Today is the fifth Sunday of Lent, often called Passion Sunday. And it is today that the solemnity of Lent darkens still further, and we begin to approach the cross. It is as if we spend these next two weeks walking the length of the cross’s shadow, until we reach the cross itself on Good Friday. And in our readings between now and then, we begin to hear about how Jesus prepares the disciples for what is to come, explaining that he is going to die. Jesus had no time for sentimental notions about human life. He knew all its reality, and he was aware that his own life would be cut short. The stance he took, the things he did, the people he consorted with, his outspoken attacks on religious and political authorities alike, all these things combined to make it certain that he would not be allowed to live to a ripe old age. So it is that in John's Gospel in particular, we find him urgently trying to break through his disciples' denial and misunderstanding of his role and mission; he urgently needs to prepare them for his death and what it would mean.
In today’s gospel, some Greeks - gentiles, non-Jews - come to Philip and tell him that they want to see Jesus. When Philip and Andrew go to Jesus to tell him, something strange happens. Jesus doesn't say, "oh bring them along tomorrow" or even "well, I'm going to be in the Temple and they aren't allowed in there because they’re gentiles". Instead, Jesus starts talking about his death. It's as if the coming of the Greeks is a sign to Jesus that death is close. Why? Maybe he just recognised that his message about the Kingdom of God was getting just too big for the Jewish nation and that in order to grow, he would have to die first.
Throughout his ministry Jesus used pictures and stories to try to explain his message to those who would listen, and here he uses the image that Paul would later to use when he is writing to the Christians in Corinth - that a seed must die in order to bear fruit. Held in the hand, it is useless. It needs to be put into the ground, where it breaks down, and from that death, life grows, a plant with many grains that can be used to feed many. He goes on to say that by being lifted up – by which he may mean both in death on the cross, and in resurrection from the grave – he will draw all people – Jew, Greek, slave, free, male female – to himself.
The way John tells the story, Jesus reflects on his own feelings about his coming death, and he recognises that suffering and death are part of what he has come to do. For we have a God who came to earth and lived as we did, and not only that, but who experienced a physical death as we do. The victory of God over sin and death was not a clever trick with mirrors; the sin and the death were – are – very real indeed, and there is no Easter without Good Friday.
On the whole, death is something we prefer not to dwell on. Our society spends a lot of time and effort denying and delaying death. Medicine is there to mend the ills of old age; cosmetics reduce the visible signs of it. All the advertisements try to tell us that we are immortal. But the reality is that we all die. This is a reality that is ever-present with me in my ministry here; I spent Thursday evening praying with someone as she died, and it always feels like an immense privilege and responsibility.
It is also something that has been very much present in our congregation recently. We have lost some good friends over these last few months, of whom Robbie [and Rose] is at the forefront of our minds today. We may well ask ourselves, why do the good ones have to suffer and die? And when someone is watching, or has watched, their loved one die, that's not the time to discuss the question. All we can do is stand alongside, as I know you have done for each other, and as you will all do for Daphne and the family.
But the reality is that suffering and death come to all of us. It is part of what we are here to do, to suffer and to suffer well, to die and to make a good death, as Robbie did. It was what Jesus came to do, and it's no different for us. Why should the servant be different from the Master? Maybe the good ones suffer because they are closer to Jesus? I don't know. Suffering and death appear to us to have no purpose. In time, it will all make sense, but not necessarily on this side of eternal life. We are shaped and perfected by the experience of suffering and death – that’s easy to say, but harder to believe when we or those we love are in the shadow of it.
But for Christians, death is the door to something greater and more glorious than we have experienced here on earth. Being afraid of death, trying to delay it at all costs, trying to defeat the signs of ageing, all these things preoccupy people. The obsession with preserving our lives as they are prevents us from attending to the kind of life that really matters, life that is full and generous and truthful.
We also believe that the eternal life we have in Christ is not something just for the future, but it begins here and now, the moment we choose to follow Christ and embrace the reality of our life here and hereafter. The hope for eternity does not mean denying the present, and to embrace life everlasting does not mean that we should deny or defy death. All that may sound gloomy, but it can be very liberating.
The shadow of the cross is at its darkest and most intense when the light behind it shines most brightly. During these next two weeks as we walk the length of that shadow, reaching the foot of the cross on Good Friday, and during our time in the valley of the shadow of death, may we dare to believe, even in the darkness, that the light is shining beyond the cross, and that the shadows will one day be no more.
We sometimes try to shut our eyes, to forget about death until we can no longer ignore it; we seek to cling on to youth and beauty and hope that cures will be found for everything that might kill us. It's hard to face up to death, both our own and that of those we love, and our society does not help us. But through the passion and death and resurrection of Jesus, we can face it not with fear, but with confidence, and find in it the way to real life. The result, according to our Gospel reading, is worth it. The result is eternal life, beginning now.