Glory
A couple of weeks ago, I got a phone call from my brother. Well, really, it was from my nephew, Nathan, whose voice interrupted my brother’s with an enthusiastic announcement. “Hey Uncle Jonny. Did you know that Liverpool plays tomorrow? If they win, they will be in first place. But if they lose and Arsenal wins, then they will be in second place. We hope they win! We want to be in first place, not Arsenal.” It is immensely gratifying—more gratifying than I would have expected—to have my nephew Nathan share this sports passion of mine for Liverpool.
A few months ago, Nathan knew nothing about soccer. Then, something sparked, and he has suddenly become a sponge for our family pastime. He’s always asking questions about the teams, the players, the rules of the game. My brother tells me that every morning he asks to see a schedule of the matches being played that day. He even knows the names of clubs in the lower divisions—the minor league teams, so to speak. “Shrewsbury”—he said to me once, out of nowhere, referring to an obscure team in the third division. “That’s a funny name!”
Where did this sudden fascination with soccer and Liverpool come from? My brother and I have always had Liverpool games on the TV. Why did Nathan so abruptly sit up and take notice of this family interest now? I can’t know for certain, but I think it has to do with his beginning to grasp the idea of competition, of winning and losing. Games like Chutes and Ladders and Connect Four have taught him that it is fun to win. It feels good to come in first. Now that he is oriented toward the basics of competition, he can appreciate what’s going on in a soccer game, in a league. He has begun to identify with a team, and he wants them to be champions, because he wants to be a champion.
All of this is to say, Nathan has not only been learning about soccer. He has been learning about the meaning of glory. He has been learning the traditional values of the world, whether we’re talking about sports or politics or the job world. Glory is the synonym that ties together all the things we desire: ability, achievement, recognition, winning, strength, success.
Glory.
Theology of Glory
When Martin Luther issued his criticisms of the church in the early 1500s—jumpstarting the Reformation, from which our own tradition would eventually emerge—he seized particularly on this word: glory. He said that the church had confused glory with God. Which is to say, the church confused success, size, prosperity, power, winning and so on, with God. It viewed the world in the simplistic terms of good-things-as-rewards and bad-things-as-punishment. If good things happened, it meant God was with you and rewarding you for your virtue. If bad things happened, it meant God was not with you and punishing you for your sins.
He called this way of thinking and looking at the world, a “theology of glory.” A theology of glory has to have victory at the finish line. So it tends to dismiss pain and difficulty and look instead to what purpose they might serve. When something bad happens, a theology of glory will rationalize it as a means to a glorious end. A bad thing becomes a lesson from which we learn or an experience that toughens us up. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” is part of a theology of glory.
In contrast to this theology of glory, Martin Luther held up what he called a “theology of the cross.” In a theology of the cross, God is not confused with success. Rather, God is the free gift of love, which sometimes meets with great suffering. Luther did not see the cross as a gruesome means to a glorious end, as a transaction by which Christ paid for our entry into heaven. Luther saw the cross as a show of love. A theology of glory says that God must have a card up his sleeve when he goes to the cross. Luther says, No. Love does not have a card up its sleeve. It’s not a trick or a transaction. It is a good thing, in and of itself, even when it meets with the worst thing in the world.
Redefining Glory:
The Glory of God
In our scripture today, Jesus has reached Jerusalem, and anticipation is building. News of Jesus’ teaching and healing has spread to the point that even Greeks—outsiders—have journeyed to Jerusalem. They implore Philip in today’s scripture, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus” (John 12:20). People want to see Jesus. They want to see with their own eyes what he’s all about.
What Jesus is all about—well, that’s something Jesus himself ruminates on in today’s scripture. He refers repeatedly to “the hour [that] has come for the Son of Man to be glorified” (John 12:23; cf. John 12:27-28). But he’s not anticipating a victory or a triumph, not in the traditional sense. He’s not anticipating the glory that the crowds are hoping to see.
“My soul is troubled,” he says (John 12:27). He is wrestling with himself: “What should I say—‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour” (John 12:27). Jesus affirms the cross. He says “Yes” to it. Not as a means to an end. Not as a transaction. But as the reason itself that he is here. The cross is the glory of God.
The Cross
It’s very easy, and very tempting, to look beyond the cross, to look for resurrection. Jesus himself talks about a grain of wheat, and how it must die in order to bear much fruit (John 12:24). Ah!—we might think. The card up his sleeve. This is what it’s all about. His death is really a detour to a greater destination. A stepping stone to a glorious end.
I don’t mean to challenge the promise of resurrection, not at all. But I do want to point out that Jesus anticipates “the hour…for the Son of Man to be glorified” not as the moment of resurrection, but as the moment of crucifixion. I want to point out that “the judgment of this world,” of which he speaks, when “the ruler of this world will be driven out,” is not identified with the moment of resurrection, but with the moment of crucifixion. Something happens on the cross that is valuable in itself, that is in fact more valuable than anything else. Resurrection may be an outgrowth of the cross, just as a seed gives root and grows, but the cross is the thing. The reason Jesus has come. The judgment of the world. The driving out of the devil. The glory of God. It’s all in the cross.
The Moment of Truth
Jesus’ repeated references to “the hour” toward which he has come and his mention of “the judgment of this world” lead me to think about the cross as “a moment of truth.” A moment of truth is a pivotal event, a “crucial” event, at which point something is revealed and also something must be decided. What is revealed on the cross is God’s love. What must be decided for all who have gathered to see what Christ is all about, is, “Do I trust in this love that has ended up on a cross?” What must be decided is, “Is this a moment of victory, or a defeat? Is this a moment of glory, or shame and disgrace?”
One of the earliest artistic representations of the crucifixion is a piece of Roman graffiti. (See here.) It depicts a man with a donkey’s head on a cross, and the inscription, “Alexamenos worships [his] God.” Needless to say, the graffiti artist has made his decision about the cross. It is a shameful, mockable defeat. A God who dies? A joke. People who worship him? Losers. There, in the heart of Rome, the center of power, the graffiti artist shakes his head and thinks, Pitiful. Could you get any further away from the idea of glory?
Again, the temptation is to jump to what we as readers long familiar with the story already know, which is the resurrection. It is tempting for us, in turn, to mock this graffiti artist, to say, “A-ha! But we know something you don’t.” It is tempting to make our judgment based on what happens next, to treat the cross as a means to an end, as a temporary stopover en route to a glorious eternal destination. But this is not the way that Jesus sees things. For Jesus, the cross is the reason he’s here, the hour of glory, the victory over the devil. The thing itself. It is confounding. It sounds like foolishness and weakness to the world, who checks the scores each morning to see who won, the papers to see who’s leading in the polls, and the stock market to see who’s ahead.
The Glory of the
Cross
And yet to us, the cross is good news. Our faith is not based on a miracle that decides matters for us. It is based on our own decision that this love, exemplified in Christ on the cross, is worth it. It is based on a very different understanding of glory—not success, but steadfast love.
I have a friend who is going through a difficult divorce in the wake of a grand deception that is only now coming to full light. I see in her situation the glory of the cross, a dogged faith that love is worth it even when it meets with pain and difficulty.
I have another friend in the hospital who is suffering from a disease that the doctors cannot explain. I see in his situation the glory of the cross, a determination to bear love to his family and others even though it does not bring an ounce of physical relief.
I think of all of us in times of loss and grief, and I see the glory of the cross. To put it plainly, I see the victory of love. In our gratitude for the gift of another’s life. In the care we show for one another.
We haven’t made it to Easter yet, so I’m hesitant to say much about resurrection. But I think in light of this difficult glory, it’s worth saying this. For Jesus, the resurrection was not a victory dance. He did not parade himself in front of his doubters, in front of the religious leaders, in front of the future graffiti artists who would mock him. If they couldn’t see his glory on the cross, they wouldn’t see it properly in his resurrection either. For Jesus, the glory of the resurrection is one and same with the glory of the crucifixion. It is cut of the exact same fabric—namely, love. The glory of love is the same on the cross as it is on Easter morning. It is the glory of a love no matter what. Its no-matter-whatness is what is stronger than death.
The followers of Jesus who trusted in this love, saw it in both places: the crucifixion and the resurrection.
Prayer
We have at various points
Tasted the glory of this world,
Success, achievement, wealth—
And it does not satisfy.
We are hungry and thirsty
For something else.
…
Give us eyes to see the cross
As the victory of your love,
And hearts to trust in the goodness of your way,
Even when it is hard and narrow.
Amen.
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