163 Sermon Illustrations on Cross

Jesus' death is central to the church, to the apostles and to Jesus himself. Jesus knew he would have to die because of:

1. Hostility of Jewish national leaders.

2. Prophecies in Scripture (though they are not many).

3. Jesus' own deliberate choice (not martyr complex, but obedience to

Father).

Why the Cross is important:

1. He died for us.

2. To bring us to God.

3. For our sins.

4. He died our death, took our penalty.

Jesus' life mission was accomplished in his last six hours on earth. He knew his death had theological significance. Evidence is in words of the Last Supper, Gethsemane, and the Cry from the Cross.

#107

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Of all the Nazi concentration camps, the worst was Auschwitz. Over 4 million people were exterminated there. One of the prisoners was a Polish priest named Maximilian Kolbe. When a number of inmates were selected for execution, one of them screamed that he was a married man with children. Father Kolbe stepped forward and asked if he could take the condemned man's place. His offer was accepted by the guards, and he was placed in an underground cell, where he was left to die of starvation.

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[for more complete illustration see #4131, 12452, 12620]

The meaning of the cross of Jesus. Looks at relation of sin and God's love, different theories of atonement (such as "satisfaction"), and the exclusivity of Christian salvation.

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The sacrifice of Abraham and Isaac speaks of the helpless of the cross, especially when seen through the eyes of a POW in North Vietnam.

Its foundation goes back 4,000 years ago, to the sacrifice of Abraham and Isaac. Most of us put ourselves in the position of Abraham, who has the power. Note this commentary by Major Fischer (a composite figure?) who was imprisoned in Hanoi after his helicopter malfunctioned over the Demilitarized Zone. [from movie "Hanoi Hilton"]:

“When I was young, at religious school, I remember a great deal was made of Abraham and Isaac... How God ordered Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, his only son, his beloved child. Abraham stood with a knife in his hand and wrestled within himself to decide whether to believe, trust God, or to deny him. And I suppose that most of us identified with Abraham, wondering how we would use free choice if THAT was us.

Well, since I've been in here I've had time to think about Isaac. Helpless, tied up on an altar, an audience to what might become his own death.

[And he couldn't trust in God, he had to trust in Abraham and hope that God would act through him. In the end it all worked out for Abraham and Isaac. Just as it will for us.]

In the book “The Fire of Your Life,” Maggie Ross recounts the story of Emma, a survivor of the Holocaust, who regularly at 4 P.M. each day stood outside a Manhattan church and screamed insults at Jesus.

Finally the pastor, Bishop C. Kilmer Myers, went outside and said to Emma, “Why don’t you go inside and tell him?” She disappeared into the church.

An hour went by, and the bishop, worried, decided to look in on her. He found Emma, prostrate before the cross, absolutely still. Reaching down, he touched her shoulder. She looked up with tears in her eyes and said quietly, “After all, he was a Jew, too.”

A Denver woman told her pastor of a recent experience that she felt was a sign of the times. She'd walked into a jewelry store looking for a necklace.

"I'd like a gold cross," she said.

The man behind the counter looked over the stock in the display case and said, "Do you want a plain one, or one with a little man on it?"

Near the city of San Jose dos Campos, Brazil, is a remarkable facility. In 1974 the Brazilian government turned a prison over to two Christians. The institution was renamed Humaita, and the plan was to run it on Christian principles. With the exception of the two full-time staff, all work is done by inmates. Families outside the prison adopt an inmate to work with during and after his term. Chuck Colson visited the prison and made this report:

“When I visited Humaita, I found the inmates smiling - particularly the murderer who held the keys, opened the gates and let me in. Wherever I walked I saw men at peace. I saw clean living areas, people working industriously. The walls were decorated with biblical sayings from Psalms and Proverbs ....

(later) My guide escorted me to the notorious prison cell once used for torture. Today, he told me, that block - houses only a single inmate. As we reached the end of a long concrete corridor and he put the key in the lock, he paused and asked, ‘Are you sure you want to go in?’

“‘Of course,’ I replied impatiently. ‘I’ve been in isolation cells all over the world.’ Slowly, he swung open the massive door, and I saw the prisoner in that punishment cell: a crucifix, beautifully carved by the Humaita inmates - the prisoner Jesus, hanging on a cross.

“‘He’s doing time for the rest of us,’ my guide said softly.”

Is God's love unconditional? The Cross shows us the true nature of love - and its breathtaking cost.

Many people, probably even many Christians, think God's love is unconditional. And insofar as God extends his love to all people without distinction, it is true. But many have bought into the sentimental notion of unconditional love evidenced in the old popular song, "Though it makes him sad to see the way we live, he'll always say, 'I forgive.'" This is fuzzy romanticism and cheap grace, not the good news of Jesus Christ.

Is unconditional love the loftiest form of love? Consider three cases:

A mother is having a test of wills with her two-year-old. The young boy wants to continue playing, but it is time for bath and bed. Mom has already given him a five-minute grace period. Now she insists he will do as she says. If the child could speak articulately, he might say, "If you really loved me, you'd let me do what I want." As adults, we can identify with Mom here. She is expressing love, but is it unconditional? Yes, in the sense that she will love her son even if he disobeys. But no, in the sense that she is requiring conditions.

A harder case. Dick and Jane have been married for almost 20 years. But Jane has discovered that her husband has committed adultery, and Dick wants to continue the relationship. He also wants his wife to accept it and continue the marriage. What does real love mean for Jane in this situation? If she loves him unconditionally, won't she accept her husband on his terms as an expression of her love? Or will genuine love require Jane to say, "It's either me or her"? Authentic love requires conditions.

So we come to the third and ultimate case: the love of God, "greater far than tongue or pen can ever tell." Surely God's love is unconditional, right?

Yes, but...Yes, God loves all of humanity and offers salvation to all without conditions of merit or worth. But God's love has conditions. When God created humanity, conditions were there from the start. "You are free...But you must not..." (Gen. 2:16-17). God's love requires conditions, and in this sense it is misleading to call it "unconditional."

The same conditionality underlines the interrelationships of the three Persons of the Trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit love each other unreservedly and without limit. But the condition for their aggregate love is their mutual submission and self-giving. This is the profoundest, but most glorious and most hopeful reality in the universe. In fact, it defines love.

The good news is: God loved our sinful race so much that he sent his Son. He will not, cannot, forgive and accept us except on the basis of Jesus' sacrifice. To do otherwise would betray the integrity of God's own holy character. The condition for God's love to reach us was the Cross.

True love is impossible without the potential for freely given response. The reason for this is that love is about relationship, about reciprocity. Genuine love is a relationship of mutuality between "sovereign" persons, meaning that if love is compelled, it ceases to be love.

If God loved unconditionally in the Rogerian sense of offering unconditional positive regard, he would forgive and accept every person no matter what, requiring no Cross. But then the Christian message would be logically incoherent. It would be as shallow as the love of a person who always accepts another's destructive behavior without ever calling him or her to account.

Why does God not simply accept people (sinners) on the basis of Jesus' sacrifice, irrespective of their responses? Again, the answer lies in the nature of love itself. Without repentance, faith, and discipleship, a woman or man cannot know God's love in its redemptive and transforming power. Without such a response, what a person is conscious of is something less than God's love. It may be relief, psychological peace, or even a (false) sense of security. But it is not God's transforming love, and therefore not salvation.

God's love has conditions, not because he is a tyrant, but because God is love. To those who say this is outmoded mythology, I would say it is moral and psychological necessity. It is grounded in God's character as demonstrated in his acts in history.

If Jesus' Cross was necessary, then so is ours. To rely on God's "unconditional love" apart from Jesus Christ, or even in him but apart from personal faith and discipleship, is to trust in mushy sentiment. The good news is that God's love in Christ forgives, transforms, and empowers for righteous, compassionate living. These are the two essential conditions for experiencing God's love: Jesus' death on the cross (costly grace) and our self-committing trust (genuine faith).

Apart from God's grace, we can do nothing to save ourselves. Our works can never save us (Titus 3:5). But this does not mean salvation is unconditional. Jesus shows us the true nature of love-and its breathtaking cost.

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Howard A. Snyder is Heisel Professor of Evangelization and Church Renewal at United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio. His latest book is "EarthCurrents: The Struggle for the World's Soul" (Abingdon).

Copyright (c) 1995 Christianity Today, Inc./CHRISTIANITY TODAY Magazine ctcurrmrw5T8030576b

The belief in a suffering God can provide an appropriate entry point for

sharing the gospel. A few years ago, I [Dennis Ngien] was in the former

Czechoslovakia on a preaching tour. On the plane home a government official

spoke to me. He told me that he had attended the service when I had spoken

about Christ's suffering for his people, and he had left the service in rage,

cursing God for the suffering he and his family had known: 40 years of

suffering under Communist rule; the starvation and death of his parents; the

long years he had spent as a lonely child in an orphanage.

His rage continued when he arrived home. On the apartment wall hung a

crucifix, given to him by his mother with the prayer that one day he would

come to Christ. Furious, he hurled a cake topped with thick, white icing at

it. The icing covered the crucifix, dripping down the face of the crucified

figure. And in that moment, my words about Christ's suffering came alive to

him. For the first time, he said, he saw Jesus' tears. In his apartment, he

knelt in front of the cross and gave his life to Christ. And he uttered

these words: "Christ is for me, not against me."

The man told me: "I don't understand many of the things that happened

politically, but I know that Jesus did not forsake me. He was in pain when I

was in pain. He was in tears when I was in tears. He did not experience joy

when I suffered the most." Forgoing speculation as to why suffering befell

him, he was now risking himself to the loving care of the Divine Sufferer. It

sufficed this wounded governor to perceive in the Cross God's deepest pain

and his loving scars. Thus sensing God's presence in his suffering, it

enabled him to receive the gospel, and eventually to find faith.

#4058

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In the movie “Hanoi Hilton” Major Fischer [probably a composite figure] came to the realization that no matter what happens to us, we can be conquerors.

Two of his men were caught trying to escape. As commanding officer, Fischer was sentenced to death. As he waited for his execution, he tapped out on the wall:

“None of the men here are ordinary. They are the bravest of the

brave, people who go on even when deserted by friends and

countrymen. What they carry inside them is the spirit that makes

all human beings unique, makes them heroic.”

[Only the death of Ho Chi Minh cancelled his execution.]

At 7:05 p.m. Ambulance #2 sped from McDonough County Hospital with red lights flashing and roared down Highway 136 toward the town of Bushnell, Illinois. The dispatch on the dashboard was brief: “Car wreck.”

Sitting in the back beside the stretcher, Steven Mosley watched the trees and telephone poles whiz past and wondered how this call would turn out. You could never tell. Even the recent collision between a pickup and a locomotive, which he was sure would be hideous, had resulted in only a few scratches. Rounding a curve they came upon a crowd of people and two police cars beside the road. Another false alarm, Mosley thought.

But then he saw something out in the field. A Chevy that had once been white was crumpled up about thirty yards from the road. The car had turned end- over-end several times. The Chevy lay there all alone, speckled in the moonlight. Spectators lining the road maintained their distance. Even the police did not go near. Sure sign of a mess.

Clutching his attendant’s bad, Mosley and the other orderly walked across the field. They peered reluctantly through a smashed window. The body was sprawled across the seat. Then the beam of their flashlight illuminated the man’s face. His eyes stared up at them, wide open and full of terror.

Steven Mosley had seen deaths before. Usually their eyes seemed benumbed. This man still shouted. Terror, fully tasted, shone from his gray eyes. It was Steven’s first encounter with death in the raw. Deep in our hearts, we rarely go “gentle into that good night”; life is ripped from our hands.

Few of us in the suburbs are touched by violence. But there was one who took on all that which we rightfully shudder at. That incomprehensible violence that we pray never comes into our neighborhoods has been heaped on the One with an immaculate soul and has torn it apart. Sometimes we do get a glimpse, if only in an accident victim’s eyes, of the Cross as a spectacle designed to pierce our minds and hearts. For a moment it stands stark and unnerving as a silent scream in a mangled car. Christ crucified.

That is the ultimate measure of his courage: facing hell open-eyed, taking on what no man could bear. Christ looked straight into the specter of eternal separation from the Father and yet willed himself to stay on the cross.

Billy Graham brought a simple message of Christian faith and hope to the intellectuals at Harvard University Sept. 26-27.

Graham spoke before capacity crowds at Memorial Church in the midst of Harvard yard and at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. Graham, 80, was honored by the university with a proclamation as "a preacher of the gospel, a Christian evangelist, and a voice for conscience and commitment," and with enthusiastic standing ovations as he entered and departed the Kennedy School gathering.

It was Graham's third visit to Harvard and his first since 1982. In the lucid and easygoing style that has been his trademark in recent years, Graham spoke Sunday morning at Memorial Church from Galatians 6:14 about the importance of the cross to an audience of some 1,200 students, faculty and friends, including some who camped out overnight with their sleeping bags to be assured of a seat.

He later told the pastor of Memorial Church that he had just preached "an old-fashioned Southern Baptist sermon." He noted that the cross, the method of Jesus Christ's execution, is seen by many people today as nothing more than an ornament or a piece of "costume jewelry." He added that many people wear a cross without an understanding of its true meaning.

Graham then reflected on his travels to the former Soviet Union and the once-thriving churches that still had a cross on top because the communists did not understand its message and thus did not remove it. He told of a boy who lived near a church and, when once he had lost his way, asked someone to "take me to the cross. I can find my way home from there."

This century's best-known evangelist said the Apostle Paul, a scholar who attended "the Harvard of his day," might have found reason for pride in his advanced education, in his Roman citizenship or in his religion, but he chose instead to "glory in the cross" of Jesus Christ. Graham called the repentant criminal who sought forgiveness from Jesus while both hung on crosses "the greatest example of faith in the Bible."

Students today who seek hope for their lives "will never really find an answer until they find it in God," Graham said, noting that the cross of Christ shows people today the depth of sin, the love of God and the only way to find salvation. He defined sin as "breaking the moral law of God. ... We're all guilty. I'm guilty." Graham urged those present to pray silently about developing or enhancing a personal faith, but he did not ask the audience to come to the altar for spiritual counsel, as he does in stadium crusades.

Stopping into one of the dollar stores this week, I couldn’t help but notice the display of reduced Easter memorabilia prominently arranged on a counter near the front doors. Alongside the plush toy bunnies, brightly colored plastic eggs, assorted dye kits and baskets lined with artificial grass were two items that stopped me in my tracks: candy crosses.

One expressed the hopeful message, “May His light shine upon you! Milk Chocolate Flavored, Net WT 1 Oz (28g),” while the other admonished, “Rejoice in the Wonder of the Day! Milk Chocolate Flavored, Net WT 1 Oz (28g).”

Is this now the summation of the death of Jesus — and of the cruel instrument of torture and execution on which he suffered? Are our marketing motivations in this “Christian nation” so strong that something this sacred is thus diminished and demeaned? Has the Cross of Christ really been reduced to a chocolate treat in a discount store?

When I was younger, I heard misguided criticisms of my Catholic brothers and sisters in the faith. That was years ago when many Baptists wondered if Roman Catholics were Christians at all. “Catholics focus too much on Good Friday, and in their churches, Jesus is still on the Cross,” someone would say, referring to a beautifully carved crucifix. “But Jesus isn’t there. The Cross is empty because Jesus is alive!”

But as I held in my hand what was once a focus of our faith and a symbol of suffering, now reduced to a sweet confection, I longed for a more thoughtful remembrance of Jesus’ final hours. Of course, I am not arguing for candy crucifixes, with milk chocolate figures of Jesus hanging on edible crosses. Instead, I would like for the “wonder of the day” not to be served up in 28-gram portions.

In an Easter special issue in 2015, Newsweek magazine examined the terrifying nature of the Cross and its purpose as a political tool of the Roman Empire: “In the age of Roman domination, only Rome crucified. And they did it often.... It was a popular method of dispatching threats to the empire. ‘Romans practiced both random and intentional violence against populations they had conquered, killing tens of thousands by crucifixion,’ says New Testament scholar Hal Taussig” of New York’s Union Theological Seminary.

Over time, after trying other vicious methods of capital punishment, the Romans realized that crucifying its state enemies was the greatest deterrent to rebellion and insurrection. The agonizing death of victims of crucifixion, as well as the punitive custom of leaving bodies on crosses to be picked apart by scavenger animals and birds, was absolutely shocking. Every aspect of death on a cross was a ghastly reminder of imperial power.

“Every aspect of death on a cross was a ghastly reminder of imperial power.”

But the horror has been hidden in our contemporary gospel choruses. In typical fashion, the lyrics of “Mighty Cross,” by Elevation Worship, move rather quickly to focus on our forgiveness purchased through Jesus’ death, as well as to gloss over the understandable panic that caused him to beg God for a different plan:

On the day that death surrendered to the mighty Cross of Jesus Christ,

The earth would shake, beneath the weight of darkened skies.

On his brow, a crown of sorrow for a King whose weakness was our strength.

No word he spoke, his love was shown for all to see.

Oh, the Cross of Jesus Christ, he’s the reason I’m alive.

For his blood has set me free. It will never lose its power for me!

But if one is not convinced by the theory of substitutionary atonement, then the rush past Jesus’ pain to our personal rescue is inappropriate. Suppose, for example, that other ancient meanings of the Cross which have been offered over the course of church history are considered.

Perhaps one is moved by the martyr motif that acknowledges Jesus as “the faithful witness (martus) ... who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood” (Revelation 1:5-6). Or maybe one is emboldened by the exemplar, or moral example, theory of the cross, where Jesus demonstrates, in his own suffering, that “no one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13).

In either case, the follower of Christ must contemplate the figure who was on the Cross for six excruciating hours. For he was either the ultimate witness, or martyr, testifying through his suffering to the power in weakness and vulnerability. Or he was the greatest illustration of godly compassion in his willingness to endure an evil execution.

So, could it be that we must not so quickly empty the cross of its victim, nor of alternate reasons that Friday should be called “Good”? Might the crucifix, indeed, be fitting even in our Baptist churches?

The crucifix is not only important in the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church, but it has a prominent place in the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Lutheran, Moravian and Anglican churches as well. Perhaps these Christian siblings of ours have much to teach us.

Often, Baptist congregations will sing a particular hymn on Easter Sunday: “Lo, in the grave he lay, Jesus, my Savior. Waiting the coming day, Jesus my Lord. Up from the grave he arose, with a mighty triumph o’er his foes. He arose the victor o’er the dark domain, and he lives forever with his saints to reign. He arose! He arose! HALLELUJAH, CHRIST AROSE!”

Excitement fills the air, as it should. There are smiles on faces. The praise team on the platform can’t keep from swaying in rhythm. The piano and organ are played as majestically as possible. Jesus is not on the Cross, he is alive!

It’s a cheerful time — a day for wearing our newest clothing, for taking family pictures in front of the flower-decorated chicken-wire cross, for sharing a wonderful meal around a table laden with food and served with the best china and cutlery.

To be clear, I love Easter Sunday also. I have sung that song with enthusiasm and joy. I have worn my best suit and taken those family photos too. I have enjoyed the pot roast and potatoes, the banana pudding and coffee.

“When I see the chocolate crosses, I think that celebratory elements of Easter may have received too much emphasis.”

But maybe we Baptists need more focus on Good Friday. When I see the chocolate crosses, I think that celebratory elements of Easter may have received too much emphasis. It’s not just that candy companies are selling crosses, possibly designed by imaginative Christians, but that these trivial snacks are intended for Christian shoppers, who are expected to buy them.

For many years, as a professor at Logsdon Seminary, I used several video episodes of a 1977 BBC documentary series, The Long Search. In that interesting presentation of religions around the world, London theater director Ronald Eyre explores the meaning of Theravada and Zen Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, Daoism, New Age spiritualities and African religions, as well as Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christianity.

The Orthodox episode was filmed in a Romanian village. I was moved by the Good Friday worship. Everyone in the hamlet, it seemed, gathered along the road for the procession of the priest, who ushered them into the small church. At the front of the room, a casket was resting upon two small tables of the same height, leaving perhaps four feet of empty space under the middle of the decorated wooden coffin. At the conclusion of the solemn service, the townspeople lined up and processed toward the physical symbol of Christ’s death, bowing their heads and stooping low to pass under the casket. It made me think of the words that generally accompany baptism: “buried with Christ and raised with him to walk in the newness of life.”

Why does my church celebrate Maundy Thursday and Easter Sunday but not Good Friday? How can so many Christians wear ornamental crosses around their necks or as bracelet charms or dangly earrings, when the original shape instilled fear and loathing?

What exactly is the wonder of the day? And will we sugarcoat his sacrifice by replacing the crucifix with chocolate candy?

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Rob Sellers is professor of theology and missions emeritus at Hardin-Simmons University’s Logsdon Seminary in Abilene, Texas.

In the spring of 2011 a startling archaeological discovery was revealed. A cache of 70 small books, made of lead sheets about the size of credit cards, was found by a Bedouin in a cave 3 years ago. He smuggled them into Israel but scholars found out about them and the Jordanian government wants them back.

Experts say they may be among the earliest Christian writings found so far, dating from the first decades of the church. The director of Jordan’s Department of Antiquities says they may be more important than the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Even though the books are written in Hebrew code that hasn’t been deciphered yet, scholars believe they are Christian. The cover of one of the books shows a “T”-shaped cross, and behind the cross is what must be the tomb of Jesus. From the very beginning, these symbols have been the center of the faith.

Some scholars believe the books are modern forgeries and contain a mishmash of writing styles and images copied from ancient sources. Further tests are being conducted.

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Adapted from a BBC News article

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[Original illustration at this number was moved to HolwickID #4353]

Shocking Reality

A business man selling full-scale replicas of Florida's

infamous electric chair is feeling the jolt of controversy.

John Pawley of North Carolina charges $995 for his models

of "Old Sparky", the 75-year-old death chair that's one of

just a few still used in the United States. For a few

dollars more, customers get a T-shirt that says, "Only

sissies do the injection."

Though Pawley won't give numbers, he says his Internet

and radio ads have yielded sales to bar owners, a sheriff

and even a judge. He admits he's a bit "warped" but insists

the venture's all in good fun.

Critics are genuinely shocked. A lawyer representing

Florida death row inmates says the replicas will desensitize

people even more to the fate of prisoners who've already

been written off by most of society.

But fascination with the electric chair is nothing new.

In the late 1890s, King Menelek of Ethiopia heard about the

introduction of electrocution in the U.S. Intrigued, he

ordered three electric chairs from the States, forgetting

they wouldn't work in a country that didn't yet have hydro.

To salvage his investment, Menelek used one of the chairs as

his throne.

In an infinitely more profound way, another instrument of

death now represents a King's position and authority. But

the cross is anything but a powerless symbol. It embodies

the stunning way in which God takes away our sins because of

what Jesus did there "This includes you, who were once so

far away from God... separated from Him by your evil

thoughts and actions, yet now He has brought you back as His

friends. He has done this through Christ's death on the

cross." (Col. 1:21,22).

That cross, with its message of hope and healing, is

still active today, giving life, not taking it away. But if

we're not careful, we can cheapen it horribly by offering

those around us what amounts to a facsimile of the real

thing: one that looks genuine and serves as a great

conversation piece, but has no power.

A morbid replica is all we have if we substitute our own

will and wisdom for God's and "empty the cross of its power"

(1 Cor. 1:7, 2:1-5). Like me, maybe you can find yourself

in the list of those who devalue the cross by "having a form

of godliness but denying its power": lovers of themselves

and money, the boastful, abusive, ungrateful and

unforgiving; those without love or self-control, the rash,

the conceited and lovers of pleasure not lovers of God (2

Tim. 3:1-5). Few of us can look down our noses at John

Pawley.

Even if we exhibit it daily, a cross without the

transforming power of Jesus and His Spirit demeans the

sacrifice of Calvary and makes it easy for people to care

little about a death that has no real connection with their

lives. That shouldn't come as a shock to any of us.

by Rick Gamble, published in Cross Current, Brantford,

Ontario, Canada. Publish at will.

In Kurt Vonnegut's novel, SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE, a group of captured Allied soldiers in WW 2 are herded into a defunct meatpacking plant near Dresden. They dread going into the basement, then the firebombing of Dresden begins. Slaughterhouse five, a place of sacrifice, becomes a place of refuge--the only safe place. The church is like slaughterhouse five. Repulsive to most, not filled with the beautiful elite. We take refuge in a place that has as much worldly status as an old meatpacking plant. We believe the

irony will be vindicated in the firestorm!

At a preaching seminar Ian Pitt-Wattson told the following true story which a student named Bill had shared from his own life in a student sermon at Fuller Theological Seminary: "When I was a young boy I fell in love with golf and my parents gave me a club and a harmless whiffle-type golf ball which I could hit around the back yard. I loved to swing the club and the feeling of hitting the ball -- even though it would not go very far because of its lightness and all the holes in it. One day, thinking my parents weren't home, I had the overwhelming temptation to feel the click of a real ball against the club head. I teed it up and gave it a hard whack. Unfortunately the ball was not hit properly and it hooked sharply from its intended flight and the ball went directly for one of the windows of our house and right through the window with a terrifying crash. But the crash was immediately followed by a piercing scream. Oh, no! I ran for the house, burst into the living room and there, standing in front of the window was my mother, bleeding. I gasped. What had I done? I cried out, "Mother, I could have killed you!" She hugged me and said, 'I'm O.K. It's all right. I'm going to be all right!'" Bill concluded the story by saying, "There in that moment -- when I saw my mother bleeding -- there were some things I could never do again in the back yard. I could never so much as carry a golf club across the lawn of our back yard. The sight of her standing there with blood flowing down -- that I had caused -- changed my behavior forever." Bill then invited the class to look at another one -- Jesus Christ -- bleeding.

H. A. Ironside once told the following:

"One of the first gospel illustration that ever made a real impression upon my young heart was simple story that I heard a preacher tell when I was less than nine years old. It was of pioneers who were making their way across one of the central states to a distant place that had been opened up for homesteading. They traveled in covered wagons drawn by oxen, and progress was necessarily slow. One day they were horrified to note a long line of smoke in the west, stretching for miles across the prairie, and soon it was evident that the dried grass was burning fiercely, and was coming toward them rapidly. They had crossed a river the day before but it would be impossible to go back to that before the flames would be upon them. One man only seemed to have an understanding as to what should be done. He gave the command to set fire to the grass behind them. Then when a space was burned over, the whole company moved back upon it. As the flames roared on toward them from the west, a little girl cried out in terror. "Are you sure we shall not all be burned up?" The leader replied, "My child, the flames can reach us here, for we are standing where the fire has been!"

The fires of God's judgment burned themselves out on Him, and all who are in Christ are safe forever, for they are now standing where the fire has been. - Robert G. Lee, Sermonic Library, pp. 105-06.

I became a Christian when I was 20 years old. A pastor told me about the cross of Christ. I believed then, as I believe now, that what Christ accomplished on the cross meant salvation for me. I have not wavered in my basic belief since that significant moment of conversion.

That belief, however, has not spared me from the difficulty-even the agony-of discerning what it means to apply Christ’s work on the cross to my daily life. I know that the cross of Christ has saved me. I wonder why it has not changed me, at least to the degree I expect and want.

I know that the cross of Christ has delivered me from sin, yet I still struggle with sinful habits every day. I believe that Christ suffered for me on the cross, yet I still wonder what Christ’s suffering on the cross has to say about my own suffering. I realize that the cross has achieved peace among enemies, yet I am aware of many hostile and broken relationships in the Christian community. I want to know how the cross of Christ can change the way we live in ordinary life.

SEEING SIN FROM UNDER THE CROSS

The first way the cross can transform our day-to-day living is to provide us with the power and means to tackle sinful habits. It provides a simple but profound principle: We have died to those habits. We can nail them to the cross. Say no. Stop.

It is, of course, easier said than done. Augustine understood sin’s grip simply by observing his own life, which he then reflected on in his famous Confessions. He argued that though evil has nothing of value to offer us, it gives the appearance of good in order to attract us. But the good it offers is always at the wrong time, in the wrong place, under the wrong circumstances. Still, our perverted nature propels us toward such evil. Before we know it, we are bound to it. "The truth is that disordered lust springs from a perverted will; when lust is pandered to, a habit is formed; when habit is not checked, it hardens into compulsion" is how Augustine described the process.

If these habits are so destructive, why is it so hard to put them to death? Because doing so makes us feel as if we are dying, not just the sin in us. Take food, for instance. As all of us know, good food in large quantities can become habit forming. It can lead to gluttony. Gluttony concerns not merely the quantity of food we eat, which is bad enough; it also concerns our attitude about food, our preoccupation with it, our impatience when we do not get it fast enough, and our resentment when we are deprived of it. Gluttony is a nasty, ugly habit.

Imagine for a moment that you struggle with the sin of gluttony. You are a Christian, and you have confessed your gluttony to God and have received assurance of forgiveness. But you are bothered and perplexed because gluttony still rules your life. Forgiveness, in other words, has not led to change. So what should you do?

One day, while reading your Bible, you stumble across this text from the Apostle Paul:

And so, because [Jesus] died, sin has no power over him; and now

he lives his life in fellowship with God. In the same way you

are to think of yourselves as dead, so far as sin is concerned,

but living in fellowship with God through Christ Jesus.

Romans 6:10-11, TEV

Perplexed, you look for other texts to illumine the one you just read. A passage from Hebrews makes it clearer:

Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, on whom our faith depends

from beginning to end. He did not give up because of the cross!

On the contrary, because of the joy that was waiting for him, he

thought nothing of the disgrace of dying on the cross, and he is

now seated at the right side of God’s throne.

Hebrews 12:2, TEV

You want to die to your gluttony. You decide to say no to it. You put it to death. Of course, your gluttonous habit makes a big fuss, crying out that if you sacrifice eating as much and often as you want, then you will die of starvation and lose all pleasure in life. But in faith you tell yourself that you will not die; only the vicious habit that is hurting you will die. You choose, instead, to believe Scripture-that there is joy before you, a kind of resurrection of your life. You assume that you will actually experience greater pleasure by living for God rather than for your stomach. You risk giving up the sin because you believe that, though you will suffer immediate loss, in the long run you will gain something far greater. You will experience the wonder and joy of living in and for God, who is the giver of every good and perfect gift (James 1:17). You remember the words Jesus spoke in the face of temptation: "Man does not live on bread alone" (Luke 4:4). You recall that His true food was to do the will of His Father in heaven (John 4:34). He said of Himself that He is the bread of life, and the bread He feeds us will satisfy us for eternity (John 6:35-59). So you dare to die to the sin of gluttony. That death, you believe, will prepare you to receive a different kind of food that only God can give, the food of obedience, joy, and divine approval.

Jesus had to die on the cross in order to usher in new life. Our stubborn sins must also die if we are to fully experience the joy and freedom of the new life He purchased for us. To live under the cross is to keep the nails handy.

SEEING SUFFERING FROM UNDER THE CROSS

The same cross that has the power to free us from stubborn sin also has the power to transform our perspective of and response to suffering.

In the past few years, I have changed my mind about suffering. I spent decades avoiding it because I considered it an unmitigated evil. When at the age of 40 I found myself in circumstances that forced suffering upon me, I still believed that it was evil. Now I am not so sure. Not that I think the opposite, that suffering is an unqualified good. I believe it is ambiguous, an evil that can lead to good, a plague that God can redeem. Suffering reminds us of our desperate need for God and makes us aware of our dependence on grace. It is like a fire that forces an evacuation of a condemned house that had become a familiar and comfortable place to us. Once we get outside and into the open air, we begin to see what we were missing.

The cross inflicted inconceivable suffering on Jesus. Jesus said that we, too, must bear a cross-which reminds us that we should not expect, and do not deserve, an easy life. Not that we should seek suffering. Even Jesus dreaded the cross and asked His Father to spare Him from it (Lk. 22:41-44). We know, however-again through the cross-that suffering does not have the final word. The resurrection does.

In and of itself, the cross was bad. It serves as undeniable evidence of the evil of the human heart, because people just like us ordered Jesus’ execution and mocked Him while He hung there in agony. But the cross was also good. It accomplished the world’s redemption. We can, therefore, rejoice, knowing that God will use our suffering to change our lives. He will form character in us (Romans 5:3-4), awaken hope in us (Romans 5:5), and work all things together for our good (Romans 8:28).

Two years ago, I wrote a book about suffering. I have received many letters from people who wanted to tell me their own stories of suffering. I have asked permission from a few to tell their stories to others. One woman, Mary, was in a terrible automobile accident when she was only five years old. Her grandmother, aunt, and only sibling - a younger brother - were killed. She, the only survivor, was trapped in that chamber of death for more than an hour before an emergency crew could get her out. It took her parents, who were touring Europe at the time, three days to get home. By the time they arrived, she had retreated into a cocoon of silence that lasted for nearly two years. Gradually, she emerged from her silence and returned to normal, or so it seemed.

Mary forgot the accident, but the memory of it did not forget her. She was married in her 20s and had a baby. When her little son reached the age of her brother at the time of his death, the memories flooded back. She had a nervous breakdown and was institutionalized. That experience set her on a journey of pain, healing, and redemption.

She was well on her way to emotional and spiritual health when she wrote to me. She concluded her letter by admitting the obvious: She would never have chosen what had happened to her. "Let this cup pass from me," she would have said to God. But she did not have a choice. She came to realize over time that her suffering had a good effect. It served God’s redemptive purpose. She understood the tension in which Christians must live - the tension between human weakness and God’s strength, life’s afflictions and God’s redemptive plan, catastrophic suffering (which she surely faced) and spiritual victory. She was living what Paul wrote: "We are often troubled, but not crushed; sometimes in doubt, but never in despair; there are many enemies, but we are never without a friend; and though badly hurt at times, we are not destroyed. At all times we carry in our mortal bodies the death of Jesus, so that his life also may be seen in our bodies" (2 Corinthians 4:8-10, TEV).

Mary embraced suffering so that God’s life could fill her up. It is a perspective she learned by living under the cross.

SEEING PEOPLE FROM UNDER THE CROSS

When we live under the cross of Christ, we will also see transformation in our relationships.

I used to be concerned about my natural limitations and weaknesses, and I wished that I could be rid of them. I wanted to be strong, independent, and competent. Now I am less concerned about my weaknesses and more concerned about my strengths. My weaknesses remind me of my finitude and need, and they drive me to seek help from something or someone outside myself, namely God. My strengths, on the other hand, often deceive me into thinking I am greater than I really am. My strengths make me feel powerful and superior. I use them to assert myself over others.

The sad, violent, and destructive history of the world tells the story of human strength gone bad. Aryans dominated other races and exterminated millions of Jews (as well as other "undesirable" populations) because they thought Aryans alone embodied pure stock. Whites rule over blacks because they think they are superior to them. One political party mocks or dismisses another because it assumes it has the edge on truth. The worst cruelties done in world history have been done in the name of strength, not weakness.

The cross exposes the danger of human strength, unmasking it for what it is-an attempt to thwart God. It was pharisaical religion and Roman law, both expressions of cultural achievement and strength, that sent Jesus to the cross. Both were the products of enlightened people and sophisticated culture. The best of humanity, as it turned out, did the worst thing imaginable.

The Apostle Paul describes "the dividing wall of hostility" (Ephesians 2:14) that separates one person from another, or one group from another. That dividing wall represents strengths that we use to assert our superiority over others - our wealth, education, gender, ethnicity, party affiliation, culture. The cross tears down those walls. For example, Christ’s death broke down the wall of hostility that separated Jew from Gentile. "He abolished the Jewish Law with its commandments and rules, in order to create out of the two races one new people in union with himself, in this way making peace. By his death on the cross Christ destroyed their enmity; by means of the cross he united both races into one body and brought them back to God" (Ephesians 2:15-16, TEV). Jewish law made Gentiles outsiders and aliens, an unacceptable group of people. The cross exposed the vanity and emptiness of those laws. Peace resulted from the demolition of the wall between Jews and Gentiles. It does that to all walls.

The cross altered Paul’s attitude toward his former opponents. His pharisaical background no longer made him feel superior to others. Instead, he viewed people through the cross. He saw what the cross did to transform them. "No longer, then, do we judge anyone by human standards. Even if at one time we judged Christ according to human standards, we no longer do so. When anyone is joined to Christ, he is a new being; the old is gone, the new has come" (2 Corinthians 5:16-17, TEV). Paul celebrated people, no matter what their background or culture, because the only thing that mattered to him was their relationship with Christ. Thus at the end of his letter to the church in Rome, he gives personal greetings to dozens of people, though the majority were Gentiles, women, or slaves. Paul did not consider what they were in the eyes of culture but who they were through the work of Christ. The cross revolutionized the way he looked at people.

I use Cry, the Beloved Country, a novel written by Alan Paton, in one of the classes I teach. It tells the story of a black South African pastor, Stephen Kumalo, who learns that his wayward son has murdered a white man who had devoted his life to racial reconciliation. The victim’s father, James Jarvis, is not sympathetic with his son’s convictions. In bitterness, he not only mourns the death of his son but also views his martyrdom as a waste of his son’s life.

But Jarvis’ heart begins to change when he reads his son’s writings, for they accuse white Christians such as Jarvis of being hypocrites. Their true religion, his son charges, is not the Christianity of the cross but white supremacy. Christianity exposes the evil of racism and brings reconciliation between enemies. When he sees his prejudice from under the cross, Jarvis is transformed.

When the two grieving fathers finally meet, James Jarvis is able to embrace Stephen Kumalo. The sacrificial death of his son liberates Jarvis to love a man he once considered an enemy. Reaching across racial and cultural barriers, he makes a new friend.

The story is fiction. The principle behind it is truth. The cross effected peace between Jew and Gentile. It has that same power today to reconcile feminist and traditionalist, black and white, liberal and conservative, fundamentalist and Pentecostal, Republican and Democrat. But there is a price to be paid. The cross will deprive us of the right to use our strengths to gain power over others. It forces us into a position of humility and vulnerability. It breaks down the dividing walls of hostility we create to have an advantage over opponents and enemies. It transforms relationships.

THE ONLY WAY TO LIFE

The cross, then, is not simply the means of our salvation, although it is that to be sure! It is also the means of our transformation. It is the way of life we must follow if we want to close the gap between who we are in Christ (as His redeemed children) and how we live from day to day (as sinful humans in the world).

The cross brings good news on two levels. It promises to redeem us; it also promises to change us. Such change is bound to produce pain. It is painful to die to self, to embrace suffering, and to reconcile with opponents and enemies.

But it is worth it. I have followed Christ for many years now, and I am serious about my faith. I am not a perfect man. I still have many problems. But the problems are different now. The foundation upon which I am building my life has become sturdier over time. I have died to some old habits, and it feels very good to be rid of them. I have faced suffering and come through it with a deep sense of the goodness of God and the power of God’s grace. I have made friends with people I would have spurned 20 years ago, yet I have not had to compromise basic convictions to do it. I have lived the Christian faith long enough to understand its incredible power. The cross has provided for me not only a way of salvation but also a way of life. It is the only way to live.

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About the Author GERALD L. SITTSER is an associate professor of religion at Whitworth College in Spokane, Washington. He is the author of several books, including A Grace Disguised (Zondervan) and Loving across Our Differences (IVP).

©2002 The Navigators All rights reserved.

*

Precisely how a man nailed to a cross 2,000 years ago, who claimed to be the Son of God, came to signify reality, in contradiction to the sawdust men of destiny with their fraudulent wars and revolutions and liberations, is something that can be understood, but not explained. You either see it or you don't.

-Malcolm Muggeridge

The day is over, you are driving home. You tune in your radio. You hear a little blurb about a little village in India where some villagers have died suddenly, strangely, of a flu that has never been seen before. It’s not influenza, but three or four fellows are dead, and it’s kind of interesting.

They’re sending some doctors over there to investigate it. You don’t think much about it, but on Sunday, coming home from church, you hear another radio spot. Only they say it’s not three villagers, it’s 30,000 villagers in the back hills of this particular area of India, and it’s on TV that night.

CNN runs a little blurb; people are heading there from the disease center in Atlanta because this disease strain has never been seen before.

By Monday morning when you get up, it’s the lead story. For it’s not just India; it’s Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and before you know it, you’re hearing this story everywhere and they have coined it now as “the mystery flu.” The President has made some comment that he and everyone are praying and hoping that all will go well over there. But everyone is wondering, “How are we going to contain it?”

That’s when the President of France makes an announcement that shocks Europe. He is closing their borders. No flights from India, Pakistan, or any of the countries where this thing has been seen.

That night you are watching a little bit of CNN before going to bed. Your jaw hits your chest when a weeping woman is translated from a French news program into English: “There’s a man lying in a hospital in Paris dying of the mystery flu. It has come to Europe.” Panic strikes.

As best they can tell, once you get it, you have it for a week and you don’t know it. Then you have four days of unbelievable symptoms. Then you die.

Britain closes its borders, but it’s too late. Southampton, Liverpool, Northampton, and it’s Tuesday morning when the President of the United States makes the following announcement:

Due to a national security risk, all flights to and from Europe

and Asia have been canceled. If your loved ones are overseas,

I’m sorry. They cannot come back until we find a cure for this

thing.

Within four days our nation has been plunged into an unbelievable fear. People are selling little masks for your face. Some are talking about what if it comes to this country, and preachers on Tuesday are saying, “It’s the scourge of God.”

It’s Wednesday night and you are at a church prayer meeting when somebody runs in from the parking lot and says, “Turn on a radio, turn on a radio.” While the church listens to a little transistor radio with a microphone stuck up to it, the announcement is made, “Two women are lying in a Long Island hospital dying from the mystery flu.”

Within hours it seems, this thing just sweeps across the country. People are working around the clock trying to find an antidote. Nothing is working. California, Oregon, Arizona, Florida, Massachusetts. It’s as though it’s just sweeping in from the borders.

Then, all of a sudden the news comes out. The code has been broken. A cure can be found. A vaccine can be made. It’s going to take the blood of somebody who hasn’t been infected, and so, sure enough, all through the Midwest, through all those channels of emergency broadcasting, everyone is asked to do one simple thing: “Go to your downtown hospital and have your blood type taken. That’s all we ask of you. When you hear the sirens go off in your neighborhood, please make your way quickly, quietly, and safely to the hospitals.”

Sure enough, when you and your family get down there late on that Friday night, there is a long line, and they’ve got nurses and doctors coming out and pricking fingers and taking blood and putting labels on it.

Your spouse and your kids are out there, and they take your blood type and they say, “Wait here in the parking lot and if we call your name, you can be dismissed and go home.” You stand around scared with your neighbors, wondering what in the world is going on, and that this is the end of the world.

Suddenly a young man comes running out of the hospital screaming. He’s yelling a name and waving a clipboard. What? He yells it again! And your son tugs on your jacket and says, “Daddy, that’s me.”

Before you know it, they have grabbed your boy. “Wait a minute, hold it!” And they say, “It’s okay, his blood is clean. His blood is pure. We want to make sure he doesn’t have the disease. We think he has got the right type.”

Five tense minutes later, out come the doctors and nurses, crying and hugging one another -- some are even laughing. It’s the first time you have seen anybody laugh in a week, and an old doctor walks up to you and says, “Thank you, sir. Your son’s blood type is perfect. It’s clean, it is pure, and we can make the vaccine.”

As the word begins to spread all across that parking lot full of folks, people are screaming and praying and laughing and crying. But then the gray-haired doctor pulls you and your wife aside and says, “May we see you for a moment? We didn’t realize that the donor would be a minor and we need ... we need you to sign a consent form.”

You begin to sign and then you see that the number of pints of blood to be taken is empty. “H-h-h-how many pints?”, you ask. And that is when the old doctor’s smile fades and he says, “We had no idea it would be a little child. We weren’t prepared. We need it all!”

“But -but...” “You don’t understand. We are talking about the world here. Please sign. We - we need it all-we need it all!”

“But can’t you give him a transfusion?”

“If we had clean blood we would. Can you sign? Would you sign?” In numb silence you do. Then they say, “Would you like to have a moment with him before we begin?” Can you walk back? Can you walk back to that room where he sits on a table saying, “Daddy? Mommy? What’s going on?” Can you take his hands and say, “Son, we love you, and we would never ever let anything happen to you that didn’t just have to be. Do you understand that?”

When that old doctor comes back in and says, “I’m sorry, we’ve -- we’ve got to get started. People all over the world are dying.” Can you leave? Can you walk out while he is saying, “Dad? Mom? Why - why have you forsaken me?”

And then next week, when they have the ceremony to honor your son, and some folks sleep through it, and some folks don’t even come because they go to the lake, and some folks come with a pretentious smile and just pretend to care.

Would you want to jump up and say, “MY SON DIED! DON’T YOU CARE?”

Is that what God is saying? “MY SON DIED. DON’T YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I CARE?”

________

submitted by Todd Brenneman, dragonreborn3@juno.com

My years of track and field competition date roughly back to the days when they gave out laurel leaves, and Sparta and Athens were the teams to beat. I was a sort-of long jumper. In the aeons since, the world record in that event has been extended dramatically; but long jumpers still jump pretty much the same way ... just farther.

But that's not true of the high jump. No other track and field event has changed more radically than the high jump. Thirty years ago high jumpers used to "scissor" over the bar; it looked like a punter punting, first with one leg and then the other. Then jumpers discovered they could go higher by rolling their bodies over the bar in a horizontal fashion.

Then in 1968 the high jump changed forever. A tall, gangly American named Dick Fosbury startled the world with the oddest high jump style anyone had ever seen. Fosbury ran up to the bar and threw himself over head-first, his face to the sky, arching his back impossibly, then kicking his trailing heels up and over at the last second. We seasoned tracksters all laughed the first time we saw Fosbury. What a bizarre and un-athletic act this guy had! It was dubbed "the Fosbury Flop, " as much in derision as in description. But Dick Fosbury kept jumping higher. And higher. Higher than anybody. Olympic gold medal. Olympic record. And guess what? Every high jumper stopped laughing and started flopping. And every single high jump world record, and every single Olympic medal since then, has been accomplished by someone using the Fosbury Flop.

Shifting from the relatively-ridiculous to the ultimately-sublime, what Dick Fosbury did to the high jump, Jesus has done to the human enterprise of faith. Across history, people have typically sought to know and understand God either through the miraculous (signs and wonders) or through philosophy (rationality). And God has communicated himself both through his mighty deeds in history and through rational revelation.

Then Jesus came. And died an atoning death. And was resurrected gloriously. Now -- since Calvary -- we know something about God we never quite knew before. Now we have a new and better means (or paradigm, or perspective) for understanding the eternal purposes of God: the Cross. The Cross shows us a God who comes to us as a suffering servant, who loves to the uttermost. So Paul says that while some seek signs and others wisdom, what we preach as primary is Christ crucified (I Corinthians 1:22-23). Because that is the key to understanding history; and that is the key to life.

Sometimes history turns a corner. After one singular event or one person's unique achievement, nothing can ever again be the same: Copernicus, Gutenberg, the Wright Brothers, Madame Curie, Dick Fosbury. The Cross is history's utmost singular perspective-changing and reality-changing event. And the funny thing is, many then and now, still see it as foolishness, a stumbling block ... a flop.

--Ken Durham

Several year ago after I had finished speaking at a conference, a lovely woman came to the platform. She obviously wanted to speak to me and the moment I turned to her, tears welled up in her eyes. We made our way to a room where we could talk privately. It was clear from looking at her that she was sensitive but tortured. She sobbed as she told me the following story.

Years before, she and her fiancé (to whom she was now married) had been youth workers at a large conservative church. They were a well-known couple and had an extraordinary impact on the young people. Everyone looked up to them and admired them tremendously. A few months before they were to be married they began having sexual relations. That left them burdened enough with a sense of guilt and hypocrisy. But then she discovered she was pregnant. “You can't imagine what the implications would have been of admitting this to our church,” she said. “To confess that were preaching one thing and living another would have been intolerable. The congregation was so conservative and had never been touched by any scandal. We felt they wouldn't be able to handle knowing about our situation. Nor could we bear the humiliation.

“So we made the most excruciating decision I have ever made. I had an abortion. My wedding day was the worst day of my entire life. Everyone in the church was smiling at me, thinking me a bride beaming in innocence. But do you know what was going through my head as I walked down the aisle? All I could think to myself was, 'You're a murderer. You were so proud that you couldn't bear the shame and humiliation of being exposed for what you are. But I know what you are and so does God. You have murdered an innocent baby.”

She was sobbing so deeply that she could not speak. As I put my arms around her a thought came to me very strongly. But I was afraid to say it. I knew if it was not from God that it could be very destructive. So I prayed silently for the wisdom to help her.

She continued. “I just can't believe that I could do something so horrible. How could I have murdered an innocent life? How is it possible I could do such a thing? I love my husband; we have four beautiful children. I know the Bible says that God forgives all of our sins. But I can't forgive myself! I've confessed this sin a thousand times, and I still feel such shame and sorrow. The thought that haunts me the most is how could I murder and innocent life?”

I took a deep breath and said what I had been thinking. “I don't know why you are so surprised. This isn't the first time your sin has led to death; it's the second.” She looked at me in utter amazement. “My dear friend,” I continued, “when you look at the cross, all of us show up as crucifiers. Religious or non-religious, good or bad, aborters or nonaborters - all of us are responsible for the death of the only innocent who ever lived. Jesus died for all our sins - past, present, and future. Do you think there are any sins of yours that Jesus didn't have to die for? The very sin of pride that caused you to destroy your child is what killed Christ as well. It does not matter that you weren't there two thousand years ago. We all sent him there. Luther said that we carry his very nails in our pockets. So if you have done it before, then why couldn't you do it again?”

She stopped crying. She looked at me straight in the eyes and said, “You're absolutely right. I have done something even worse than killing my baby. My sin is what drove Jesus to the cross. It doesn't matter that I wasn't there pounding in the nails, I'm still responsible for his death. Do you realize the significance of what you are telling me, Becky? I came to you saying I had done the worst thing imaginable. And you tell me I have done something even worse than that.”

I grimaced because I knew this was true. (I am not sure that my approach would qualify as one of the great counseling techniques!) The she said, “But, Becky, if the cross shows me that I am far worse that I had ever imagined, it also shows me that my evil has been absorbed and forgiven. If the worst thing any human can do is kill God's Son, and that can be forgiven, then how can anything else - even my abortion - not be forgiven?”

I will never forget the look in her eyes as she sat back in awe and quietly said, “Talk about amazing grace.” This time she wept not out of sorrow but from relief and gratitude. I saw a woman literally transformed by a proper understanding of the cross.

____________

told by Rebecca Pippert in HOPE HAS ITS REASONS (1989)

*

[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #1301]

I once heard a story about a cottage in a little country village. In the cottage a family of four: father, mother, and two small children. One evening the cottage caught on fire. In a few seconds the thatched roof and the wooden timbers were ablaze. There was no fire engine in this remote spot and the villagers stood around helpless. Suddenly a young man, who had just arrived upon the scene cried out, “What, can nothing be done to save them?” When no one responded he jumped through the flames and darted into the house. A moment later he emerged bearing a little child under each arm. He had carefully protected them from the flames by hiding them under his coat but he himself was badly burned.

The parents of the two children died in the fire. There was much sympathy for the two children in the town and several people wanted to adopt them. When the judge arrived to decide who would adopt the children there were two who petitioned the court. The first was the squire of the village. He had money, position, and a fine house to offer the children. The second petitioner was the man who had rescued the children from the flames. When the judge asked him what right he had to ask the court for the children he did not answer with words. Instead he held up his hands that had been badly burned and scarred in their recuse and let them do his arguing for him.

Friends, when the devil accuses us before God and asks what right we poor sinners have to be adopted into God's family, I imagine the Lord Jesus Christ doesn't answer with words but rather holds up his nail scarred hands and points to his scarred side.

- Unknown

=========================

Another version:

Leslie B. Flynn told a story that illustrates a great truth. An orphaned boy was living with his grandmother when their house caught fire. The grandmother, trying to get upstairs to rescue the boy, perished in the flames. The boy’s cries for help were finally answered by a man who climbed an iron drain pipe and came back down with the boy hanging tightly to his neck. Several weeks later, a public hearing was held to determine who would receive custody of the child. A farmer, a teacher, and the town’s wealthiest citizen all gave the reasons they felt they should be chosen to give the boy a home. But as they talked, the lad’s eyes remained focused on the floor.

Then a stranger walked to the front and slowly took his hand from his pockets, revealing severe scars on them. As the crowd gasped, the boy cried out in recognition. This was the man who had saved his life. His hands had been burned when he climbed the hot pipe. With a leap the boy threw his arms around the man’s neck and held on for dear life. The other men silently walked away, leaving the boy and his rescuer alone. Those marred hands had settled the issue. And so it is with Jesus. His nail-pierced hands remind us that he has rescued us from sin and its deadly consequences.

=========================

Another version:

I read a story by Leslie Flynn who told of a small boy being raised in a frontier city by his grandmother. One night the house catches on fire. The grandmother, trying to rescue the boy who was asleep in the bedroom upstairs, is overcome by the smoke and dies in the fire. This frontier city doesn't have much of a fire department. A crowd gathers around the house and they hear a small boy crying out for help. The lower floor is a wall of flames and no one seems to know what to do. Suddenly, a man pushes through the crowd and begins climbing an iron drainage pipe which runs to the roof. The pipe is hot from the fire, but he makes it to a second floor window. The man crawls through the window and locates the boy. With the crowd cheering encouragement, the man climbs back down the hot iron pipe with the boy on his back and his arms around his neck.

A few weeks later, a public meeting was held to determine in whose custody the boy would be placed. Each person wanting the child would be allowed to make a brief statement. The first man said, "I have a farm and would give the boy a good home. He would grow up on the farm and learn a trade."

The second person to speak was the local school teacher. She said, "I am a school teacher and I would see to it that he received a good education." Finally, the banker said, "Mrs. Morton and I would be able to give the boy a fine home and a fine education. We would like him to come and live with us." The presiding officer looked around and asked, "Is there anyone else who would like to say anything?" From the back row, a man rose and said, "These other people may be able to offer some things I can't. All I can offer is my love." Then, he slowly removed his hands from his coat pockets. A gasp went up from the crowd because his hands were scarred terribly from climbing up and down the hot pipe. The boy recognized the man as the one who had saved his life and ran into his waiting arms.

The farmer, teacher and the banker simply sat down. Everyone knew what the decision would be. The scarred hands proved that this man had given more than all the others.

_____________________

Robert L. Allen, His Finest Days: Ten Sermons for Holy Week and the Easter Season, CSS Publishing Company, 1993.

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[see also HolwickID #27239]