(WARNING: This post includes scenes of death and killing. Discretion is advised.)
Good morning, saints.*
This morning, I’d like to read three verses: John 19:30, 33 and 38. The NRSVUE reads:
30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. 33 But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. . . . 38 Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away.
“What do you do with a dead body?”
That was the question the teacher asked the students in the class. The class entitled, “The Ethics of Life and Death.” “What do you do with a dead body?” A student raised their hand and answered, “Every body must be handled with dignity. That body belonged to a human being who deserves to be treated with respect because one day, at the Resurrection, the body and spirit will be rejoined.” That was the student’s compassion-filled answer. A hopeful statement. A wonderfully hopeful statement. Innocent, you might even say. Wonderfully Christian. If only it was true. If only every person’s body was handled with dignity and respect.
What do you do with a dead body?
A lifeless body.
Baking in the rays of the sun. In the heat of the day. His body was there, dying, then dead. His lifeless body remained. The life having seeped out of him. The blood oozing from his precious body.
His lifeless body remained there.
People looked. Cried. The horrible scene of death. Public death. What you might call, “death for sport.” The scene of an unarmed man dying at the hands of the government. They say his head was bent downward when it happened. He’d had his hands outstretched. When government did it. Those enforcers who knew their marching orders. “Kill him! Kill him! Disable him! Kill him!” They say that the enforcer “had a brazen disregard for the very people he was supposed to protect in that community.”
His lifeless body remained there.
Baking in the sun. People watched. Looked. Stared. Took mental pictures. The scene of the horrific government killing of the man of color imprinted on the minds and psyches of the people who saw it, heard about and still read about it today. All these years later. Mothers were there. They tried to shield the scene from their children’s watchful, keenly observant eyes. Oh. His mother. What was she feeling? How could she have endured seeing her child, her boy, her precious one, dead in public. Slain. Crucified. Killed. Lynched. Murdered. Brutally treated like a common criminal. He had not been given a fair hearing. His rights had been supremely violated. “How could she endure this without losing her mind?” That’s what I have always wondered.
His lifeless body remained there.
The incompetence that surrounded his death. The alliances that formed and joined in the conspiracy to pin his death on his actions. Yes. You heard that right. The conspiracy to blame the death, the public slaying, on the victim. The cover up that said, “He shouldn’t have done that. He should have answered our questions. He should have heeded our demands. He didn’t help himself. He could have avoided this if he had just….”
His lifeless body remained there.
What were the final thoughts in his mind? Thoughts that could never be recorded. Have never been recorded. We think we know what he said, but what did he think? There. In the sun. Dying. Did he wonder why? “Why would the system do this?” “Why do they hate people like me so?” But he knew the answer. He’d always known the answer. That’s why he did what he did. That’s why he responded the way he did. That’s why he didn’t do what they expected him to do. Because he knew this confrontation was not going to end well. He knew he would be executed in broad daylight. He knew they would see to it that he did not survive this scene. He knew. He knew …
His lifeless body remained there.
On the street, with more than 22 guns shots fired. Six to eight of them making contact with his body. Shots fired by the police that pierced his flesh. Many of the bullets entered, exited and re-entered his riddled body until the last one. The last bullet striking him in the apex of his bowed down head, according to the Department of Justice report. Then his dead body lay there. Lifeless in the middle of the street. His body remained there for more than four hours. Face down. Blood streaming from his head. His dead body reportedly measured 6 feet 4 inches tall and weighed 292 pounds. His body remained there in the sun, just after noon on Saturday, August 9, 2014 in Ferguson, MO. His rap handle was “Big Mike,” his family lovingly, called him, “Mike-Mike,” but we have come to know that his name was Michael Orlandus Darrion Brown. An 18-year-old unarmed Black teenager. Massacred in the street. His lifeless body laid there on the street only eight days after his high school graduation. Michael Brown’s dead body laid on the street, in the sun for all to see, photograph and videotape for 4.5 hours. There his dead body remained until after 4 PM that hot August, Saturday afternoon in 2014.
What do you do with a dead body?
This is not the teacher asking the class this question. This is this Christian. This preacher asking this question to all of us.
What do you do? What should you do? What do you do when the body is a Black body? A body of color? What do we do when the body doesn’t respond the way those in established power tells them they should? When “the man,” the “power” prescribes who and what they shall be? What do you do as you sit here, listening?
Let me ask this question more pointedly. I will ask it the way that The Right Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas encourages me to ask it: What do you do when the body is a Black body and US Americans, including African Americans, have been conditioned to believe that a Black body is a criminal body?
So, what do you do with that dead body?
Apparently, you leave it there, in the hot sun, hoping it will serve as a deterrent for anyone else who looks like this one, or acts like this one, or talks like this one, or has any solidarity with this one.
You leave it exposed, you don’t cover it, you don’t dignify it. You leave it there so that others will be deterred from doing what this one did.
Well, my sisters and my brothers, by now, I hope that hearing about the circumstances surrounding Michael Brown’s body made you think of another body.
Another body of color – though we have been conditioned to believe that this body was so white that his skin was basically transparent, but we know otherwise … we know that the Bible tells us otherwise.
Matthew tells us that this body, as a baby, was hidden among the Egyptians. In Africa.
John tells us that this body had hair that was like wool, and feet that were like burnished bronze.
John tells us that this body’s eyes were fiery; face was full of strength; voice had a quality about it that sounded with the force of a rushing waterfall.
John tells us that this body carried a cross.
Scholars suggest that the body may have been up to 6 feet 2 inches tall, carrying a cross that might have weighed over 292 pounds.
Matthew, Mark and Luke tell us that the enforcers seized another body, belonging to Simon of Cyrene, North Africa, to help this body carry that cross.
I’m sure you’ve figured it out by now. This other body that I am talking about. You may call Him, the Alpha and the Omega, or a bridge over troubled waters. Some affectionately call Him a Mother for the Motherless; a Father for the Fatherless; and a Friend for the Friendless. Someone else may call Him Son of God, Lamb of God, Wonderful Counselor, Prince of Peace, and Mighty God. We’ve come to know that His name is Emmanuel, because He is Jesus the Christ. I call Him, Savior.
Though there are some seeming similarities between Michael Brown’s dead body and Jesus’ dead body, there are some stark differences, too.
Jesus’ body wasn’t left in a northern suburb of St Louis. The Saviour’s body was left in a northern suburb of Jerusalem.
Jesus’ dead body didn’t remain dead for hours on a midwestern street called, Canfield Drive. The Savior’s body remained dying for hours on an ancient near eastern hill called, Calvary.
Jesus’ body wasn’t stretched out on the street for all to see, with his shorts halfway down his legs. The Savior’s body was stretch out on an old rugged cross as a public spectacle, stripped naked of his garments.
Jesus’ body didn’t have a gunshot wound to the right hand. The Savior’s body bore holes where the nails had been driven into both hands.
Jesus’ body didn’t have gun shot wounds to the top of his head. The Savior’s body bore a crown of thrones that was force down onto the top of His head.
Jesus’ body hadn’t held up raised arms as a gesture of surrender. The Savior’s body had arms that were out-stretched which confirmed that He came for this.
Jesus’ body didn’t request, “I don’t have a gun. Stop shooting.” The Saviour’s body resolutely said, “It is finished.”
Jesus’ dead body wasn’t the means of political, social, cultural and religious oppression because it was Black. The Savior’s dead body means an eternal protest against the political, social, cultural and religious oppression against bodies – big, Black and brown, man and woman bodies.
Best of all, Jesus’ dead body didn’t spark a moment of unrest that just over 10 years later, most of us have forgotten. No beloeveds! The Savior’s dead body sparked a movement of liberation that for over 2,000 years has claimed the lives of countless billions of people, and counting.
Jesus’ dead body makes God’s name known to people like you. People like me. Jesus’ dead body paves the way for our sanctification. Our redemption. Our atonement. Our salvation.
So, I ask the question, again: What do you do with a dead body? Well, when that dead body is the body of Jesus – You adore Him. You celebrate Him. You exalt Him. You glorify Him. You honor Him. You lift Him. You magnify Him. You obey Him. You praise Him. You seek Him. You thank Him. You worship Him.
You remember the Betrayed. Bruised. Beaten. Belittled. Bloodied. Blemished. Broken. Busted. Burdened. Beautiful. Beloved Body.
What do you do with the dead body of Jesus?
Believe.
* This is a sermon I preached on Good Friday 2025. I am aware that we are no longer in the Easter Season, after all, Pentecost was last week. I share this sermon now because with all that’s going on in our world, we Christians need a reminder of our justice purpose.
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