September/October 2026
The summer is coming to an end. School is back in session. Vacations are at an end. Now, the church begins to start again as we move to the end of the year.
At Luther Memorial September is our anniversary month. Programs start up again: those Wednesday Bible studies; council meetings; people settling in to be more regular in Sunday attendance.
A festival on September 14th, Holy Cross Day, has always caught my attention. The focus on the cross of Christ and the shadow it casts guide us as we make new beginnings after the summer hiatus. We are an Easter People. Yet, the call of Christ is to take up our crosses and follow him. We know the end of our stories; we are in Christ Jesus. However, there is that time, an in-between-time, that we live our lives today and hopefully many, many todays to come.
So just how do we live? We live as best we can to have the mind of Christ. Christ lived perfectly for others. Sadly, for most of us that is not possible. Still, we are called to try, to do what we can no matter how imperfectly. I think that is what Luther meant when he said to “sin boldly.” Nothing we can do can merit our salvation. That does not mean we are resigned; we are let off the hook. Christ Jesus said to be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect. We do our best. We will make mistakes. But in the mind of Christ, we can sin boldly.
Here the cross enters in. The cross is the judgement of the world. We are told to hesitate where Christ calls us to be bold. Far from being a sign of shame and rejection, the cross is the sign in which we conquer. There is the story of the Roman Emperor Constantine, the emperor who legalized the Christian Church in 313 through the Edict of Milan. In a battle he prayed for a divine sign; the sign he received was a vision of the cross in the sky. He won that battle. That vision occurred in 312 and was a reason he made that edict the following year.
How many Christians today wear a cross! Almost every church building has a cross on the outside and in the sanctuary. The cross of Christ gives us hope. We all need hope. Life does have a way of saying “no” to us. The cross of Christ, in a world filled with no’s, gives us the yes of God.
And so, as we take up the rest of the year, the sign of the cross leads us in all of our gatherings and in the midst of committees and in the projects that will take our time; it leads us and gives a peace and purpose that the world cannot give.
In Christ,
Pastor Combs
Luther Memorial Lutheran Church 