In the name of God ☩ Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.
Today’s
Collect is at the heart of why the Church celebrates Holy Week. And I use that
word, “celebrate,” intentionally. We do more than mark or remember Holy Week,
we celebrate it, even if it is not as exuberant as a birthday party. Though the
focuses of Holy Week are betrayal, pain, suffering, and death, the point of
Holy Week is not to forget how this story ends. We continue to celebrate the
Eucharist which remains the victory feast of the Lamb and we continue to
proclaim and give thanks for his saving Death and glorious Resurrection until
he comes again.
And
this wonderful prayer helps us to see this reality – Jesus went not up to joy
but first, he suffered pain and entered not into glory before he was crucified.
This prayer does not deny that Holy Week culminates with the joy and glory of
the Easter Vigil, but it does not rush ahead in getting there. Instead, we
follow Jesus through Holy Week and see that the road that takes us to this
victory is that of pain and a cross.
So
often we like to take the shortcuts that lead us around the tough times. Call
it what you like: optimizing our situation, life-hacks, shortcuts, the easy
way, the point is that we structure our lives around avoiding uncomfortable and
difficult things. This Collect reminds us that, at the center of our faith, is
the story of Jesus who did not go around suffering, but rather went straight
through it.
Now,
why is this? The fourth-century Archbishop of Constantinople, Gregory of
Nazianzus, wrote: “For that which he has not assumed he has not healed; but
that which is united to his Godhead is also saved.” Jesus brings his
healing grace to all things, and so it is important that within the Trinity,
through the Incarnate Son, the human experiences of pain, rejection, betrayal, abandonment,
suffering, and death are experienced. There is nothing that we can go through that
God does not understand. And, therefore, there is nothing that we can experience
that is beyond God’s healing grace.
But
more than simply bringing these human experiences to God so that they might be
healed, this prayer goes further. It states that in walking the way of the
cross, we might “find it to be none other than the way of life and peace.” The
Cross is the way of life and peace. That seems to be completely wrong at first
glance. The Cross is about death, which is the opposite of life. And the Cross
is an instrument of pain used against political enemies, which is the opposite
of peace. So how is that we can say that the Cross is the way of life and
peace?
I’ll
turn to a phrase you’ve heard me use often because I think it so well conveys
the Christian life – “The people who bear crosses are working with the grain of
the universe.” Think of a piece of wood, there is a grain to it. If we
work with that grain, things will be smoother. It doesn’t mean it will be
perfect, sometimes there are knots in the wood, but we’re going in the
direction that we’re supposed to. Grace is that Jesus has shown us how to
follow him in going with the grain of love. But we are given freedom to choose
to go against the grain, which causes splintering and rough edges.
As
we know, love is wonderful and is the grain of the universe, it is the way
things ought to be. But love is not always easy. Love is open to pain, love is
vulnerable, love does not insist on or always get its own way. Going with this
grain of love will sometimes put on a collision course with the forces of Sin
and Death which insist on cutting against the grain.
Love
though is the way that leads through these pains and into Resurrection life.
That is the way that Jesus went, and so in following him, we walk that road
into eternal life and into the peace which passes all understanding. As counterintuitive
as it may be, the way of the Cross really is the way of life and peace because
it is the trail that has been blazed by the Lord of life and the Prince of
Peace.
This
week, with the Cross as our guide, pay attention to the unexpected things in
life and in the Scriptures we hear, for that is often the path on which God works.
Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he
suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified:
Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the cross, may find it
none other than the way of life and peace; through the same thy Son
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
