In the Name of God:  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Amen.

The story of the Passion is a terribly powerful story in itself . . . and when we hear one of the evangelists tell it we bring to our listening all the other tellings we’ve heard of the story . . . as well as all of our personal imaginings.  This makes for a very rich experience.  But, you know, if we had only John’s Gospel, our experience of the event would be very different.  In John’s Gospel Jesus does not agonize in the garden, he does not stumble and fall under the weight of the cross, he does not give a loud cry at the last. 

In John’s Gospel, Jesus knows everything before it happens, and he remains firmly in control even when giving himself away.  He is stalwart to the end.  At least one scholar has suggested that John’s story of Jesus’ death should not be called a “passion narrative,” because the word ‘passion’ implies suffering and in the fourth Gospel it is not Jesus who suffers.  It is everyone around him who suffers.

And so it is strange to hear Jesus say, “I am thirsty,” like any regular, old dehydrated human.  Of course, John provides us with an explanation for this ahead of time.  In parentheses he tells us that Jesus said what he said “to fulfill the Scripture.”  Psalm 69 to be specific, which says, “They gave me poison for food, and for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink” (69:21).  In John’s Gospel, just about nothing is simply what it seems.  Water is never just plain water.  It is living water, with currents that go back to creation.  Bread is never just plain bread.  It is manna from heaven, the bread of angels.  Wine is never just plain wine.  It is the wine of God’s presence, especially when there are rivers of it.  It is the sign that God’s new age has come to pass.

John loves signs.  So when Jesus says, “I am thirsty,” John is quick to let us know that we are not talking about ordinary dryness here.  Jesus is busy fulfilling Scripture.  Jesus is telling John’s congregation – and this one, and anyone else who wants to know – that what is happening to him has been in the works for a long time.  He is not some second thought God had when plan A did not work out.  He has been around since the beginning.  He was there when the Spirit first moved over the face of the waters.  He was there before Abraham, before Moses, before Gabriel ever went to pay a visit to Mary.

What is happening to Jesus now is the last act in a very long drama.  And Jesus is thirsty for much more than water.  Having accepted crucifixion for being fully who he is, he is being drained of the waters of life.  The preacher Barbara Brown Taylor, whose work is the basis for this sermon, describes it this way:[1]  Jesus has given himself away for love, and this is how it looks:  he is not only dehydrated but also drained of divinity, like a reservoir whose dam has been destroyed to save the land from drought.  He has chosen it willingly, but at what a cost; that he who turned water into wine, who stilled the storm and walked on water, should find himself in such a dry place.  Of course, he is misunderstood.  People who take Jesus literally almost always miss the point.  So, of course, they give him sour wine to drink.

And he drinks it to fulfill Scripture.  But this is not what he is thirsty for. He is thirsty for heaven.  He is thirsty for reunion with God, and there is only one way he knows how to get there.  “Am I not to drink the cup that the Father has given me?”  “I am thirsty” is what he says . . . but what he means is, “I am ready.”

And as Jesus is now fully ready, this final act in this very long drama may finally end.  “It is finished.”  Those are Jesus very last words, according to John’s Gospel.  But what exactly is finished?  Well, it turns out that just about everything is finished.  Of course, the dying itself is finished.  Crucifixion was an especially unpleasant way to die . . . it was meant to be painful and terrifying.  Death itself is not painful.  It’s the dying that hurts.  Crucifixion hurts dreadfully.  And now that is finished.

Another thing that’s finished is the work Jesus began when he saw how hard it would be to reach us . . . how hard it would be to break open our hearts to receive his love, God’s love.  Self-annihilating love was the weapon he chose to break open our hearts.  “No one has greater love than this,” he said on the last night of his life, “to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”  Having explained it to his friends, he then left the room to go do it.  Less than 24 hours later, it was finished.

Whether he meant to or not, there was something else that Jesus finished off:  the religious system of the day . . . the temple, with its careful division between clean and unclean, the clergy pretending to know which was which, and the whole idea that a lamb or a pigeon was an appropriate substitute for a surrendered human heart.

The religious leaders of the day all thought that they were doing God’s will by putting Jesus to death.  When it was all over, however, some realized for the first time who the scapegoat really was, and the system that put him to death was doomed.  Its tactics were exposed.  Its motives were revealed:  not to defend God but to defend the system.  Jesus was the last lamb of God that would die for the people.  One of the reasons Jesus was killed was to prevent a Jewish revolt.  But 30 or so years later the Jews revolted anyway and the Romans destroyed Jerusalem.  Temple Judaism ended forever.

There was one more thing that ended that day:  the separation between Jesus and God.  The distance was mostly physical, according to John, and it was only temporary . . . but when Jesus gave up his spirit, his thirst was quenched.  He dove back into that stream of living water and swam all the way home.

Those whom he left behind saw nothing but his corpse.  He was not a teacher anymore.  He was a teaching – a window into the depths of God that some could see through and some could not.  Those who held out hope for a strong God, a fierce God, a God who would not tolerate injustice – they looked upon a scene where God was not . . . while those whose feet Jesus had washed, whose faces he had touched, whose open mouths he had fed as if they were little birds – they looked upon a scene in which God had died for love of them.

He had put his own body between them and those who meant to do them harm.  He had broken open their hearts.  He had shown them a dangerous new way to live.

It was dark by the time they got him down and found a place to lay him.  It was the Sabbath, his turn to rest.  His work was done.  His part was over.  The curtain fell on this drama that began so very, very long ago.

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