Dear Brothers and Sisters,
We celebrate the feast of the Exultation of the Cross this Sunday, which is an enormous gift for us. How can we exalt such a torturous death, which is what crucifixition was. It is still used today in some countries in the East to crucify Christians. So why does the Church on this date celebrate it as something good. There is a song that says, “The Glorious Cross of the Risen Lord is the tree of my salvation.” Thanks to this instrument of torture, we have been saved. These are not just pretty words. This is the greatest thing that can happen to a man: he encounters salvation through the Cross. The cross is glorious, because Christ has conquered death, which is something you and I cannot do.
Look how the devil deceives Adam and Eve in the garden of paradise. He lies to them; he betrays them and makes them believe that God does not love them. He insinuates that if God loved them, he would leave you free to eat whatever you wanted. He would not limit you. But if he has forbidden you to eat from this tree, you are not free. Therefore, he does not love you. He envies you and he knows that if you eat from this tree of knowledge, you will be like him, and he does not want you to be God. These are all lies that the devil tells us at some point in our life. He is deceiving us when he says you can be the god of your life and do whatever you want and no one can tell you anything, right? Just be respectable, and an honest person and do whatever you want as long as you don’t hurt anyone and even if there is some collateral damage, it doesn’t matter. Don’t worry because the important thing is you. This is what the devil tells you constantly at home, at work, at school, and at the university.
The devil says that you are God, and he has deceived you and me. You have done whatever you wanted because you are God, and you thought you would be happy. Eve said the fruit was pleasing to the eye and looked good to eat. In other words, there was nothing wrong with what you did. Eve thinks it was only a prohibition from God and so she reinforces the lie of the devil. Therefore, I think that God does not love me because the apple looks good to me. If God forbids it and I see it as something good, then it means that God doesn’t love me. This is the logic the devil uses on Eve, and she uses it on Adam. We think the same way. Is it good or bad because God says so or because the Church says so or is it good or bad because I decide if it is good or bad. We are in a society where each one chooses what is right and what is wrong. We are eating from the tree of good and evil. We choose what we want. If you are happy with this choice, you do it. When we cut ourselves off from God, we sin and that is why we see monstrous and horrific things in our society today. The killing of these children in a church, shooting a young father who is speaking at a college campus and many other things.
So, God has now deceived the devil in a wonderful way. He has taken revenge against him, saying, “You have deceived my children and now I am going to deceive you.” Do you know how he deceived the devil: through the cross. God has deceived the devil in the cross because the devil thought he could destroy Christ on it. If the devil had known that Christ was going to rise…but he didn’t even suspect it; he had no idea, and he would not have let him enter because in order to destroy death, it was necessary for God himself, God himself, to enter death, and God died, he died for love of you. How great this is, brothers and sisters, and I am not saying anything heretical. He was three days in the tomb, Christ, the son of God, the same nature as the Father, true God and true man, rose on the third day. It is a great mystery. It is not that just Jesus the man died, but Jesus, true God and true man, died for you.
Three days dead and he resurrects; he conquers death, which is what the Church celebrates today and because of this wonderful event, we exalt him. This is God’s vengeance on the devil who tricked us. This is why the cross is the instrument that shows us the love of God. But you and I say that God does not love us. If he loved me, why did he give me these parents. If he loved me, my father would not have been a drunkard. If God loved me, I wouldn’t have this temper. If God loved me, my wife would change. If God loved me, my dad would not have abandoned me. If God loved me, that thing would not have happened to me when I was little. For all these reasons and more, we think God does not love me. If he loved me, he would have given me a different history, but he has given me this one; he has given me a cross. But the Lord has given you a cross to save you, not to crush you. The devil wants to crush you with the cross. He tells you that God does not love you. If he loved you, he would not have given you this cross, he would have given you a different father. But the Lord comes today to tell you on this feast of the exaltation of the cross that I love you. The cross that I have given you will help you to retaliate against the devil, who is trying to destroy your marriage, who is ruining the relationship with your father or with your kids, or making you think that illness is horrible. In all those things I will show my resurrection, I will conquer the death you face.
This is something wonderful that the Lord wants to do. I hope that you are listening, and this word is reaching your heart, because if not the words go in one ear and out the other. But if it touches your heart, your life is transformed. We see in the first reading how Moses intercedes for his people in the desert with the bronze serpent. There were tiny snakes who were biting the people because they were murmuring. They were like Adam and Eve and complained against God. When we murmur, we cut ourselves from God and we sin. They did recognize their sin and asked Moses to intercede for them and ask the Lord for help. The snakes, who are devils, come to bite us and destroy us. It is important for us to recognize our sins and then the Lord will come to us. If you do not see your sin, the Lord can’t do anything for you.
So, the Lord tells Moses to make a bronze serpent and mount it on the pole, like this cross here. Everyone who is bitten and looks at it will be saved. It is the antidote to the poison. Jesus said, “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.” He invites us to look at him. What does that mean to look at Christ on the cross? First of all, that you are a sinner and Jesus is there because of you. Think about your sins and think this is why Jesus is there on the cross. Take a few minutes and think about the worst sin you have committed, and you will know that Christ is giving his life for you. We should be on the cross, not Jesus. This is why the Church says to exult, to praise the cross because someone took my place. I should be there. But the Lord is there and so when you look at him, acknowledge your sin and more importantly we will not stay there. We will not be like Adam and Eve who were expelled from paradise. Then, you will see how much greater is God’s love than your sin.
This is why a true Christian does not look at the cross without weeping. Weep first because of your sin and second because of the great love Christ has for you. Have any of you ever cried for feeling loved? Has anyone loved you so much that it makes you cry? We cry not just because of sadness but also out of joy. It is beautiful to cry for joy. A Christian could not look at a cross without crying if he is truly a Christian. This is what we celebrate today: the love of the Lord in our loves without judging us or punishing us; instead, he says, I love you. He has open arms on the cross because his love is so great. He always welcomes us with open arms.
A priest I know tells this silly story, but it helps him a lot. When he enters the door of the church and sees the cross, he says, Lord, thank you for being there today. And every day he does the same thing. You think what nonsense; it is statue, of course, it is there; he is not coming down. But when you have a cross at home, look at it and the day you look at it and Christ is not there, throw yourself down and tremble because he got tired of you. But the cross in the church Jesus is still there, and it tells you, you are a mess, you treated people badly, you do whatever you want, but I still love you. Christ can’t stop loving you. And we can say, Lord, I am unfaithful, and I want to love as you love me. Thank you for being there on the cross and staying there for me.
When you walk through that door and you don’t see Christ on the cross then start to tremble. It is because he got tired of you, but I assure you he will always be on the cross and will always conquer death for you. I assure you that he will always conquer death and always love you.