Thoughts which drag me back to Jesus, and to the Cross…

“Then I heard the Lord’s voice, saying, “Whom can I send? Who will go for us?” So I said, “Here I am. Send me!” Then the Lord said, “Go and tell this to the people: ‘You will listen and listen, but you will not understand. You will look and look, but you will not learn.’ Make the minds of these people dumb. Shut their ears. Cover their eyes. Otherwise, they might really understand what they see with their eyes and hear with their ears. They might really understand in their minds and come back to me and be healed.”” (Isaiah 6:8–10, NCV)

If, in view of something apparently more important, we push God to one side in order to give precedence above all else to the happiness of the human person, we do not thereby become more free to establish right order in the world, but rather lose the standard and eventually come to despise mankind. Only one who regards humanity from God’s perspective is capable of loving mankind. Only one who knows God can love mankind—even the most wretched, the weakest, the defenseless, the battered, the unborn, the inept. That is why the “Hear, O Israel” stands irremovably at the beginning of all our ways.

Now, this is Christ. I see him hanging on the cross, not beautiful, nor greatly honored; but I see him hanging in disgrace, like a murderer and malefactor; thus, reason must say that he is cursed before God. The Jews believed this to be true and they could only consider him the most cursed of all men before God and the world.
Moses had to set up a serpent of brass, which looked like the fiery serpents, but did not bite, nor harm any one; it rather saved the people. Thus, Christ also has the form and the appearance of a sinner, but has become my salvation; his death is my life; he atones for my sins and takes away from me the wrath of the Father. If man believes that the death of Christ has taken away his sin, he becomes a new man. The carnal, natural man cannot believe that God will gratuitously take away and forgive us all our sins. Reason argues: You have sinned, you must also atone for your sin. The gospel of Christ says: You have sinned, another must atone for you. Our works are nothing; but faith in Christ does it all

I have see Social Media blow up over the opening of the Olympic Games in France.  I have seen a lot of fear, a lot of hatred, a of condemnation. Because they took license (in both meanings of the words) with a man’s depiction of the Last Supper.

But what should the church expect from people who do not know God? What should we expect from that part of humanity that is “wretched, weak, defenseless (against evil and temptation) battered by sin, etc. I think the fact the church has a different expectation of the world is sadder than the world’s attempt to mock the church.

But the world needs to learn a lesson about how to mock, how to completely pervert something, for it can only take what is good, and try to make it look evil. It has no power to take what seems evil and make it good. That’s why Isaiah says they have no clue, as they refuse to listen to God. For if they had, they would flip things from bad to good….as Jesus does.

Consider Luther’s point about the serpent – the one who delivers the judgment for rebellion against God.  God mocks Saan there, by using the image of the serpent that causes such pain and death- to bring healing and life. The difference is God’s serpent didn’t bite us, it bit death.

The same with Christ on the cross. A hideous form of torture, an unbelievable amount of pain, as one hangs on the tree – accursed because of sin.. not his own, like other criminals and rebels, but ours. And so the church mocks sin, Satan death, and the world by preaching Christ crucified – earing crosses and crucifixes–parading them before the entire world… shattering the world and perverting the world sense of justice, by punishing the Innocent One in a humiliating, ugly, and traumatic way.

The irony of the Cross is its brutality, its horror, it injustice leads to perfection, to holiness. The irony of the cross is His death leads to eternal life. Its irony is that what sought to permanently divide us from God, eternally united us to God.

And those who think they mocked the church, those that think they were deliberate profane, we pray that they understand the irony, and find the hope in Christ Jesus, and in His sacraments.

Ratzinger, Joseph. 1992. Co-Workers of the Truth: Meditations for Every Day of the Year. Edited by Irene Grassl. Translated by Mary Frances McCarthy and Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press.

Luther, Martin, and John Sander. 1915. Devotional Readings from Luther’s Works for Every Day of the Year. Rock Island, IL: Augustana Book Concern.