[stephenkhoo]

CHOOSING LIFE THROUGH SELF-DENIAL BY CARRYING OUR CROSSES DAILY
SCRIPTURE READINGS: DT 30:15-20; PS 1:1-2, 3, 4, 6; LK 9:22-25
http://www.universalis.com/20140306/mass.htm

Yesterday, we began the season of Lent. We were given the Lenten program of prayer, fasting and almsgiving. The performance of these spiritual exercises would be burdensome if we only focused on these alone. Hence, in today’s gospel, the Church gives us the perspective of what we should be seeking through this Lenten program.

The whole purpose of the Lenten program is in order that we might have the spiritual strength to choose eternal life and not death through self-denial in obedience to the Lord, by carrying the cross, even unto death. This is the theme of today’s liturgy and indeed the whole season of Lent. To choose life over death is what the season of Lent seeks to lead us to so that at Easter we can proclaim that we have died with Christ to sin and death and now share in His new life. So the season of Lent really is meant to be something refreshing. It is a time when we do spring cleaning to our souls.

How then do we choose life over death? At first glance, it seems that there is an apparent contradiction between the approach taken by Moses and that of Jesus. For Moses, to choose life is simply to choose God above all things. Hence, he instructed the people, “If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin on you today, if you love the Lord your God and follow his ways, if you keep his commandments, his laws, his customs, you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to make your own.” Conversely, he warned, “But if your heart strays, if you refuse to listen, if you let yourself be drawn into worshipping other gods and serving them, I tell you today, you will most certainly perish; you will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.” In other words, life is found when our will is one with the will of God. But when our will crosses the will or the path of God, the cross would be there to confront us.

The way of Christ in choosing life is to choose death to self. For without choosing death to self, we cannot choose God. Choosing God presupposes that we die to self, since the greatest form of idolatry is the worship of self. All other false gods is rooted in egotism and selfishness. Hence, the way of Jesus is simply this, “anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it.”

Indeed, the way of Jesus is also the way of the cross, which He himself carried. For He told his disciples, “The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.” For this reason, there is no true Christianity without the cross. If our master has walked the way of the cross, how could we as His disciples be exempted from walking that same path?

Yet, the greatest temptation today is to walk away from the cross. In this age of hedonism, where pleasure is the determinant of happiness, there is a tendency to avoid all forms of suffering and pain at all cost. There is this intolerance for pain, discomfort or inconvenience. In this age of individualism, the emphasis on the self or the rights of the individual has made us individualistic in our outlook

Of course, whilst not advocating that we need to be sadistic and seek pain, the abandonment of the cross, the fear of suffering and pain, the contempt for acts of mortifications, the scorn for acts of self-denial and sacrifices certainly are symptoms of a shallow spiritual life. When we are only concerned with making ourselves happy, having all our wants satisfied, then we have actually turned our back on the cross. Instead of seeking for holiness and true detachment, we have become enslaved to pleasure and self-centered interests.

St John of the Cross tells us that without an active embrace of the cross, we can never achieve a high state of union with God. In his book, the Living Flame of Love, he wrote “if anyone wants one day to possess Christ, never let him seek him without the cross.” Indeed, only by accepting the cross, can we learn the true meaning of love, life, self-sacrifice, generosity, compassion, and detachment and self-emptying.

So, what are the crosses we are called to carry? Jesus says, “Let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me.” The cross that we are called to carry is our own cross that comes to us in our daily life. He does not call us to carry the cross for others but our own cross.

This means that firstly, we are called to carry the cross because of our sins. Although such crosses we bear are produced by selfishness, laziness or envy or from a disordered love of self, and do not come from God but from our sinfulness, it can be sanctifying. Such crosses have value if they lead to us conversion and the realization of our sinfulness. Of course, it is less noble than that of carrying the cross because of love.

Secondly, we are called to carry the cross on account of Jesus for He said, “anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it. “ Hence, Jesus invites us to lose our life for his sake. The cross must be carried with a higher motive for the sake of Jesus and the kingdom. When we carry it for Jesus, it is carried for love and thus there is great joy in the midst of pain. Anything that is done for love is always a paradoxical joy because love implies pain. Indeed, in carrying the cross, one does not carry it with sadness but with joy because it is carried in the name of Jesus.

Yes, it is through acts of mortification that our hearts are purified and we become humbler in our relationship with God and with others. If our acts of mortification produce sadness, it reveals our selfishness, self-centeredness and a lack of generosity and the love of God. But when we take our mortifications seriously for the love of Jesus, then it shows our capacity for love and true selflessness in sacrifice. Through patient carrying of the cross, we will grow in strength as we grow in virtue and charity. In this way, we are sanctified and share the heart of God. By living our lives courageously, offering up disappointments, having a smile for others even when we are sad, showing our appreciation for others, having consideration for them, serving them in small little things; giving up our desire for a comfortable life, and overcoming curiosity and the need to satisfy our internal and external senses will truly liberate us for authentic love.

Of course, this attitude towards self-denial is not possible without the help of prayer and fasting. For this reason, the charity expressed in almsgiving can only be ours through a life of meditation and prayer. Fasting aids us to be more focused on God and more aware of our own weaknesses. In this way, we become more tolerant of others and more compassionate with the sins of others.

Let us carry the cross in little and big things. But first let us carry the small crosses in small things, especially in the inconveniences and frictions of family life. We must not try to escape from suffering and pain. The cross is inevitable for Christian life. We must embrace it and see the value of it so that we can accept our daily cross with love. In this way, by dying to self, we have chosen life. Let us pray that we will do everything with constancy and always for the love of God. By choosing death to self, the life of Christ lives in us and we can therefore truly live.