Jesu Juva

“Every Day a Holy Cross Day”

Text: John 12:20-33; 1 Corinthians 1:18-25; Numbers 21:4-9

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father, and from our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen.

I don’t know how you felt this week . . . stunned, shocked, sad, mad, empty, confused. Maybe all of the above. The video of a young woman going home from work stabbed on a train. A young man shot while talking to a group of college students. Recent school shootings. And then remembering the terrorist attacks of 9-11 - an attack that happened not that long ago, and yet many of you weren’t even born when it did! Add to those things the ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, and maybe things that happened to you this week that no one else knows about, but hurt you very much. That’s a lot of stuff. And it’s why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

Because this world is an evil place. It is often said (and I’m sure you’ve heard it) that deep down inside, we are all basically good. That love, kindness, compassion are part of our “common humanity,” no matter who you are, where you’re from, or what you believe. That’s the default and things like what we saw and heard this week are the aberration. . . . But the truth is exactly the opposite. This week shows us not what humans can do, but what humans will do if we do not have a change of heart. This week is not the exception to the rule. We’ve had weeks like this far too often, and it seems as if they are getting more frequent and closer together. This is the Fall. This is what sin has done to us. It is no mistake that the first story in the Bible after the Fall is when brother murders brother. Sin has not only turned us away from God but against each other.

This is why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

It is not a coincidence that as the true Christian faith and the Biblical message of the sanctity of life - life created by God in His image - is proclaimed and taught less and less that acts of violence increase more and more. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control are not part of our “common humanity” - they are fruits of the Holy Spirit working in our hearts and lives. The works of the flesh, the works of our “common humanity,” here’s that list: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies (Galatians 5:19-23).

This is why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

And it’s not just people flying planes into buildings, shooting those they disagree with, stabbing people at random. Those things make the headlines. But how many babies have now been killed, and still are, before they’re even born? Now, just pop a couple pills - just like getting rid of a headache, not a life. How many take their own lives because they’re told that’s better? How many spouses abused, elderly neglected, hatred spewed online? And we are not guiltless. How have we hurt others, how have we failed to love, failed to speak, to act, to care?

This is why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

Sir, we wish to see Jesus. We don’t want to see buildings fall, blood flowing, people dying. We want to see love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness . . . That’s what Jesus wants, too. It might have been really cool for those Greeks to get a private audience with Jesus, but Jesus had something else in mind. He wants to be seen, but not like that. He wants to be seen where all the hatred, violence, and death of the world clashes and collides with all the love, mercy, and grace of God, in a battle royale for the life - or death - of the world. For that’s what was on the line when Jesus ascended the cross. If He loses, there is only death. But if He wins, there is life.

So that’s where Jesus wishes to be seen. He is the one knocked down, He is the one who takes the bullet, He is the one stabbed, He is the one with hatred spewed against Him. And What does God do with all that hatred and violence and killing in our world? He does not do violence for violence, hate for hate, killing for killing. That’s what we do. What does God do? He takes it. All. Upon Himself. Into Himself. All the sin, all the shame, all the guilt of it, too. And all the sinful, hurtful, and hateful desires of our hearts and thoughts of our minds that never make it into words or deeds - He takes those, too, as if they did. So they’d be on Him and in Him and not on us. So that He would become sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21), and die for us, die in our place. And then rise to life again. Victorious. To give us that same life. To rescue us, save us, from our “common humanity.”

That’s why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

This day began, originated, because it was thought that a woman named Helena had found the cross that Jesus hung on. It was now legal to be a Christian and she wanted to find all those holy sites in Jerusalem and that region where all these things had taken place. Now, did she find the actual cross? I don’t know. Maybe.

But here’s what I do know: more important than us going back and finding Jesus’ cross, is Jesus’ cross being brought to us and finding us. Having a piece of wood won’t save you. What happened on it will. And when what happened on it is given to you. And when what happened on the cross is given to you, then the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and goodness of Jesus, that caused Him to do that for you, is also given to you and planted in your heart. That so justified and sanctified, we live not our “common humanity,” but Jesus. Not the old life, but a new life.

And so in the Holy Gospel, the cross finds you as you hear all that Jesus has done for you. And in Baptism, the cross finds you. You are joined to the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. All you do is given to Him, and all He did is given to you. And in the Absolution, the cross finds you as those words that Jesus spoke while hanging there with your sins are spoken to you: Father, forgive them (Luke 23:34). And He does, and you are. Forgiven. And in the Supper, the cross finds you as the Body and Blood that once hung there is now given to you. Not a dead body and blood, but a risen, glorified Body and Blood, that you be raised and glorified, too. And not just someday in the future, but already now. Living not our “common humanity,” but love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

That’s why we need the holy cross and a Holy Cross Day.

When horrid events happen, like they did this week, or we saw this week, or remembered this week, we sometimes wonder: Doesn’t that person have a conscience? Well, yes, they do. But it is a conscience that has been seared, a conscience that has been malformed - a conscience fallen in sin that is so warped that it thinks evil is good and good is evil, that darkness is light and light is darkness. And that’s not new. The prophet Isaiah spoke that some 700 years before Jesus (Isaiah 5:20). We need our consciences formed by the Word of God, and raised to know what is good and what is light, in a world constantly trying to catechize us the other way.

So what we need in our world is not a hard turn to the left or a hard turn to the right but a hard turn to the cross. And not only to see Jesus there, where He wants to be seen, but to die there with Him. To repent. That my thoughts, words, deeds, and desires have been soiled with sin. And then to be raised with Him in the forgiveness of my sins to live a new life.

For that’s how the victory is won.

Which sounds stupid to a dying world, fighting for survival. It did in Paul’s day, too. The word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, he wrote. Survival is not laying down your life for others, but demanding or forcing them to do so for you! But if there is any victory in that, it is short lived. As short as until someone does that to you. And on and on it goes until there is no one left - or only one left: satan. After he destroys all that God created.

So God did it differently. He sent His Son. Was that stupid? The world thinks so. But the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. The empty tomb shows us that. Where what looked like defeat was turned into victory.

Which is why we can now look at the cross, the holy cross, on a Holy Cross Day, and not see defeat and shame, but victory and glory! And see a God who is not only filled with, but is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, and goodness hanging there for us. And that is why that therefore is where He draws all people to Himself. Gods who promise you the world are a dime a dozen. Only one laid down His life for you. So that by looking at Him there, like the people of Israel looked at the bronze serpent, the venomous bites of the evil one not kill us, but that we have life.

A life that you can, now, without fear, lay down for others. Because in Jesus, you have a life that cannot end. It may in this world, and it will, one day, somehow, maybe peacefully, maybe not. But no matter. Because it will then continue in the next. And not because you found Jesus or His cross, but because Jesus and His cross found you. We saw that faith this week, and I see it here, too. Faith to lay down your life and serve your spouse, your children, your friends, even your enemies. Even when its hard. Even when you don’t really want to. Is that foolish? Crazy? Stupid? Some would say so. But we know better. We know that is better. Jesus.

And that’s why, for us, every day is a Holy Cross Day.

In the Name of the Father, and of the (+) Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Now the peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Amen.