“Our Lenten Journey: Mt. Calvary”
Luke 23:33

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Lent Service V—March 30, 2022

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

We continue our Lenten sermon series on the locations of Christ’s sufferings and death with “Mt. Calvary.”

Because it was a place of execution, a place of torture and death, it was called “The Place of the Skull.” In Aramaic “skull” is Golgotha, and through the Latin translation of the Bible it came to be commonly known by the Latin word for “skull”: “calvaria,” “Calvary.” Luke says, “When they came to the place called the Skull, there they crucified him.”

Convention dictated that a city’s place of execution be just outside the city walls.  And, perversely, the Romans always located their places of execution on a main thoroughfare.  They purposely made their executions public spectacles, because they believed in the deterrent effect of capital punishment.  Every execution was a warning and example to all not to dare defy the Empire and its laws.

Jerusalem’s place of execution was probably just west of the city, along the road leading to Joppa.  This is the medieval Joppa Gate in the city walls.  “Golgotha” or “Calvary” was likely a small hill only a few hundred feet outside the ancient Joppa Gate.  That would be the equivalent of the busiest interchange in downtown Kansas City, where all the major highways converge.

This is different hill on the other side of Jerusalem called “Gordon’s Calvary,” because a British general named Gordon who made a pilgrimage to the holy land in the 1800’s thought that the rocky surface of this hill had the appearance of a skull.  Although it is very unlikely that this is the actual site of Calvary, tourists are often taken here because it does give a good idea of what Mt. Calvary probably looked like originally.

For, today, the actual site where Calvary was likely located is inside and underneath the ancient Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which Emperor Constantine built over the traditional sites of both Calvary and the tomb of Christ, after he converted to Christianity in 315 A.D.  At one time there was great doubt about the authenticity of these sites inside this church.  However, extensive archaeological research within the last few decades has changed many minds, and now most archaeologists and scholars agree that these are indeed the authentic sites that the earliest Christians revered as the locations of our Lord’s crucifixion, death, and resurrection.

Originally, the place of execution was probably a small hill in the landscape, in order to make the crucifixions carried out there more prominent and visible to the passing populace. However, because many layers of debris and fill have accumulated over the centuries, today you actually go DOWN to Calvary, in a small, dark chapel resembling a cave in the basement of the church.  I was not allowed to take pictures there so this photo is from Encyclopedia Britannica.

On display is a large boulder of the original, living rock of Mt. Calvary, the only part of the mount that was not cut away when the chapel was built over it. And in the pavement on the floor is an inscription: “This Is the Center of the Universe.”

This coming Monday will mark 42 years since I knelt in prayer in this chapel on Good Friday in 1980.  I remember vividly how reading that mystical inscription brought tears to my eyes.  For, it is so true that what happened on Mt. Calvary is the central event in the history of the universe.   Mt. Calvary shows the depth of man’s sin and the depth of God’s love.

This painting from the 1800’s by Hungarian artist Mihaly Munkacsy portrays the dreadful events on Mt. Calvary.

At the beginning of John’s Gospel is a tragic, poignant verse: “He came unto his own and his own received him not.”  That indictment applies not just to the Hebrew race but to the entire human race.  Our God walked in our world in the flesh, and what was humanity’s response?  Isaiah says, “He was despised and rejected by men . . . and we esteemed him not.” 

The old spiritual asks, “Where you there when they crucified my Lord?”  What if you had been there?  Would you have been any better than the disciples, who deserted him and fled?  Would you have been any better than Peter, who denied him three times?  Paul says in Romans, “What shall we conclude then? Are we any better?  Not at all! . . .  For [we] are all alike under the power of sin.”

Mt. Calvary shows the depth of man’s sin and the depth of God’s love.  Before the American patriot Nathan Hale was executed in 1776 he declared, “I only regret that I have but one life to give for my country.”   He was willing to die for the cause of American liberty. 

What about Jesus, as he was executed in 33 A.D.?  What was the cause he died for?  Paul tells us in Romans: “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.  Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.  But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” 

What was the cause Jesus died for?  “Christ died for the ungodly . . . Christ died for us.”  He gave his life for your eternal liberty, to set you free from sin with the payment of his own suffering and death, and to set you free from death itself by his resurrection from the dead. 

Mt. Calvary shows the depth of man’s sin and the depth of God’s love.  Even as he was being nailed to the cross, Jesus cried out, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”  Your heavenly Father does forgive us our sins, and not only ours but the sins of the whole world, on account of his Son’s sacrifice. 

One commentator says: “Calvary shows the desperate vileness of sin. . .  But above all, Calvary speaks of love, a love that passes all understanding.  ‘Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as an offering and sacrifice to God.’  Let us love him, because he so loved us!”*

Amen.