The Way of the Cross, Part 2

In part 1, we discussed the way of the cross as the path of suffering and learned that Jesus invites us into that. You see, he did not live a life of suffering so I can somehow live a life in direct opposition to what he teaches. 

A Place Ordained

It is possible, you know. Thomas Jefferson was not the only one who cut out the parts of Scripture that he didn’t like. Instead of cutting out the miraculous Jesus, as he did, we want to cut out the parts that talk about the suffering aspects of discipleship. And out of that, we accept a gospel that causes us, when things go badly, not to say, “Not my will, but thine be done, O Lord; give me the grace to live in it” but instead to ask the question, “What have I done wrong?”

This implies that somehow, bad things happen because of an act of retribution on God’s part, as opposed to him using all things to shape and conform me into the image of his Son. And in that great place of deep stability, even in the midst of the worst that is happening, what is being imparted into us is the great truth Paul says when he tells us that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our Lord (see Rom. 8:38-39).

Yet it was the will of the Lord to bruise him, it says in Isaiah 53. So it’s not that I come to the cross in admiration, although I do. I come in awe and in holy fear. But I also come to the cross because that’s my place. It is the place that has been ordained for me and for all who call upon the name of the Lord: to know the drops of blood, cleansing my soul. 

A Pain Embraced

And out of that, being able to stand, knowing that by the Holy Spirit, he in fact crosses over with me to embrace even the deep places of this world’s pain. I can’t somehow see myself as in a kind of special relationship that somehow inures me from life’s difficulty, but instead know God is calling me, in the midst of life’s difficulty, to step up. He calls me to be there, even in the places of deepest political, social conflict, to stand there and declare the love that will not let us go, and that anything less than that is to use the cross as a place to hide out. 

Sometimes we need a place to hide out. But it’s only temporary. It is only meant to be a place of refreshing. So in that place, we rediscover again. Our feelings, as it were, catch up. And we begin to discover again that he is true: “I will never leave you or forsake you” (Heb. 13:5b). And so we take a breath, we receive again, the great promise of the power of the Holy Spirit, and out we go. 

So come, brothers and sisters. Come into this place where we allow the definitions of love and life and fatherhood and friendship to be redefined according to the death and the resurrection of Jesus. So that we see with Jesus’ eyes and ask him to help us to see what it means to walk in the way of the cross, to find that place as the way of peace. 

A Purpose Released

Because you see, to enter that place where we know the cross by virtue of what Jesus has done to us is to release through us a level of purpose, a level of capacity, even for suffering. The capacity to be able to not look to my own interests, but to somehow be available for the life of the world, Jesus’ life flowing through us in a way that touches the people who are so hungry for it but often think they are the least deserving.

So come, ignore your fear. Let your world be turned upside down. Find life and peace on his terms, not yours. Let the expanse and power of his suffering light a fire within you. 

 “Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace.” Amen.

How has the way of the cross changed you? Share this blog and your response on Twitter. Please include my username, @revgregbrewer. 

(This post is an adaption of Bishop Brewer’s Good Friday sermon on March 30, 2018, at St. Luke’s Cathedral, Orlando, Florida.) 

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

PHOTO: Barry MacCoy, St. Barnabas, DeLand