Real People

 

I cried at church on Sunday.

We were reading from 

Palm to Passion 

And the emotion of it all just got me. 

 

I think we sometimes go on autopilot 

When we read the story of Jesus’s last week of life. 

We read the events and see them as history 

And forget that real people actually lived them. 

 

I think, too, we sometimes dismiss Judas’s betrayal as preordained 

And forget how difficult it must have been for 

Jesus to receive that kiss. 

 

For that matter, 

I think we sometimes see the whole week as preordained 

And forget how difficult the whole week must have been. 

 

The ups and downs. 

The moments of beauty and of horror. 

The silence and the noise. 

The praise and the condemnation. 

 

It was all lived in real time

With real people who had 

Real emotions and real pain.

 

All of the ways that we’re human now

Were all of the ways that people were human then

And the mob mentality then was just as strong as it is now. 

The mob mentality freed a convicted criminal 

While it condemned an innocent Jesus to death. 

 

It was ugly.

It was brutal. 

They came at him with swords.

They used violence against a peaceful man. 

 

It didn’t have to be that way.

And yet it was.

 

And still Jesus found it in his being to say

Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

 

Today, on Maundy Thursday, 

As we remember Jesus washing his disciples’ feet, 

Serving his disciples his last meal, 

Going to the garden of Gethsemane, 

And being betrayed, 

May we remember just how real it all was

And may we cry at the emotion and weight of it all.

 

Jesus was fully God, 

But he was fully human.

And we humans haven’t changed much in 2000 years.

 

Amen.