Easter 2025

 

There they crucified him       Matthew 27: 35

 

The fact of Evil

Every now and again our complacency is shaken. Just when we've convinced ourselves that this is a canny old world something arrives to shatter our illusion. Cruelty,  injustice, callous disregard.

it happened at Golgotha when they crucified Christ. And every time we scream for an answer. What happened, who's to blame.

If they crucified him - who are they?

No scapegoat to carry it all.

May be there are some people who are particularly evil. And we can heap all the world's evil at their door.

There was an old comforting notion that we in the church haven't got rid of yet - sacrifice. That evil can be got rid of if someone pays the price, so kill a sheep, or a ram, or a human, or Jesus?

Nice idea - load everything onto The Scapegoat and get rid of that and evil has been dealt with. But we don't do that nowadays - do we?

The papers are fond of pictures - like that terrible one of Myra Hindley, the moors murderess. Or Evil Frederick West, or Robert Black.

It is so easy to say, we know what causes it - just get rid of these people and it will be alright.

But it is not true and just as the honest people in the wilderness watched the scapegoat wandering off into the wilderness but realised that all the evil hadn't gone with it - we know that the evil is still here.

People Like Us

But when we look at what happened all those years ago we realise it wasn't that kind of person who killed Jesus. Look at the cast.

Pilate; a politician scared to displease his people; Herod, the puppet king who had to please his bosses; chief priests and scribes - jealous of Jesus popularity; Peter & the disciples, scared for his life; Judas interested in making a few pounds; the crowds, everybody else is doing it; the soldiers and the man that made the cross, only doing the job. And all the others who thought it was wrong but did nothing.

No! in the end we come to the dreadful conclusion that most human evil is done by ordinary people - people suspiciously like us. Everyone seemed to think that James Hamilton was a decent enough person, no signs of terrible evil lurking below the surface. I'm sure if you met the people who are perpetrating horrors you would not be impressed with their evil. Himmler was a quiet man, with a weak chin and glasses; when he walked into a room no-one noticed; he didn't like cruelty to animals. Yet he founded the dreaded SS and sent millions of Jews to the Gas chambers. At the Nuremberg trials one observer noted that all the horror sounded so ordinary. It should worry us that they were a lot like us.

When someone asked Paul Eddington, the actor and Quaker how he would like to be remembered; he said "he has done little harm". I know what he meant.

In the end only we can deal with it

Modern man keeps thinking he has got the master of it - education, arts, get rid of inhibitions, religion. It's all to do with social conditions! But it continues to plague us. I'm afraid evil is like a lot of things we think we have tamed..

But no evil - in the human form, is ever present. How do we deal with it?

The first is to try to pretend everything is all right when it isn't. That we shouldn't talk about sin and evil - it's not nice and it's not comforting. And being religious is all about sweet flowers and golden sunsets and thinking about nice things. But I'm afraid that Christmas is followed by Calvary and the manger gives up its baby to the cross. Don't be kidded - evil is here and it must be fought.

The second is to say it has nothing to do with me - when it does. What about the tele when someone is getting roughed up and everyone backs off until a young woman has a go to help.

Then there is the way of Christ - he saw what was good and did it - and when he ran into trouble he went on ahead. He took it on - when others were keeping their heads down for fear or popularity or because they had too much to lose he went ahead. In spite of everything that evil could throw at Him. He believed in God and that God was good.

On the victory side

But it is not about stoicism and stiff upper lips. It is about believing that we are on the victory side. That in the great struggle between the forces of good and the forces of evil we are with God and with Christ.

What we do is what Christ does - face it all - the injustice, the pain, the insults, the rejection, and yes even death - to defeat them all - that none, not even death could defeat the power of the love of God. So, we take up the cause - with the same trust - in his strength; accept that evil is there and face it certain in the knowledge that it cannot defeat us, will not overwhelm us.

And remember just as evil runs through us all and delivers its hurt and suffering through human lives - so does good.

When you read the story of the cross you keep coming across not just the evil but the good. Pilate's wife, Simon who carried the cross, the soldier who gave him something to drink, the women who kept him company when the men had fled. And you must make up your mind Faith (Kennedy) You are on one side or the other - adding to the good or adding to the evil.

Every day there is good to be done and evil to be fought - prejudice, injustice, unkindness. These things wreck people's lives. I have seen people cut down by a harsh word and unkind deed. And people lifted by it.

 

We are here to show love and compassion, to be kind and understanding, to build people and give them hope. To brighten their lives. So that they too begin to discover the greatest of all truths - that in spite of the evil working in people the love of God can rise above it - take it on and conquer it - that is the glorious message of Easter