I want to begin by remembering a story from the book of Genesis, surrounding the great Patriarch Abraham and his wife Sarah. Both were extremely advanced in age and well beyond the years of childbearing. Despite this, God promised them both that they would conceive a child, and sure enough, Sarah bore her first born son Isaac.
As Isaac grew up, he was no doubt the pride and joy of Abraham…a true gift from God Himself. Nevertheless, we read how God tested Abraham and said to him: “Take your beloved son Isaac, whom you love, and go into the land of Moriah, and offer him there is a whole burnt offering on one of the mountains I tell you.” (Genesis 22:2)
Abraham set out with his beloved son Isaac, and coming near to the place where he was to sacrifice his son, he set the firewood on the back of Isaac, and they went together up the mountain. Having arrived at the appointed place, Abraham built an altar, placed the firewood in order, and bound Isaac hand and foot, laying him upon the altar of firewood.
Just as he was about to sacrifice his son, an angel of the Lord stopped Abraham and said to him: “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him, for now I know you fear God, since for My sake you have not sparred your beloved Son.” The Lord then provided a ram caught in a thicket by its horns to offer up to God in place of Isaac.
This event in Early Jewish Tradition is called the “Akedah” or “The Binding”. Every time we hear this story read for us in the Church, our focus always turns to the tremendous love that Abraham had for God. To sacrifice His Beloved Son in perfect obedience to the Creator is something that goes beyond human comprehension.
What sometimes gets lost in the entire story is the incredible role of Isaac, who was at least old enough to carry the wood for sacrifice on his back. In the earliest of Jewish writings, like the Book of Jubilees, 4thMaccabees, and numerous other first century commentaries on Genesis, it was understood that Isaac didn’t just go blindly up to the mountain to be sacrificed by his father. He was a willing participant in all of this! One of the Dead Sea Scrolls even mentions Isaac ENCOURAGING Abraham to accomplish the sacrifice! “Tie me well” he told his dad. (Scroll 4Q225)
For a son to be willingly sacrificed by his father doesn’t make much sense to the Jews, but for Christians, this event in history means EVERYTHING. Because 2000 years later, on the 14th day of Nisan (the exact same day), in what is in Jewish tradition the exact same place, Jesus Christ walked 1/3 of a mile, carrying a piece of wood on His own back, on His way to willingly sacrifice Himself on what would become the instrument of our Salvation…the Precious and Life-Giving Cross.
Just like Isaac, our Lord’s march to the Cross was not forced. He could have called upon 12 legions of angels to come and remove Him from that Sacrifice (Matthew 26:53). Jesus went to the cross willingly, not as a victim, but as an ultimate victor.
What does the cross mean for us as Orthodox Christians? To the Romans and the Jews at the time, it was an instrument of humiliation. To kill Jesus in secret wasn’t good enough. They needed to humiliate him, to beat him, to have him stripped naked and put on display for all who might oppose the corrupt Jewish authority.
Even in our own day, there is a sad understanding by the secular world of what the cross is. There are some that see the cross is just an instrument of death that was required by an angry God as a payoff of the penalty for our sins. This idea wasn’t really popularized until the Middle Ages in the west, and in no way was the focus of the early Church. This is perhaps one of the very reasons why we have so many people that reject Christianity today. Why would they want to follow such an angry God?
The Cross goes well beyond these limited understandings, because 2000 years ago, Christ turned a simple piece of wood from a Roman instrument of humiliation, into a symbol of victory. It is this victory that we wear on our chests. It is this victory that we put high above our Churches. It is this victory that we literally BOW DOWN to, because we see it as a symbol of hope from God, who willingly endured all of this for us.
St. Athanasius says that before the Cross, even before Abraham and Isaac, “God saw us destroying ourselves…and pitying our race, moved with compassion for our limitation, unable to endure the death should have mastery, and all of the work of the Father turn into dust, He took Himself a body, even as our own. He surrendered His body to death instead of all…This He did this out of sheer love for us.” (St. Athanasius, On the Incarnation)
When someone asks what Love is, the answer is simple, and it doesn’t require words. All we need to show them is the Cross. Just as its base was buried deep beneath the earth to support the weight of our Lord, so also do we need to bury the Love of the Cross deep beneath the recesses of our hearts, so that we can better understand and come into communion with God, who so richly pours out that Love on His Creation.