Today as I’m writing this, it is Sunday. The day when more people frequent churches all over the world to lift up the name of Jesus Christ, the Father and His Holy Spirit. The main symbol that one may think of when thinking of church is the cross. While we might most familiarize a cross as more of a decorative item in the halls of our churches or etched on our bibles, I’d like to suggest to view it in a different light.
3 Things the Cross Is Not
1. The cross of Jesus Christ is not cute.
Yes, the sterling silver necklace of a cross and the T-shirt with a colorful cross displayed on it might be termed, “cute”, but the cross of Christ is anything but that. Our savior, bruised and beaten with about 39 lashes carried a real piece of wood for the cross beam of His cross weighing anywhere from 75-125 pounds. Before this, He had agonized to the point of sweating blood, withstood a blow from the High Priest, been beaten with fists, scourged, bled from a crown of thorns that was pierced into his skull and his beard missed spots where in mockery hair had been plucked. This gruesome scene of carrying His cross dragged on for some 650 yards or so.
The physical trauma being too much to bare, He collapsed and a man was asked to help him finish carrying the beam. The rest of the details of the crucifixion were nails entereing his hands and feet and the pain from hanging on the cross display unbelievable agony. The blameless sinless Son of God hung there with the world’s sin and shame upon Him. This is such a violent picture, but nonetheless a picture of an unthinkable love. This wasn’t meant to just be a symbol of some “nice teachings”, or of “self-help”, or an entitlement to be better than others. This was real love poured out.
When Jesus called His disciples to come to Him, deny themselves and take up their crosses, He wasn’t asking them for a real physical death like He would eventually suffer. He was asking them if they would be willing to lay down their agendas, their desires, their sin and self dependency to embrace His love. He was challenging them to walk the road of what others may call suffering to embrace the kingdom of God. Let me clarify that suffering doesn’t mean that you have to be in poor health, live in poverty or in continual distress. However, suffering in Christ does mean dying to the desires and passions that war against the holiness of God. Jesus spoke these words with a heart of love and deep conviction as he urged His disciples to embrace their “death” to the love of the world so that they could follow Him. Seems like a cult, except that this man was fully God and fully man and took on our sin, death, hell and the grave to give us victory! What a mighty love!!
The cross is not something cute or to be taken lightly. The challenge Jesus gave to His then living disciples is the continual beckoning with which He reaches out to us today. We should not make light of this call, but with all seriousness and repentance of heart, embrace the cross of Christ. As we wear it around our necks, see it hung in our churches or place it as decor in our homes, may we be reminded that it’s calling us to die to what we think love and pleasure is and accept Jesus’ passionate love for us.
We weren’t the Pharisees or Roman soldiers who brought Jesus to the place of crucifixion that day, but our sin surely did. Instead of running away from the cross, may we look upon the One we’ve pierced and allow the reality of Christ’s finished work on the cross have it’s way in our lives.