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February 24, 2002
Sermon: The "Cross" Culture
John 3:1-17
Reverend Larry Gerber

Like a Rapid Deployment Hemostat, Jesus comes to stop the hemorrhaging, to heal the wound of sin, and he does it with a cross, a bloody symbol of his love for us.

It was midafternoon, April 6, 1862, when a young officer spotted Confederate General Albert Sidney Johnston wobbling in the saddle after leading a bloody charge at Shiloh. "Are you hurt?" the officer asked.

"Yes," replied Johnston. "And I think it's serious."

But soon he had bled to death from what was a readily treatable leg wound. He ignored it and paid the price. Worse, said military medical historian Robert Joy, "Johnston had a tourniquet in his pocket, but didn't think it was worthwhile."

Is this ancient history? Hardly. Nearly 140 years later, blood loss still causes 50 percent of battlefield deaths in the U.S. armed forces, and the methods for coping with it are still quite low-tech: Slap on a battle dressing, press down and wait for evacuation.

But such carnage is not limited to the battlefield. Car accidents, gunshots, surgery and work-related mishaps all cause bleeding. Massive bleeding.

In fact, whether it's on the battlefield, the operating room table or the interstate highway, tens of thousands of people die from blood loss every year - 50,000 in the United States alone.

What can be done to stop it?

For thousands of years, people have been attempting to control bleeding by applying pressure and covering wounds with gauze-like materials. While this works for light to moderate bleeding, it cannot stop massive bleeds. And the problem with gauze is that it must eventually be removed, leading to the tearing away of blood clots.

Now there's a new product called RDH (Rapid Deployment Hemostat) that promises to stop bleeding in seconds. The RDH is supercharged with a polysaccharide produced by unicellular algae, cultured in sealed bioreactors.

You say: "What was that?" It doesn't really matter. What does matter is, that with RDH, bleed time is cut by two-thirds. "Band-Aids are just that, a band aid, something that covers up boo boos until they heal, but the RDH is all about trauma."

Right now, only hemophiliacs, cardiac patients and kidney dialysis patients use the algal bandages, but Dr. Finkielsztein, the inventor of RDH, sees potential uses on battlefields and mountain bike trails, where injuries are common and help is far away. He is working with the feds to develop a soldier-friendly field kit and with sports enthusiasts to develop a patch for athletic endeavors. The cost: about $30.00.

In today's classic text from John, Jesus reaches into the Old Testament for the story of how Moses tried to "stop the bleeding" - stop the literal bleeding of his people from snakebites, as well as their spiritual hemorrhaging from sin. Wandering through the wilderness, the people of Israel had once again fallen into the predictable pattern of impatient whining and bitter grumbling against God and Moses. So the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, killing many. Panic-stricken, the people came to Moses and confessed, "We have sinned by speaking against the LORD and against you; pray to the LORD to take away the serpents from us."

Hearing this confession and feeling compassion for his people, God came up with an innovative healing device. Not the tourniquets, pressure dressings, lint, spider webs or hot irons so popular in the 1860s, but something every bit as odd and unexpected. "Make a poisonous serpent," the LORD said to Moses, "and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live." So Moses made a serpent of bronze and put it on a pole, and sure enough: Whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live (Numbers 21:4-9).

Algal bandages and bronze serpents. Two equally surprising devices that are equally effective at cutting bleed time.
But the serpent on a pole was just a prototype. God's greatest innovation came many years later with the raising up of Christ on the cross. As Jesus explains to Nicodemus in this morning's lesson, "And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life" (John 3:14-15).

Remember the opening song this morning? "Lift high the cross". God used the cross as a way of offering us a way to stop our spiritual bleeding!

What a shocking treatment for sin. Jesus had to die in order for me to live. Wow! I look to the cross of death, that I might live. Yes!! That was, and is, God's plan. The death of Jesus takes us to the crown of glory. Someone once said that if there was no cross, there would be no crown.

Wheter we are looking at the serpent on the stick, or Jesus on the cross, we are asked to look with faith at something that is lifted up and exalted. In both cases, we are challenged to lift our heads and believe that God is at work in a new place and in a new way, to heal us and to save us. And in spite of those who thought they had a trial, and found Jesus guilty of something......and thought that they killed him as a common criminal, God used the cross as a vehical to save the world. If the Israelites looked to the bronze serpent, they would be saved. If we look to Jesus, on the cross, we can be saved. It is the vehicle to cultural salvation. The cross is for all cultures.

No doubt, taking a bite from the serpant was tough for the Israelites. After all, common sense called for them to look down to the ground and desperately try to dodge the deadly ankle-biters. But Moses said, "Look up ... and believe!" And when they did, they were saved.

The very same words come to us. We're not asked to look up at a serpent on a pole, but a Savior on a cross. God says, "Look up ... and believe! Look at my Son, who died so that you might live. Everyone who believes in him may not perish, but may have eternal life" (3:16). And when we do, we are saved.

Jesus is lifted high on the cross to cut our bleed time and bring us healing. He stops the hemorrhaging and heals the wound of sin, and he does it in a totally innovative way: by some bleeding and suffering of his own. Jesus achieves our salvation through the cross, a bloody symbol of his love for us.

Give this an R-rating for gory. But at the heart of the gospel is the blood of Christ. It's not pretty. It's messy. And when the final nail was thrust into his hands, and the sword thrust into his side, it was a sight his mother and bystanders could not bear to watch. When Jesus went to the cross, there was no RDH patch available for him, but in his cross, we have a "patch" that stems the flow of our own guilt and shame.

His body, broken for us.

His blood, the blood of the new covenant.

It's central to our identity as Christians and our relationship with God. That's why some of the old hymns are not afraid to address the "blood-theology" of the cross.

What can wash away our sins?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
There is a fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Immanuel's veins.

Jesus suffered. Jesus died. Like a snake on a pole, a criminal on a cross. But in that RDH death, our soul-bleeding is stopped. The bleed time is cut to zilch.

The other side to this cross event is that Jesus now calls on us to suffer and bleed for others in a way that, while not redemptive in the same way, can nevertheless bring healing in the lives of others.

To this extent, we're the "hemostatic" people of God. The word means "acting to stop the flow of blood." Our role as hemostatic Christians is nothing less than to apply the healing power of the gospel to a hemorrhaging world.

We live in a culture of violence. Natural disasters abound. Children kill children. Ethnic cleansing erupts around the globe. Whole nations are at war, human rights crumble, and people bleed to death, physically and spiritually. There's no need to be reminded of the depths of "human inhumanity to humans."

The world, our cities, our neighborhood and our communities need an RDH patch desperately and as ones who ourselves have been healed, we are able to offer this same healing to others.

Rosalie Potter, who writes frequently about evangelism, describes this as a moving away from a ministry of maintenance to a ministry of mission, determined always to demonstrate the redemptive love of God in Jesus Christ. It means living out a ministry of doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God (Micah 6:8). It means recognizing that the life, death and resurrection of Jesus was an awesome happening - one that has changed our lives forever. It means finding ways to tell other people of this incredible gift that has come to be.

That's why, as dark as Golgotha is, as bloody and messy as the cross very definitely was, the gospel is not a theology of serpentine despair but of hemostatic hope, because it cuts the bleed time of a hemorrhaging world.

Band-Aids may be good for boo-boos, but the gospel is God's one and only cure for sin and death.

Sources:
Graeber, Charles. "Algae-Aid." Wired, August 2001, 48.
Gugliotta, Guy. "Ocean algae bring sea change in battle dressings." The Washington Post, May 7, 2001, A7.
Potter, Rosalie. Living the Vision: Preparing Members for Evangelism. Louisville:
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), 2000, 2.

Let me know what you think. The church Email is: SLUMC@att.net, Phone: 480.895.8766