Fr. Michael Williams

After I have given this short sermon, we will say together in the Creed: ‘For our sake He [Jesus] was crucified under Pontius Pilate’. It is always important that we remind ourselves that it was ‘for our sake’, that Jesus ‘accepted death, death on a cross’. It wasn’t for His salvation, but for ours. Jesus endured the desolation and degradation of the Cross, that we might be saved from eternal death. It was ‘for our sake’ that He endured the terrible event s that we have just heard in St Matthew’s gospel. Ultimately, Our Lord’s Passion manifests to each one of us Jesus’ great love for us.

In another gospel, St John’s, Jesus tells us that He is the Good Shepherd who lays down His life for the sheep. What we have just heard is Jesus laying down His life for us, His sheep, men and women who have wandered far from the restful pasture of the God’s household. Our Lord’s Passion reveals to us the lengths that the Good Shepherd will undergo, to enable us to return one day to the Father’s fresh and green pastures of Paradise. Without Our Lord’s Passion there is no return to Paradise!

And St Matthew’s gospel also gives us a glimpse into the new life that Jesus won for us following His death on the Cross, the return to Paradise. At the end of today’s gospel we hear how, ‘The earth quaked…the tombs opened’. This gives us a glimpse into the glory of the Resurrection, that takes place on Easter Sunday, when ‘God raised Jesus high’ and makes explicit that Jesus has authority over all things, even death itself.

Before we acknowledge that, ’*For our sake* He was crucified under Pontius Pilate’, let’s spend a few moments is quiet gratitude for what He has done for us, which we so often take for granted and may do not appreciate at all for whatever reason.