The Feast of the Holy Cross -- 14 September 2008

"The Holy Cross"

The Rev. Stephen Elkins-Williams

And I, when I am lifted up, will draw all men to myself.

Today is Holy Cross Day, our parish feast. In fact when Bishop Levi Ives consecrated the chapel 160 years ago next month, he named us the Chapel of the Holy Cross. Inexplicably the “holy” never stuck, and whether for reasons of humility or brevity, we have been the Chapel of the Cross ever since! (There is no “holy” at the Chapel of the Cross…)

While the origins of this feast, by at least the seventh century, have to do with the legendary finding of the true cross and later its recovery after being stolen by the Persians for fifteen years, the assigned scripture readings point us more to the meaning of the cross. On it, Jesus, who had emptied himself to become human and to serve others, “became obedient unto death.” Through it, he freed us from the bonds of sin and death and reconciled us with the Father. The cross has become the symbol not only of Jesus’ death and triumphant resurrection – that is the implication of the cross itself without a facsimile of Jesus’ body on it, that Jesus lives and dies no more. But it has also become the symbol of our discipleship, that we are to serve Jesus by taking up our cross and following him, that, in the words of the Prayer Book, God has made “the way of the cross to be the way of life.”

We are fortunate in this parish, through our name, to be constantly reminded of these two realities. Every time we say “The Chapel of the Cross,” we acknowledge, consciously or not, the central mystery of life and of our faith: that Jesus through his death and rising to new life overcame both physical and spiritual death. Using the very tangible symbol of a rough-hewn cross, two pieces of wood connected together to support Jesus in his ignominious death, we proclaim the larger reality of Jesus’ once-for-all, life-changing victory. When he was lifted up from the earth on the hard wood of the cross, he did draw all of us to himself, uniting us to that victory.

In our frequent saying of our parish name then, we also recognize our identity as followers of Jesus: those who also embrace the cross and look for new life and grace to come through the metaphorical and actual dying in our lives. Rather than simply serving ourselves and accumulating as much as we can, we live that God may empty us out and fill us with himself that we may serve others. As members of the Chapel of the Cross, we try, individually and communally, to live into our name, and to support one another in doing so.

All this is a very positive reality for us. It does not ignore or diminish the constant presence of deep pain and suffering and death in the world or the imminent threat of it. But the proclamation of the cross does establish the limits of these divine and human enemies and encourages us to place our ultimate trust in God’s unconquerable love.

That is why this is a joyous feast and why joy is to be the normal state of the Christian. The cross culminates in the deep gladness of Jesus’ resurrection and encourages us to live out of its profound perspective.

Last Sunday morning, many of you packed the church during the educational hour for our intergenerational church school gala kickoff. After a biblical skit about Samuel, who was ready for God to send him, the celebration continued with a parade of saints, all joyfully sung about. Many staff members, children, and other parishioners – in character and in costume – processed to the music into our midst: Moses and Paul, Luther and Calvin, Bach and Tutu, Martin Luther King and Mother Teresa and John the Twenty-third. Finally, outshining them all came an almost unrecognizable, densely bearded David Frazelle as the leaping and dancing Jesus! In his striped robe and bare feet, he cavorted freely between the choir pews. Then, dashing and leaping high from the top of the steps down into the center aisle, he led the parade of saints through the congregation and presumably into the world, ready to serve others and to spread God’s Good News.

The next day a parishioner marveled at the exuberant performance and said to me, “I would like to hear the theology behind such a portrayal of Jesus!” Well here it is!

The dancing of course is metaphorical for the rhythms and events of life, as in the folk hymn, “The Lord of the Dance.” “I danced in the morning when the world was begun, and I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun; I came down from heaven and I danced on earth, at Bethlehem I had my birth. Dance then wherever you may be. I am the Lord of the dance said he.” The movement and the energetic gracefulness of dance provide a creative metaphor to express God’s purposeful action in the world. And in that context, Jesus’ euphoric, dynamic movements last Sunday embodied the deep joy of overcoming sin and death and restoring everyone throughout history to unity with God and with one another. Love in the person of Jesus, God’s embodied Word of love, has truly conquered all. And we as redeemed children of that God of love are called to take up our cross and to follow him, loving and serving others.

There are pictures from last Sunday’s celebration pinned to a poster board in the dining room. One of them captures our dancing Jesus, leaping high in the air, his feet amazingly on a level with the height of the choir pews. That is a picture I now carry in my mind as I hear Jesus’ words, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.” First Jesus was lifted up on the cross, and then having “humbled himself and [become] obedient unto death,” he is forever lifted high in joyful resurrected triumph, drawing us all to himself and to that exhilarating level.

So, happy feast day, Chapel of the Cross! Treasure your heritage and embrace your exalted mission. Take up your cross and joyfully follow Jesus.

Philippians 2:5-11; John 12:31-36a