Hello, you're listening to Second City Sermons,
a ministry of Second City Church in Midtown,
Harrisburg. This epiphany in Lent, we're back
in the Gospels, specifically the Gospel of Mark.
We are seeing the revelation of God in Jesus.
Mark is showing us the true King becomes a servant
for us. He says right at the heart, the Son of
Man came not to be served, but to serve and to
give his life as a ransom for many. And Mark
is nearly always asking his audience, what do
you make of that? So what do you make of this
good news? We'd love to meet you and we hope
you'll consider coming and joining with us each
Sunday morning at 10 a .m. in the heart of Midtown
Harrisburg. You can find us online at secondcitychurch
.org and on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
We hope you enjoy this sermon. God bless. We
think of these accounts and these beautiful accounts
and yet utterly tragic accounts of you on the
cross Right there next to that thief Lord for
us Your pain and your sorrow your affliction
The redemption of the world for the forgiveness
of sins. God, it's easy at times to rush to Sunday
morning, but I pray that you would help us to
be a people that sit in this reality of the suffering
Savior. what sin did, what you did for us. Lord
bless our time of meditation tonight. Amen. At
the heart of Christianity, at the heart of the
Christian faith is this idea of the descending
God, the God who comes low, God who goes down.
In fact, you could say that that is the thing
that distinguishes Christianity from certainly
the other monotheistic religions, really any
other faith. That's the distinguishing thing,
going down of God. God comes down. And while
that idea might be anathema actually to some
of these other religions, it is the heartbeat
of Christianity, God descending. In the incarnation
of God, we have God's great affirmation of His
world. Far from being a God who condemns physicality,
God embraces it. Far from being a God who just
looks from far off a galaxy far, far away wherever
He is up there. He's the God who comes near.
Far from being a God who demands our praise and
demands our homage, though, of course, with all
good reason to do so, he comes down lowly in
a manger to shepherds, common folk. God descends.
And of course, actually, if you have been with
us this year so far, we've been in the Gospel
of Mark. And what we've seen already in the gospel
of Mark in Jesus' ministry is that he comes down,
not just physically in this idea of the incarnation
of God, God truly in the flesh, but when he does
so, he takes on time, space, and the dynamics
of speech and actions for that time and space.
And so he speaks with the common language of
his day, the common humanity of his day, seed
and soil and fish, farming. and all of that kind
of thing. A God who embraces when He descends
the time and the space and the actions of those
time and space, the people of that time. God
descending in real physicality to real people.
So when He descends, He comes down to the lowly
in the manger and He descends down into time
and space. But also we actually hear that He
does this In some ways, qualitatively too. This
is in 2nd Corinthians. Do I need new batteries?
Am I kind of breaking up? Probably do. I'm going
to keep going and then maybe I'll have to stop
for this. What we're told is that though he was
rich, yet for our sake he becomes poor. It just
seems to be the constant dynamic. If we look
at Christ, what we see is the descending God,
the God who is high up and who embraces the lowly
place. Of course we come to the cross. It's not
a grand death. What did we just hear? It's a
criminal's death. It's actually so lowly and
disgusting. Kind of way to die that Roman citizens
weren't allowed to die that way the lowest of
the low God coming down God descending I'm going
to take a quick break from this short homily
I'd rather pause and make sure you're able to
hear me later on than keep going. That doesn't
know this, but some of you know Ted Prescott.
He didn't know I was going to mention this, but
some of you know his work, his life -sized piece
that depicts the descent of Christ from the cross.
It's actually just titled, Descent from the Cross.
It's currently at the Museum of the Bible down
in DC, and I know some of you have had the opportunity
to go see that. And it's part of this larger
exhibition of these images of the descent of
God, the God coming down. But in this time, God
coming down from death. He said, die. Being lowered
down. The emphasis in these pieces is not the
descent in Christ's incarnation. It's not the
emphasis of Christ's descent in his taking on
the physicality of time and place. It's not even
the descent of Christ in how he died, this lowly
kind of death, but in the fact that he died so
much that others had to actually take him down
further. As a family, we went down and saw this
exhibit a few weeks ago and a couple things stood
out to me. Both in Ted's piece and in these other
depictions of the descent of Jesus, there are
often quite a few people around. five to eight
people or so. Standing around or helping lower
the very body of our Lord. Part of what I read
was that it was common to depict these different
people coming together to carry the body of Christ
down. And you think actually some of the texts
we're reading tonight mention some of those people.
Joseph of Arimathea. I'll actually hear of him
in a couple days. Wealthy. well -connected, able,
getting the ear of Pilate, Nicodemus, sometimes
a Roman soldier, the Marys, Mary Magdalene and
Mary the mother of Jesus, the disciple John,
these kinds of folk, and they're all varied.
You think of those different people, their different
ages and their different experiences, their different
knowledge of the Lord, some committed, some questioning.
Some just coming to terms with the fact that
this one who died is the son of God Some doubting
real people Really different kinds of people
the wealthy and the poor and the enemies and
the loved ones and the really religious the Nicodemuses
and the not so religious the soldiers Those wondering
Another thing that I noticed, and this is actually
very pronounced in Ted's piece, but on others
also, is that so often the people in these pieces
of art are not often actually depicted as though
they were living in the ancient Near East with
the garb of the ancient Near East with the beards
and the facial structure and all of that. Instead
they're They fit the time and the context of
the artist. So Albrecht Durer's descent has people
largely clothed with what you'd expect, like
16th century German art. Van der Weyden's folk
in his great painting, they're all wearing what
you'd expect from a Dutch Renaissance kind of
painter. Bright reds, greens, and things like
that. Ted's piece was made in the 1980s here
in Pennsylvania. It fits. Friends, this is what
I'm saying. This is how it should be. Why? Why?
Because we believe that the ultimate descent
of Christ, which is not his incarnation into
the manger, or his speech among the farmers and
the fishermen of his day, but in his death on
a Roman cross is for us today. He descends. He
descends for 15th century Holland, for 16th century
Germany, for 21st century Harrisburg. This is
what we proclaim. That the death of Christ long
ago on that lowly Roman cross is the descent
of God for us For you and for me This is the
ultimate descent him going down not just to this
earth But to death and to death Playing the reality
of sin Conquering Satan low for you and for me
Which is say if you if you really want to wrestle
with religion do comparative religion What are
the different gods like what are the different
religions say no doubt you have heard as I have
They're largely probably talking about the same
when it all comes down to it. They're all sort
of touching the same elephant saying, oh, he's
like a tree trunk grabbing his leg, like a great
wall touching his side. That's absurd. That's
crazy because Christianity alone says that God
keeps going down. It's the only religion that
says this. And it's right at this unique thing
of Christianity that is the hope of the world.
God continuing to go down, down, down, giving
of himself, giving of his very life, descending
to the tomb for us. God expiring on the cross
for us. God being taken down from the cross for
us. God being put in the tomb for us. Here's
where I'm going and this is all and simply with
this It is on it is in the descent of Christ
it is in the stopped heartbeat of Christ That
is the heartbeat of the good news God going low
for you today Amen Thank you for listening to
Second City Sermons podcast. We hope this sermon
has encouraged you to worship God and to celebrate
the gospel of Jesus. Please consider subscribing
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bless.