The Descending God

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

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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.