“We Preach Christ Crucified!”

Lent II, Cycle B

March 16, 2003

The Rev. Dr. David M. Wendel

Saint Luke’s Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado

Lessons:  Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16;  Romans 4:13-25;  St. Mark 8:31-38

Trust me, there are many reasons why some pastors refuse to allow non-members to use their churches for weddings, but one of the top ten is that the bridal party is always wanting to rearrange things.  The bride, for example, wants to move the altar out to make room for a canopy.  The mother of the bride thinks it looks too cluttered with that big pulpit on the side.  The wedding co-ordinator has in mind a wonderful arch covered with ivy and gladiolas, right where the communion railing stands.  It’s bad enough when non-members come in to a church and want to move things around, as if the altar, pulpit and communion railing are just props.  It’s even worse when they want things removed due to poor theology!  A case in point, is a meeting I had with a bride to be, who wanted to get married at Saint Luke’s because her church worships in kind of a warehouse—a big multi-purpose facility that doesn’t look like a church.  So, she said, “I guess Sunday worship there is okay, but not for my wedding!”  So, after I gave her a copy of our wedding policy booklet, she said, “The only thing that really bothers me is that crucifix.  Can we take that out, because I don’t want people to think we worship Jesus on the cross.”  To which I answered, “But we do worship Jesus, crucified, and risen.  It’s not one or the other—it’s both.”  So, the answer was an emphatic, “NO”.  And  as I walked back to my study shaking my head in disbelief, I gave some thought to how we got into this situation where Christians are kind of like modern-day Peters, loving the glory of the resurrection, reveling in the good feeling and the positivism of Jesus raised from death, but when we think about Jesus’ suffering and death, when we’re called to face up to the fact that Jesus was nailed to a cross, and hung there until dead,  we’d just as soon rebuke Jesus, and forget it ever happened!

     In biblical times, there was nothing Jesus said that was more offensive or distasteful, than his talk about his own suffering and death.   The faithful had been waiting for centuries for the coming of the Son of Man, the Messiah who would come and rout God’s enemies, and establish God’s kingdom in Jerusalem, once and for all.  Every time a religious figure appeared on the scene, folks were looking and asking, “Is this the one?  Could this be the Messiah, come to save us from our enemies?”  There were high hopes when Jesus appeared, preaching and teaching and talking about himself, as the Son of Man.  The only problem was, he was preaching and teaching about this Son of Man undergoing great suffering, being rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the scribes, being killed, and after three days, rising.  Now, to us who know the whole story, the rising takes pre-eminence.  Maybe that’s why the rising is all people want to see today.  But in biblical times, for those first disciples, what they heard was that this Jesus, this Messiah, if that’s who he was, was to suffer and die.  The rising meant little, because before that, Jesus would have to die.  And Jesus never sugar-coated his dying.  Jesus never glossed over the suffering and the death on the cross.  He could have easily said something like, “I will live forever!  Yes, I will die, but focus on the life, and the living and the glory of forever!” That would’ve been a subtle twist, but it might have made the pill easier for the disciples to swallow.  Odd, isn’t it, that Jesus never softened his message, nor served it up, a la mode, to make it more palatable.  Even after hearing that Peter is put off by Jesus’ talk of suffering and death;  even after hearing that such talk bothered Peter, far from softening it up, for Peter, far from saying to Peter, “Now, now, don’t let it get you down—remember, it’s all going to turn out okay!”  Rather, Jesus’ answer to Peter is, “Get behind me, Satan!  For you are setting your mind not on divine things, but on human things!”  For Jesus, and for his followers, the death and the resurrection are inseparable.  The dying and the rising are two sides of the same coin, if you will—two sides that can not, and should not be separated.  The two are so intimately integrated, that Jesus says, “if you are unwilling to accept my suffering and death, then you are on the side, not of God, but of Satan!”

     And not only does Jesus affirm his own path to the cross, as being God’s will, listen to what Jesus says right after that.  He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.  For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life?”

    If you’ve never heard it before, then let me tell you now, this is what Dr. Martin Luther called, the theology of the cross.   It means, as simply as I can put it, that indeed, in this life, in this world, the cross is what it’s all about.  This life is not about glory, and ease, and living the high life.  This life is not about unbridled success, or doing whatever we want, or having only happy, good thing happen to us.  This life is about suffering and cross-bearing.  Luther wrote, in the Heidelberg Disputation, “That person does not deserve to be called a theologian who looks upon the invisible things of God as if God’s will were clearly perceptible in those things.  He deserves to be called a theologian, however, who comprehends the visible and manifest things of God, seen through suffering and the cross.”  In other words, we can’t know God, in God’s glory, any more than Moses could see God’s face, and live in the Old Testament.  God’s glory and majesty, are not for us to see, in this life, because we cannot understand or comprehend God, with human eyes and mind.  Instead, God has revealed himself to us in one way—in his suffering, sacrifice, death on the cross, and his resurrection to eternal life.  And God has laid out for us, only one way to live life that is full, free, and joy-filled—and that is the way of the cross.  That is taking up one’s own cross, whatever it might be, and following Jesus in the way of sacrifice and service.  That’s giving up one’s life for Jesus’ sake, and the sake of the gospel, and thereby finding what life is really all about—it’s about living for others.  It’s about loving God, and others.  It’s about serving God and others.  That’s what God has created life to be, and we find fulfillment, and satisfaction, when we are not pre-occupied with self, when we are not self-centered and self-absorbed, but self-giving.  We find fulfillment and satisfaction, when we are not focused on getting, getting, getting, but giving, giving, giving.  And Christ, on the cross, calls us to that life of sacrifice and service.  Christ, on the cross, is a visible proclamation of his own words, “If any want to be my followers, let them deny themselves, take up their cross and follow me!”

     Which is why, to go back to my original discussion of weddings, rather than hiding the crucifix in the sacristy during weddings, the couple might be better served, by putting it right there, right smack dab in front of the couple being married, as a reminder that Christian marriage is about, cross-bearing.  That Christian marriage is not about what I can get out of it, but what I can give to another—that Christian marriage is about giving oneself, totally, to another, in Christ-like love.  And that’s also why we have this crucifix right here, right in front, every Sunday—to be a visible reminder to each of us, as St. Paul writes in I Corinthians 1:23, “But we preach Christ crucified!”  For it is the word of the cross, that is folly to some, that is the power of God, for those of us who are being saved.  The power of God, for life and for living, is in the cross—in Christ crucified—in Christ, suffering and dying on the cross, for us and for our salvation.  In Christ, who calls us, still, today—especially today, to take up our cross, and follow him—to true life;  to real life, to eternal life. 

     In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.