Passion

This past Sunday at church, someone mentioned that it was the beginning of “Passion Week.”  I admit, under my breath, I chuckled a bit – because outside of a church setting, declaring a week to be “passion week” could be a bit risqué.  If we play a word association game and I say “passion”, I am pretty sure that Jesus won’t be the first thing to pop into your mind.  My guess is that you’d probably think of romance…and if we believe all that TV and the movies tell us, then “passion” must just be a synonym for sex.

So, why do we call this Passion Week?  Have we lost the original meaning of the word passion? 

According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11^th edition), passion is a noun.

It is an English word derived from Anglo-French, which came from the Latin word passion.  Passio meant suffering…and the Latin word pati meant “to suffer”.

If you capitalize the word “Passion”, the dictionary says it means:

a.      the sufferings of Christ between the night of the Last Supper and his death

b.      an oratorio based on a gospel narrative of the Passion

***Side note:  PASSION. FLOWERS. ARE. SO. COOL.  They were named because of the “passion” of Christ’s death.  They are also called the “flower of the five wounds.”  You should read up on that when you get a chance. J 

 

That fits with “Passion Week”.  But how did we go from there to the meaning of “passion” today?

If this article is correct, then the word passion developed through time – was affected by different languages (Latin, French, English….even the Greek “pathos”) and different authors (Shakespeare).    

Using the word “passion” for suffering is now obsolete…but we do see the word passion being used for emotion or an “intense, driving, or overmastering feeling or conviction”.  Merriam-Webster states that it can also refer to an ardent affection (love) or a strong “devotion to some activity, object, or concept”.  It can also mean a sexual desire or an object of desire or deep interest.  In other words, the dictionary now says, “Passion applies to an emotion that is deeply stirring or ungovernable.”  Passion, today, often means Love - an inexplicable emotion that takes over us and makes us do things we wouldn't normally do.

Can we think of Passion Week in those terms?  In some ways, yes. 

During this week, we remember and celebrate that Jesus “set his face towards Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51).  We are amazed that He would go to the cross for us – to take our punishment – to LOVE us that deeply.  I would say that qualifies as a strong emotion/ardent affection.  But, it was not without reason or ungovernable.  Jesus was in control of His emotions; He knew what He was heading into.  He even prayed this prayer:

“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will but yours be done.”  (Luke 22:42)

That cup included whipping, crowns of thorns, nails, a rugged/splintered cross, physical pain, spiritual separation…and He went anyway.  For us.

Passio is Latin, but so also is pati.  Pati is the root word for Patient, which is an adjective that means:

1.       Bearing pains or trials calmly without complaint

2.       Manifesting forbearance under provocation or strain

3.       Not hasty or impetuous

4.       Steadfast despite opposition, difficulty or adversity

5.       Able or willing to bear

That truly sounds like Jesus.  It sounds like Passion Week – the Lord Jesus Christ, the man who not only was able, but who was willing to bear our sins…calmly and without complaint.  That's not love as our culture portrays it.

Passion, like so many words today, has had an evolving definition.  Truly, today’s most prevalent definition would probably be a romantic passion seen most frequently in art.   

If TV, movies, and other art forms are really the cries of our culture’s heart and depict a world longing for passion…a world longing to understand what it means to truly be loved…then maybe we need to consider that there is a deeper passion than sexual passion.

And that Passion was Love displayed on a cross two thousand years ago.

 

This week, as I remember THAT Passion, may my heart echo with thankfulness the words of Charles Spurgeon:

"Come in, O strong and deep love of Jesus, like the sea at the flood in spring tides, cover all my powers, drown all my sins, wash out all my cares, lift up my earth-bound soul, and float it right up to my Lord's feet, and there let me lie, a poor broken shell, washed up by his love, having no virtue or value; and only venturing to whisper to him that if he will put his ear to me, he will hear within my heart faint echoes of the vast waves of his own love which have brought me where it is my delight to lie, even at his feet forever"  (Morning & Evening, April 12).