In some previous seasons I worked through my thoughts about God's incarnation in Jesus of Nazareth, especially as it is portrayed for us in Christmas, Epiphany and the Sundays following.
It has always been important to me that in a fully human/fully divine manifestation, even in Bethlehem's manger, God was as present with us as God could be. So that when Jesus was crucified even in our bereavement we still had all the proof we needed that God had been honest about and fulfilled the demands of finite human existence.
That's what's behind my constantly saying "God did everything God could do to be with us." No trickery, no Docetic illusions, no Arianism, no Monophysitism. Just God incarnate, fully human, fully divine, just as we recite in our creed "conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary . . . " or "by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man."
As we move nearer and intensify our lenten approach in this Holy Week we are again focusing on God's incarnation. Sunday's procession and passion narrative pull us all into close proximity to Jesus, as well as the crowd and all those pretending at power - the chief priests, the teachers, the elders, Pilate and Herod. Lots of humanity on stage and most present of all is Jesus.
So Holy Week gets us as close as possible to the One. It is by way of his incarnation that we have the benefit of this narrative proximity. We probably undercut our own efforts by forcing all these incarnational moments into a single week of observance and reflection. But tell the story we must.
Maybe we hurry through this part of the incarnation story because it is the hardest one to enact. It recalls his being handed over by Judas, denied by Peter, abandoned by most of the others, and perhaps most difficult is our being so clearly implicated as we realize the shout of the crowd's "crucify him" is being delivered by us in our very own sinful everyday lives.
None of this is easy and our creeds also help us tell this truth when we say "he suffered under Pontius Pilate. Was crucified . . . " or "For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death . . ."
Suffering is incarnational. In Jesus it is human AND it is holy.
He is with us. We recall his passion to help us realize that every time we suffer is a another moment for Jesus to turn up and be with us in our suffering.
There's more to it. The Good News of Easter is the rest of the incarnation story. For nowwe recall his passion to help us do our part to be with him honestly, humbly, faithfully. For now it is our work to turn up and through our human lives to follow, to be near, to trust, and to pray.
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