The Seventh Station--Jesus Falls A Second Time.

"Is it possible that he

who did not spare his own Son

but handed him over

for the sake of us all

will not grant us all things besides?"

          --Romans 8. 32

The story dates back to medieval times. It was the season of Lent. The old priest announced that morning that in the evening service he would preach about the Cross. So that evening, here and there, from different roads the people came. Some were very old, hardly able to walk. Some came holding the hands of their little children. Some came alone. And as the people gathered and the darkness began to descend in the little church, someone came forward and lit the candles on the altar. In a few minutes the old priest came forward and took one of the candles. He walked up the steps, behind the altar where the crucified hung. Tiptoeing he lifted the candle high until you could see the crown of thorns and Jesus’ face. And after a long time, the priest moved the candle to the hands, first one hand and then the other. Light shone on the pierced hands. Then the priest moved the candle to the Lord’s wounded side. After that he stooped low and illuminated the nailed feet of the Lord Jesus. Nothing was said. After a long time—the priest blew out the candle and the people left the church silent and weeping. They had seen a sermon and it touched them all.

As we pilgrims move now to the Seventh station of the Cross—Jesus falls for a second time. Look closely and you may just see yourself. For the Incarnated Jesus in this fall stands with any of us who have suffered, who have known defeat, who have fought and lost. And who among us has not known brokenness? In marriage, in family, in personal life—sometimes in some job. Maybe looking back feeling that so much that we have given our lives too has been for little or nothing.

Move even closer. Look at the fallen Jesus. He is at one with all those poor and dispossessed that have few to speak for them. In this fall he reaches out to any sinners who have stumbled and fallen—sometimes humiliated and ashamed. This Christ, bearing this heavy cross accepts us all. None of we fallen ones are beyond the pale of his love and care.

He will somehow stagger to his feet and move on. But this is the place where he meets us one and all. None of us are left behind. Standing here before the fallen Jesus we know, like our Lord, we can make it. “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4.16)

The Hell You Say!

"Go to Heaven for the climate. Hell for the company."
      --Mark Twain


The biggest hoop-la lately is Rob Bell’s new book, Love Wins. (Subtitle: A Book about Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived.) Takes in quite a bit of territory. The book just came out March 29 and yet it has a lot of people enraged. Bell was even interviewed on CBS the other morning. He has a video, which you might want to check out stating his case. He said that one of his members told him that Gandhi was in hell. That remark set Pastor Bell to thinking. Kiran Thadhani has written for Sojourners: “Really, the potential for a Hindu peacemaker to be in heaven upsets so many people?” Pretty good question.

Bell’s book had made the top ten list of topics discussed on Twitter. People are taking sides. Poor Rob, I am sure his phone has not quit ringing. What do I say about all of this hell talk?  I would agree with Reinhold Niebuhr when somebody asked him about the afterlife. He said, ”I refuse to conjecture on the furniture of heaven or the temperature of hell.” That just about sums it up for me. Jesus said don’t judge who’s in and who’s out.


I grew up in a church that was sure we had all the answers. Those that had been properly baptized, said the right words were gonna get in. Those who had been sprinkled, led by some Pope, didn’t agree with our very narrow interpretations about everything or worship like us--would certainly not get in.


Bell makes a pretty good point by saying that God’s kingdom is a pretty big place. He breaks that down to say: all nations, everybody. He’s talking about folk with different skin colors, languages we cannot understand, dialects, accents, eating all kinds of food and having strange customs and traditions that seem downright un-American. He says they may just be included in the circle. Who’s in—who’s out? I do not know. I do know some of the meanest people I have ever met were in church just about every Sunday. I sometimes wonder where they will be. And down the street—one of the kindest people who never darken the door of anybody’s church--makes you glad you’re a human being when you are with them.


This hell talk sounds mostly like an intramural sport. I don’t believe the discussion will really make it into the Final Four. Jesus spent most of his time with the wrong kind of people—not because he was afraid of their going to hell as much as he laid awake at night thinking about how hungry they were, how much they had suffered, how broken their hearts were and how they could be touched and loved and find a better life for themselves and their families.

America is in two wars and with another waiting in the wings. Congress trying to slash just about every item that deals with human need. Many rich and well heeled are worrying about health care somebody else may get. With a foreclosure on every street—seems to me we have better fish to fry. Jesus said it well—why not try to take the beam out of your own eye before you sorry about the mote in your brother and sister’s eyes. Rob Bell is right about one thing: Love really does win. Maybe unpacking the ramifications of that principle might keep us busy for a long time.

The Sixth Station: Veronica wipes the face of Jesus.

"He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.
He was despised and rejected by all, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom we hide (our) faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not."
         --Isaiah 53. 2-3

The Sixth station of the cross is the only stopping point not mentioned in Scripture. Veronica moved through the crowd and made her way to the staggering Jesus. As he bore the cross she reached out, took her veil in love or maybe just human kindness and wiped the spittle and blood from his face.


Legend had it that when she pulled the veil back from Jesus face the image of his face was embedded in the cloth. From the fourth century on the name Veronica emerges in one of the stations. The legend of the veil bearing Jesus image emerged later in the thirteen century. Some thought that this Veronica was the same woman whom Jesus healed of an issue of blood. The story went that she touched the hem of his garment and she was healed. Her name meant true or truthful.


What does this old story mean to us today? Whether the veil she touched Jesus’ face with bore an image or not is not the point. The truth here is simple. When we come close to Jesus—when we reach out in kindness to anybody anywhere—we ourselves will bear the mark of his love in our lives. This is an old miracle and one of the great wonders of the gospel. Like that long train of pilgrims through the years “inasmuch as we do unto the least of these...we do it unto him.”


I love that story that comes from Jim Wallis of Sojourners. He writes that twenty blocks from the White House is the Sojourners Neighborhood Center. Every Friday morning they open their doors and about 300 families come in seeking food. Just before the doors open the volunteers, mostly poor themselves join hands in prayer. One old African-American woman prayed one morning. “Thank you, Lord, for waking me up this morning. Thank you that the walls of my room were not the walls of my grave, and my bed was not my coolin’ board. Lord, we know that you’ll be coming through this line today, so help us to treat you well.” I wonder if her name just might have been Veronica.

Helpin' Ain't Easy

"Let us keep this truth before us.
You say have no faith?
Love--and faith will come.
You say you are sad?
Love--and joy will come.
You say you are alone?
Love--and you will break our of solitude.
You say you are in hell?
Love--and you will find yourself in heaven.
Heaven is love."
   --Carlo Carretto

Burden bearing. It’s a noble profession. Lately we’ve become acquainted with burden bearing up close and personal. My wife’s Aunt was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s over a year ago. Slowly she was drifting away from us and we had to do something. First we tried home health care hoping she could stay at home. After several months the Doctor said it was time to move her. So we found a facility close to us and not long after she moved in she tried to walk away and so we had to move her again. In the second facility she did get out the door and they found her on a busy highway trying to get home. So—we had to find yet another place and the third facility was fine until she began to fall and fall and fall. First she broke her arm. Then she broke her hip and landed into a fourth facility for physical therapy. She has gone downhill fast. But she still knows us and brightens up when we come into her room. She is much better but still cannot walk and continues to try.

What does this has to do with burden bearing? Everything. Beginning with home health care and moving through all four facilities—we have been amazed at the genuine love and quality of care that she has experienced from those that worked there. When she was still at home her caretaker cooked her favorite meals, checked on her after she had gone home at night and cared for her as if she was a member of her family. After we moved her to our town this woman still called long-distance to find out how she was doing. She and others went far beyond the call of duty.

In all four facilities—most of those that worked there reached out and did all they could to help. They knew her name and they would spend time talking to her. She loved them and they loved her. These folk have a hard job. It’s messy never-a-break-business. Some in a pinch even work twelve-hour shifts. Most are African-American. Most of them make little money. Some are divorced and many bring with them their own personal problems. Aging parents, never enough money—worries about foreclosures and children. Yet—some drive through the early morning hours and spend all days bearing someone else’s burden. Often it is a thankless task. Tending to difficult patients, dealing with irate family members, washing old uncooperative bodies.  They change diapers continually and have to be alert at all times. Some feed the patients. Others sit down and listen to some old woman or man spin dreams which may or may not be true. It is hard business when a little old lady sits by the door day after day with her suitcase thinking her son will come and take her home. Some curse and refuse to let black folks into their rooms. Others simply sit in the television room staring blankly at the screen.


I don’t know how they do it, these burden bearers. I do know that Jesus said on more than one occasion: “As you do it unto the least of these—you do it unto me...” And I really think moving amid the messes and spills these helpers really are bearing somebody’s burden whether they know it or not. And these, great unappreciated heroes—really are the stuff of the kingdom of God

The Fifth Station: Simon--The Burden Bearer

"As they led him away,

they laid hold of one Simon

   the Cyrenean

who was coming in fron the fields,

They put the crossbeam on Simon's

   shoulder

for him to carry along behind Jesus."

    --Luke 23.36

+           +           +          +

"To lend each other a hand when we are falling,

perhaps that's the only thing that matters in the end."

                      --Frederick Buechner

They remembered the story all their lives. It was hard to pinpoint when their father had first told it. But Rufus and Alexander had heard it so often they could tell it to you even in their dreams. How did it begin? They would laugh and say, “Always the same. Always the same.”

Simon, their father had said it was springtime. Passover was near. All his life he had longed to celebrate Passover in Jerusalem. For years he had saved—but always there was a roadblock. One year it was sickness, another year the crops had failed. Always something. But one day his wish finally came true. He found Jerusalem different than he imagined. People everywhere—streets crowded. And Rome—with their soldiers and flags you could tell that was an occupied country.

He saw a crowd that had gathered and was curious. Someone was about to be crucified. He edged closer to the street. And he saw this man, bloody and beaten, slowly carrying the crossbeam to his execution. Soldiers behind him nudged him with their swords. People in the streets jeered at him. Some spat on him. One soldier waved a banner that read: “Jesus of Nazareth: King of the Jews.” This man was old not old. On his head there was a crown and it looked like thorns. The blood dripped from his brow, streaked his face like tears.

The man stumbled and fell down and the weight of the crossbeam pinned him to the road. He couldn’t get up. And a Roman soldier came over and kicked him—but did not move. This same soldier looked at Simon, motioned him to come, and then dragged him out into the street. “You bear his cross—someone has to take it to the hill.” Simon was scared and furious. But he obeyed orders. Who wouldn’t?

He lifted the heavy beam off the bleeding man and shifted until it was on his own back. And he started the march, which would finally lead him up the hill. He told his boys that the soldiers took the cross placed it on the ground and stretched the man’s arms out on the beam. They nailed his hands first...and then his feet. It was horrible.

Their father told him he stayed all day long. It rained and thundered-and the lightning—he had never seen anything like it. Later, on the boat back home, he felt different. It was hard to pin down. He told Rufus and Alexander about other travels. The mountains he had climbed. The deserts he had seen. The robbers that scared him so. He told them of the money he had made and how life had been good. He had loved a woman—their mother—and she had loved him back. He told them how proud he was of them, his sons and the grandchildren they had given him.

But of all the things he had ever done he said that Passover in Jerusalem changed his life forever. Against his will, they had thrust Jesus’ cross on his shoulders and made him carry it all the way. Both sons knew the story by heart. Their father always ended it by saying: to do something hard and sometimes embarrassing—stretching the best you are--for someone else, this is the best thing I ever did. Shouldering his heavy load, bearing Jesus’cross had made it all different.

I Am Proud of my Church

"Let the little children come unto me, and do not hinder them, for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these."
                         --Luke 18:16


Every once in a while I stumble on to something that makes me proud to be a Christian and a member of the church. It happened last Sunday. In the middle of the service we had a Parent- Child Dedication Service. But this part of the service was unusual because down the aisle there strode two women and their new baby. Trailing behind them were the parents of one of the women. Nobody left the church furious. Nobody acted like this was a more special dedication than any other baby. It was just another Sunday when we lifted up before the Lord this new little girl and prayed for her parents and rejoiced on this new birth.


It was a moving moment for me. I remember when they first came to church well over a year before. They sat close to the back. They had felt uncomfortable in a number of churches—and so they were a little skittish. But members welcomed them after the service and invited them back. The next Sunday they sat a little closer than they had the Sunday before. Later they told me how grateful they were that they had found a church that would accept them. No big deal like “Aren’t we the super-Christians that welcome everybody!” No. They felt like we had opened our arms and taken them in. It wasn’t long before they left their safe pew and walked down the aisle and joined the church. The congregation rejoiced in our new members. Months later we found that one of the women were pregnant. So they had always wanted a baby—and so she was artificially inseminated. The couple was so happy and our church gave them a shower.

And so when the little girl was born we did what we always do when couples bring new life into the world. We welcomed them to the front of the church, dedicated the baby and pledged to stand by the parents and rejoiced together.


Weeks before our inner city church celebrated the hundredth anniversary of being in our beautiful old sanctuary. In the sixties Deacons stood at the front doors of the church and turned away those of the wrong color. But that was then. Since that time, the doors were slowly opened to everybody—everybody. And looking around on Sundays you see homeless folk and the well heeled and gays and singles and young married couples and a multitude of little children. Our mission statement says: “Building an inclusive Community of grace.” And we are trying to do just that.

Oh, we have our problems like any other church. We are far from perfect. But I am glad to be part of a church that can change its history. A church that can courageously stick its head out in a deep-South town. A church that can take that part of the Gospel seriously that says: “Whosoever will may come.” Last Sunday, especially I was glad to be a member of the church.

(This meditation is dedicated to Georgia Elizabeth Loague Long and her proud parents: Mary Long and T.J. Loague.)

The 4th Station--Jesus Meets his Mother

"Did Mary make a birthday cake
For Christ when he was small,
And think the while she frosted it,
How quickly boys grow tall?

Oh sometimes years are very long,
And sometimes years run fast,
And when the Christ had put away
Small, earthly things at last,

And died upon a wooden cross
One afternoon in spring,
Did Mary find the little toy,
And sit...remembering?
-Helen Welshimer, "The Birthday"



Today we come to pause before the fourth station of the cross. There are only two stations when Jesus stopped and addressed someone. In this fourth station Jesus confronted his mother. In his pain he said nothing. But from the Cross at the top of the hill he would look down and see his still weeping mother. It must have broken his heart—but he spoke to her: “Woman, behold your son.” And then to John, “Behold your mother.” There at the end he gave Mary to John and John to Mary.

Why did the church add this fourth station? In a sexist world where women counted for little—the church was far ahead of its time. Further ahead than it knew. For the Gospel and the whole of the Bible is peppered with Sarah’s and Ruth’s and Naomi’s and Elizabeth’s and Anna's and Mary’s and Martha’s and, as Mark put it “the other women.” Perhaps he said this because there were too many to name.

I wonder if this isn’t a word to some old bag lady digging through a garbage can looking for food or treasures. I wonder if it isn’t a word to some single mother of three who has been up since five at McDonald’s serving coffee and sausage biscuits? And I wonder if this is not a word for all those scared and frightened women who must decide if they go to the abortion clinic or not. Could these words address all those who burkas and are confined to houses unless some man says otherwise. And would this station take in the battered and abused women who live always in quiet desperation. Not to speak of all those mothers who have lost sons and daughters in this war that seems to have no end.

Dorothy Sayers imagines the fourth station this way: In her imagination he has Mary speaking to Jesus:

“My child. When he was small, I washed and fed him; I dressed him in his little garments and combed the rings of his hair. When he cried, I comforted him; when he was hurt, I kissed away the pain; and when the darkness fell, I sang him to sleep. Now he goes faint and fasting n the dust, and his hair is tangled with thorns. They will strip him naked to the sun and hammer the nails into his living flesh, and the great darkness will cover him. And there is nothing I can do. Nothing at all. This is the worst thing; to conceive beauty in your heart and bring it forth into the world, and then to strand by helpless and watch it suffer...”


And so maybe our task is to console all those who need consolation in our time. Maybe our task is to make sure that women are safe and have the same opportunities as men. We still have a long way to go. Maybe it means to stand up and say: “No more!” wherever women know injustice and maltreatment.

Ponder the mystery of the fourth station. Jesus confronts his mother. It is a word of compassion and reconciliation. It is to be a gracious word for a most ungracious time. It means that they really will know who we are and what we do if we really, really love one another.