The Cross as an Open Door
Video of sermon: https://www.facebook.com/stlukesferndale.org/videos/261337575034854
Thumbnail image by ManelSallem, used under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en
Clare L. Hickman
Good Friday, 2020
(Portion of “Abre La Puerta” by Clarissa Pinkola Estes)
“Oh world who is young, and has loved so deeply,
and been so betrayed,
whose skin hangs like rags,
whose arms have no muscle,
whose eyes have lost luster —
Open the door of your heartache,
step through the door of your betrayal,
pass through the hole in your heart,
Pass through! It is a door.
¡Abre la puerta!
Open the door…
“Remember, fire is a door.
Destruction is a door.
Song is a door.
A scar is a door.
¡Abre la puerta! Open the door!
“The forest on fire is a door.
The ocean ruined is a door.
Anything that needs us,
or calls us to God
is a door.
¡Abre la puerta!
Open the door.
Anything that hurts us,
anything we make holy
opens the door.
¡Abre la puerta!
pass through the door! …
I wanted to read part of that poem today, because I’ve been meditating on the idea of Good Friday as an open door.
So often, I think, we see it as more of a blank wall against which we are thrown: a wall made up of violence, loss and suffering. And it does touch on all those things; it does echo all of those things when they come to us in our lifetimes. Loss, pain and grief transport us to Golgotha.
But, at its core, Good Friday is not a day about endings. Rather, it’s a day about beginning to acknowledge things we would rather ignore.
Good Friday forces us to face into the hardest things, the deepest cruelty, the worst of humanity’s worstness. At the foot of the cross, we see the world unvarnished, and know ourselves to be unvarnished before God.
Which makes it a very hard space to walk into. Which is why so many people avoid spaces like this (ahem) like the plague.
But we do it every year. And having walked this way before gives us an unusual strength and courage for such places. Because we have been here, and we have discovered that the cross isn’t a wall: it’s a door! It’s an open door, before which we stand. It’s an open door, and resurrection is on the other side of it.
We know that. We’ve seen it too many times to doubt it. Which is how we can bear (only just, but that’s better than nothing) to stand on this side. On the side that is drenched in fear and suffering and death. On the side that doesn’t really have a clear signpost how long it will take to get through that door. Not when you’re at the foot of the cross. Not when you’re outside the tomb, that he’s just been placed inside. Not when you’re hiding in your locked room, with no idea what’s going to happen next.
Good Friday walks us into this open space. It is what fancy folks might call a liminal space, a space between. Between suffering and relief; between betrayal and reconciliation; between the falling apart and the putting back together; between death and resurrection.
This is a gift the church has, in a time like this. In a time when swift action was very much necessary, but now most of us are left with a lot of very anxious waiting. And we can’t see through to the resolution. And those who like to fix things can’t actually fix them right away, because there’s nothing for it but to go through it, this thing that feels like a long agony.
The church is good at this. Despite the ways that sometimes folks come to religion for quick and easy answers, we’re actually better at this: at standing in the midst of undefined times, surrounded by brokenness, fear and confusion, and holding ground against despair. Because we have stood at the foot of the cross, we have watched through endless agony, we have felt the fear, and taken in the loss … and somehow made it through to the other side.
We’re good at this. Well, I mean, we’re as good at it as it’s possible to be good at such a thing. We are at least mostly willing to walk into that open space, and make a camp there, no matter how barren or scary it might feel. Because our sacred history promises us that our tent is God herself, and she goes with us in all our wildernesses. Our Creating, Sheltering, Challenging God is the touchpoint that allows us to be and exist in a place where the fix is not obvious, where we don’t know where the good news will come from, or how and when it will happen. We can be there, and not be overcome by despair. Because we trust in the good news that the cross is always, eventually, an open door into new life. And so is this strange, long and difficult time that we find ourselves in. Because (after all)
“The forest on fire is a door.
The ocean ruined is a door.
Anything that needs us,
or calls us to God
is a door.
¡Abre la puerta!
Open the door.