Believe it!\u00c2\u00a0 “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up their cross, and follow me”.\u00c2\u00a0 Whoever- that’s you and I, not just Jesus and his disciples some 2000 years ago, but you and I, right here and now.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
For most people, the name of the game is to avoid the cross.\u00c2\u00a0 People will go out of their way to avoid pain, confrontation, suffering, and taking a stand that makes them unpopular.\u00c2\u00a0 Possibly because they don’t recognize that it is their cross.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jeremiah is a good example of a person who recognized his cross.\u00c2\u00a0 His cross was to bear witness to the Word of God- to be a prophet.\u00c2\u00a0 But he didn’t want to do it, because his prophecy was not popular. \u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0It frightened and threatened the establishment.\u00c2\u00a0 And so, he had to shout it out, over the protests of his people.\u00c2\u00a0 Jeremiah knew he would be abused if he spoke up.\u00c2\u00a0 But, Jeremiah could feel the urging of the Lord.\u00c2\u00a0 It was a strong urge, one that kept haunting him.\u00c2\u00a0 And so, he embraced his cross, and spoke up anyway.\u00c2\u00a0 We find out later that he was thrown into a cistern- a well, and abandoned to die.\u00c2\u00a0 So, suffer he did before he was finally rescued by the king.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now I know that all of you want to follow Jesus.\u00c2\u00a0 But what exactly can you and I do about your crosses?\u00c2\u00a0 Well, first, recognize your cross.\u00c2\u00a0 Then, embrace it, don’t run away from it.\u00c2\u00a0 Clearly, the word “cross” here is a symbol.\u00c2\u00a0 It doesn’t mean being dragged up a hillside and hung on a physical cross.\u00c2\u00a0 It does mean many other things, among which are:\u00c2\u00a0 Following God’s will for you, not your own desires; or being satisfied with the life you’ve been give, and not being bitter that you don’t have another kind of life.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
If your cross is something the Lord is calling you to do- like Jeremiah was called to be a prophet, don’t keep putting it aside and avoiding it.\u00c2\u00a0 We have Paul’s advice from the second reading:\u00c2\u00a0 “Do not conform yourselves to this age, but be transformed by renewal of your mind”.\u00c2\u00a0 Yes, when you become committed to Jesus, and you sincerely want to follow after him, he will renew your mind, through His Spirit, and you will be given the gifts of the Spirit- things like strength, and understanding- to help you through whatever you are being called to do.\u00c2\u00a0 But you have to recognize that you are being called, and not run away from it.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Perhaps, you have been called to speak up about a wrong, or to come to the aid of someone in need, or follow a nudge to a different vocation.\u00c2\u00a0 Whatever that call is, it is that voice in you that, try as you may, you can’t ignore, just as Jeremiah couldn’t ignore it.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Another cross you might be called to embrace is forbearance.\u00c2\u00a0 I think this is a cross most of us have at one or more times during our lives, because it includes sickness, disability, demands from our loved ones, mental suffering- anything that stops us cold.\u00c2\u00a0 Stops us cold from our agenda, and forces us to submit, or to forbear the challenges of life.\u00c2\u00a0 These crosses are made more difficult when others tell us we can avoid them,\u00c2\u00a0 The voices of others take many forms- like you did something wrong to cause this; or you can take the easy way out; or it’s not your responsibility.\u00c2\u00a0 But sometimes, these crosses are just the way it is.\u00c2\u00a0 They are the life dealt to us.\u00c2\u00a0 The great St. Augustine said something very insightful:\u00c2\u00a0 “There is more courage in a man who faces rather than flees the storms of life, and who holds cheap the opinions of men”.\u00c2\u00a0 Courage is what the Spirit gives us to face these crosses in our lives- courage to forbear these kinds of crosses.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
Finally, our perspective on life can play a big role in how well we look at crosses.\u00c2\u00a0 If your perspective is that life can always be managed to produce happiness, then these crosses cause bitterness and disappointment.\u00c2\u00a0 But uninterrupted joy is reserved for Heaven.\u00c2\u00a0 The road to heaven is paved with crosses, just as it was for Jesus.\u00c2\u00a0 In the words of St. Margaret Mary:\u00c2\u00a0 “Nothing unites us so closely to the Sacred Heart of Our Lord, Jesus Christ, as the cross, which is the most precious pledge of His love”.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00c2\u00a0 August 31, 2008 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Jer 20: 7-9; Rom 12: 1-2; Mt 16: 21-27 Dc. Larry Brockman Believe it!\u00c2\u00a0 “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up their cross, and follow me”.\u00c2\u00a0 Whoever- that’s you and I, not just Jesus and his disciples some 2000 years ago, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}