sufferings.
This world is a world that is consciously or unconsciously in revolt against God; and a pattern of resistance to him was built into the history of his Chosen People, Israel. And it manifested itself in their rejection and persecution of the men of God who proclaimed to them his will and sought to establish his sovereignty over their hearts and minds.
So the prophet Jeremiah, in the 6th century BC, summarised their history by declaring, “Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel…From the day that your ancestors came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have persistently sent all my servants the prophets to them, day after day; yet they did not listen to me, or pay attention, but they stiffened their necks. They did worse than their ancestors did” (NRSV, Jeremiah 7:21,25-26).
So centuries later, in the Parable of the Wicked Tenants, Jesus also recalled that pattern of rejection and looked ahead to its imminent culmination in the rejection and murder of himself, God’s beloved Son (Matthew 21:33-45).
Similarly St Stephen, three years later, summed up that whole long tragedy when he faced and denounced the Supreme Jewish Council in words which precipitated his own martyrdom, “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised (i.e. heathen) in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did not your fathers persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered…” (RSV, Acts 7:51,52, our emphasis).
Thus the Crucifixion of the Son of God was the climax to which the consistent rejection of the men of God had been steadily and inevitably leading.
Now in this world of revolt against God, an otherwise unknown prophet had been given the inner vision to see that in no other way could the guilty be restored to God except through the obedient suffering of the righteous. He expressed it in words familiar to us all, “…he was wounded for our transgressions…and with his stripes we are healed. …. by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous; …he poured out his soul to death, and was numbered (reckoned) with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors” (RSV, Isaiah 53:5,11,12, our emphasis).
For only the righteous, whose own obedience was absolute, could bring the guilty back to God; and only the righteous who willingly suffered out of love for them could kindle in them the love and the penitence without which their hearts would remain untouched.
The prophet himself had envisaged that the faithful remnant of Israel would fulfil that role of the Suffering Servant, but what he had seen as an ideal was not actually realised until Jesus consciously embodied it to the full in his own Person. As he said on Maundy Thursday night before he left the Upper Room for Gethsemane, “…I tell you that this scripture must be fulfilled in me, ‘And he was reckoned with transgressors’; for what is written about me has its fulfilment” (RSV, Luke 22:37).
The restoration of the guilty, therefore, was inseparably linked with the Crucifixion of Christ, and because the former was God’s will so also was the latter. And since it was the Father’s will that he should suffer, it was the Son’s will also.
“My food”, Jesus had said, “is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work” (RSV, John 4:34). That work of man’s salvation necessitated the willing sacrifice of himself as the cost of his mission to mankind. Speaking as the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep, he said, “For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord (RSV, John 10:17).
It was because the suffering of Christ was inseparable from the salvation of man, that the word “must” tolls like a bell through the Gospel record. “…the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected…and be killed” (RSV, Mark 8:31, our emphasis) he had said while still in Galilee. And at the time of his arrest in Gethsemane he said, “Do you not think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the scriptures be fulfilled, that it must be so?” (RSV, Matthew 26:53,54, our emphasis).
So it is the sight of the Son of God nailed alive on the Tree of Calvary – and all out of love for us – it is that which melts the stony hearts of sinners and drives them to their knees in humility and penitence and shame.
And when that happens the Crucifixion ceases to be merely an event in history and becomes something acutely personal, as it was to St Paul: “…the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (RSV, Galatians 2:20, our emphasis) – and who still loves me and still offers himself once crucified to his Father for me.
Prayers of thanksgiving for Christ’s sufferings
Heavenly Father, we thank you for your great love in giving us your only Son, Jesus Christ, that we might not perish but have everlasting life.
And we thank you for his own love in accepting the Cross as the cost of our salvation.
Warm our hearts to remember with humility and gratitude that he who knew no sin was crucified that he might bring us sinners to you.
And may the lifting up of your Son from the earth so kindle our love and penitence, that we may be truly drawn to him and in him to you.
And we ask this for the sake of your Son Jesus Christ Our Lord. Amen.
Prayer of St Richard of Chichester
THANKS be to you, O Lord Jesus Christ,
for all the cruel pains and insults you have borne for me;
for all the many blessings you have won for me.
O holy Jesus, most merciful Redeemer, Friend and Brother,
may I know you more clearly,
love you more dearly
and follow you more nearly, day by day. Amen.