We have a valuable lesson from The Masters Golf Tournament, which finished at Augusta National back on Palm Sunday. I know this is ten days after the fact, but I couldn’t publish this during Holy Week.

Even if you’re not a golf fan, this year’s Masters gave us a valuable lesson.

The tournament was way more exciting than it needed to be. Rory McIlroy was leading by four strokes when he blew up on the par-5 13th hole. Just plain hit a bad third shot pitching to the green and landed in the water. Double bogey. Bogey on the next hole, and he was suddenly tied with Justin Rose who had jumped to a big lead the first day, then had a really bad third day. But he came back and was the only player to challenge McIlroy.

But Rory came back too after the 13th. He missed a makeable eagle putt on the 15th, settling for a birdie, and made a birdie on the 17th to go up one. All he needed was a par on the 18th. Rose was already finished, having made a 20-foot birdie putt on the 18th. Rory missed a 5-foot par putt, and they went to extra holes.

They both had good approach shots, but Rory’s was much closer. He made the birdie putt to win, giving him a career grand slam. I didn’t know there were so few of those: Sarazen, Hogan, Nicklaus, Player, Woods. That’s all. Now McIlroy. It took Rory 11 years (11 tries at Augusta) to finish his.

Back to the April 13 fourth day of the Masters. Both Rose and McIlroy showed remarkable persistence, but McIlroy prevailed.

Jason Gay of the Wall Street Journal wrote about all the bad shots and missed putts, but then he observed:

In the end, it’s all footnotes, because the 35-year-old Northern Irelander shook off his extended bad luck at Augusta National and prevailed. In the fading light on the 18th green, McIlory hit a clutch playoff birdie putt against runner-up Justin Rose to capture the only major title that had eluded him, making him one of six modern players to win all four of golf’s major tournaments. 

It was a reminder that great sporting accomplishments don’t require unbroken greatness. McIlroy didn’t win Sunday by going out and stomping the field. He didn’t play close to his best golf. On CBS ,Jim Nantz called it a “masterpiece,” but it was a messy mod-art canvas at best. 

It was perseverance, not perfection.  – Rory McIlroy’s Messy Masterpiece at Augusta, Jason Gay, Wall Street Journal, published April 15, 2025.

Perseverance, not perfection. Did you just relapse into a sin you thought you’d left behind? Did you lose your temper…again? Remember the lesson from Rory McIlroy’s Masters: it’s perseverance, not perfection.

You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised. For, “In just a little while, he who is coming will come and will not delay.” And, “But my righteous one will live by faith. And I take no pleasure in the one who shrinks back.” But we do not belong to those who shrink back and are destroyed, but to those who have faith and are saved. (Hebrews 10.36 – 39, NIV)

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us. (1 John 1.9, 10, NIV)

With Holy Week fresh on our minds, it’s instructive to look at the juxtaposition of Elihu’s observations in Job 34 and Jesus’ words in Mark 8. First, Elihu’s Santa Claus Theology:

Therefore listen to me, you men of understanding: Far be it from God to do wickedness, And from the Almighty to commit iniquity. For He repays man according to his work, And makes man to find a reward according to his way.” (Job 34.10, 11, NKJV)

Job is suffering. Every man is repaid according to his work. Therefore, Job is wrong when he says he is righteous.

But look what happened to Jesus!

And he began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed, and after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.” And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me…”  (Mark 8.31 – 34, ESV)

Jesus took up his cross of suffering literally. We are told to take up our crosses, perhaps metaphorically. But there might be real suffering. Jesus was precisely NOT repaid according to his work. To think otherwise is to set our minds on “the things of man.”

For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. (1 Peter 2.21 – 24, ESV)

I would be remiss if I didn’t comment on the passing of Pope Francis, today, Easter Monday, 7:35a, local time in Rome. It can be said that, like Queen Elizabeth, he worked until he died. Good for him. On Easter Sunday he gave the  “Urbi et Orbi” blessing to the “City [of Rome] and to the World” while an aide read his address. He later greeted cheering crowds in St. Peter’s Square from the popemobile.

He was 88, assuming the office of Pope at age 76. It’s hard to imagine. I’m 78, and it’s been years since I wanted to lead anything. I don’t mind working, but being in charge of an organization as large as the Roman Catholic Church at that age boggles the mind.

Because of who he was as a man and a Jesuit priest, he was often at odds with tradition and with the keepers of that tradition. Here are a few snippets from Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads by Chris Lowney. The book was written (and I read it) not long after he took office.

[He was trained by] the Jesuits, a religious order that forms leaders not by management courses but in a month-long silent retreat, by sending trainees off on an arduous pilgrimage, and by preparing recruits to counsel adults by having them teach young children.

He challenged “lukewarm Christians” and “couch potato” Christians to engage much more energetically in spreading the Church’s message, not to “take refuge . . . in a cozy life,” but to get beyond our “comfort zones” and live with greater “apostolic fervor.”

He challenged his Church to be more forthrightly “poor, and for the poor.”

Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, reacting to the pope’s challenges, told an interviewer, “I find myself examining my own conscience . . . on style, on simplicity, on lots of things.”

“Your proper place is the frontier,” the cultural frontier, where they were “not to build walls but bridges” to those who did not share Catholic beliefs or culture. He told a group of devout Catholics that we should not “lock ourselves up in our parish, among our friends . . . with people who think as we do” but instead “The Church must step outside herself. To go where? To the outskirts of existence, whatever they may be.” 

All the more stunning, then, that Pope Francis dispatched with tradition nearly a half-dozen times in his papacy’s first two hours: eschewing the red papal cape (the mozzetta); keeping his own simple pectoral cross instead of choosing from the more precious ones offered him; greeting the faithful in St. Peter’s Square with an informal “good evening” instead of more formal language; asking the crowd’s prayer for blessing before bestowing his own; and, at the end of it all, leaving the papal limo empty to join his fellow cardinals on the bus.

L’Osservatore Romano, the staid newspaper of record for Vatican watchers, called the performance “unprecedented and shocking.” Except it wasn’t a performance at all. We were not watching someone trying to act like a pope. We were watching a person unafraid to be who he was: Jorge Mario Bergoglio, called to serve as pope, not someone donning a costume to play a new role. In fact, if anything discomfited him at all, it seemed to be only the costuming, apparently a bit too regal to hang comfortably on his shoulders.

With Holy Week fresh on our minds, I’ll close the excerpts from Chris Lowney’s book with how Pope Francis handled Maundy Thursday:

Jesus bathed filthy, dust-covered feet that might have been flecked with traces of human or animal waste. That’s what Jesus did.

This iconic moment is commemorated in Christian churches on Holy Thursday, with selected parishioners standing in for the disciples and the parish priest for Jesus. The ritual typically unfolds like in the movies—that is, with no verisimilitude whatsoever. My brother was invited to have his foot washed when he was about ten years old, but my reverent Irish mother did the real washing, scrubbing away two or three epidermal layers, and, for good measure, dumping so much baby powder into my brother’s shoe that a fragrant mushroom cloud wafted over the altar when he yanked off the shoe.

The ritual is no less stylized when the pope enacts it at the Basilica of St. John Lateran, with select bishops or seminarians representing the apostles; I doubt any of them ever risked the career-ending gambit of presenting smelly feet to the pope.

But in 2013, Pope Francis recovered some of the shock value of Jesus’ original gesture. He forsook St. John Lateran’s gleaming marble floors for the drab stone flooring of the Casal del Marmo juvenile detention center, and he kissed the feet not of carefully chosen clerics and other Catholic worthies but of male and female juvenile delinquents who had been judged unworthy of walking the streets without close supervision.

There’s no shortage of news stories on the Pope’s passing and on his papacy. Some positive. Some negative. You can research and read those for yourself. I’ll just leave you with what Loyola Press shared this morning. A quote from Pope Francis himself:

Dear friends, if we walk in hope, allowing ourselves to be surprised by the new wine Jesus offers us, we have joy in our hearts, and we cannot fail to be witnesses of this joy. Christians are joyful; they are never gloomy. God is at our side…Jesus has shown us that the face of God is that of a loving Father. Sin and death have been defeated. Christians cannot be pessimists! They do not look like someone in constant mourning. If we are truly in love with Christ and if we sense how much he loves us, our heart will “light up” with a joy that spreads to everyone around us. —Excerpted from Embracing the Way of Jesus by Pope Francis

Joyful Pope Francis…

The Apostle Paul shared this joy:

And being confident of this, I know that I shall remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy of faith, that your rejoicing for me may be more abundant in Jesus Christ by my coming to you again. (Philippians 1.25, NKJV)

The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments. On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment.

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. (Luke 23.55 – 24.6, ESV)

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures…But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead… (1 Corinthians 15.3, 4…20, ESV)

A friend, strong Christian, whom I love and respect, wrote this a couple of weeks ago:

Celebrating our Lenten journey to the empty cross and tomb of our Risen Lord and Savior! 

I appreciate his faith and enthusiasm, but I think he’s rushing things. We probably ought to give a bit more thought to a cross and tomb that were NOT empty. Jesus hung on the cross for hours and died. The tomb was occupied. “He descended into hell. The third day he rose…”

But this isn’t the third day, it’s the second day. How were the disciples feeling? Afraid?

Jesus answered them, “Do you now believe? Behold, the hour is coming, indeed it has come, when you will be scattered, each to his own home, and will leave me alone. Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me. (John 16.31, ESV, emphasis mine)

Despondent?

They said to him, “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. (Luke 24.19 – 21, ESV, emphasis mine)

Sit with it a little while today.

PS An article in Christianity Today, Before Christ Rose, He Was Dead, reminds us of this truth while analyzing its theological and liturgical aspects. Here’s a sample from the introduction to the article:

The question of God’s presence in mortality is central to a significant, but seldom recognized, day in the church’s yearly calendar. Holy Saturday is that odd day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday during which Jesus Christ—life himself!—lay dead in a tomb…The church has had little difficulty fixing its attention on the dying of Christ, and even less difficulty on the rising of Christ, but the being dead of Christ has found relatively little expression in its theology and liturgy. Holy Saturday, however, has an integrity of its own. If the church can attune its ear to its frequency, so easily drowned out by the dominant tones of Good Friday and Easter, it may be able to hear a profound word about human living and dying between the Cross and the Resurrection.

I can’t do better than a B.C. comic by Johnny Hart, which I can’t reproduce here.

• Cave man #1: I hate the term “Good Friday.”
• Cave man #2: Why?
• Cave man #1: My Lord was hanged on a tree that day.
• Cave man #2: If YOU were going to be hanged on that day, and he volunteered to take your place, how would you feel?
• Cave man #1: Good
• Cave man #2: Have a nice day.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. (1 Peter 2.24, ESV)

God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5.8, ESV)

It’s Maundy Thursday, and I don’t think I can improve on what I shared back in 2022 except to add the scripture references from John 13 – 17.

So many images from Maundy Thursday – we especially remember Jesus’ initiation of “The Lord’s Supper” or “Communion” or “The Eucharist.”

And when the hour came, he reclined at table, and the apostles with him. And he said to them, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he said, “Take this, and divide it among yourselves. For I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.” (Luke 22.14 – 20, ESV)

In addition to the bread and the wine, John’s Gospel, chapters 13 – 17, records a lot that Jesus said and did that night:

• He washed the disciples’ feet. (John 13.1 – 20)
• He told them to love each other. (John 13.34, 35)
• He promised the Holy Spirit. (John 14.15 – 17, 15.26 – 27, 16.7 – 15)
• He explained the vine and the branches. (John 15.1 – 17)
• He prayed for them (and us!). (John 17)

A good night, and worth thinking about as we:

Do this in remembrance of me.

It’s now called Holy Week for Christians, but it was Passover Week for Jews. The religious leaders wanted to arrest Jesus and destroy Jesus…but not during the Passover!

It was now two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth and kill him, for they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar from the people.” (Mark 14.1, 2, ESV)

Of course, God has set up the Passover way back in Exodus 12 precisely to foreshadow Jesus’ death on the cross:

Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male a year old. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats, and you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill their lambs at twilight. “Then they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. (Exodus 12.5 – 7, ESV)

It’s not hard to imagine a cross shape, is it?

The next day [John the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1.29, ESV)

So when did the crucifixion occur? On Passover. Jewish days started in the evening, carrying through to the next day.

And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, “Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?” (Mark 14.12, ESV)

Jesus eats the Passover with the disciples, then becomes the Passover lamb, all on the fourteenth day of the month, just as it says in Exodus 12.

So much for the leaders’ desire that Jesus not be killed on Passover.

Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. (Acts 4.27, 28, NIV)

…Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. (1 Corinthians 5.7, ESV)

The religious leaders were seeking to destroy Jesus after he cleansed the temple. Then Jesus finally tells a parable that they understand!

And he began to speak to them in parables. “A man planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a pit for the winepress and built a tower, and leased it to tenants and went into another country. When the season came, he sent a servant to the tenants to get from them some of the fruit of the vineyard. And they took him and beat him and sent him away empty-handed. Again he sent to them another servant, and they struck him on the head and treated him shamefully. And he sent another, and him they killed. And so with many others: some they beat, and some they killed. He had still one other, a beloved son. Finally he sent him to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But those tenants said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.’ And they took him and killed him and threw him out of the vineyard. What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others…” (Mark 12.1 – 9, ESV)

As I say, they finally figured out a parable with a predictable result:

And they were seeking to arrest him…for they perceived that he had told the parable against them. (Mark 12.12, ESV)

We get it! You’re talking about us! Oops. Only one thing to do: kill the messenger.

Since Mark 3, people have been trying to figure out how to destroy Jesus. The opposition intensifies, of course, during Holy Week. Look how the cleansing of the temple story ends:

And they came to Jerusalem. And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold and those who bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. And he would not allow anyone to carry anything through the temple. And he was teaching them and saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations’? But you have made it a den of robbers.” And the chief priests and the scribes heard it and were seeking a way to destroy him… (Mark 11.15 – 18, ESV)

In those days a worshiper couldn’t bring his own sacrifice or even his own money into the temple. The leaders had set up a nice profit-making operation selling sacrifices and changing money. Jesus called it a “den of robbers.” If they hadn’t been plotting against Jesus for his Sabbath violations and other perceived rule-breakings, this would have done it. Don’t mess with our money!

No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. (Matthew 6.24, ESV)