Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross

 Lectionary: 638

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might not perish
but might have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through him.

It may be my middle class conceit to complain that life is difficult. I remember the same observation -- without the plaintive note -- among poor widows and jailed young men when I was the pastor of a church. 

If they agreed with me that life is not easy, they also reminded me that it's not supposed to be easy; that indeed the Lord himself found it difficult. And, in fact, he was taking up his cross and insisting that we should carry ours long before that fatal Friday morning. 

It's probably my middle class conceit to wonder if life, which is not easy, is also godless. That is, it has neither purpose nor redemption nor justification; that, "Life is hard and then you die." I might feel that way even amid the leisure of my entitlements; but the same poor widows and jailed youths told me that, 

"God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him."

The exaltation of the cross is core to the Gospel and the Biblical life which we espouse. Anyone who does not get that, who supposes that the game of life can be won with a little bit of luck and a lot of hard work misses the point altogether. 

Idealists -- that is, people who have the leisure time to dream up ideals -- might suppose that "If everyone just did their part it wouldn't be so hard." That theory is yet to be proven. In the best possible world with everyone sharing and sharing alike, the cross would remain, and would still be waiting for you and me to take it up and carry it. 

But that's an idle thought. The fact is the cross is a blessing -- an exulted blessing -- which the Lord in his infinite mercy gives to each person. We have seen how the saints and martyrs insisted upon carrying theirs. If some admitted it took half-a-lifetime or more to learn that lesson, they only urge us not to waste as much time as they did. 

The cross remains for us. Even the Protestant Reformation, for the most part, retained the cross when they eschewed crucifixes. We see crosses stretching from coast to coast as we travel the highways and interstates of our nation. Many enormous statues of Jesus show his arms outstretched as though nailed even when there is no cross behind him. 

Saint Francis described the cross as the fastest, easiest, most direct, efficient, and certain way of living well. Why would anyone want another way?