Sunday Sermon - 14 September
When Kelsey first asked about having Benson’s baptism today, on September 14, I had to pause, think, check and pray on the matter as today is also Holy Cross Day, the day we acknowledge and even celebrate the way of the cross as the means to our salvation. Holy Cross Day is not to be confused with Good Friday which focuses on the Passion of Christ and his sacrifice. Good Friday is a day of sorrows, Holy Cross Day is a day of exaltation. Which, therefore, makes it absolutely appropriate and even more special to celebrate a baptism on this holy feast day.
That said, the reason I paused is because no matter how hard I try, I cannot get the fact that the cross was (and sadly, in some places in our world, still is) an instrument of death out of my mind. As glorious as it is to celebrate Christ’s journey through the cross as a means of our salvation, it was a brutal and painful journey for Jesus.
Maybe the reason I struggle with trying to separate the celebration of the cross as a symbol of salvation from its identity as an instrument of crucifixion is because of my High Anglican or Anglo-Catholic upbringing. As a High Anglican I grew up being very exposed to the images and icons of Jesus on the cross, as opposed to the empty cross focusing on the fact that Jesus overcame the brutality and was resurrected. This became resoundingly true from a line about Jesus’ crucifixion in a movie I watched a long time ago. Quite frankly, it left such an impression on me, I can remember the line from the movie but could not remember the actual movie it came from. I had to look it up. I discovered that the movie was called Dominick and Eugene. I didn’t have to look up the quote, though.
“If I was God, I wouldn’t have let that happen to my boy.”
If I was God I wouldn’t have let that happen to my boy. I watched this movie and heard this quote long before I ever became a father. In fact I was young, only 22, and was just in the third year of my undergrad when I watched it, but did it ever stick in my mind. “If I was God, I wouldn’t have let that happen to my boy.” Now, 37 years later (yes, you can do that math and figure out how old I am) I have a son and I know, as does any parent out there, that they would never let anything bad happen to their child if they could help it. Clearly, our all powerful God could have helped it, right? God could have stopped Jesus’ suffering and crucifixion couldn’t He have? Did God really have to “so love the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life?” I was caught in this tension. How could an all powerful God, our loving Father, allow Jesus, His Son, suffer so? If I was God, I wouldn’t have let that happen to my boy either.
It was only until I was thinking about this service, about Benson’s baptism on this Holy Cross Day, that I realized how wrong my thinking was. You see, we simplify God’s identity for our easier understanding. We think of Jesus as God’s son to make things easier for us to communicate, to pray, to better understand or grasp our relationship with Jesus and his role on earth and in our lives. But Jesus isn’t God son, not really, Jesus is God. Do you know who God's children are? Of course you do. We are.
This is when I had the epiphany (thank you Kelsey and Nathan for this gift of understanding by asking for a baptism today). God didn’t let that happen to His boy. God didn’t let his Son suffer and die on the cross. God, our father, died on the cross for us, his children. To take our pain away, to save us. Like any of us, for our own children, would we not bear their pain if we could? Would we not save our children? I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I love my children so much that, if I could, I’d bear all of their pain and sorrow so that they wouldn’t ever have to suffer. And I’m sure you’d do the same for yours.
That is why we have a baptism today.
To Kelsey and Joshua
Kelsey and Joshua, you bring your son before God today, to allow God to save him just as He has saved us and all of His other children. Today you bring Benson to God, offering him the gift of baptism so that he may join this family of faith. In these waters, he receives God’s grace and is sealed in the sacrificial love of Christ. He will also know the steadfast love of this parish family, who promise to surround him with prayer, encouragement, and care. We are here to walk with Benson — and with you — through life’s trials and tribulations, and to rejoice with you in all the joys his life will bring.
Today, on this Holy Cross Day, as we celebrate the cross as the sign of our salvation through our Father’s love, you offer yourselves to God for Benson. You will take vows on his behalf, renouncing evil and sinful desires, and promising to stand against the temptations of this life — for him. In doing so, as good, faithful and loving parents, you echo what God has already done for us all in Christ.
And so your promises today become a living sign of the Cross: love that protects, faith that endures, and hope that never lets go.
Amen.