Mark 15:33-41
April 6, 2012 (Good Friday) • Portage First UMC
Several years ago, our family took a vacation to Stone Mountain, Georgia, which is just outside of Atlanta, and for some reason, we got it in our heads that a good way to start the day would be to walk up the mountain. There is a trail on one side of the mountain which is 1.3 miles long and ascends 786 feet before it reaches the top of the mountain. Well, that doesn’t sound so bad, and so, water bottles in hand, we started off. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day, and the first part of the hike was pleasant, almost easy. We smiled and talked to people as we passed them, feeling more confident with every step. And we kept going, until we came to a turn in the trail, maybe about two-thirds of the way up, where suddenly the path seemed to go straight up. Now, I know it didn’t really go straight up, but it sure seemed like it did. All of a sudden, the trail got very, very steep very, very quickly, and while the kids charged ahead (and made it to the top way ahead of me), I found myself slowed down, gasping for breath, and worrying my wife. I was winded, tired, hot, and not sure I was going to make it to the top of the mountain. Was there a helicopter anywhere nearby? We’d come too far to think about going back down; all I could think of was getting to the top and riding the cable car down. In retrospect, I don’t know why we didn’t think about riding the cable car up and walking down, but that wouldn’t have made as good a story. Instead, I just kept my eyes focused on the goal, on the top of the mountain, and concentrated on taking just one more step, and then one more, and then one more. That’s all I could do. And step by step by step, I made it to the top of the mountain.
I kind of feel like that’s where we are as we come to this Good Friday. We’ve been on a journey, a Lenten journey, and we’ve been gazing for the last six weeks at the top of a mountain, a hill called Calvary, at a cross planted there by some Roman soldiers. But more than that, we’ve been centered on the man on the middle cross, the one who made some outrageous claims about himself and why he was on that cross. The sign above his head reads, “King of the Jews,” but he’d claimed to be the Son of God. And so we’ve listened as he gasped out his final words, and we’ve watched as he died, as he gave up his spirit. At that moment, it feels like we’ve turned a corner and we’re facing a steep, uphill climb. What do we do now? Jesus is dead. Where do we go from here? Do we keep climbing, keep moving, or do we go back home, back down the mountain, untouched and unchanged by our time at Calvary? What do we do now?
There is one man at the cross we haven’t talked about yet. In the midst of disciples, family members and curious onlookers, there are also a whole bunch of Roman soldiers. Some of them have gambled for Jesus’ clothing. Some of them have mocked the men on the cross. And some of them haven’t cared what happens there on the hill; to them, it’s just another crucifixion, another in a long line of dirty jobs they are called on to do in this backwater province of Judea. But one of those soldiers—a centurion, we’re told (15:39)—sees what happens and reacts to it. A centurion would have been the equivalent of a sergeant-major (Barclay, The Gospel of Mark, pg. 365). He would have seen many men die, perhaps participated even in many crucifixions, and it’s likely he was in charge of this particular detachment of soldiers. He’s probably been with Jesus through the scourging, the mocking, the spitting and so on (Wessel, “Mark,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 8, pg. 783). He’s heard the seven cries from the cross, and he’s watched as Jesus gave up his spirit. Quietly, peacefully, not violently like the others. Mark says when he saw how Jesus died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (15:39). Theologians debate what, exactly, the centurion meant by that statement. Did he come to faith in that moment? Was he simply acknowledging that Jesus died in a godly way? Was he simply impressed with the way Jesus gave up his spirit? I don’t know if Mark is all that worried about why the man said it. I think, instead, Mark wants us to see ourselves in this Gentile soldier, standing in front of the cross, having done our worst to Jesus. What do we say? How do we respond to this brutal, ugly, horrible, yet life-giving death?
Standing here at the cross can leave us breathless, much like I was at the top of Stone Mountain. We stare up at the horribly disfigured man hanging there, lifeless, breathless himself, and we can’t help but wonder: what now? What difference does his death make? How does what he did save me in any way? How does it draw me closer to God? Sometimes, when we stand in the shadow of the cross on this day, we’re like another man who once came to Jesus. The story is told in Mark 9, right after Jesus has been on another mountain, where his disciples saw a glimpse of his glory. Actually, the man had come to the disciples and asked them to heal his son. The boy seems to have had some sort of epilepsy, so severe that he couldn’t speak and would often have seizures that left him incapacitated (Barclay 215). “I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit,” the father says, “but they could not” (9:18). So Jesus calls the boy to himself, and the boy has another seizure which causes the father to beg Jesus, “If you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.” “‘If you can’?” Jesus asks. “Everything is possible for one who believes.” And so immediately, the father cries out, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” And right then, Jesus heals the boy (9:21-29) and restores him to his father.
You see, sometimes I find myself like that father, only instead of asking for the healing of a family member, I’m standing in front of the cross, wondering if what he did there really makes a difference in my life. “I believe,” I cry out. “Help my unbelief!” All of us, much of the time, are a mixture of belief and unbelief, of hope and despair, of sorrow and joy. We know who we are, and how unworthy we often feel that someone would dare to die for us. We know the truth of what Paul said: “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person” (Romans 5:7). Why would Jesus die for me, being so far from righteous? I believe…help my unbelief. Help me be like the centurion, who could recognize something powerful and unique in Jesus’ death, even if he didn’t understand everything it meant. He was willing to put words to his faith even though, being a Gentile and unschooled in the teachings of the Scriptures, he couldn’t possibly have known everything he was saying in that moment. Instead of being like him, sometimes we stand off to the side, we say we want to wait until we know more, until we understand more about what was happening at the cross, until we can intellectually categorize how Jesus saves us by his death on the cross, until we have all our questions answered. And while there is a time for learning and growing and studying, that time is not today. Questions can be debated another day. Today we stand at the cross, and we gaze up at the one who loves us. He is the one who asked forgiveness for the people who murdered him, the one who cared for his mother, the one who paid attention to a dying criminal, the one who felt forsaken, who knew thirst, who accomplished his mission and gave up his spirit. His life and death call us to faith. It calls for a decision on our part. I believe—help my unbelief.
In the late 1940’s, two men who were close friends were both preaching the Gospel with Youth for Christ, traveling around the nation and the world proclaiming the good news about Jesus. At one point, Charles began to develop physical illnesses the doctors couldn’t explain—at least there was no medical reason for his sickness. One doctor told him the problem wasn’t in his heart. It was in his head. Charles knew what the doctor was talking about, because he was finding himself struggling more and more to believe what he was preaching. World War II and the growing intellectual challenges to Christianity had sapped his faith. He had taken his eyes off the cross and put his focus on his doubts, so eventually Charles had to walk away from his preaching because he couldn’t explain every piece of it. His friend, however, listened to his struggles and doubts. William faced the same difficult questions. Particularly challenging were the accusations starting to make the rounds that the Bible wasn’t God’s word. Rather, some said, it was just a collection of ancient stories and writings. If that were so, William knew it would have no authority in his life, nor could he ask anyone else to accept its authority. Unlike Charles, however, William spent much time in prayer over the matter, continued to focus on the cross, and finally decided he could not settle all the questions by just thinking them through. He had to come to a point where he either believed or he didn’t. He said, “The finest minds in the world have looked and come down on both sides of these questions…and I am not going to wrestle with these questions any longer…I accept this book by faith as the Word of God.” In the midst of a forest at a conference center, Billy Graham cried out to God, in essence, “I believe; help my unbelief.” And for the last sixty years, Graham has touched untold numbers of people by calling them to look toward this crucified savior. Charles Templeton, on the other hand, never looked back to the faith of his early life and died an agnostic.
It’s not that questions are unimportant; it’s not that doubts shouldn’t be faced. Questions and doubts are part of faith; they are not evidence of faithlessness. It’s just that faith requires more than simply having all the answers to the questions or doubts. Faith requires us to step out. “Faith,” the book of Hebrews says, “is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for” (Hebrews 11:1-2). And sometimes faith comes from a most unlikely source. “The Roman centurion becomes the first sane human being in Mark’s Gospel to call Jesus God’s son and mean it” (Wright, Mark for Everyone, pg. 216). We don’t know what happened to him after this moment. I wish we did. I wish we had scenes of him telling others about this man on the cross, scenes of him sharing his faith and his doubt with the other soldiers. We don’t know what happened to him. We only know about this moment in his life, when he saw in Jesus something that stirred at least the beginnings of faith within him. “This man was God’s Son. I believe—help my unbelief.” He stood before the cross, he took one step down the path of faith, and I believe his life was changed from that moment forward.
John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, found himself struggling, much like Charles Templeton, with preaching a Gospel he wasn’t always sure he believed wholeheartedly. He asked a friend of his, Peter Bohler, if he should quit preaching. “By no means,” Bohler said. “But what can I preach?” Wesley asked, to which Bohler responded, “Preach faith till you have it; and then, because you have it, you will preach faith” (Journal, March 4, 1738). There comes a point in our life when we have to choose, where we have to decide if we’re going to trust Jesus’ death on the cross for our salvation or not. There is a point where we have to decide we’re either going to keep going up the mountain one step at a time or we’re going to turn around, go home and give up. The journey of faith, the walk with Jesus, is not an easy one. It’s not meant to be. He said whoever would follow him would have to take up their own cross (8:34), and a cross is an instrument of death. Following Jesus means dying to ourselves so that we can live for him. Are we willing to make that journey this Good Friday?
When we got to the top of Stone Mountain, the view was incredible. You could see the lush Georgian countryside for miles around, and you could see quite a ways toward downtown Atlanta. I never would have seen that had I quit, had I turned around and gone back, had I not taken one step more, and then one more, and then one more. Sometimes that’s all we can do: one more step. I believe—help my unbelief. As we stand here at the cross on this Good Friday, as we once again hear the words of the passion of Jesus Christ, of his great love for us, how will you respond? With you stand with the skeptics, questioning the day? Will you stand with the onlookers, interested but not really committed? Or will you stand with the centurion, declaring faith when it seems hopeless? This day, this Good Friday, may we resolve to move ahead, to take one more step toward Jesus this day, to stay focused on him, for he is truly God’s Son and he is our only hope. Amen.
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