To Serve and Protect and Holy Week

I left early Sunday afternoon for our Habitat trip. It was a busy day at church between Palm Sunday, leading the high school opener, spending time with the young adult group, and packing up for the trip. I got a brief word that two Charlotte police officers had died earlier that morning. However, I did not hear another word about it till I got back from my trip yesterday at around 11:30 a.m. Then I started hearing the story and about the officers, Jeff Shelton and Sean Clark. I watched bits of the two services on TV in-between preparing and leading the Maundy Thursday and Good Friday services at church.

I found out that the funeral procession was going to be heading down Providence Rd. which runs right by the church and my apartment. Both days I stood outside, hand on my heart, watching the hundreds of police and citizen cars drive past on the way to the grave site. I had never seen anything like this. The outpouring of support was incredible. There were people lining the streets up and down the entire city of Charlotte doing the same thing I was. The days were both sunny but the mood was somber. I was both filled with joy to see the support of these fallen officers who had died serving and protecting others and sorrow for the loss felt by the families, fellow officers from Charlotte and around the south (there were police cars from all over NC, SC, VA, and FL to name a few), and the community of Charlotte.

All of this takes place in the context of Holy Week, the week where we as Christians celebrate Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the Last Supper and Jesus' betrayal and arrest on Maundy Thursday, Jesus' death on the cross on Good Friday, and Jesus' resurrection on Easter Sunday. It is a week of both deep sorrow and immense hope. A week that shows both the sin of humankind and love of God that ultimately trumps everything, including death.

Here were two officers who lived to serve and protect others and died doing just that. And we commemorate them on two days that are all about serving and protecting. Jesus commanded us to love one another as he had loved them on Maundy Thursday and even washed his disciples feet, one of the dirtiest tasks of the old world. And then on Good Friday, Jesus died on the cross in order to serve and protect us. He died in order that we may not bear our sin and death anymore but instead may have forgiveness and eternal life.

These two days and these two funerals show us the tragic nature of humanity. That people are capable of killing others in cold blood. That we are all capable of killing the one who came to protect and serve us. But, at the same time, we also remember all the more the loving nature of God. That God took the tragedy of the cross and turns it on its head come Sunday morning. That because of God's love and what Jesus did on the cross, that even though we mourn in sorrow, we also live in the hope and promise of the resurrection and eternal life. That God is here mourning with us and the families. That the funerals and processions are not the end. That God has the final word and his word is one of grace and love and comfort.

"In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:37-39)