Holy Week Remembrance

In 1998, early during Holy Week, F-5 tornadoes blew through Alabama, then Georgia and the Carolinas. They began in the Great Plains on 6 April, and by 9 April, a total of 62 tornadoes touched down. 32 people were killed in the Birmingham area by one of only two F-5 tornadoes to touch down that entire year. Seven people died in Georgia in that same outbreak of destruction. 

Frank Harrington was the pastor of Peachtree Presbyterian Church in Atlanta at that time, and I remember listening to his Easter Sunday sermon later on Easter Sunday evening. These aren’t exactly his words, but they reflect what he said. It was something like, “Evil does its best to ruin the joy of Easter Sunday, but it always fails; resurrection always wins over evil.” Those words have floated around in my head for 25 years now.

I couldn’t help but think about those words the week before last, when more than two dozen people in Mississippi lost their lives because of tornadoes. It isn’t yet Holy Week, but it’s close, and again, more tornadoes and destruction have blown through the Midwest into the South. I don’t recall reading about tornadoes in Genesis 2 – what I think is the most beautiful description of what God intended the world to be when He made it. And I’m thinking of Romans 8:18-25, where even creation itself longs for the day when the work of Christ fully restores creation to its God-intended purpose. The world God intended didn’t have tornadoes destroying lives like we witnessed last week.

But if that isn’t convincing, let’s move from the Midwest to Nashville, and from tornadoes to guns. Six people – three of them children – lost their lives at the hands of a person who owned a slew of guns, all bought legally. The shooter brought three of them to a Christian school, and now we are reeling with the reality that three little children won’t be a part of this year’s Easter Egg Hunt. Three godly adults are no longer there to lead them, and one very troubled person is also no longer alive. 

“Evil does its best to ruin the joy of Easter Sunday, but it always fails; resurrection always wins over evil.”

I agree with Dr. Harrington: in the big picture, evil does fail. But in all honesty – I’m not related to any of those victims in Nashville and don’t know a person directly connected to them – for crying out loud, this does put a damper on what Easter is all about. Of course I believe that when God finally “puts the world to rights,” as N.T. Wright often describes it, these hurts are going to be fixed. But until then, my heart hurts deeply.

My own children are not of school age. I don’t have any biological grandchildren. But I do have a host of surrogate grandchildren who call me “Sam” or “Mr. Wye.” I have a bunch of kids who call me “Uncle Wye.” I lay in bed at night thinking what I would do if one of their parents called me and said, “Sam, ‘Suzie’ was one of the victims in Nashville.” 

It dawned on me that it is so ironic that during this very week – Holy Week – one of Jesus’ disciples, Peter, decided that violence was the answer. In response to what could have been a huge crowd of Roman soldiers and temple police, Peter grabbed a sword and swung it at a man named Malchus (we learn from John) as Jesus was being arrested. Rather than patting Peter on the back for being “armed,” Jesus rebukes him and says, “put the sword away.”

I honestly have no idea what the answer to this cultural crisis is. I know that outlawing guns won’t solve the problem, but I also know that allowing everyone to have whatever kind of weapon they want is not a smart move. I think I do know that Jesus wouldn’t walk around urging people to arm themselves with assault rifles and the like. After all, He could have called down an army from heaven to blow away the Romans about to crucify Him. But He didn’t. Remember, this is the One who called us to “turn the other cheek.” 

During Holy Week, we are once again confronted with just how broken our world is. Tornadoes and guns have reminded us of that in ways that can’t be easily dismissed. We who love Jesus surely cannot just say “that’s life.”

I’m not smart enough to know the answer, but this is one thing I do know: if guns are more important to me than the gospel and the story of life that flows out of the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, I’m worshipping the wrong thing. 

As New Testament scholar Esau McCaulley suggested last week, I don’t think we want the value of our culture measured by the number of small coffins that need to be manufactured for children killed by people with guns.

The Jesus story is a story of life, and we must find a way to make that clear. We can do that when we learn to value the Sermon on the Mount more than the Second Amendment.

_{Please note the artwork accompanying this post, which depicts Peter cutting off the ear of Malchus at far left.
Duccio di Buoninsegna. Christ Taken Prisoner (Scene 7). 1308-11, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Siena.}