A Homily for the Exaltation of the Cross
Glory to Jesus Christ!
Jesus calls to Himself the multitude with his disciples. Jesus calls you who are gathered here this Sunday with the monks. Jesus speaks this Sunday equally to each of us present here, big or small, with the same words. What does Jesus say? “Set yourself as goal to come after Me. The first prerequisite is that you deny yourself, that means the first prerequisite is that you say “no” to
every preoccupation, every attachment, every pleasure you may have... in relationship with another human person, or in relationship with an animal or in relationship with a material object.
"Still then it is not enough if you wish to come after me: before I invite you to follow me there is a second, additional, prerequisite to satisfy: take up your cross, that means take on your shoulders alone to bear whatever is troublesome in your life, be it your anxieties, be it those mental and physical handicaps you have, be it this or that brother or sister who is bothering you right now in one way or another, be it the limited number of days left for you on this earth before you are carried to the cemetery,..." Jesus is saying, "do not drag any such troubles along, carry them willingly, carry them meaningfully as your prerequisite for your desired happiness."
A few verses after today’s Gospel, Jesus gives two model persons: John the Baptist who suffered grievously and was treated with contempt, and likewise the Son of Man, Jesus Himself, whose tribulations unto the Cross are the story of the Gospels. St Paul says today: my lot is to be co-crucified with Christ. In the daily ritual of our monastic community, we read of men and women whose lives leave no doubt that they have been co-crucified with Christ. In summary, Jesus announces today: “Two prerequisites are asked of you - to deny yourself and to take up your cross - two prerequisites and then comes the time when I will call out to you: “follow me”. If this is the truth, and I believe that it is the truth, it is most evident that I have never heard Jesus say: “follow me”!
I, though a monk for close to 40 years, am far from being able to say as St Paul: “It
is not I who live, but Christ who lives in me”. Why am I so drastically missing of these prerequisites? St. Paul today adds that essentially, I am missing faith in the one who loves me and has delivered Himself up to the Cross for my sake. So what am I to do? Will I open up, here and now, to Jesus loving me and delivered up to the Cross for my sake? I am not to despair, rather, moment after moment, to start over to profess faith that Jesus can save me, that He can save me in a way that is not measured by any abundance of my failures, but measured only by his love for me, love which comes from before the creation of the world.
Jesus may even have in store for me and a couple others that we see His Glory within a few hours,
as a few hours after today’s gospel, Peter, John and James saw Jesus’ conversing in glory with Moses and Elijah and then came down again from the Mount of the Holy Transfiguration. This would be a very special privilege which I am in no way to expect. For me and for all of us there is the call, here and now, to faith that Jesus loves me and is delivered up to the Cross for my personal sake. I receive the call not to rely on any works of this earth to attain the only necessary thing, to solely rely on acts of faith in Jesus to reach the happiness that I truly thirst for. There is nothing automatic in this choice, only free opening up of my heart to Jesus’ Divine mysterious Presence now in this temple, now in this Divine Liturgy.
All these icons on the walls are Jesus calling: “open your heart to me”. We stand and sing during this Divine Liturgy: so we engage in the activity of opening our hearts and minds to Jesus in His Mystery. Everything else is secondary. Everything else is transitory, I drop it out as soon as it has lead me back to focus on the Divine Liturgy of this day. I waste no time engaged in other activities, I am dead to them, I detach myself from them. We are so lucky, we monks to have bells resounding during our days, calling out to us: “Detach yourself! Detach yourself from whatever you are doing! Go to the Temple to pray with your brothers!" I recommend that each of you have in your homes a little bell, even if you live alone, and to ring the bell, and to hear it say to you: “Detach! Detach yourself from whatever you are doing and come, give yourself to
prayer, to faith that Jesus loves me and has delivered Himself up to the Cross for my sake!"
This is the Sunday of the Exaltation of Jesus on the Cross that has brought salvation to the world, this is the Sunday recalling the most important moment of history concerning our own lives, this is the Sunday recalling that we are to be reborn from above. Jesus has given us a mother from whom we are to be reborn. He says to her from the Cross: “Woman! Here is your son, here is your daughter, to be reborn from you.”
Glory to Jesus Christ!
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