Lent #6: It Isn't Me, Is It?

This week I've chosen the 'Week 5: Saturday' reading in this series from NT Wright's Lent for Everyone - Matthew. His commentary is based on a lengthy portion from Matthew 26 & 27, focusing on the intimate gathering of Jesus and his disciples shortly before his crucifixion. In this gathering Jesus tells them that one of them will betray him. Wright comments on the disciples' reaction:

"It isn't me, is it?"

"...We often wonder what it was that made Judas do it. Perhaps we should also ask what it was that held the others back. They, like Judas, had misunderstood so much. They still didn't realize what it was Jesus had to do. There is a worried humility about their question which we would do well to imitate as we approach the narrative of Jesus' last moments...Read (this story) with the question in mind, 'Lord, it isn't me, is it?' and see what answer you get.

"Because it is me - and you, and all of us...We have all been loyal and yet disloyal. We have all wanted to do the right thing and then run away when the going got tough. We have all colluded with injustice, stayed silent when we should have spoken out, and then perhaps blurted out some give-away remark when we should have shut up. And we have all stood by scenes of sorrow and tragedy, not knowing what to say or do but feeling that somehow, of only, we could or should have prevented it...Many (of us) have hurled insults at Jesus...

"Find yourself in the story, wherever you are. Only then, perhaps, can we ask the question in a different way. Because from the earliest days of the church's life the followers of Jesus told this story for another reason. The story of Jesus became their story, in the sense that they believed they had died with Jesus; they had suffered with him, been crucified with him, been buried with him. Somehow - and this mystery lies at the very heart of authentic Christian experience - ...they were living in Jesus and he was living in them...

"'Lord - is it me? Is it me, facing misunderstanding and betrayal? Is it me, praying in agony, being arrested, tried and unjustly condemned, abandoned by my friends, mocked, beaten up, stripped and hung up to die in shame?' As you read this story in faith, we should hear the answer, life-transforming as it is: 'Yes, it is you. This is who you are now. You are not the person you once were. You are the person to whom all this has happened...You are in me and I am in you. You have died; your life is hidden, with me, in the life of God himself.'

"When St. Paul speaks of being 'in Christ', this is basically what he means...you died with him, were nailed to the cross with him, were buried with him. This is who you now are...Easter and all that follows gives a further dimension...(but) it is through Jesus' crucifixion that he becomes what he was born to be: the saviour...: by extending his arms on the cross, enfolding us in that God-with-us embrace, and bringing us with him through death into a whole new life."

"Thank you, loving Lord. Thank you."