God on the Gallows

Luke 23:44-49

March 9, 2025 • Mount Pleasant UMC

Lithuania is a small nation in northeast Europe that lived under communism for a long time, and one of the things the dictators tried to do was to eliminate religion—Christianity in particular. In response, on a hillside outside a small town whose name I can’t pronounce, a few people planted crosses as a symbol of their independence. The Communists bulldozed the site, but during the night, more people snuck up onto the hill and put up more crosses. Those were removed the next day, and what do you think happened? The people went up again under the cover of darkness and planted even more crosses. After a few rounds of this, the authorities stopped bothering and today that hill is crammed with 100,000 crosses, “large and small, simple and ornate.” It has become a symbol of defiance, hope and freedom, and it’s also a reminder that no one can stop the power of the cross (cf. Howell, Everywhere is Jerusalem, pg. 12).

We began Lent on Wednesday night by remembering that the there is no more recognizable symbol in the world than the cross, and I said that it’s kind of amazing that an instrument of death is something we wear as jewelry. Crosses seem to be everywhere, from the giant one over in Effingham to smaller ones placed at the scene of an automobile accident. There’s a family in our neighborhood that has a giant wooden cross in front of their house, and I said the other night they must be getting ready for Easter. Cathy corrected me; apparently it’s been there a while and I’m just not very observant. Crosses seem to show up in all kinds of places, and the symbol means different things to different people. That’s why, this year during Lent, we are focusing intently on some of the many different meanings that the Gospel writers give to the cross. Too often we come to this time of year and only focus on the simple but true statement, “Jesus died for my sins.” And there is certainly that happening on the cross; we will talk about that in the weeks to come. But there’s more going on than that. On “the old rugged cross,” God is speaking in many ways and one of the things he is saying is, “I’m with you in your suffering.”

We live in a world where the innocent suffer. There’s no easy or soft way to say that. Babies die before they get a chance at life, children get cancer, young families are torn apart by a car crash, people get horrific diseases for which there is no cure and little relief. We live in a world shaped by wars and famines, none of us can remember a world without terrorism and genocide, and we have known atrocities that shake us to our core. All of it makes us wonder why. In fact, as we talked about a few weeks ago, that “why” question is often the biggest challenge for people to have faith. If you believe the polls, a whole lot of people believe in God. They don’t doubt that God exists. They doubt that God is good. The question usually goes like this: if God is all-powerful and all-loving, present everywhere and all-knowing, then why do things like this happen? Why do bad things happen to good people? And where is God in the midst of it all (cf. Zahnd, The Wood Between the Worlds, pg. 34)?

Elie Wiesel was a Jewish teenager when he was put into a concentration camp during World War II. The rest of his family died there, but Wiesel survived both Auschwitz and Buchenwald then went on to write about his experience. In his book Night he tells about a time when the Nazi guards forced all of the prisoners to stand and watch as three people were hung—two men and a boy. The boy died slowly, and as Wiesel stood in line, another man whispered behind him, “Where is God now?” Wiesel said at that moment he heard a voice inside of himself saying, “He is hanging there on this gallows” (Zahnd 39). Nevertheless, because of incidents like that and others, Wiesel found his faith in God “murdered” in the concentration camp. Others have found their faith similarly challenged or even killed when similar situations happen—when a shooter tears up a school, when a pastor abuses his or her trust, when a dear relative contracts an incurable disease. Where is God when the innocent suffer?

The Scriptures have one answer for us: God is on the gallows. He is on the cross. That man hanging on the middle cross, between two thieves? That’s God up there. In the passage we read this morning, we have Luke’s description of the final moments of Jesus. It’s a rather sparse account, to be honest. There isn’t much detail for such an important event in history. But what Luke really wants to highlight are the evidences that Jesus is who he said he is. One: the sun goes dark for three hours (23:44-45). What that was like, exactly, I don’t know but I picture it being like the total eclipse we had last year. Only rather than lasting for just a few minutes, it lasted for three hours. Though Luke doesn’t point it out, those who stood there that day would have remembered that the Old Testament prophet Amos (8:9-10) had said there would come a day when the world went dark and it would be like a time of mourning for an only son (cf. Card, Luke: The Gospel of Amazement, pg. 257). So the world goes dark. Then, two: the curtain of the Temple was torn in two (23:45). This curtain was a foot thick and sixty feet tall; it separated the Holy of Holies, the place where God was said to live, from the rest of the Temple space. It would have been hard to tear for anyone, and Luke says it was torn from top to bottom. That means someone ripped it from sixty feet up in the air all the way to the bottom. We have to get a ridiculously heavy and tall ladder to change the bulb in this projector! It’s a lot of work to get that high up in the air, but this happened effortlessly, with no ladders or any kind of equipment. At the moment of the death of Jesus, the way to God’s presence was opened. “Holiness is being released, set free upon the earth” (Card 257).

Then there’s the third evidence, and that’s the witness of those who were there, especially the witness of the centurion. He is a Roman soldier who was responsible for 100 soldiers, the smallest unit of a Roman legion (which was made up of 60 centuries), and it was up to him to train, discipline, schedule and take care of those soldiers. If they failed in their duties, the whole legion might not function well. He would have been battle-hardened, an exemplary soldier, and probably destined for even more responsibility in the future. One historian says centurions were “an exceptional class of men” (Card 257). And since it seems this man was stationed in Jerusalem, it’s unlikely this was his first crucifixion. He’s seen men die, probably been responsible for many deaths himself. That’s why Luke narrows the focus on this man, because his testimony is significant, especially if, as some speculate, he might have become part of the church by Luke’s time. Maybe he was even someone Luke knew. When he sees how Jesus dies, that he gives up his spirit rather than succumbing to blood loss and exhaustion, how he didn’t curse those who put him to death but asked God to forgive them, how he interacted kindly even with those nailed on crosses next to him, the centurion stops what he’s doing, looks at the cross, praises God and then says, “Surely this was a righteous man” (23:47).

He say Jesus is “righteous.” The word there can mean both “righteous” and “innocent” (Card 257). So here is a Roman citizen, a soldier, saying, in essence, Jesus was not guilty of what they accused him of, that the verdict against him was unjust and he didn’t deserve to die. He confesses that what has happened on this hill is wrong, even though he was a part of it (cf. McKnight, Luke, pg. 352; Wright, Luke for Everyone, pg. 286). And when he looks on the end result, when he gazes on this dead man hanging between heaven and earth, he praises God. Did you catch that? A Roman soldier, who has probably worshipped many gods all throughout his life, who might have even worshipped the emperor as a god, a man who has made killing people and carrying out the whim of the Roman leaders his career—that man praises God. The God of the Jews. The God who is on the cross, though I doubt he knows that at this point. But he praises God, and his testimony has, for centuries, reminded us that God is not distant when we suffer because God himself suffered for us and with us and still does. God is on the gallows.

There is another group standing off to the side of the hill. Luke says, “All those who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance, watching these things” (23:49). Have you ever wondered why they are still there? I mean, the crowd Luke mentions in the verse before is there for the spectacle of execution. When the show is over, they leave. But these people, those who personally knew the man in the middle, stay. Even when the crowd leaves, they are still there. It’s not just because they are friends and relatives. In fact, being seen with him probably put them in more danger. No, I think they stay because they see something in the way Jesus died that gave them hope. Not for resurrection; no one expected a resurrection even though Jesus had told them over and over again it would happen. No, that’s not why they stayed. They stayed because they saw in the suffering of Jesus a God who understands, a God who has looked death in the face, who has been beaten on the back by suffering, and who died believing that what happened on that hill outside Jerusalem would accomplish something powerful. In the death of Jesus, these people found a God who suffers with them, with us, and they held onto his promise that one day all things would be made right. Somehow, as they gazed upon the God on the gallows, they found hope for the restoration of all things (cf. Zahnd 40-41). This group, standing at a distance, become the model for all who will follow, all who stand at the foot of the cross.

You’ve heard me talk about Dietrich Bonhoeffer before, and maybe some of you saw the movie about his life that was out recently. Bonhoeffer was a German Lutheran pastor who was in America as it was becoming evident that the world was on the brink of another war. He watched the alarming rise of the Nazi party, and though he could have stayed safely in another country, he insisted on returning to Germany. Many of his friends protested and tried to talk him into staying, but he told them he could not share in the restoration of his country if he didn’t also share in their suffering. And so he returned, established an underground seminary to train pastors who would stand up against the evil he saw, participated in a plot to assassinate Hitler (an act that bothered his conscience greatly, even though he believed it was the right thing to do), and eventually was arrested because of his participation in the resistance movement. He was killed in a concentration camp by the Nazis just days before liberation. Just shortly before he died, Bonhoeffer was contemplating his mortality and his suffering when he wrote these words: “Only the suffering God can help.” A God who remained distant, far off in the heavens, was no help to Bonhoeffer in his time of trouble. It was Christ on the cross, the God who suffers with us, who was comforting to him as he faced his own death (cf. Zahnd 42). God on the gallows gives us hope.

There’s another aspect to this facet of the cross, because knowing God suffers with us can also enable us to live in ways that make no sense to the world around us. I think of the community of West Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania, an Amish community that went through the unbearable experience of a school shooting. It’s hard to believe that it’s been almost 20 years since Charles Carl Roberts took the lives of five girls in a one-room schoolhouse before taking his own life. But the story that captured the attention of the nation was how, within hours of the shooting, the Amish community was comforting the family of the shooter and offering forgiveness. One grandfather said, “We must not think evil of this man.” They said they believed in a just God who would judge Roberts, and that removed the responsibility from them. And they knew that Jesus suffered with them in the death of their children. Because of that, they could forgive and move toward a future with hope. They were suffering, but they could still be Jesus to the community because of the God on the gallows.

My neighbor growing up was named Harry, but we called him Papa. I’m honestly not sure how that got started, but I never could call him Harry or even Mr. Carlyle. He was always Papa. And I remember as a kid when I first heard of “Parkinson’s Disease.” I had no idea what it was, and mostly I learned about it by watching how it affected Papa. When he had to stop working. When he stopped going places. When he stopped doing yard work. Parkinson’s is one of many cruel diseases loose in our world today, and the cruelty of this one is that is robs the body of mobility and strength but leaves the mind intact so you know exactly what’s happening to you. What I remember most about Papa’s experience is that I never heard him complain. And I don’t ever remember him with anything other than a smile on his face. When his body would no longer allow him to go anywhere, he would sit on his front porch and wait on people to come by to visit. Whenever we stopped in, he was always glad to see us and he welcomed us with his signature smile. I wish I had been old enough to really talk to him in these terms, but I believe now that what sustained him was the years of faith he had practiced and lived out. He believed in a suffering God, and if Jesus had done that for him, he could live whatever life he had for Jesus. His suffering was nothing compared to the glory that awaited him.

Paul even says that, and I sometimes wonder if Papa had that verse in mind during his last years. Paul puts it this way in his letter to the Romans: “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (8:18). That’s why, as I’ve told you before, at almost every funeral I do, I remind those gathered that no matter what we go through here, there is something better coming. No more tears, no more suffering, no more death—all because Jesus suffered in our place. He suffered for us and he suffers with us. No matter what we go through here, Paul says, it’s nothing compared to what is waiting for us there.

In the Roman Catholic tradition, you most often see depictions of the cross that has Jesus hanging on it. By contrast, Protestant churches, like those of us in the Methodist tradition and others, typically have crosses displayed that are empty. When I was young, I was told that was because the Catholic tradition emphasizes Good Friday and Protestants emphasize Easter. I seriously doubt that, whatever the origins of the practice are, it’s that simple. Theology rarely is. But I have grown to love and appreciate a crucifix, where you see Jesus on the cross, because it is a reminder that Jesus suffers with us. Not just back then. Not just one time on a hillside outside Jerusalem. But still, today, here and now. I think there’s great value in contemplating Jesus on the cross and being reminded that we worship a “God who refuses to allow his beloved creatures to suffer alone” (Zahnd 41).

Sometimes he reminds us of that not just through his own presence—certainly that—but also through the comfort and presence of other people. I can’t begin to count how many times God has sent and used someone to remind me of his comfort and his presence and his love, most recently and essentially during my recovery from my cardiac arrest last November. But one of the times that always stands out was when my grandmother died many years ago. Grandma had always been there. When my brother and I were young, she lived just two blocks from us and our bikes often took us down the street to her house. Later on, she got remarried and moved to Rossville, five miles away but just about six blocks from where our school was, so there were a lot of afternoons we would walk to her house after school until Mom got off work and picked us up. We spent a lot of time with Grandma, even when she began having health problems. We would spend the weekend with her so her caregiver could have time off. Church, family gatherings, everyday stuff—I can’t tell you how many meals we ate at her table. Grandma was just always there. But then the strokes took her personality away and eventually they claimed her life. I remember getting the call that she was gone, but I don’t really remember the funeral or anything around that time except standing on the hillside in the Geetingsville cemetery after the services were all over. That was when the whole thing hit me and I broke down into tears. What was life going to be like without Grandma? And at that moment, a family friend came over and just wrapped his arms around me. He couldn’t change anything, he couldn’t take away my suffering, but he could remind me that there was someone greater than both of us who suffered with me that day. God on the gallows. Jesus knew and he understood because he suffered too.

Elie Weisel’s book Night has been translated into 30 languages and sold 10 million copies. It’s been said that, other than The Diary of Anne Frank, it’s the most read book in Holocaust literature. You could say Weisel is most known for his writing about the death of God. But later in life, he began to write differently. Eugene Peterson, translator of The Message, heard Weisel speak late in his life, and what astonished Peterson is how Weisel’s murdered faith seemed to have been resurrected. Peterson described the evening that way: “He spent the next hour leading us, a secular audience of seven or eight hundred people, in what was essentially a Bible study. Everything he said could have been transcribed from a Wednesday night prayer meeting in a Baptist church” (qtd. in Zahnd 43). The God who had died in the concentration camp seems to have risen again, but then resurrection is what that God specializes in, isn’t it?

I don’t know what caused the resurrection in Weisel’s life, but I know one thing that can allow it to happen in your life. As the end was near, Jesus himself prayed a prayer that, at least in some way, allowed him to focus on the joy that was before him (cf. Hebrews 12:2). Luke says at the end Jesus cried out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (23:46). And he didn’t just say it so a few people could hear. Luke says it was yelled at the top of his lungs, which would not have been an easy thing for a man on a cross to do. It’s like he saved all his strength for this one, last bold cry. No matter what suffering he had gone through, it was all worth it because he would, in the end, be safe in the Father’s hands. And so will we. What if, in those times when we hurt, when we struggle to understand, when we just don’t know what is happening—what if we pray as Jesus did: “Into your hands, I commit my spirit”? Can we pray that bold a prayer and know, deep down inside somewhere, that he is with us, that is suffering with us? And one day, everything will be made new and we will understand it all. I believe that, but even if God never explains everything to us like we think she should, can we trust that God knows and that he is walking with us through it? “Into your hands, merciful suffering savior, I commit my spirit, my life, my heart, all that I am.” Into your hands, God on the gallows, I place everything that I am. May it be so, now and forever. Amen.