Once I read a maxim saying in effect, "Problems are walls to be scaled; Mysteries are pools to be plunged into."
God our Father, in obedience to you your only Son accepted death on the cross for the salvation of mankind. We acknowledge the mystery of the cross on earth. May we receive the gift of redemption in heaven. (Opening Prayer: The Exaltation of the Cross)
I've heard it said that when Jesus entered the Jordan River at his baptism that he consecrated the waters. In a similar manner when he entered his Passion he consecrated all suffering. The understanding and treatment of suffering is one of the attributes that marks a Christian and separates him or her from the mainstream. In a proper sense we strive to alleviate suffering to its irreducible core; and that core is the place where it can no longer be ameliorated, it can only be embraced or rejected. If we embrace it we do so with Christ and with his strength, love and passion, at which point it eventually is overcome, as death is overcome with new life.
But when we reject or disdain our sufferings we resist the power of God in our lives which is always life giving, even as our bodies tend toward their ultimate temporal state, that of death. (We sometimes forget this when we fail to discern the proper boundaries for medicine and healthcare, violating the rights and dignity of all human life and sacrificing others for our own well being. )
It's no coincidence that the Feast of The Triumph of the Cross is followed the next day by the Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. Somehow all Christian love passes through suffering in this life. That's one of the keys to the mystery of the cross. In one respect we call Christ the 'Eternal Word of God' because his life communicates all true life (He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life) not only in speech but in the transcendent reality of the Divine One becoming incarnate and consecrating the human condition. The sinless Virgin Mary is not spared from the sorrows of this world because she is so completely united with her Son. His willingness to take on suffering for our salvation and her willingness to accept sorrows because of her union with him are further keys to understanding our role in the plan of salvation.
Thus it's difficult to get one's arms around this mystery unless we are willing to join in an intimate journey with Our Lord and his mother as we enter the 'valley of tears'. The Crucifixion is a scandal and an outrage. It involves humiliation and indignity. It asks us to accept surrender and powerlessness. It cries for justice and asks, "Who is to blame?" These questions often elude us when we are free from pain. But they eventually surface and cry for attention when we are confronted with this mystery: especially when we are trapped in corners where the only escape is the Way of the Cross.
Pope Benedict XVI reminds us at his recent remarks in Lourdes, France that the Lord has bridged immeasurable distance to unite himself with us through suffering and love.
"He is calling you (cf. Jn 11:28)! He wants to take your life and join it to his. Let yourself be embraced by him! Gaze no longer upon your own wounds, gaze upon his. Do not look upon what still separates you from him and from others; look upon the infinite distance that he has abolished by taking your flesh, by mounting the Cross which men had prepared for him, and by letting himself be put to death so as to show you his love. In his wounds, he takes hold of you; in his wounds, he hides you. Do not refuse his Love!"
In Ineffable Wisdom the Lord has chosen to communicate eternal life through his own passion and death and to draw us into the mystery of what this divine suffering means and does for the whole of creation. He has given us the opportunity to transform our own suffering by uniting it with his and offering it to God the Father. As each Christian grows in maturity they become drawn to the reality of suffering and the cross and their need to submit in obedience to its efficacious work, even as it remains mystery.
And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived" (v. 9).
The stress in this passage is not on some magical healing, but on a bronze serpent as a symbol of salvation that God offered to all who would look to Him and live.
Jesus borrowed the object lesson from history. He said, just like Moses raised the serpent up in the wilderness, He, too, must be lifted up so that whoever believes on Him may have eternal life.
This "lifting up" of the Son of Man is a definite statement of Jesus' coming death on the cross. He was telling Nicodemus that in His death God would provide salvation. There is a divine imperative in the death of Jesus. The Son of Man "must" be lifted up. Peter preached the necessity of His death saying, "this Man, was delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death. And God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death; since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power" (Acts 2:23–24). It was God's deliberate choice and purpose to crucify Jesus. It was no accident, or the martyrdom of a good religious teacher. He died as an act of God. His death was necessary for our salvation.
The death of Jesus is exalted in New Testament preaching. The preaching of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved it is the power of God (1 Corinthians 1:18). There is something about the message of the cross that throbs, it acts, it produces results. We glory in the uplifted cross of Jesus because it is the power of God to bring healing to our sin sick souls. "We preach Christ crucified" was the theme of apostolic preaching in the New Testament (1:23). Without that cross, we die an eternal death.
Why is the uplifted cross so important? The apostle Paul wrote, "God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8). In fact, Christ died just at the right time for us while we were helpless sinners (5:6). He "died for us;" He "died for the ungodly." He died "on our behalf," or "instead of us." The atoning death of Jesus Christ on the cross is the foundation for the kingdom of God. There is simply no other way to be saved. "The wages of sin is death," the apostle Paul wrote. Then he went on to say, "but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23). A look of faith gives eternal life to those doomed to die.
| ||
"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:16).
The emphasis Jesus is making is that salvation comes through believing. "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast" (Ephesians 2:8–9).
Salvation doesn't come through some magical formula. It comes by simple faith, looking up to the cross of Jesus and believing that He died in your place on the cross. There is no other way of salvation. "There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). There is no other name that you can call upon to be saved. No other person anywhere in this world will give you a right relationship with God. Be careful what name for God someone whispers in your ear. Any other name or person will send you to hell.
Salvation comes by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone. How tragic, but in the history of Israel the bronze serpent became an idolatrous object of worship (2 Kings 18:4) and had to be destroyed in King Hezekiah's reforms. Salvation came not through the serpent on the pole, but through God's sovereign provision. They were not saved by what they saw, but by the Savior.
We live in a day in which men take sacred objects and icons and turn them into idolatrous objects of worship and belief. The object of our faith must always be the Lord Jesus Christ.
The cross is the greatest mystery of God. A little child can drink of it; old men can meditate upon it for a lifetime. Still, people do not know even a “thimbleful” about it. It is “unexplainable,” yet we can grasp the import of its eternal truth. Mystery challenges and allows growth. Creeds do not have mysteries.
A mystery defies our grasp and is difficult to communicate. Eternal principles are larger than human words. We think we know who we are, but we finally recognize that we are seeing ourselves through a darkened glass! (See 1 Corinthians 13:12.) We have daily surprises that result in our saying, “I never understood this!” Sinful man is always strong in things that do not matter but weak in eternal things that do matter. We do not conquer mystery—we use it, grow in it, and celebrate it.
Mystery is understood only by revelation, not by reason. God can be known but not figured out. We cannot understand God’s grace until we accept His wrath. Until we understand the cross, we cannot understand Christianity.
Where there is no mystery, there is no wonder. Without wonder, there is no real worship. When one explains a magic trick, he finds nothing is left; when we accept God’s mystery, we find everything!
Mysteries are not discovered in Eastern religion or Western logic. Mystery comes only by divine revelation. A mystery is an eternal secret that can be disclosed by God alone. A truth once hidden is now revealed. The secret things belong to God . . . but they are revealed to us. We do not have to be “one of the initiated” or know the “secret handshake” to enter the mystery of God.
Paul said that the gospel message is a mystery (Ephesians 6:19). Faith is a mystery (1 Timothy 3:9) to be lived in a pure conscience. Redemption in Christ is the mystery that 96 THE AGONY & GLORY OF THE CROSS
No comments:
Post a Comment