There’s a striking phrase in St Paul’s letter to the Galatians: “God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (6:14). When we come across that sort of statement it can be helpful to ask the question, “Why did Paul write like that?” To ask ourselves, “Why the Cross?”
There’s a story told - and I take it to be a parable because I hope it’s not true - of a country church which had a creeper - perhaps an ivy plant - growing up by the porch doorway. Over the doorway was a text carved in stone, "We preach Christ crucified". Over the years the plant grew steadily and a branch gradually spread over the doorway. The first word of the text covered by the leaves of the plant was "crucified" which reduced the text to "We preach Christ". Well, we might think, that’s unfortunate but the essential part of our faith is still there. As time went on the branch spread further and covered over the word "Christ". Now, this was serious, but no-one seemed to notice, and the message of the church to the world outside was reduced to "We preach" - it had no message; the church was merely a talking shop.
That’s why I said I hoped the story was only a parable, because if any essential part of the message of the Christian gospel is neglected, Christianity will lose its power, it will no longer be the Gospel as revealed in Jesus. This is what the apostle Paul meant when he wrote to the believers at Galatia, "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world" (6:14).
It’s been said that nothing in history or in the universe cuts us down to size like the cross ... it’s at the foot of the cross of Calvary that we shrink to our true size. It’s there that our delusions of self-righteousness are exploded because we see ourselves as we really are - as sinners before a holy God. So we have to ask the question, "Why the Cross?" Why did Paul say that he could never boast of anything except the cross of Jesus? The context of Paul’s words is his concern that the Christian believers to whom he wrote were in danger of being seduced by false teachers into abandoning the simplicity of faith in Jesus as their Saviour; Jesus who had died on the cross.
What happened to the Christians at Galatia can easily be repeated at the beginning of the twenty-first century because the evil one is just as anxious to divert us away from the truth of the Gospel as he was in the first century. Human nature hasn’t changed in the passing of years. So let’s think of what could side-track us from the priority of boasting only in the Cross of Christ. I trust I’ll not be misunderstood when I suggest a candidate is the ethical teaching of Jesus. His teaching, of course, is wonderful. It’s the highest standard of morality given to humanity. There are many people who aren’t Christians who praise the Sermon on the Mount. Ghandi, the great Indian leader and a Hindu, praised it. They like Jesus the teacher; they say that his teaching is the very thing the world needs - as indeed it does. The theory is that if everyone practiced it, all our problems would be solved. There was a TV show of a prominent politician choosing his favourite hymns. He told the interviewer that he believed in the ethical teaching of Jesus which fitted in with his brand social ideals, but he had no feeling for the Christian view of the atonement of the Cross of Christ. It was what you did that mattered. Well, St Paul would disagree!
It’s true the world would be a great deal better if the teaching of Jesus was put into practice, so why didn’t the apostle say, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the Sermon on the Mount, save in the incomparable teaching, of the Son of God?" Paul knew very well that teaching alone, even from the lips of Jesus, was not sufficient. You see, there is all the difference in the world between praising the Sermon on the Mount and practicing it! We applaud it, but to apply it is a different matter! In our better moments we may want to live according to its standard but because we are fallen beings, we are powerless to do so.
Paul knew all about this when he wrote to the Christians at Rome of a "law at work ... in my body, waging war ... and making me a prisoner ... What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me?" The real meaning of the Sermon is not, "Live like this and you will become a Christian", but rather "Because you are a Christian live like this." In fact, like the Ten Commandments and the life of Jesus, there’s nothing that condemns us, as the Sermon on the Mount. Paul knew that it wasn’t just the teaching of Jesus, but the power of God in his life which would rescue him - as he put it, "Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord" (7:21-25).
No wonder, then, that he exclaims, "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." So what is it about the Cross which is so important, so vital? The Cross is the symbol of Christianity. It’s a focal point of church architecture; it’s worn as an ornament at the end of a gold chain, but that’s only a caricature of the reality. These symbols are things of beauty - the polished wood or the precious metal - but the Cross of Jesus was just the opposite.
The scene on Calvary was a dreadful one. It was a place of torture. Think of how the Roman soldiers, having previously beaten Jesus, mocked him and placed a crown of thorns on his head, then nailed him to a rough cross-beam of wood, dropped it in a hole in the ground with a thud, causing unimaginable pain. So why the Cross? The message of the Bible is that the Cross is God’s means of salvation to sinful mankind. To many people this all sounds very morbid and remote from life. Whatever difference can it make to us now, that Jesus of Nazareth was crucified nearly two thousand years ago?
To many people, taken up with living a busy and fulfilled life, the Cross is more or less meaningless. At best, it was no more than a noble act of martyrdom, or a fine example of devotion to duty. At worst, it was a bad mistake, a terrible miscarriage of justice. In any case, it’s something which never ought to have happened, like all the great tragedies of history. What are we to say to this? Has the Cross no particular meaning for us today? Is it only a splendid pattern of self-sacrifice which we must try to copy? The apostle Paul would say a resounding "no!"
The death of Jesus upon the Cross wasn’t an accident, it wasn’t the greatest tragedy of all time, nor was it something to be imitated. It is the means of our salvation. It’s the only way by which you and I can be saved from God’s righteous judgement. But how does the Cross save us? We must see who it is on that cross. It is as the apostle puts it "our Lord Jesus Christ". Those who looked at the ghastly spectacle of a man dying in agony saw him as a man of their time. He was the carpenter of Nazareth who at the age of thirty set out to be a preacher. He had extraordinary powers of insight and even worked miracles and then he had fallen out with the religious establishment of his day who managed to have him condemned as a political agitator.
Who is this man? The testimony of Scripture is that he is the Lord, the Son of God, but if that is true, why has the eternal Son of God come from eternity into time, taken on human nature and a human body? More important than that, why has he died? He answers the question in his own words, "The Son of Man came ... to give his life a ransom for many" (Matt 20:28). He died at the hands of wicked men, the Jewish leaders who conspired against him and the Roman soldiers who were the instruments of the crucifixion. But the Cross was not an accident. It was God who had purposed this.
The participants in the drama of the Cross were simply carrying out in time what God had predetermined before the foundation of the world. God knew that man was going to fall before he made him, and had planned a way of salvation before man was ever created. Of course the Cross is a mystery but it’s an essential part of God’s plan of redemption. Of course it’s beyond our understanding. Charles Wesley humbly acknowledged this in his hymn: "Tis mystery all; the immortal dies." The apostle Paul saw this very clearly. There could only be one reason why this most amazing spectacle the world has ever seen took place. It was because mankind needed so desperately to be redeemed.
The apostle Paul writes that "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" (Rom 3:23). Someone put it rather well when he said, "Any man who thinks that he deserves heaven is not a Christian." Human kind is a mixture of good and bad, moral and the immoral, but respectability doesn’t count in the sight of God, because under the veneer of morality and good works we are still sinners. Most people would agree with that, even if reluctantly. But then comes the question, "Why can’t God forgive this? Why can’t a God of love, just like a good father, forgive a person who says he or she is sorry?" It’s a good question!
The answer is that God is righteous, he is the law giver, he is holy. He can’t pretend that he hasn’t seen sinful humanity; he can’t turn a blind eye. He must punish sin; he must be just. To do otherwise would compromise his holiness. If sin is to be forgiven, it must be on some basis compatible with God’s holy law. So here is the problem. On the one hand is the guilty sinner and on the other is a holy God. How can the two be brought together? The answer is the Cross of Christ. The Cross, you see, is the centre of God’s plan. It’s the heart of God’s way of saving the world. No wonder that Paul exclaimed, "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
In the years of Communist domination of East Germany there was a symbol which brought hope and comfort to believers in Jesus. A huge TV tower had been erected to broadcast atheistic propaganda. Near the top of the building was a globe-shaped structure housing a restaurant. The remarkable thing was that the sunlight always reflected off the globe in the shape of a cross. The authorities were embarrassed and tried everything they could think of to prevent this optical phenomenon, even covering the dome with paint. But nothing worked. A pastor commented wryly, "No matter how hard they try, they can’t get rid of the Cross!" Paul would agree and would say, "God forbid that we even try to do that!"
The Cross is the Cross of redemption, of atonement for the remission of sins and reconciliation between God and man. The Old Testament sacrifices of animals pointed towards the Ultimate sacrifice to be made by Jesus on the Cross. John the Baptist announced Jesus as "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29). In order to make possible our salvation God would have to provide his own sacrifice. It was his own Son; the Lamb of God. Paul tells us, "God ... did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all" (Rom 8:32).
That’s what happened on the Cross. God took your sins and mine upon his own beloved Son and the punishment that was our due was exacted on him. As the prophet Isaiah had announced hundreds of years before, "The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all" (Isa 53:6). There’s a quotation which tells it all, "Mercy and truth met together. Righteousness and peace kissed each other" (Psa 85:10). It was only at the Cross of Jesus that it could take place. The wages of sin were indeed death, but instead of the sinner, it was the Son of God who was the Substitute Lamb. This is how the apostle put it to the Galatians, "the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age" (1:4). Hallelujah, what a Saviour!
I read of two friends who went to a law school. One became a lawyer and eventually a judge, but the other squandered his life, broke the law and finished up in court. Who do you think was sitting in the judge’s seat? It was his old friend. One question filled the court-room - what kind of sentence would he pass? To much surprise, the judge demanded the full penalty of the law. But no sooner had he passed sentence than he stepped from the seat of judgement, took off his robes, walked over to the dock where his old friend stood and putting his arms round him, gently said, "Let it be recorded today, not only have I passed sentence upon him, but I will stand chargeable with all his debts." In that moment the judge became his redeemer!
This is but a faint picture of what God in Christ has done for you and me. That is why the apostle gloried in the Cross. It is in the Cross that we are saved. Jesus took our punishment and our guilt and God’s holy law was satisfied. Our sins may be classed as very respectable or they may be foul. It doesn’t matter before God. If we come to him in repentance and faith in the sacrifice made by Jesus on the Cross, we have forgiveness. It’s as if we had never sinned because God sees us through the merits of his Son. Paul could confidently write, "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:1).
The apostle tells us that he glories in the Cross because of what it has done to and for him. It is in the Cross of Jesus, he says, "through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." "The world" in this context isn’t the actual physical universe in which he lived. He was referring to the society of unbelievers, the life he once lived and the values which he once held dear before he met the Lord Jesus. This "world", he says, this "Vanity Fair", anything which debases men and women "is now crucified to me, and I unto the world."
The operative word is "crucified". Something has happened to him in relation to his spiritual life. His experience at the Cross of Christ has shown him that these things are dead. They represented a view of life and time alien to God. What he once cherished no longer appeals to him. He had a lot going for him before his conversion - he was an up-and-coming leader in the Jewish hierarchy, a man of education and culture. And yet looking back he counts them all as loss because they were a source of pride and self-sufficiency.
I read about some Christians who went on a pilgrimage. As part of their commitment they carried crosses, which as the day wore on, were heavy to bear. They felt the symbolism of the words of Jesus when he said, "Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple" (Matt 10:38). The Cross is a symbol of death ... and Jesus does not call us to a life of personal ease, selfishness and pleasure. He calls us to leave self behind and to die to all those things which would distract us from the journey.
Perhaps we need to consider if, like Paul said, "the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." The message of the Cross to the world of Paul’s day was inescapably offensive. To the Jews it was "a stumbling block". It was a symbol of weakness, humiliation and defeat. The Greeks also had a problem with the Cross. It offended their sense of reason. No sane person would believe that kind of tale. A cartoon has been found on a wall in the ruins of ancient Rome showing how crazy the Christian message seemed to the people of that time. It’s a caricature of Jesus’ crucifixion, showing a man’s body hanging on a cross - but the body has the head of a donkey. Next to it there’s a figure of a young man with hand raised as if in worship. Underneath is the inscription, "He worships his God!" Christ and His followers were objects of derision - they often still are.
A crucified god? It just defied all reason. The non-Christian says that God would never involve himself in the world like that! Do we believe that? Well, that’s the choice we have to make. The Cross of Christ is the message which God has called us to believe, proclaim and live out. It’s a message which is centred on the Cross. To those who will not believe on the Christ of the Cross, it’s inescapably offensive, but to those who believe, it’s powerfully effective as "the power of God unto salvation" (Rom 1:16). I trust we can all say like Paul, "God forbid that I should boast save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
