Hung on a Tree

Lent V II Samuel 18:33
 In 1971, just prior to the Lenten service a call came to my office at church.  A wife and mother in her early 40’s had just died of a heart attack.  After the funeral her mother commented, “You just don’t expect that your children will die before you do.”
 Consider Oscar, a burly man in his 80’s who had been a boxer, a police officer, and a county sheriff.  By the time I got to know him he ws a shut in.  A photo of a young man in uniform sat on a side table.  One day Oscar talked about his son who had fought in North Africa during World War II.    Oscar’s son had apparently died in action.  However, they never found his body.  With tears in his eyes Oscar said, “You just never get over the loss of a son.  You just never get used to the idea.”
 This evening we visit David after his son Absalom died.  Our text informs us, “The king was shaken.  He went up to his room over the gateway and wept.  As he went, he said, ‘O Absalom, my son!  My son, my son Absalom!’”
  Though Absalom rebelled and sought to have him killed- David continued to show the depth of love that a parent has for a child.  It is hard to kill that love.  When David’s forces went out to battle Absalom and his troops, David knew his more experienced and better-trained army would win.  Still he made it clear to everyone, “Be gentle with the young man Absalom.”  However, Joab, David’s right hand man, found the fleeing Absalom caught by his hair in the branch of a tree.  Joab overrode David’s fatherly love.  He did the politically necessary thing.  He put three darts into Absalom’s chest.  When he heard the news of Absalom’s death, David cried, “If only I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son.”
 St. Paul wrote to the Roman Christians, “Rarely will anyone die for a righteous man; though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.”  David was willing die for a son he loved who was neither righteous nor good.  Yet, even if David had placed himself in the tangled boughs of that tree;  even if he taken Joab’s three darts in his heart; even if, he allowed himself to be hacked and thrust through by Joab’s armor bearers, it would have all been in vain.  Absalom would still be a rebel and David would still be dead. 
 Absalom died a rebel and was buried a rebel.  “They took Absalom and threw him in a pit in the forest and piled a large heap of rocks over him.”  Anyone who was killed and hanged on a tree was to be buried immediately, for God cursed anyone hanged on a tree.
 What does this ancient story have to do with us?  As we have found in the past weeks, these stories touch our lives too.  Just as David needed to take Absalom’s rebellion seriously, so God had to take our rebellion against his rule and authority seriously too.  Our rebellion is not simply the sins we do in disobeying God, but it is also our own rebellious nature against which we need to fight our entire life.  Likewise, God not only directs His wrath against our acts of rebellion, but also against our continuous tendency to join in rising up against him, his law and even his saving grace.
 Therefore, God out of his great fatherly love for his children had to find a way to satisfy his wrath against our rebellion so that we could live.  Otherwise, God would simply need to wipe us off the face of the earth.  Helmut Thielicke, one of the 20th century’s great theologians, puts it this way, “God the judge wrestled with God the Father and God the Father won out.”  What David, you, and I could not accomplish, God accomplished when he put himself in our stead.
 In a great reversal, God the Father showed how much he loved us by sending his own son into human flesh.  However, Jesus, Son of God, was unlike Absalom, son of David.  Jesus did not try usurping the place of his heavenly Father.  He did not regard his equality with God as a thing to grasp for himself.    He did not seek his own will.  Rather he made himself nothing, gave up all the benefits and power which were his and being an obedient Son obeyed his heavenly Father to the point of even dying on the tree on the cross.
 In the story of Absalom and David we read only of the grieving words of the father.  We hear nothing of the words of Absalom. In the story of Jesus and his heavenly Father we hear nothing of the Father while his son hangs dying on the tree.  However, we do hear the word of the son. 
We heard them this evening.  He speaks seven words.  “Father forgive them…” From the Father we hear, Silence.  “Today you shall be with me in Paradise.”  Silence.  “Woman, behold your son.  Silence.  Behold your mother.” Silence.  “My God, my God, why have your forsaken me.”  Silence.  “I thirst.” Silence.  “It is finished.”  Silence.  “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”  From his heavenly Father, Silence.
 Perhaps Jesus’ words, as he hung on the tree of the cross, express what Absalom thought and felt as he hung caught by his hair in the tree.  In a sense, they died alike.  Absalom was the rebellious son.  Jesus was the obedient son who took upon himself all the rebellions of humankind against God , including Absalom’s and including yours and mine.  Thus, both died as rebels.  Absalom was given an ignominious burial in a pit, never intended as his grave.  Jesus was buried in a borrowed tomb intended for someone else.  He too went down into the pit, the pit of hell.  However, there he announced his victory over all the rebellious ways of humanity.
 Therein is the essential difference between Absalom, son of David and Jesus, Son David and of the heavenly Father.  Jesus did what David could not accomplish.  He died in behalf of all the son and daughters of God who had rebelled against Him.  We might even dare to say that God the Father loved you and me more than he loved his own Son at that moment on the tree.  Jesus took on the curse of those hung on a tree and the curse of the grave and satisfied the wrath of God the judge.  Thus, we can have confidence that God does not hang onto his anger forever, but delights in steadfast love.  It is as the prophet Micah wrote, “Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives transgression…You do not stay angry forever, but delight to show mercy.”   The centurion said of Jesus on the cross, “Truly, this was the Son of God.”  He was truly the obedient Son  of God, even unto death. His obedience wipes out our rebellion.