9781644135945

The Time After Pentecost
His whole life was one conscious and voluntary progress toward death on the cross. “For which
cause God also hath exalted Him and hath given Him a name which is above all names; that in
the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the
earth; and that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God
the Father” (Epistle). Even according to His sacred humanity He now shares with the Father
the ruling of the world. “Thou alone art the Lord. Thou alone art most high, O Jesus Christ,
together with the Holy Ghost in the glory of God the Father” (Gloria).
Jesus Christ our Savior was humbled on the cross, but He was also exalted through the
cross. “It behooves us to glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom is our salvation,
life, and resurrection; by whom we are saved and delivered” (Introit). Through the Cross
we obtain the forgiveness of our sins, the fullness of God’s grace, union with Christ, and
the fullness of the Holy Ghost, who is poured out in our hearts. Through the Cross our acts
become fruitful, our prayers and sacrifices become meritorious, our hope and faith in the
eternal promises become firm. The Cross should be more dear to us than anything on this
earth, and we should cling to it faithfully.
“And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all things to Myself. Now this He said,”
adds St. John, “signifying what death He should die” (Gospel). “Now shall the prince of this
world be cast out” (Gospel). Through Christ’s death on the cross the power of Satan was broken.
Everyone who belongs to the kingdom of Christ, to the Church, possesses the power to
escape from the power of Satan and sin. Grace flows to him steadily from Christ on the cross.
“And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all things to Myself.” Through His
death on the cross, Christ has become the King and center of all hearts. The force of His
love as exhibited on the cross conquers the hearts of men. The grace which He merited
through His death is so powerful that it can sway and control the strongest will. Through
the sermon which He preached from the cross, Christ conquered the world. To those
who are not Christ’s, the cross is foolishness; but to the elect it is a sign of power. “For the
word of the cross to them indeed that perish is foolishness; but to them that are saved, . . .
it is the power of God. For it is written: I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the
prudence of the prudent I will reject. Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? . . . Hath
not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For seeing that in the wisdom of God
the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of our preaching
[of the cross] to save them that believe. For both the Jews require signs, and the Greeks
seek after wisdom. But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews indeed a stumbling
block and unto the Gentiles foolishness; but unto them that are called, both Jews and
Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor 1:18–24). Therefore
the Apostle, the Church, and the true servant of the Lord know nothing “but Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. . . . That your faith might not stand on the wisdom of men, but on the
power of God” (1 Cor 2:2, 5).
In the Cross is our salvation; in the Cross is life; in the Cross is our protection against the
enemy; in the Cross is the strength of the spirit and the progress of holiness. There is no other
way to life, no other way to the heights of perfection, except the Cross. “If I be lifted up from
the earth [I] will draw all things to Myself.” Woe to those who seek another Christ, a Christ
who was not crucified. “But God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ; by whom the world is crucified to me and I to the world” (Gal 6:14).
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