Sermon Illustrations for Good Friday (2018)
Illustration
Isaiah 52:13-55:12
This passage from the prophet Isaiah is interpreted by many as referring to the Suffering Servant, who Christians view as Jesus. The attribute of suffering was associated with the Messiah not only by Jesus and later by Christians, but as we are learning by other Jewish groups in the time of Jesus. At one point Isaiah wonders who could possibly believe this, his description of the Suffering Servant, and yet the success of the Suffering Servant is also seen as inevitable as the weather! The work of the Suffering Servant is seen as sustaining as hearty bread, and just as necessary to life. Isaiah notes: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth…(Isaiah 55:10-11).
Hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanoes, and wildfire, make it clear that devastating weather, like the rain and snow described by Isaiah, are inevitable, unstoppable, and powerful! Like the witness of the Suffering Servant.
Frank R.
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
William Faulkner was a Mississippi writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature for his novels. However, he is also noted for his short stories and his consideration of faith in God. One of those short stories that touches on that is a folk tale he’d heard told by African American friends. It went like this:
Bill T.
Isaiah 52:13--55:12
On Tuesday, May 20, 2003, Patton Oswald and Michelle McNamara feel in love at first sight. They met while Patton was doing a comedy show at Largo, in Los Angeles. Oswald is an actor and a comedian. McNamara is a crime writer and the founder of the website True Crime Diary. They have a 7-year-old daughter, Alice. On April 21, 2016, Michelle suddenly died in her sleep. Her death was caused by prescription drugs and an undiagnosed heart condition. After her death, Alice told her father, “When your mom dies, you’re the best memory of her. Everything you do is a memory of her.” Patton said that that remark “made being a parent fun.”
Application: Isaiah pointed us towards Good Friday by giving us the terminology to best understand and explain who Jesus is. As we continue centuries after the death and resurrection of Jesus, we can keep his memory alive by using the same language that Isaiah chose.
Ron L.
Hebrews 10:16-25 (or 4:14-16; 5:7-9)
There was a pastor who served my last congregation in Wyoming, who had plenty of money, but his doctor told him he had the beginning of Alzheimers. Not only did he not want to be a burden on his wife and family, but he didn’t want to waste all his money on keeping himself alive -- for no good reason, so he took some drugs that would end his life and leave all his money to his wife and children. That might have been considered thoughtful and loving, but not quite moral (committing suicide).
Jesus did not commit suicide, but he could have saved his own life through the great power he had within him. He even asked his Father in heaven to let this suffering pass from him, but then he added, “But let thy will be done.” Because of his sacrifice we inherited much more than a few dollars from his will! We inherited eternal life!
The love of God amazes me. He loved us so much that he came to earth and suffered and died for us!
Some fathers let their sons join the army with the possibility that they might die for their country. I’m not sure that is love. It is not the father’s will that they die. I’m sure he hopes they will make it home alive. He might not want them to go especially if he knew they might not come home again!
Another thing that causes us to think is that this passage says Jesus was tempted in every way that we may be tempted.
Jesus must have been tempted to marry Mary Magdalene -- to settle down for a career as a carpenter. Don’t those of us who are married sometimes look at other women lustfully? I learned long after he died, that while grandpa loved grandma, he had a girl on the side! What a shock to me! He was held in such high esteem by my folks.
Even though he sinned badly, it still looks like Jesus died for him and forgave him his sins.
Our text is one of the most comforting words in the Bible. Our church is here to remind us of God’s great love.
One of the jobs of our church is to spur one another to love and good deeds. That means both pastor and people!
Bob O.
Hebrews 10:16-25
The author of Hebrews reminds us that the old ways of sacrificing are no longer necessary. Jesus has made the supreme sacrifice, loving so very much that he gave his life for his beliefs and for us. Whether or not you believe Jesus was born simply to die or that our human rejection of the kingdom of God necessitated the sacrifice, we no longer need burnt offerings in order to be forgiven. God’s law is now written on our hearts. God’s love and grace, God’s forgiveness is poured out on us. We are redeemed. The gift of Jesus’s life and his death demonstrated God’s extraordinary love for us, for each and every one of us. We are redeemed!
Bonnie B.
Hebrews 10:16-25
In 2010, Paul Froes and Christopher Bader conducted a poll that found that nearly 1 in 4 of us Americans believe in a distant God (America’s Four Gods). A Pew Foundation poll four years earlier found the percentage to be 40% and another Harris poll in 2005 found 44% of us view God that way. It’s unlikely that there has been that much of a change in this way of thinking in the last 8 to 16 years. The distance Americans perceive between God and us may be a reason for the marked decline in church membership in our nation. But on Good Friday that distance erodes. God and his love become so clear that we are made to feel that God really is true, truly loving and full of care for us. Our lesson says that Jesus gives us the confidence to enter the [Temple] sanctuary, to approach God (v.20)! John Wesley nicely explained what this means:
Mark E.
Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9
A 2015 Barna Research poll indicates that nearly 1 in 5 of American Christians believe good works or our goodness get us to heaven, not Christ’s atoning work. It seems that we need to do a better job making clear the importance of Christ’s work. One problem is that we have an inflated view of our goodness. Famed modern theologian Karl Barth helps put that myth to rest:
John Calvin beautifully explained what Jesus did on Good Friday:
Mark E.
John 18:1--19:42
I share this story that I originally shared in an Easter Bible study published by CSS Publishing called Surrounded by Grace. For grace to be grace there has to be a sacrifice. Something must be given which is unmerited.
The mother of a nine-year-old boy named Mark received a phone call in the middle of the afternoon. It was the teacher from her son’s school.
"Mrs. Smith, something unusual happened today in your son’s third grade class. Your son did something that surprised me so much that I thought you should know about it immediately."
Mark’s mom began to worry.
The teacher continued, "Nothing like this has happened in all my years of teaching. This morning I was teaching a lesson on creative writing. And as I always do, I tell the story of the ant and the grasshopper: The ant works hard all summer and stores up plenty of food. But the grasshopper plays all summer and doesn’t work. Then winter comes. The grasshopper begins to starve because he has no food. He begins to beg, ’Please Mr. Ant, you have much food. Please let me eat, too.’ Then I said, "Boys and girls, your job is to write the ending to the story. Your son, Mark, raised his hand. ’Teacher, may I draw a picture? ’Yes Mark, if you like, you may draw a picture. But first you must write the ending to the story.’ As in all the years past, most of the students said the ant shared his food through the winter, and both the ant and the grasshopper lived. A few children wrote, ’No, Mr. Grasshopper. You should have worked in the summer. I have just enough food for myself.’ So, the ant lived, and the grasshopper died. But your son ended the story in a way different from any other child, ever. He wrote, ‘So the ant gave all of his food to the grasshopper; the grasshopper lived through the winter. But the ant died.’ And the picture he drew? At the bottom of the page, Mark had drawn three crosses."
To understand grace is to understand that for something to be given for nothing, a price had to be paid. Mark understood that. In order for the grasshopper to live the ant had to make a sacrifice. For fallen man to live, Jesus, the Son, had to make a sacrifice.
Bill T.
John 18:1--19:42
During his trial Jesus tells Pilate he has come to testify to the truth. Pilate replies, “What is truth?” almost as if truth was something malleable and difficult to pin down to the point of being meaningless.
Pilate probably spoke Latin and Jesus probably spoke Aramaic, so the language they would have conversed in was Greek. At this point in time Greek was everyone’s second language. The Greek they spoke was not poetic. It was not classical Greek. It was a very practical Greek designed for the kinds of conversations that happened in the marketplace.
Or at trials.
The word truth (aletheia) was used in contracts to mean dependable, reliable, and accepted. It was not some vague concept open to debate. Truth was hard fast and rock solid. We see this in the ancient business documents from that time. In one business contract between two individuals it states “Every valid written contract is credited and accepted.” That word “accepted” is aletheia, that word that is also translated as truth. The phrase meant that the individual who made the contract is “true,” in the sense that his word is reliable, dependable, and accepted by all.
Like Jesus.
Frank R.
John 18:1--19:42
When Marie Osmond was 56, she said she never felt better. With her usually happy countenance she said, “They say the music industry is a place for 20-year-olds, but I’ve been in the business for five decades, and I can tell you that that’s not true.” Osmond went on to say in 2016, that since her last album she went through a divorce, and then fell in love again with her first husband Steve Craig. Marie said this happened “again after not seeing each other for 25 years.” Marie then went on to say, “After all the life I’ve been through, I knew I had another album in me.”
Application: The message of Good Friday, when it stands in the shadow of Easter Sunday, is that we always have a new song within us.
This passage from the prophet Isaiah is interpreted by many as referring to the Suffering Servant, who Christians view as Jesus. The attribute of suffering was associated with the Messiah not only by Jesus and later by Christians, but as we are learning by other Jewish groups in the time of Jesus. At one point Isaiah wonders who could possibly believe this, his description of the Suffering Servant, and yet the success of the Suffering Servant is also seen as inevitable as the weather! The work of the Suffering Servant is seen as sustaining as hearty bread, and just as necessary to life. Isaiah notes: “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth…(Isaiah 55:10-11).
Hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanoes, and wildfire, make it clear that devastating weather, like the rain and snow described by Isaiah, are inevitable, unstoppable, and powerful! Like the witness of the Suffering Servant.
Frank R.
Isaiah 52:13--53:12
William Faulkner was a Mississippi writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature for his novels. However, he is also noted for his short stories and his consideration of faith in God. One of those short stories that touches on that is a folk tale he’d heard told by African American friends. It went like this:
A mother sheep had warned her little ones, “Do not go near the river, for a bad tiger lives there, and he will kill you and eat you.”This is a cute story with a profound point. Isaiah 53:6 makes it clear. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
One lamb kept toying with the thought that the grass was greener down near the river. The lamb thought its mother must be mistaken about the tiger. Finally, curiosity got the best of that lamb, and she scampered down for a drink from the river.
Suddenly the lamb heard a loud, gruff voice: “What are you doing, drinking from my river and muddying my water?” The disobedient lamb began to excuse herself, but the tiger came closer, saying “I’m going to kill and eat you.” As the tiger sprang toward the helpless lamb, the mother sheep ran between them. She took into her own body the death dealing blows of claws and fangs. Meanwhile, the disobedient lamb scampered up the river bank to safety.”
Bill T.
Isaiah 52:13--55:12
On Tuesday, May 20, 2003, Patton Oswald and Michelle McNamara feel in love at first sight. They met while Patton was doing a comedy show at Largo, in Los Angeles. Oswald is an actor and a comedian. McNamara is a crime writer and the founder of the website True Crime Diary. They have a 7-year-old daughter, Alice. On April 21, 2016, Michelle suddenly died in her sleep. Her death was caused by prescription drugs and an undiagnosed heart condition. After her death, Alice told her father, “When your mom dies, you’re the best memory of her. Everything you do is a memory of her.” Patton said that that remark “made being a parent fun.”
Application: Isaiah pointed us towards Good Friday by giving us the terminology to best understand and explain who Jesus is. As we continue centuries after the death and resurrection of Jesus, we can keep his memory alive by using the same language that Isaiah chose.
Ron L.
Hebrews 10:16-25 (or 4:14-16; 5:7-9)
There was a pastor who served my last congregation in Wyoming, who had plenty of money, but his doctor told him he had the beginning of Alzheimers. Not only did he not want to be a burden on his wife and family, but he didn’t want to waste all his money on keeping himself alive -- for no good reason, so he took some drugs that would end his life and leave all his money to his wife and children. That might have been considered thoughtful and loving, but not quite moral (committing suicide).
Jesus did not commit suicide, but he could have saved his own life through the great power he had within him. He even asked his Father in heaven to let this suffering pass from him, but then he added, “But let thy will be done.” Because of his sacrifice we inherited much more than a few dollars from his will! We inherited eternal life!
The love of God amazes me. He loved us so much that he came to earth and suffered and died for us!
Some fathers let their sons join the army with the possibility that they might die for their country. I’m not sure that is love. It is not the father’s will that they die. I’m sure he hopes they will make it home alive. He might not want them to go especially if he knew they might not come home again!
Another thing that causes us to think is that this passage says Jesus was tempted in every way that we may be tempted.
Jesus must have been tempted to marry Mary Magdalene -- to settle down for a career as a carpenter. Don’t those of us who are married sometimes look at other women lustfully? I learned long after he died, that while grandpa loved grandma, he had a girl on the side! What a shock to me! He was held in such high esteem by my folks.
Even though he sinned badly, it still looks like Jesus died for him and forgave him his sins.
Our text is one of the most comforting words in the Bible. Our church is here to remind us of God’s great love.
One of the jobs of our church is to spur one another to love and good deeds. That means both pastor and people!
Bob O.
Hebrews 10:16-25
The author of Hebrews reminds us that the old ways of sacrificing are no longer necessary. Jesus has made the supreme sacrifice, loving so very much that he gave his life for his beliefs and for us. Whether or not you believe Jesus was born simply to die or that our human rejection of the kingdom of God necessitated the sacrifice, we no longer need burnt offerings in order to be forgiven. God’s law is now written on our hearts. God’s love and grace, God’s forgiveness is poured out on us. We are redeemed. The gift of Jesus’s life and his death demonstrated God’s extraordinary love for us, for each and every one of us. We are redeemed!
Bonnie B.
Hebrews 10:16-25
In 2010, Paul Froes and Christopher Bader conducted a poll that found that nearly 1 in 4 of us Americans believe in a distant God (America’s Four Gods). A Pew Foundation poll four years earlier found the percentage to be 40% and another Harris poll in 2005 found 44% of us view God that way. It’s unlikely that there has been that much of a change in this way of thinking in the last 8 to 16 years. The distance Americans perceive between God and us may be a reason for the marked decline in church membership in our nation. But on Good Friday that distance erodes. God and his love become so clear that we are made to feel that God really is true, truly loving and full of care for us. Our lesson says that Jesus gives us the confidence to enter the [Temple] sanctuary, to approach God (v.20)! John Wesley nicely explained what this means:
As by rending the veil in the Temple, the holy of holies became visible and accessible’ so by wounding the body of Christ, the God of heaven was manifested and the way to heaven opened. (Commentary On the Bible, p.568)Having this sense of nearness to God is not all that Jesus does, Martin Luther says. Jesus actually brings us to God:
For while others can teach and exhort to cross over, this Christ alone is not only the Companion but also the One Who leads the way, not only the Leader but also the Helper... For he who relies on Christ through faith is carried on the shoulders of Christ... (Luther’s Works, Vol.29, p.226)With a love like that we can say with St. Augustine: “God loves each of us as if there were only one of us.”
Mark E.
Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9
A 2015 Barna Research poll indicates that nearly 1 in 5 of American Christians believe good works or our goodness get us to heaven, not Christ’s atoning work. It seems that we need to do a better job making clear the importance of Christ’s work. One problem is that we have an inflated view of our goodness. Famed modern theologian Karl Barth helps put that myth to rest:
Man stands before God a sinner, as a being who has sundered himself from God, who has rebelled against being what he may be. He rebels against grace; it is too little for him, he turns from gratitude. (Dogmatics in Outline, p.117)Barth also tells us what Christ has done for us: “In Him the enmity of man against the grace of God is overcome, therefore man in no more outside... He is inside where God is knowable...” (Church Dogmatics, Vol.II/1, p.153)
John Calvin beautifully explained what Jesus did on Good Friday:
...since Christ of His own accord extends His hand to us, that we have no reason to dread the majesty of Christ since He is our brother and that there is no cause to fear.. (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol.XXII/1, p.107)Our lesson refers to Jesus as High Priest (v.15). Martin Luther gives insight to what that means for us:
Therefore the Apostle also introduces Christ here more as a Priest than as a Lord and Judge, in order that He may console those who are frightened. (Luther’s Works, Vol.29, p.167)The result of this consolation is nicely described by the Reformer:
Therefore a Christian as a child of God must always rejoice, always sing, fear nothing, always be free from care, and always glory in the Lord. (Ibid., p.177)The Friday before Easter is indeed a Good one.
Mark E.
John 18:1--19:42
I share this story that I originally shared in an Easter Bible study published by CSS Publishing called Surrounded by Grace. For grace to be grace there has to be a sacrifice. Something must be given which is unmerited.
The mother of a nine-year-old boy named Mark received a phone call in the middle of the afternoon. It was the teacher from her son’s school.
"Mrs. Smith, something unusual happened today in your son’s third grade class. Your son did something that surprised me so much that I thought you should know about it immediately."
Mark’s mom began to worry.
The teacher continued, "Nothing like this has happened in all my years of teaching. This morning I was teaching a lesson on creative writing. And as I always do, I tell the story of the ant and the grasshopper: The ant works hard all summer and stores up plenty of food. But the grasshopper plays all summer and doesn’t work. Then winter comes. The grasshopper begins to starve because he has no food. He begins to beg, ’Please Mr. Ant, you have much food. Please let me eat, too.’ Then I said, "Boys and girls, your job is to write the ending to the story. Your son, Mark, raised his hand. ’Teacher, may I draw a picture? ’Yes Mark, if you like, you may draw a picture. But first you must write the ending to the story.’ As in all the years past, most of the students said the ant shared his food through the winter, and both the ant and the grasshopper lived. A few children wrote, ’No, Mr. Grasshopper. You should have worked in the summer. I have just enough food for myself.’ So, the ant lived, and the grasshopper died. But your son ended the story in a way different from any other child, ever. He wrote, ‘So the ant gave all of his food to the grasshopper; the grasshopper lived through the winter. But the ant died.’ And the picture he drew? At the bottom of the page, Mark had drawn three crosses."
To understand grace is to understand that for something to be given for nothing, a price had to be paid. Mark understood that. In order for the grasshopper to live the ant had to make a sacrifice. For fallen man to live, Jesus, the Son, had to make a sacrifice.
Bill T.
John 18:1--19:42
During his trial Jesus tells Pilate he has come to testify to the truth. Pilate replies, “What is truth?” almost as if truth was something malleable and difficult to pin down to the point of being meaningless.
Pilate probably spoke Latin and Jesus probably spoke Aramaic, so the language they would have conversed in was Greek. At this point in time Greek was everyone’s second language. The Greek they spoke was not poetic. It was not classical Greek. It was a very practical Greek designed for the kinds of conversations that happened in the marketplace.
Or at trials.
The word truth (aletheia) was used in contracts to mean dependable, reliable, and accepted. It was not some vague concept open to debate. Truth was hard fast and rock solid. We see this in the ancient business documents from that time. In one business contract between two individuals it states “Every valid written contract is credited and accepted.” That word “accepted” is aletheia, that word that is also translated as truth. The phrase meant that the individual who made the contract is “true,” in the sense that his word is reliable, dependable, and accepted by all.
Like Jesus.
Frank R.
John 18:1--19:42
When Marie Osmond was 56, she said she never felt better. With her usually happy countenance she said, “They say the music industry is a place for 20-year-olds, but I’ve been in the business for five decades, and I can tell you that that’s not true.” Osmond went on to say in 2016, that since her last album she went through a divorce, and then fell in love again with her first husband Steve Craig. Marie said this happened “again after not seeing each other for 25 years.” Marie then went on to say, “After all the life I’ve been through, I knew I had another album in me.”
Application: The message of Good Friday, when it stands in the shadow of Easter Sunday, is that we always have a new song within us.
