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True love by its very nature greatly desires the good of the other. Authentic love is sacrificial. It sets aside personal desires, preferences and even genuine needs for the sake of the beloved. Real love stops at nothing in its effort to lift and care for the treasured one. Jesus Christ demonstrated true love for every creature made in his image and likeness through his humble entrance into this world, his three years of public ministry and, most especially, the surrender of his life on the cross in loving obedience to the father.

I never tire of marveling at how various events, persons and prophecies in the Old Testament point so remarkably to the life and ministry of Jesus. Today, for instance, we gaze upon an event in the life of Moses and the Hebrew people as they are making their way from Egypt through the desert to the Promised Land. Once again, the people lose sight of all that God had done to care for them and grumble about the struggle to find food and water. As a result, the Lord sends seraph serpents among the people which bite them. Moses prays for the people and the Lord responds, “Make a seraph and mount it on a pole, and if any who have been bitten look at it, they will live.”

There is remarkable irony in this story. The very thing that is causing them to suffer and die is to be raised up for their sacred viewing. As they gaze upon this mounted serpent, they are healed. This image is a strong reference to the cross of Christ. Jesus’ mission to heal the whole world from the bite of sin is achieved through the cross, the most hideous way in which Romans tortured and made a spectacle of the greatest criminals in their day. To gaze upon Christ mounted upon the cross with faith is to find healing for the worst ills that beset humanity and to open the door to eternal life.

Sept. 14 is the day the church celebrates the Exaltation of the Cross. We will never fully comprehend its beauty, its import or the abyss of love revealed on the cross, but we make the effort on this day to ponder its beauty, praise and worship God for what his beloved Son did on the cross and seek the grace to respond to God’s love with more love than ever before.

The cross of Christ is the earthly locus of the greatest act of love that the world has ever known. The cross is the visible instrument by which Jesus redeemed every human being from sin and death. The cross represents the crowning moment in the sacrificial self-emptying of Jesus. It was the last stop on Jesus’ earthly mission to restore our broken relationship with God and establish his kingdom of love and truth in history. The cross is the tree of life from which we are fed on our journey to heaven and find refuge in the father’s tender mercy. The cross is the staff that God used to strike the rock of Gethsemane from which a river, the greatest of rivers, the river of mercy flows until the end of time.

Heavenly Father, we thank you from the depths of our being for all that your Son, Jesus, did for us on the cross. We know that he suffered in a way that is beyond our comprehension. The one thing greater than his suffering is the love that led him to endure it. “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.”

It is no wonder that the cross of Christ is the principal and most enduring symbol of our Christian faith.