Reaching Destination.

Read the story. That’s the best preaching advice anyone can give for this day. Read the story. Certainly, there is an urge to explain, examine this event, and provide an interpretation. But resist. As much as you can, preacher, resist. Read the story. Let the story speak for itself. Don’t assume everyone knows it. Because while they might have the outline in mind, it is the detail, the nuance that the gospel writers capture that will let the story seep into the consciousness of the hearers.

That’s the risky part of this. When you let the story speak for itself, you are no longer in control of the message. Who knows what someone might hear? They might find it appalling. They might get angry at God. They might look for someone to blame. Or they might listen again and find themselves in the story. That will be the most harrowing part of the event. When you realize you were there shouting, “Crucify him,” it is sobering. You might see yourself watching him pass by, staggering under the weight of that cross, and understand that you contributed to the weight he bears. And those words he utters through dry and cracked lips, words about forgiveness, just might be directed toward you. Who knows what people might hear when you let the story speak for itself? Read the story.

Better yet, tell it. Or at least read it as though it mattered, as though it were not scripture but a report from a witness. Tell it as if it were a story you were told by a breathless reporter live from the scene of the event. Tell it as though it is your story, because it is, and you were on the journey with him, all the way to this unimaginable ending. Tell it from your own despair and pain and the thin thread of hope that you desperately want to cling to even here at the foot of the cross.

As far as we know—as far as those first disciples knew—this is the end of everything. No power within us can undo this story. We’ve gone as far as we can. We have reached our destination, and it is this death. There is nowhere we can go from here. Tell the story.

The final verse of the passion story from the Gospel of John reads: 

Tell the story. but leave room for hope. Tell of the destination to which we arrived, but hear the word that says even this was preparation. There is something more. But that is another story.

Rev. Dr. Derek Weber, Director of Preaching Ministries, served churches in Indiana, Arkansas, and the British Methodist Church. His PhD in preaching and media is from the University of Edinburgh. He has taught preaching in seminary and conference settings for more than twenty years.