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Palm Sunday
March 16, 2008 Sermon by Bill Van Oss, Rector
                                                                                       Readings                                                                                    

Why all the blood? Why did Christ have to die so horribly? These are centuries-old questions, and they attempt to find an answer to the greatest mystery of all time: the suffering and death of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Why? Why all the blood?

Because this is the greatest mystery of all time, we can only ever understand it partially, gradually – but here’s one piece:

From the beginning of time up to the crucifixion of Jesus, all cultures sacrificed blood to their gods, because blood is life. Blood carries life. The loss of blood is death, so ancient cultures believed that we owe God blood. It was the only language God understood. Humans were killed on altars in sacrifice, in order to satisfy the gods.

By the time Jesus shows up, most cultures were using animals instead of humans for sacrifice. The temple had become a giant butchery with priests killing animals nearly non-stop.

This animal sacrifice was meant to appease, to satisfy, an angry God, a God who was to be feared above all else. But with Jesus, things are different – totally different.

“The curtain of the temple was torn in two” when Jesus died. The veil that hid the mystery of God, the Holy of Holies, from God’s people has been torn. God is no longer some far distant reality to be feared. God no longer requires blood to be appeased.

God is with us, among us, within us, in Jesus Christ. God has “entered the scene” – entered our lives – through the torn curtain. We receive the very blood of Christ in our communion. We receive the very life of God, that we might become the Body of Christ.

Why all the blood at Jesus’ death?

According to Richard Rohr: “For all these centuries we have been spilling blood to try to get to God and, in the crucifixion, things get reversed. God spills God’s own blood to try to get to us. It’s this reversal that rips open the old veil of fear, the false belief that God wants blood. God does not want us to spill blood to get to God. We are not meant to live in fear of God.” Christ’s blood is meant, at least partially, to teach us that.



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