Lent 5

Lent 5 (John 12:20-33) I, if I be lifted up will draw all people unto me.

The cross is the great scandal of our Heavenly Father’s Plan of Salvation.

The idea that God would permit His Son to die the terrible death of crucifixion was incomprehensible to people in Jesus’ day. It is horrifying to most people today. It only makes sense in the context of the way Moses and the Prophets describe the fundamental problem confronting the human race. And, it only makes sense if we understand who God is.

The problem Moses and the prophets describe in scripture is separation. Our species made an original choice to separate from God. The two major consequences of that separation are sin and death.

People sin because we have separated from God. The separation produces the sin. People die because we have separated from God. The separation produces death.
Most people and consequently most religion that people create reverse the order. Most religion teaches that our actual sins produce the separation. And so, if you tell a lie you separate from God.

Most people and the religions we create tend to describe God in terms of rewards and punishments. If we do good we get good. If we do bad we get bad. In this system death is either a punishment or simply part of the natural order of things. We can avoid the punishment and overcome the natural order by getting God’s attention and acquiring sufficient merit to earn God’s reward of an afterlife.

Moses and the prophets and the other Biblical authors have a very different perspective. Over the course of thousands of years of history the people who contributed their observations of human behavior to the Bible all come to the same conclusion. It is the original separation from God that results in people committing sin and experiencing death.

Neither sin nor death were part of our Heavenly Father’s Plan for our species. The Father planned for humanity to be the loving companion of God the Son through the indwelling real presence of God the Holy Spirit.

A soul in union with Divine Love and holiness does not sin.

A soul in union with Divine love and holiness does not die.

Our Heavenly Father designed our species to live and move and have our being in the active dynamic spontaneous creative and eternal life of the holy and blessed Trinity.
Separation plunged our species into darkness. Separation has produced a terrible and profound existential pain in the human soul. That pain distorts the way we think, feel and make choices. That pain eventually kills us.

God’s solution to this problem is Jesus Christ.

Jesus unites humanity with divinity in a single person.

Jesus never separated from God; but, Jesus experienced human separation from God on the cross.

Jesus never lived with the existential pain of separation; but, Jesus experienced that pain on the cross.

Jesus never sinned; but, Jesus became sin on the cross.
Jesus is the very source of human life; but, Jesus willingly experienced death on the cross.

The cross is central to the Plan of Salvation. It is on the cross that the love of God incarnate in Jesus Christ experienced human separation and transformed the consequences of separation. Jesus transforms sin back into love. Jesus transforms death back into life.

Religion cannot do this. Law cannot do this. Knowledge and power cannot do this. Only the Infinite and Eternal love of God incarnate in Jesus Christ and personally present in Jesus Christ can do this.

The Plan of Salvation is not a religion because the problem is not a religious problem. The problem is separation, pain, sin and death. The solution is reunification, grace, love and life.

No mere mortal can solve the problem. The only solution is the solution God Himself provides. The solution is the universal Savior of all humanity. The solution is Jesus Christ.

As it was in the beginning so it is now.

In the beginning our Heavenly Father invited our species to choose love. We chose power and in that choice separated from God and manifested pain, sin and death.
In Jesus God reunifies humanity with the very source of life. Once again we have a choice. We can choose love in Jesus. We can choose to receive reunification. Jesus did all of the work on the cross. He presents the gift of infinite and eternal love to all people everywhere. The gift is Himself.

From the horrific pain and suffering and death on the cross Jesus makes his appeal to all people everywhere. In that appeal he doesn’t just preach or teach salvation. Jesus is salvation.

The gift of God is Jesus Christ, the co-eternal Son of God.

In Jesus, God demonstrates to us that He loves us so much he is willing to allow the co-eternal son to suffer and die on the cross in order to give all of us a new life and a new way of living. It is the way of the original blessing God offered our species. It is the second chance to choose love.

Jesus says to all people everywhere: “I, if I be lifted up will draw all people unto me.” All means all. Everyone is invited to receive the gift. None are excluded. The gift is love. The gift is life. The gift is Jesus Christ.