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ARCHIVE
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April 2006
What shall I do with
Jesus?
Bp
Ron Ferris
This was a question faced by Pilate. It is a question that is faced
by each of us daily. The Gospel accounts are a masterpiece of how
people react to Jesus. The story grips us because we are in the
story. We ask the words with Pilate, “What shall I do with Jesus?”
There was an urgency in the question. Pilate had a riot on his
hands. He had the choice of dealing with Christ or facing disorder.
There is the same kind of urgency in our lives. There is a disorder
within each of us. Christ causes a crisis of decision. He comes
unexpectedly into the riot that is in the heart. He comes to sort
out our hearts.
We can bind Him and lead Him away. We can keep Him safely tied up.
We can recognize the threat that he poses to our values, our
possessions, our sense of propriety. We can be jealous of the claim
that His love has on us and those around us. When He calls to us
from within for some act of tenderness or generosity or sacrifi ce,
do we fi nd Him threatening? Do we bind Him and lead Him away?
We can betray Him. Christ speaks within us, calling us to a life of
purity — to a life of simplicity. We are to be free of scheming,
intrigue and getting the advantage over others. We are called
to an honest and transparent goodness. When we dissemble or
manipulate, we also betray His truth.
As with the wife of Pilate, does He trouble us? Do we say, “Have
nothing to do with this just man”? There are inconsistencies in our
lives that make His presence and His purity deeply disturbing. What
are the times in the week when His presence would cause severe
embarrassment? Like Pilate, we might admire Jesus, but we wash
our
hands. Pilate was the epitome of culture, education, power, and
civilization. Yes, we admire Jesus. He has a lot of good things to
say. But, like the typical administrator,— “I wash my hands.” “I am
sorry but there really is nothing I can do.” “If only I had more
evidence that Christ was God’s spokesman, then I could certainly act
on it.” “I am not going to threaten the good position I have worked
so hard for.” “I admire Him, but at a safe distance.” The
administrative way of dealing with Jesus is well known in our
secularized age.
“Crucify Him, we want Barabbas!” We want another saviour. Christ’s
way of love is too costly and unsure. We can make our
communities better places through politics, or money, or pride, or
recreation, or education, or awareness. Would not science or
technology be amore certain saviour? Give us Barabbas — a quick hero
— something practical. Let us see the results. Do not send us a
saviour demanding self-sacrifice and holy love.
The soldiers stripped and mocked. Obscenity takes weird delight in
destroying what is precious to others. People gain fame and
notoriety by obscene depictions of Jesus in art and film. We,
too, are guilty of stripping and mocking Jesus whenever we treat
people without the
dignity they have as God’s children.
They that went by, wagged their heads. “We told you so!” “You
deserve everything that has come to you!” When we see others who are
over-extended and vulnerable, do we say, “I told you so”? “Where is
your God now?”, they asked. “The thieves also cast the same in
his teeth.” To the world, the self-giving love of Jesus Christ just
does not add up.
“Why do people help the poor when their own children do not have
everything they need?” “Why do people leave promising careers to go
and work for a charity?” “How can you visit the sick and the dying
when it is so depressing?” “Why do you sacrifice for the faith
when it would be so much easier to go with the flow?”
As the Passiontide story proceeds, we come to the tragic line of
high drama. “Now when the centurion and those with him, who
were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took
place, they were terrified and said, ‘Truly, this man was God’s
Son!’” (Matthew 27.54). “Christ, we are sorry. We did not know
it was you!” Will that be our excuse at the end of time? Will there
be for us a tragic discovery, made too late?
There is a courtroom in each of us. Christ, each day, appears
in that courtroom. We can recognize ourselves in each
character of the Passiontide story. There is not one person in
the whole story who saw until too late, even the Apostle Peter!
The Passiontide story is a miracle. It is not simply a story
about long ago. It is a story about you and me. It is a
story about a decision.
The Rt. Rev’d Ron Ferris, former Bishop of the Yukon,
is now the Bishop of Algoma, in the province of Ontario
(which spreads all the way from Thunder Bay in the
west to just over into Quebec in the east). Bishop
Ferris recently celebrated the 25th anniversary of his
consecration to the episcopate.
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