Dead and Alive

August 29: Friday of Week 21 of Ordinary Time, Year A-II:

Feast of the Beheading of John the Baptizer

1 Corinthians 1:17-25; Psalm 33:1-2, 4-5, 10-11; Mark 6:17-29

Thoughts to help us surrender to Jesus expressing himself through us in ministry.

Dead and Alive

“We proclaim Christ crucified.” 1Corinthians 1:23

The last line of the Gospel sounds pretty final: “When his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.” John’s disciples, yes. But when Jesus’ disciples laid his body in a tomb, that was just the beginning.

We proclaim Christ risen. And we proclaim it by being Christ visibly—his risen body continuing his messianic mission as Prophet, Priest and King.

And yet we proclaim Christ crucified.

Our only justification for walking erect among the people of this earth is that we have died in Christ. He took us, with all of our sins, into his body on the cross, so we could die with him and in him, and go down into the grave with him, where our sins were annihilated. We rose with him out of the waters of Baptism a “new creation.” We have no record of sin. The one who committed those sins died in Christ on the cross. We are his risen body: a “new creation.”

We can present ourselves as Christ risen only because we proclaim Christ crucified. He is risen in us because we died in him.

Jesus on the cross is my excuse for being on earth.

Until we really know our sin, we don’t know Jesus crucified. Until we know him risen, we don’t understand him crucified.  

PRAY: Jesus, I died in you. Live in me.”

PRACTICE: Look at the crucifix. Be aware. Appreciate.