The Cross of the Lord is a Sign of Our Faith
Sunday Before the Exaltation of the Holy Cross
Galatians 6:11-18; John 3:13-17
In the Gospel passage we have just read, it is written,
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16).
So, out of love for the world He created, here we must understand - for people, God sent His Son Jesus Christ, “that the world might be saved through Him”. We must always remember that God not only created the world, not only created people in His image, but also cares for them. But people are not thoughtless creatures; God created them and endowed them with a living soul, mind, various senses, and will, so they cannot be saved mechanically; they must consciously express a desire and aspiration for salvation. After all, God the Creator gave people the freedom of choice:
“He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” (Jhn. 3:18)
A little later, Christ expressed the same truth in other words:
“He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” (Jhn. 3:36).
The evangelist Mark conveys a similar but even more expressive definition of Christ:
“He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.” (Mark 16:16)
From these explications of Christ, it is quite clear that people do not receive salvation mechanically or automatically, that salvation does not come to all people, but only those people will be saved who consciously manifest their faith in God the Creator and His Son whom He sent.
From the very beginning of the appearance of the Son of God on earth, from His birth in the body of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the forces of evil, people possessed by evil spirits and evil intentions, tried to prevent His mission of salvation. King Herod's killing of babies in the surrounding area of Bethlehem, Judas' betrayal, the conspiracy of the chief priests and scribes "to destroy Him" (Luke 19:47) -- all these are the actions of the evil spirit, the actions of the devil through people possessed by him to hinder the plan of God's salvation.
It is also important to understand, to recognize the devil's cunning: it was easy to kill Jesus; it could have been done from around the corner by some hired assassin. But the chief priests and elders of the Jews were aware that such a murder would not turn the people away from Jesus, that His followers would remain. Therefore, according to their cunning plan, they had to dishonour Jesus as much as possible, to humiliate him so that the people would reject him.
Thus, it was necessary not only to kill Jesus Christ, but to crucify Him on the cross, to crucify Him in the company of robbers and thieves, so that He would die the most humiliating death of a slave, so that the people would reject Him and His memory would be forgotten. The chief priests were well aware of the Old Testament saying that “he who is hanged [on a tree] is accursed of God.” (Deuteronomy 21:22,23; Galatians 3:13)
It is sad that some Christians also fight with this Old Testament argument, advocating the wishes of the chief priests and scribes. We must not forget that when the crowd shouted,
“Crucify, crucify Him!” - it was at the behest of the same people who were possessed by an evil spirit, the devil, to humiliate and denigrate the Son of God.
And here God performed the greatest miracle, which the devil's servants did not expect. Those who sought truth and salvation in God turned away from those who had cunningly prepared the crucifixion of Jesus Christ on the cross in the company of robbers, and turned their attention with love to the cross of Christ and glorified the crucified Jesus Christ, glorifying His cross.
From being a sign of shame and humiliation, the cross became a sign, symbol, and weapon of salvation; the cross embraced all who sought salvation in God. The Lord God showed the “wondrous miracle” that the prophet Isaiah had proclaimed (29:14):
“…behold, I will again do a marvelous work Among this people, A marvelous work and a wonder; For the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, And the understanding of their prudent men shall be hidden.”
And the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, after His glorious entry into Jerusalem, prophesied:
“And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself.” (Jhn. 12:32)
And in the Gospel passage read today, Christ's prediction is also cited:
“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.” (Jhn. 3:14)
Elevated, crucified on the cross, Jesus Christ sanctified that cross with His blood, and the cross, with the crucified Son of God, became God's power, the weapon of salvation, and the sign of our faith - faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour.
The Apostle Paul, the greatest missionary of the Church of Christ, who preached about the crucified and risen Christ, who preached the Gospel of Christ in many places where people had not heard of the one God, who founded many churches that exist to this day, who had much to boast about, yet he, as we have heard today from his Epistle to the Galatians, said:
“But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)
And as a sign of our faith in Jesus Christ, as a sign that we belong to Christ, we bear the sign of the cross from the moment we are baptized,
“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”. (Matthew 28:19)
With the sign of the cross, we sanctify our intentions, our beginnings, and express our gratitude to God. We begin and end our prayer with the sign of the cross as the seal of our faith.
On the buildings dedicated to prayer to God, on our churches, we place a cross on top, and with this sign we declare and testify without words to our faith in the crucified and risen Christ.
We mark the books of our faith, prayer books, with a cross on the cover to testify that these books are dedicated to our faith in Christ-Saviour.
Amen.
Very Rev. Fr. Taras Slavchenko
Taras Slavchenko was born on March 8, 1918 in Nikopol, Dnipropetrovsk region in Ukraine. After graduating from school and the Pedagogical College, he entered the language and literature faculty of the Scientific Pedagogical Institute. Having successfully completed it in 1938, he served as a teacher in a secondary school.
