Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Congratulations with the feast of the Resurrection of the Lord, as well as the leave-taking of the Nativity of the Most-Holy Theotokos!

Today during the Divine Liturgy we heard three Epistle as well as three Gospel readings. One of the Gospel readings is assigned to be read on the Sunday before the Elevation of the Cross. In this excerpt, we heard a small part of the much longer nocturnal conversation of our Saviour with His secret disciple, the old Pharisee Nicodemus.

This excerpt should help us to correctly prepare for and, later, understand the essence of the feast of the Elevation of the Cross. When we see the Cross, perhaps the first things that come to mind are the awful suffering, the death, and the extreme humility of Jesus Christ. The humanity of the Lord is shown in the most dramatic manner, for there is nothing more common to the race of man than suffering and death.

From the first words of today’s Gospel reading we hear that the Lord Jesus Christ is not simply a person. He is also the One that was in heaven, and although He came to earth He has remained nonetheless in heaven; that is, Jesus Christ is at the same time both man and God. This gives Him the ability to speak not only of worldly things, but also about heavenly, about Divine things, with authority. After such an introduction, Jesus begins to teach about the Cross and His voluntary death for the sake of the salvation of all the believers. Without a doubt, it was difficult for a righteous Jew to accept that the Messiah came not only to the Jews, but to all of mankind, and not for the purpose of creating an earthly Jewish kingdom, but to save all the faithful from sin and death. For Nicodemus, as is also the case with us, it was hard to understand that the Saviour would accomplish all of this through the humiliating death on the Cross. To prove this, the Saviour leads his thoughts to the familiar Old Testament and reminds him of the brass serpent, thus showing that His death on the Cross was foretold in ancient times.

In the penultimate verse from today’s Gospel reading, we heard that God the Father so loved the world that He gave His beloved and only Son to die on the Cross for the salvation of this world. John Chrysostom comments on this verse thus: “What He saith, is of this kind: Marvel not that I am to be lifted up that ye may be saved, for this seemeth good to the Father, and He hath so loved you as to give His Son for slaves, and ungrateful slaves. Yet a man would not do this even for a friend, nor readily even for a righteous man.” In the final verse of today’s excerpt, Christ says that He came to save the world, not to judge it. The first coming of God amongst man was for the sake of his salvation, while the second coming will be to judge all men.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, tomorrow evening the Cross will be brought to the centre of our church. We, seeing His outstretched hands, will draw near to Him and piously bow down before the image of our crucified, tortured, and killed Saviour. How difficult it is, perhaps even impossible, to understand with our worldly minds how it is possible that Christ has bestowed salvation upon us through suffering and death. How difficult it is to accept that we also are called to humbly and calmly carry our sorrows. We very much fight against doing this, but we have to accept it, for this is the will of God. Today’s Gospel reading, the words of our Saviour, the incarnate God, bear witness to this. Therefore, let us be humble, let us calmly accept all those sorrows that appear in our lives, let us repent of our sins. In such a way, through God’s grace, we will be justified and receive from Him eternal life.

priest Alexis