Today we celebrate the Exultation of the Holy Cross and tomorrow Our Lady of Sorrows!
With their patience worn out by the journey, the people complained against God and Moses,
“Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert, where there is no food or water? We are disgusted with this wretched food!”
In punishment the LORD sent among the people saraph serpents,
which bit the people so that many of them died. Then the people came to Moses and said,
“We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you. Pray the LORD to take the serpents from us.”
So Moses prayed for the people, and the LORD said to Moses, “Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and if any who have been bitten look at it, they will live.”
Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole,
and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent
looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.
Brothers and sisters: Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness;
and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death,
even death on a cross.
Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name
that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Jesus said to Nicodemus: “No one has gone up to heaven
except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man.
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”
For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through him.
I really like these readings: the first reading and the Gospel tie in together. In the 1st reading the people were complaining about what they no longer had, rather then the miracle that God was caring for them, and feeding them in the desert. Don’t we many times grumble rather then give thanks to God!? i.e. when it is hot we want it to be cold or at least cooler, when it is cold we want it to be hot.!
God the Father hears the complaining and punishes the people. The people realized their sin and asked Moses to pray to God for them (intercession prayer), God heard and answered. It is an interesting answer; God instructs Moses to make a bronze serpent and mount it on a poll and when the person who was bitten looks at it he lived. Notice God didn’t say worship the serpent!
Some people say we worship statues, yet here in scripture God instructs a statue to be made, but not worshiped.
Tie in to the Gospel: The serpent was a prelude to Jesus and His redemption! “The son of man will be lifted up…”
The 2nd reading speaks plainly of the Exultation of the Holy Cross! Of the humility and obedience of Christ the 2nd person of the Blessed Trinity to God. As it says in this scripture every knee will bend, when we go into our pew we first bend the knee, called genuflection to Jesus present in the Tabernacle!
I also like to contemplate the words “every knee shall bend”. Not just the Catholic knee or the Christian knee, but every knee! Not just on earth but in heaven and under the earth. I remember my dad used to say that at mid night on Christmas Eve the animals all bend the knee at the birth of Jesus. I have always loved the image in my mind of all the animals bending their knee right along with us in worship of Jesus our Lord!
I would also like to share a few of my thoughts on the cross; we all have a cross, no matter what our vocation in life, be it Priest, Religious Brother or Sister, Single or Married Laity. We all look upon the cross to be able to carry our own cross, to be able to “exchange it someday for a crown”! (From An old rugged Cross)
I was thinking about how people tend to say, especially when we are complaining, “God never promised you a rose garden”. Well sometimes I think differently. Maybe He did promise us a rose garden! If you have ever seen high grade rose bushes they have huge thorns! The kind of thorns you have to wear gloves while pruning, and still have to be careful of how you touch it to prune, cut a long stem rose. If you are not careful these thorns go into your finger and make it bleed! So with the beauty of a rose garden there is pain! So I sometimes think He may have promised a rose garden because with the pain of the cross comes the glory of the Lord!
While Our Lady is Queen Mother, she has 7 Sorrows, which we see when we celebrate Our Lady of Sorrows tomorrow!
Have a Blessed week!
Catherine Nagl
