The Way of the Cross

It has often been observed that a lie often repeated gradually wears down the dedicated resistance until the lie is accepted as truth. Every dictator and every would-be dictator knows how to do this.

But in an ironic twist, when the truth is repeated in exactly the same way over and over again, it can lose its force and capacity to surprise and capture us.

I'm thinking about the word “cross.”

It seems to be used by some as a fashion accessory for rock stars.

I wonder for how many of them it is a lie, a mark of a Christian on one who professes no faith at all?

But even when it is worn by a believer, have we really thought very much or very deeply about what we are doing?

This cross is the sign of man's ultimate rejection of God – we do our Lord Jesus to death rather than listen!

At the same time, this cross is the sign of God's ultimate patience with us,

reaching out to us despite our rejection of him,

saving us from the self-indulgences we otherwise choose.

The Cross, the cross; we've heard it so much, we have seen it so often that we can hardly hear the truth anymore...

...not that we ever really wanted to hear it in the first place!

We're right there with Peter and the others, saying, “Oh, no, Jesus, say it isn't so;

You can't be about dying and rising.

You need to stress living and ruling, and glory; glory for you and for us!”

“Get behind me, Satan,” Jesus replies,

for you are not on the side of God, but of men!”

“We didn't sign up for this,” the disciples complain, and we share their position.

We show up with more or less regularity on Sunday.

We put something in the offering plate.

We may take part in some educational program from time to time.

It is a very nice place to come, with wonderful, friendly people.

And Jesus says to us, “Take up your cross and follow.”

And we reply, “What do you mean?”

Remember that mark of the cross on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday?

Dust you are, dust redeemed by the cross of Christ.”

And silence.

What can we say to that?

It is a recognition of our true situation, and about what God had done with us.

Dust, nothing...

despite fancy clothes and high-flying attitudes, we are smaller and smaller in a universe which gets larger with every new telescope we invest to probe its distant reaches.

Dust, nothing...

yet valued, rescued, bought for a price,

A little like the discarded pet at the SPCA whose cage bears the ominous sign “Last Day.”

who is nonetheless seen, rescued, loved, bought with a price, and given new life.

If that has happened to you and me,

if we have been claimed,

if we have been named by the Lord Jesus,

if we have been pulled through the waters of Baptism

if we have been marked with the cross of ownership by Jesus,

if we have been set up in a new life by him,

if we have been supported each day by the Holy Spirit,

what should we be doing?

This is where our First Lesson, the Ten Commandments, and Luther's Small Catechism are so useful.

We've heard again and again about the three uses of the law:

1. to regulate society, to keep us from killing each other.

2. to convict us of sin and separation from God and thus to drive us to Christ, our only hope in this mess.

3. once we hold the promises of Jesus and wonder what we should be doing because of that, then the commandments serve as our guide.

We'll take only one example: 5^th commandment “Thou shalt not murder”, which means, Luther says, that we are not to harm our neighbor in any way, but help him in his every need.

What more reason do we need, then, to take on things like Family Promise that offers hospitality to homeless families, or aid a struggling seminarian so that he/she can get on with his/her work of proclamation, or comfort a new widow in her sorrow, or ten thousand other things. Get going!

This is not the place to thoughtlessly sleep and take our ease;

it is a place to prepare strenuously for all that we'll be doing the rest of the week.

Ones who have been rescued (that's us), will feel the compulsion to let others know about rescue available for them.

As Luther said long ago:

“The church is one beggar telling another beggar where to find food.”

There is risk in doing that:

The other person may be suspicious of us and our motives and may lash out at us individually or collectively.

Some may feel that those others deserve their situation, and thus try to prevent us from reaching out to those other persons.

Some with try to block us out of sheer perversity.

Jesus knew that the rejection which he endured would come to all those who follow him.

“Take up your cross and follow me,” Jesus says.

Get ready for rejection, get ready for dying, but know also that there is a way through it.

I have gone there ahead of you.

I know the way through.

I will accompany you.

I will greet the whole body of the church when you are through.

“Take up your cross,” then

does not mean what those who use it so casually mean.

[That's the point of the silly cartoon-like illustration on page 2 of the bulletin today.]

Cross-bearing is also not the regular hardships of human life: cancer, job losses, family tensions, overbearing mother-in-law, floods, etc.

Taking up one's cross is what we say and do far someone else in order to bring them into the full understanding and life of the Lord Jesus.

--knowing full well that there will often be rejection.

--and perhaps even rejection leading to death.

But the value of Christ's promise is so great that we can do no less than to share it.

What we say and do may affect a single person; or it may in the mystery of God's power reach many persons.

There is a story that has been passed down since the 4^th century. The details have probably become embellished across the generations, but something like this happened one fateful day.

A monk named Telemachus had spent a long time alone and in thought, and he realized that he needed to share those thoughts with someone.

So he set out from the east for that great sin-filled city of Rome.

Rome was by this time officially Christian, but they had not given up all of the old ways.

A general had won a victory and games and festivities were declared.

No longer were Christians thrown to the lions, but those captured in war were forced to fight each other to the death.

The chariot races were over and the crowd in the arena was tense with expectation.

The gladiators marched in.

They said to Caesar, “We who are about to die salute you.”

Telemachus was horrified.

Ones for whom Christ died were now going to slaughter each other for sport.

He leapt down from the stands in his monk's robe and came between the fighters.

There was a moment of confusion, with boos and catcalls.

They pushed Telemachus aside, but he got up and came between them again.

After considerable abuse, the commander of the games gave the order, a sword flashed, and Telemachus lay dead.

The crowd fell silent, shocked that a holy man would have been killed in this way.

The games ended abruptly, and were never resumed afterward.

Telemachus, by dying, had led to their end.

“Take up your cross, and follow,” Jesus says.

If we live always carefully, our thoughts ruled by the stock market,

if we measure everything by how easy it is and how little trouble it is,

if we make no effort except for ourselves,

we are losing life day by day.

But as we spend life for others, for the sake of Jesus,

we come to realize that Jesus is giving us life in full-measure, overflowing, abundant, enduring forever.

The way of the cross is death to self-indulgence.

From this springs our idea of giving up something in Lent.

It is a good idea which immediately gets swallowed up in a mountain of rule-making, guidelines, exceptions and caveats.

Every year someone asks me to settle such questions as “If I can't see the chocolate, and don't realize it is there until I've eaten it, does it count?”

[For the nit-picking casuists among us, the answer is Yes, by the way.]

Let's not get stick of this kind of thing.

If one of these disciplines is helpful to you in focusing attention on someone other than yourself, then by all means make use of it.

The most fruitful thing is to ask oneself what we are taking on.

What is our mission field this week?

Who needs to hear Good news from you and me?

Who needs our prayers, our personal touch, our help?

Where are we risking rejection in the name of Jesus?

“Take up your cross and follow me,” Jesus says.

And he also says, “I will be with you to the close of the age.” AMEN.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.