St. John Studies

It was 2004…

My wife and I were able to go watch the film with a group of people from our church.  The power of the movie was evident, especially the scenes depicting the Roman’s treatment of Jesus after they captured Him–His torture and His crucifixion.  However, I was viewing the film in a theatre with other people, in a public place.

The full impact of the film did not manifest itself until I was able to view it by myself at my home several years later.  That’s when the full impact struck me.  When Jesus’ Roman tormentors began to beat Him, I began to cry and I asked them to stop.  Crying uncontrollably is one thing but talking to the screen is another.  Of course I got even more emotional as I watched Jesus drag His cross to Golgotha and die upon the cross.

The film was Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ.

In this discussion, I will concentrate on responsibility for the death of Jesus and this first perspective will deal with those most immediately responsible, the Roman soldiers and Pilate.

R. W. Stott* feels that Jesus’ treatment came about due to “personal moral factors” which influenced the leaders who carried out Roman and Jewish law.  Pilate suffered a moral collapse due to his “dark passions” which overruled his sense of right and wrong.

One might turn to the Bible and read accounts of the crucifixion in the Gospels, but details of the gruesome death are vague.  We are told “They crucified Him” and Jesus kept praying out loud, “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”  One can turn to Gibson’s Passion and see a very accurate portrayal of what usually happened at a crucifixion.  “The prisoner would first be publicly humiliated by being stripped naked.  He was then laid on his back on the ground, while his hands were either nailed or roped to the horizontal wooden beam (the patibulum) and his feet to the vertical pole.  The cross was then hoisted to an upright position and dropped into a socket which had been dug for it in the ground.  Usually a peg or rudimentary seat was provided to take some of the weight of the victim’s body and prevent it from being torn loose.  But there it would hang, helplessly exposed to intense physical pain, public ridicule, daytime heat and nighttime cold” [Martin Hengel’s Crucifixion as quoted in Stott].

There are few if any details to suggest how the Roman soldiers felt about their duty.  Was crucifixion just normal duty for them to carry out?  Did they enjoy it?  Since this was Jesus, were they more cruel and sadistic than usual?  There was some information about the state of Jesus before He began His walk to Golgatha; He was dressed in a purple robe, given a crown of thorns, spat upon, struck on the head and slapped.  But when He arrived at Golgotha, there is no reference to a hammer, nails, pain or blood.

Pilate was in charge of the crucifixion; he ordered it and handed Jesus over to his soldiers to take charge of the task.  Stott points out that he certainly was culpable, even showing up in our Christian creed which declares that Jesus was “crucified under Pontius Pilate” but why did he do this to a Jewish rabbi?

Pilate had been appointed procurator (governor) of the border province of Judea by Tiberius, where he served for about ten years.  He had a reputation as an able administrator and was known as a man who had a sense of right and wrong. However, he had great contempt for the Jewish people as we will see later.  His overarching goal as governor was to maintain law and order and keep the troublesome Jews under control.

Was Jesus really a threat to his power?

Stott writes that “Pilate was convinced of Jesus’ innocence.”  Three times he declared publicly that he could find no grounds for charging Jesus of any crime.  Even Pilate’s wife stated that Pilate should leave Jesus alone because “I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of Him” [Matthew 27].

So why didn’t Pilate let Jesus go?  The short answer is that he did not want to exonerate Him because the Jewish leaders believed He was guilty. 

He shuffled responsibility off to Herod in order to get him to declare Jesus guilty of something.  That did not work.  Herod sent Jesus back unsentenced.

He tried “half-measures,” scourging or whipping Jesus with a leather whip with imbedded metal.  His hope was that the crowd would be happy that He was punished enough as soon as they saw His lacerated back.

Third, he tried to do the right thing (release Jesus) for the wrong reason.  It was his custom to grant amnesty to a prisoner on Passover and he hoped Jesus would be the one released.  He did not anticipate that the crowd would want to release Barabbas. 

Finally, he took water and washed his hands of the whole episode in front of the crowd.  In Matthew 27 it is recorded that he said “I am innocent of this man’s blood.”

My pastor reads Scripture to our church every Sunday and a technique she often uses is asking this question about the Scripture: “Where are you in the story?”  Stott declares that we are in the story of Jesus’ crucifixion; we are Pilate.  His devious behavior is something we can all relate to.  Too often we are anxious to avoid whole-hearted commitment to Christ, so we search for ways to avoid declaring our feelings.  We may have a half-hearted commitment.  We may think of Jesus as a wonderful teacher but don’t want to admit that He is Lord.  We have even been known to make public affirmations when we are really denying Him in our hearts.

What causes this man to cave into the crowd’s demands?  What caused him to ignore his instincts and let the Jews have their way?

John 19: 12: “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar.  Anyone who claims to be king opposes Caesar.”  This Scripture was Pilate’s turning point.

Pilate was an ambitious man and he did not want to be assigned to Judea all his life.  He wanted an assignment closer to Rome or he wanted to be in Rome itself.  He could have obeyed his sense of honor and let Jesus go, but he calculated that the best move for his future was to turn Him over to be killed.  The most expedient thing was just to let the crucifixion happen.  The more correct and principled thing to do was to let Jesus go.

Pilate had already drawn negative attention from Tiberius due to his posting of Roman standards for rule all over Jerusalem.  This was deemed a very provocative act by the Jewish leadership.  Historians also recount the misappropriation of Temple money for the building of an aqueduct.   Pilate also put down a rebellion of the Jews who did not want to pay Roman tribute.  Not only did he slay the rebels but he was said to have mixed their blood with the blood of the Passover lambs.  Was he concerned that more attention could ruin his career?  Possibly.

Pilate was a man who could have saved Jesus but he did not.  Many would argue that it was God’s plan for this man to be in charge.  His behavior allowed Jesus to die upon the cross which was God’s plan all along.   His “dark passions” overruled his sense of right and wrong and that triggered Jesus’ sentence.

Stott summarizes Pilate and his responsibility with these two sentences: “His conscience was drowned out by the loud voices of rationalization.  He compromised because he was a coward” [Stott, 56].

*author of The Cross of Christ

Ok, let’s just say that a “basic Christian” now believes one of the most fundamental thoughts about the faith [that Jesus Christ actually existed on this earth and He was God].  That is a big step forward for anyone who used to doubt Christianity.  I have an extensive discussion of this idea in my post on December 7^th [“Basic: Jesus is the Son of God”]. 

But in the preface of his book Basic Christianity, John Stott brings up two additional fundamental questions that should be addressed if we believe that Jesus was God.

1.What did Jesus come to earth to do?

2.Do we have to do something in response?

For the first question, let’s start out with a short answer: He came to earth to save sinners (you and me).

Humanity in the form of Adam and Eve had already been created and soon after they arrived on this earth, sin entered the world and also death.  God did not prefer for life to turn out that way, in fact, He gave a pretty obvious warning in the book of Genesis that man had some serious restrictions, some things that he should avoid (you know, that apple thing).  But God left man with the option to sin and guess what?  Man took that option.

What is the upshot for us today?  We daily sin against God.  Adam and Eve got the “ball rolling” but we have continued their bent toward sinning.  Try as hard as we might, we are still “falling short of the glory of God” [Romans 3: 23].

The Bible is the story of how man has revolted against God our Creator and Lord and how God applies justice to man due to all those transgressions.  The book is also full of warnings that are delivered to man and we see man’s repeated failure to heed those warnings.  What is amazing is that God comes around to forgiving us so many times.  God expressed His love for us despite our rebellion; we deserve nothing but the hand of judgement but we don’t get that nearly as much as we deserve.

God does not give up on man because He has made a covenant [referred to as the Old Covenant].  He promised the patriarch Abraham that the Israelites would be His people and through them, He would bring all the nations of the world to Him.  He just wanted them to be faithful, to love justice, to show mercy and to walk humbly before their God.  The problem is, the Israelites often found God’s requests too hard to do.

God came up with another plan [a New Covenant if you will].  God gave man a Messiah, Jesus Christ, to live on earth and to explain what He expected of man.  Jesus lived among us [see that December 7^th post] and He promised to bring us into the Kingdom of God and give us life in all its fullness.  All we have to do is believe in Jesus’ Father.  All we have to do is believe that Jesus is also God.  The Israelites had Ten Commandments and many, many complex rules for devout living.  Jesus made things much simpler.  His New Covenant just said we must love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul and all our mind.  The second commandment is love your neighbor as yourself.  He even stated that the basic New Commandment to go along with His New Covenant is we should love one another as He has loved us.

Under the Old Covenant, God knew man was not getting His message.  The history of mankind before Jesus was a history of repeated failure, but when Jesus came, God’s purpose for the saving of mankind changed.  He wanted to save man from sin by sacrificing His only Son.  “Jesus of Nazareth is the heaven-sent Savior we sinners need.  We need to be forgiven and restored to fellowship with the All-Holy God, from whom our sins have separated us.  We need to be set free from our selfishness and given strength to live up to our ideals.  We need to love one another, friend and foe alike” [Stott, 9].  This is what salvation means.  On a large scale, salvation is God’s effort to restore humankind. 

Remember, we broke the Old Covenant; God did not break it, yet He made the supreme effort to give us a Human Guide, someone who could tell us how to behave on earth.  And God’s Son is our advocate because He knows what it is like to be a human being.  He sits at the “right hand of God” pleading our case at judgement day.  He did not sin but He understands the temptations that we all face, for when He was on earth, He was tempted. 

When we become “born again” He promises a new life for us on this earth through His Spirit that resides in us.  We can live a life of righteousness, knowing we are forgiven of our sins.  We can grow in holiness as we maneuver through this world.  God will help us go from “childlike Christianity” to mature Christianity, if we listen to Him (His Holy Spirit).  God also promises that we will have eternal life. “Although God’s people have already in one sense been saved, in another, their salvation lies still in the future” [Stott].  We are given the promise that our bodies will be redeemed upon our death.  As Jesus suffered death and was resurrected to a new life with God, we can have that too.

In so many respects, Jesus Christ was our Scapegoat.  He died for us upon the cross.  People hear that all the time, but what does it really mean?  Jesus bore the punishment for all of man’s sins when He died so we could be saved.  We deserve to be punished and placed on the cross but we did not get what we deserved.  He suffered our death. 

What a revelation all this was for me in 1998.  When I read the preface of Basic Christianity, the book affirmed in clear English what I was learning in my life at that point. 

But what about that second question:  did I have to do something in response to Jesus’ call on my life?

Yes I did…

I needed to commit myself “heart and mind, soul and will, home and life, personally and reservedly to Jesus Christ” [Stott, 9].

That sounds like a lot but I was ready.  I was humbled by my life circumstances at that point.  I had been chasing a dream that was not based on anything other than the exertion of my will.  I was not worshipping God; I was worshipping values of the world.  I was ready to submit to God.  I was ready to become His child.  I was ready to become a Christian living my life to further His kingdom.  I was ready to become a loyal member of His church.

It was not too much.  I had a life of misery, doing what I knew I should not do, not knowing what my purpose was in life and throwing away the important people in my life in pursuit of my own selfish goals.

I was not experiencing freedom.  I was experiencing the opposite.  My actions were putting me in a jail cell, where I was limited by my own sinful actions.  When I became “born again” Jesus Christ gave me the key to my cell and I unlocked the door and walked out.  I felt freedom for the first time in my life.

My approach in this post has been pretty simplistic and I have covered a lot of “territory,” but when I returned to John Stott’s book Basic Christianity and read his opening three questions I knew I had to write on them for anyone reading this blog who was not ready for the more complex discussion of The Cross of Christ.  Can you believe that Jesus was the Son of God and was God Himself?  What did He come to earth to accomplish?  What do we have to do in response to His efforts?

If we have some idea about how to answer those three questions, Stott’s book may get you on your way to living a life as a believer.  It served that purpose for me in 1998.

For the first time in my life, I realized that I had a God who was seeking me and I should spend the rest of my life seeking Him.

Basic Christianity…*

*My first post on The Cross of Christ made reference to Basic Christianity so I am going to insert comments on that book in between posts on The Cross of Christ…  I think readers may find this approach interesting.  For my opening comments on Basic see the post “Studying Stott Again” on October 25, 2020.  I have never worked on two books at a time but I feel that now is the time to do that.

Who was responsible for the death of Jesus Christ?

Some believers don’t seem to be that concerned about this at all; their focus is mostly on the resurrection.  Their thought is that Jesus did not really die.  He was raised from the dead, so the responsibility for the death of Jesus does not matter that much.  But with theologian John Stott, he is not willing to gloss over the death of Jesus; his book is entitled The Cross of Christ.  Jesus’ death is front and center.

Stott’s view is that someone was responsible for killing Jesus; someone charged Him with being a felon.  Maybe we should stop and just say that Jesus’ behavior brought about His death.  Certainly Jesus appeared to be a revolutionary to both of the ruling parties in His culture.  The Jewish leadership was not happy with Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God.  They labeled that behavior as blasphemous and worked to find a way to eliminate Him.  The ruling invaders, the Romans, felt that Jesus’ claim to be the King of the Jews upset their balance of power.  Their concern was that Jesus was politically dangerous and if He declared Himself a king, He claimed power that was not rightfully His.  The power to rule belonged only to Caesar.

So John Stott states that the Jewish leaders and the Roman rulers entered into an “unholy alliance” in order to eliminate Jesus.  He was just too much of a threat to the status quo.  He was a law-breaker and his death was justified.

But was it?

The Gospel writers present a different story.  They present the idea that Jesus was not a law-breaker.  He was a martyr and was brought before the ruling bodies because they misunderstood His message. 

Why is all of this important?

People who are less focused on the divinity of Jesus and the fact that He was going to be resurrected all along are more focused on the assessment of guilt for this miscarriage of justice.  In short, they are obsessed with blaming someone for His death.

What is the significance of this?  Over the years, the Jews have born a lot of the blame for killing Jesus.  This of course has caused serious anti-Semitic feelings and has been one basis for persecution and violence of the Jews over the centuries. The idea is that Jesus was too much of a threat to the Pharisees; they wanted absolute spiritual authority over their people and Jesus broke their rules too often, doing what was needed rather than what was called for in the Jewish law.

Certainly there is evidence that Jewish leadership was unhappy with Jesus.  The Gospel writers write that Jesus claimed authority over the laws of Moses.  He often responded to obvious human needs with little regard to what day of the week it was, performing miraculous acts on the Sabbath.  Furthermore He declared that the Pharisees were hypocrites, an attitude that did little to endear Him to the Jews.  When He came to the Temple on His last visit to Jerusalem, the first thing He did was destroy the moneychangers’ tables in that Holy Place, very upsetting to the status quo.

In short, there were reasons that the Jewish leadership wanted Jesus eliminated.

With the Romans, the evidence is far less compelling.  Jesus was crucified and that was a Roman method of execution, not a Jewish method. This is evidence that there had to be some Roman influence on His death.  The Jews preferred to  stone people to death.  Also the Jewish authorities were not capable of bringing a capital punishment case forward in the courts; that was something that the Romans could do and only the Romans. 

Was Jesus a serious threat to the Romans?  Maybe not.  His words were probably not that revolutionary from a Roman point of view.  He did not come to preach violence; He came to preach love.  Many in Jewish society longed for a Messiah, but their concept was a Messiah who would lead the Jewish people into battle, a leader who was capable of overthrowing Roman rule.  Jesus was not that type of Messiah.  When asked about paying tax to Rome [a ploy to trap Jesus into uttering some seditious comment] He said “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”  That type of language is hardly enough to seriously worry Roman authorities.

In upcoming posts, I will comment on Stott examining this issue from four different perspectives: the Roman view, the Jewish view, Judas Iscariot’s view and what he calls “their sins and ours.”

He does this because at the heart of what happened to Jesus is more than a “gross miscarriage of justice.”  Stott feels that the whole episode of Christ’s death on the cross came about because of “personal moral factors” which influence the course of law.  Caiaphas the Jewish high priest suffered a moral collapse.  He was influenced by dark passions which led him to lose his sense of morality.  Pilate was supposed to uphold Roman rule, not allow himself to be manipulated into exacting justice on a man who did not deserve a death sentence.  Stott describes these representative men as “fallen and fallible human beings, swayed by the dark passions which rule us all….behind their façade of rectitude of performing their public duty were violent and sinful emotions” [Stott, 52].

In everyday life I have known men to be concerned about two kinds of law: civil/criminal law and spiritual law.  One refers to behavior that is offensive to society or to a private party and the other refers to living and non-living ideas regarding emotions, thoughts and feelings [supernatural?].  Depending on the believer’s point of view, spiritual law can be seen as the higher power and personal moral behavior can alter the ruling of civil/criminal law.

Is this what happened to Jesus?

Did moral decay bring about His death on the cross?

Certainly the Gospel writers feel that the death of Jesus was brought about by a miscarriage of justice but rather than looking at civil/criminal law as the main reason Jesus was punished, the point to spiritual forces at play, spiritual forces working inside some important men of the day.

Stott writes that what leads to the death of Jesus is not so much a blame game for people who are trying to assess guilt.  The purpose of the narrative is more for “the moral instruction of converts” [Stott, 52].

Maybe Stott is right; it is not good to emphasize the resurrection completely, ignoring what brought about Jesus’ death on the cross.  Violent and sinful emotions really do exist and when they happen in the hearts of public officials,  great harm can occur.

Maybe they are the reason great harm came to Jesus.

We will see…

“I don’t fit in with those people in there.  They are perfect and I have my share of problems.  I am not sure I even want to get rid of my problems.  At least I can have a little fun out here in the real world.”   “I used to belong to that church but I got tired of them spreading gossip about each other.  They are so hypocritical.  Why would I want to attend services where people don’t practice what they preach?”  “Those people believe in God and they believe that ______ [some politician] is a good man.  How can that be?  There is very little about his positions that truly reflects Christianity, there is little about his character that reflects Christianity.  I can’t associate with people like that.”

Actual conversations I have had with people who have turned their back on the church…

Why all this discussion of not valuing the church?  That’s how John Stott begins his book Basic Christianity.  *

He describes the state of many people as “hostile to the church, friendly to Jesus.”  I would agree.  I have personally known many Christians who say they believe, yet they rarely go to church.  They may attend church one time per month and that is what they describe as “regular” or they may not go to church at all.  Many people don’t want to have anything to do with church.

What is going on?  Stott says too many people today see contradictions between the teachings of Jesus and the current state of the church or the current behaviors of believers.  For many, Jesus has not lost His appeal.  His call to love one another is admirable.  He preached that it is important to try to live a sinless life and people who read the Bible know that Jesus was a person who acted out His faith.  He was not afraid to take a stand against convention; many times He did what was right and found Himself pitted against the strict religious leaders of His day.  Another problem with many people today is they just don’t find church appealing, with its institutionalized “rules.”  Add to that the idea that it is easy to denounce churches and church members for “corrupt” behaviors [falling short of the glory of God].

People still seem to need some spiritual guidance in their lives.  When times get tough as they can do, that is the time to turn to a higher power and ask for help. So what do they do?

They turn their back on the Christian church and turn to other faith worldviews.  Maybe they just get so busy with today’s values that there is no time to think about God.  [I am doing fine in my successful life, thank you very much].

Let’s say that belonging to a church is the problem, but there is still a fascination with Jesus Christ.  Stott addresses a basic question that some people may have.

Did Jesus really exist?

The answer is yes.  Multiple Christian writers attest to his life as well as pagan writers.  He was very much a human being, being born into this world, growing up as a child and then an adult, He worked as a carpenter, He slept, ate and drank, He suffered pain because He had a human body, He had human emotions and He died.** 

But according to Stott, the biggest stumbling block for many who are on the fringes of the church is the following question: Was Jesus God?

For one to be a believer, that is an essential.  Jesus was not some bizarre Christian superstition.  Jesus was the unique Son of God.

Stott comments: “This question is fundamental.  We cannot dodge it.  We must be honest.  If Jesus was not God in human flesh, Christianity is exploded.  We are left with just another religion with some beautiful ideas and noble ethics; its unique distinction has gone” [Stott, 8].

At earlier times in my life, I was not sure I was truly ready to accept this.  I found the Bible to be an interesting “book,” not really the “Word of God.”  It had lots of passages where I found problems [it says this here, and over here it says something else types of problems].  I was raised to go to church so it was a given that I continue that after I left home.  It was more of a duty than anything.  I was not sure that I was getting something valuable from church service.  I did not think deeply about my faith.  If someone asked me if Jesus was God I would have said “Yes!” without thinking because that was the proper response.  In those days I am not sure I could even explain the significance of the God-Jesus connection. 

Then I had a chapter of my life where I lost my moorings.  I was living as I wanted and then I was confronted with the fact that all I depended upon was taken away.  I needed help quickly and like many who find themselves in a foxhole in the middle of an artillery bombardment, I made a sincere overture to God Almighty. 

It was a simple one-word statement but it was the first time in my life I had ever said it. 

“Help!”

I asked God for help.

I asked Him for help, believing He could do something for me.  I asked Him for help, knowing deep in my heart that He would be there for me.  For the first time in my life, I truly wanted Him and needed Him.

He had already sent His Son to earth to help me, but as I said above, that God-Jesus connection was something I just accepted because I was told to accept it.  I could not explain it.  It did not seem that important to me.  Then in 1998 I was very interested in it.  When all that I believed in life was called into question, I needed a new “rulebook.”  That rulebook was the New Testament.

I turned to the New Testament and read it like a novel.  Page after page held clues for me about how to live a better life.  For much of it, the message was articulated by Jesus or His Apostles and it made so much sense.  Little did I know that when I asked God for help that I would find myself studying His word, but I had always been a Christian on the fringes, not serious about my beliefs, but someone who did go to church regardless.

One of the first books I read to supplement the Bible in 1998 was Basic Christianity by John Stott.  I loved the New Testament but I also loved John Stott’s writing.  He was clear in his message.  He challenged me with his declarations.  He instructed me about the basics that I missed somewhere along the line. 

He made me think about how it is essential that I accept Jesus as the Son of God and the more I went to church and actually listened to my pastor, attended adult Sunday school and took my teacher’s lessons to heart, the more I read the Bible and other good books, the more I formed a rock-solid belief that Jesus was Divine, the true Son of Almighty God.

I still had my problems as I began to attend church on a regular basis.  The people in my church did not condemn me about my problems; they loved me anyway.  I saw that many of them were struggling too, but they knew that God loved them and forgave them.  Some people misbehaved in church but I began to see that as normal.  We are all human beings and to be held to a perfect standard just because you walk into a church is a bit of a stretch.  Their behavior was regrettable but it was understandable. We are all human.  Over the years I have heard people express their political views in church [not pastors], but I tried not to do that.  I understand how non-believers can be upset about that.  I began to feel that taking politics of the world into a church somehow takes something away from the worship of God.  I don’t discuss politics in my adult Sunday school class and when I hear someone saying political things, I just don’t respond.

I won’t turn my back on church.  I need it.  I won’t turn my back on God.  I have to have Him.  I won’t turn my back on His Son.  He inspires me.

You see, God sent His Son Jesus to help me.  He is there to help you too.

There it is…

Basic Christianity…

*My first post on The Cross of Christ made reference to Basic Christianity so I am going to insert comments on that book in between posts on The Cross…  I just finished chapter one of The Cross [November 30, 2020].  I think readers may find this approach interesting.  For my opening comments on Basic see the post “Studying Stott Again” on October 25, 2020.  I have never worked on two books at a time but now is the time to do that. 

**See “Archaeologists Believe They’ve Unearthed Jesus’s Childhood Home”  Caroline Delbert,  Popular Mechanics Website, December 1, 2020 for recent discoveries.

I guess you can find images of just about anything on the internet. Here are images of the exact R.W. Stott book I read in 1989, when I gave my life to Christ. At a time when I needed to read about basic Christianity, Stott gave me clear information about the faith.

Beginning December 7, 2020, I will mix commentary about this book in with commentary about The Cross of Christ.

This is the first time I have ever blogged on two books at the same time, but my heart is telling me to do this.

Two books: one author. One book basic; another book quite complex.

I know I will enjoy this.

I hope you do too.

David Carter

I daresay that many of us are searching for a faith, a worldview, an outlook that works for us.  Some of us may try on various “philosophies” like we try on clothes.  This one looks good.  This one feels right.  I can see value in this way of living.  We may adopt it for a while and then over time things happen: the faith is tested and we think it fails, the worldview crumbles as it confronts reality and what we consider to be a good outlook is no longer good any more.

Such was my life in college.  I dallied with a worldview that I thought was “cool”.  It seemed to explain a lot.  I had a mentor who believed it and he encouraged me to read literature that espoused it but in my heart I knew that something was lacking.  At the time I could not figure out what was wrong but I knew something was wrong.

It captivated my heart for awhile…

John Stott closes “Chapter One” of The Cross of Christ by pointing to several competing thoughts in the world that do not support the idea that the cross is the most important symbol for Christianity.  I have already discussed the Roman attitude toward crucifixion and the Jewish attitude toward crucifixion [see Nov. 1, 2020 post entitled “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross”].  Romans felt the cross represented a horrific way to die and Jews felt that Jesus’ death was a curse from God.  Certainly culture in First Century A.D. did not think the cross a significant or worthy symbol.

Other examples come from religions like Hinduism which has been around for five thousand years.  Stott writes Hindus “repudiate the gospel of the cross” [47].  Gandhi was attracted to Christianity for a while but could not accept the divinity of Christ.  Writing in 1894, he said “I could accept Jesus as a martyr, an embodiment of sacrifice, and a divine teacher, but not as the most perfect man ever born.  His death on the cross was a great example to the world, but that there was anything like a mysterious or miraculous virtue in it, my heart would not accept.”  Hinduism was the worldview I was fascinated with but I remember feeling that it was a bit hollow, that it did not seem to go anywhere.  Maybe I wanted a faith that inspired people to grow.  As I said above, something about it was “lacking.”

The Muslim faith ranks second today with 2.22 billion followers and it is considered the fastest growing religion in the world.  Muslims feel that Jesus was a major prophet, a Messiah, but they don’t accept the Christian concept of the need for the sin-bearing death of a Savior.  They believe each man will reap the fruit of his own deed.  Allah is capable of being merciful and capable of forgiving those who repent, but they just don’t feel that Jesus’ death on the cross served any purpose.  Stott describes Muslim theories of Jesus’ death as “God cast a spell over the enemies of Jesus in order to rescue Him” and other people were substituted for Jesus on the cross at the last moment. Nothing miraculous occurred on the cross, certainly nothing so important that a large number of people should hold up a cross as a significant religious symbol.

Western cultural thinking has long been an enemy of the Christian cross.  Friedrich Nietzsche [considered a major influence on modern intellectual history] wrote that Jesus was weak and Christianity was a weak form of faith.  “What is more harmful than any vice is active sympathy for the ill-constituted and weak Christianity.”   Darwinism emphasizes “survival of the fittest” and he found that conception much more attractive than a Messiah who found Himself sacrificed on the cross.

Other scholars like Sir Alfred Ayer wrote that “among religions of historical importance, there was quite a strong case for considering Christianity as the worst.”  He cites the “contemptible and morally outrageous” doctrine of original sin and Christ’s atonement on the cross.

One could go on and on citing example after example of opposition to the cross.  In fact, it is amazing that the cross is the central symbol of the Christian faith that it is today.

How did Christians persist in the face of opposition?  What happened to cause this symbol to be the central symbol of a faith with 2.3 billion followers, making Christianity the largest religion in the world?  Stott summarizes this phenomenon in a single word—“integrity.”   

What he means by integrity is personal loyalty to Jesus.  Stott has already written that he feels Jesus knew His life was leading to a death on the cross.  In my November 8 post entitled “Looking into the Mind of Jesus” I comment on the idea that Jesus was fixated on the saving cross as His significant last act as a human being.  Stott cites numerous Christian theologians that support his argument, P.T. Forsyth and Emil Brunner among them.  Forsyth writes “All that was in heaven or earth was put into what He did there [at the cross]…Christ, I repeat, is to us just what His cross is.  You do not understand Christ until you understand His cross.”  Brunner feels there is no other way to understand Christianity if one does not understand the significance of the cross, what he refers to as “revelation and atonement through the Mediator.”  “He who understands the Cross aright—this is the opinion of the Reformers—understands the Bible, he understands Jesus Christ.”*

Given this Christian theological emphasis, it is no wonder that Stott describes the cross as the center of Christian history and theology.  Christians “naturally perceive it [the cross] as the center of all reality.  So they see it everywhere, and have always done so” [Stott, 49].    Anglican theologian Stephen Neill writes “the death of Christ is the central point of history; here all the roads of the past converge; hence all the roads of the future diverge.”**

Why all this concern for the cross?  Why has Stott spent a whole chapter detailing the role of the cross in the history of the church?  Why has he argued that Jesus had every intention of going to the cross as His life unfolded?  Why does Stott turn to Scripture to make the case that Biblical writers knew that the cross was the central symbol of the faith?

The answer lies in the faith of the believer.  Jesus was the Son of God, God in human form.  Jesus came to save us sinners, to tear down the wall of sin that separates all of us from God.  Jesus did all this through His death on the cross.

We need to have that faith, that cornerstone of our belief, that the only authentic Jesus is the Jesus who died on the cross.

*From Emil Brunner,  The Mediator

**From Stephen Neill “Jesus in History” in Truth of God Incarnate

Jesus knew He had to die in order for His mission on earth to be complete but how did His apostles view His death?  Many Christians think that the main thrust of the New Testament is the resurrection of Jesus, John Stott writing “It is often asserted that in the book of Acts the apostles’ emphasis was on the resurrection rather than on the death of Jesus” [38].  Of course there is nothing wrong with that but Stott is writing a book entitled The Cross of Christ, and his focus is not on resurrection but on the importance of the death of Jesus.  Do we as Christians prefer to skip the uncomfortable negative news so we can get to the good news?  Do we ignore the sacrifice in order to get to the salvation?  Is it easier to turn away from the vision of our Savior hung upon the cross than stare directly at that spectacle and consider its meaning?

Furthermore, is there any evidence for a doctrinal explanation of Jesus’ death in the writings of the apostles?  Is there any evidence for the centrality of the cross in the minds of the apostles or were they like us; they just wanted to skip over the bad part to the good news of the resurrection?

The “human verdict” for Jesus was death on a cross; of course, the resurrection was the “divine reversal of the human verdict.”  You can’t have one without the other, but do we dwell on the resurrection too much and ignore the sacrificial death of our Savior?  Stott argues that the writings of Paul, Peter and John do provide ample evidence that Jesus’ key followers knew that Jesus was on a divine mission directed by His Father God, a mission that led to a purposeful death.

In turning to Paul, it is clear why he refers to his own writings as “the message of the cross.”  In First Corinthians and Romans, he uses phrases like “we preach Christ crucified,” Jesus’ baptism is referred to as initiation “into His death” and the Lord’s Supper as a “proclamation of the Lord’s death.”  Paul felt that Jesus’ death on the cross was proof of the very essence of God’s wisdom and power.  When Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he was convinced that Christ died for our sins “according to the Scriptures.”   Repeatedly Paul focuses on how humankind is sinful and guilty before God and Jesus came to make “the unrighteous right;” in Jesus, “God presented as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood” [Romans 3:21-25].  We are “justified” through the blood of Jesus, “reconciled to God through the death of His Son.”  Paul knew that the sacrificial death of Christ was necessary for us to be saved from our sin.  In Galatians, Paul boasted in nothing “except for the cross”.  Certainly Paul did not let resurrection overshadow the importance of the cross; there is evidence that the cross was central to his message. 

When we focus on Peter, his testimony about the importance of the cross is also clear.  His first letter opens with a statement that his readers have been sprinkled by the blood of Jesus.  He reminds his readers that they are redeemed at a cost, not with “perishable things such as silver or gold” but rather “the precious blood of Christ, a Lamb without blemish or defect” [First Peter 1:18-19].   Peter connects the sacrifice of Christ to our need for redemption: “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree” and “Christ dies for sins once and for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God” [First Peter 2:24; 3:18].   In the context of First Peter, the cross is the main point of emphasis and Christ is our “sin-bearer and substitute.”  Peter does not gloss over the cross in his writings, moving on to the resurrection; he knows the importance of the cross for the Christian’s life and he explains it clearly. It is central.

No apostle concentrates on the cross more than John.  John even tied the incarnation of Jesus to the death of Jesus: “he saw the incarnation as being a view to the atonement” [Stott, 42].   God’s love for mankind was seen in the birth of His Son, whom He “sent . . . as an atoning sacrifice for our sins” and whose “blood purifies us from every sin” [1 John 3:16, 4:9 etc].

An even more striking portrayal of John’s focus on the death of Jesus is seen in the last book of the Bible, Revelation.  Jesus is introduced in this book as the “firstborn of the dead” and “the Living One” who was dead but is now alive forever.  The most common designation that John gives Jesus is “The Lamb”.  This title occurs twenty-eight times in the book and it has nothing to do with Jesus being meek.  It is about Jesus as a sacrificial character whose blood has been shed so His people can be set free.  Stott says in order to understand the full ramifications of The Lamb, you have to divide the symbolic meaning into salvation, history, worship and eternity.

We owe our salvation to the blood of The Lamb.  “Salvation belongs to God, who sits on the throne, and to The Lamb.”  Man has been “washed . . . and made white in the blood of The Lamb.”  In other words, all of mankind owes their righteous standing because Christ went to the cross.  Furthermore, our salvation is secure because not only are our names written in The Lamb’s book of life, but the Lamb’s name is written on our foreheads” [all references to Revelation].

History is also depicted in Revelation.  Our Savior is standing in the center of God’s throne, sharing the rule of Almighty God.  The occupant of the throne is holding in His hand a seven-sealed scroll which is generally identified as the book of history.  In Revelation, John weeps because no one can break the seals on the scroll but The Lamb does break the seals and proves He is a part of history.  Stott writes “It is significant that what has qualified Him to assume this role is His cross, for this is the key to history and the redemptive process it inaugurated.”  No matter what will come to man, God will overcome the devil due to the blood of The Lamb, which is in all of history, until the final victory.

In Chapter Five of Revelation, choir after choir sings the praises of The Lamb.  “Four living creatures and the twenty-four elders” fell down before The Lamb and began to sing a new song.  They sing that Jesus is worthy to take the scroll of history and open the seals because He has been slain “With your blood you purchased for God, from every tribe and language and people and nation.”  Next John hears a hundred million angels singing “worthy is The Lamb, who was slain.”  When the four living creatures [representing all of mankind] fall down and worship The Lamb, this (of course) is worship to the extreme.

Finally, John makes the case that the cross entitled Christ to have eternal importance.  Revelation is one of the most difficult books to understand in the Bible but “eternal” imagery is powerful regarding the lasting influence of The Lamb.  John is telling the reader that from the eternity of the past to the eternity of the future, the “center stage” is occupied by The Lamb of God who was slain for all of us.  Jesus is placed on an equal level with God.  Jesus mediates God’s salvation, shares God’s throne, and receives God’s worship.   What allows Jesus these privileges forever is the fact that He was slain for man and died to procure our salvation.  John has the vision that God and Jesus are forever coupled: Stott describes this as “the seer’s uninhibited coupling of ‘God and The Lamb’” [44].

I have been a Christian all of my life, attending church all my life and making a “born again” commitment in 1998.  I know first hand that as Christians approach the Christmas season, the incarnation will get a tremendous amount of attention and 100 days later, we will have a tremendous celebration of the resurrection.  John Stott is trying to take a little of the emphasis off of the beginning and the end of the life of Jesus. He is trying to suggest that we should stop and consider the importance of Jesus’ death, for it is in His death that we are forgiven, in His death we are made righteous before God, for it is in the sacrifice of His life that we have a chance for eternal life.

Paul, Peter and John certainly did not forget the importance of Jesus’ death.  One might examine their writings and conclude that they felt it was the key to all that followed.  Like us, maybe they would have preferred to “skip over the bad part” to get to the resurrection but when one does a close reading of their writings, they certainly did not ignore the fact that Jesus died for all our sins.

They did not turn away from the fact that Jesus hung upon the cross.  They stared directly at that spectacle and had a serious consideration of its meaning.

They recognized the centrality of the cross…

Most of us don’t think about it all the time.  Overemphasis on it may lead to depression.  Too much concern about it can cause us to stop accomplishing anything in our lives.  I once had a doctor tell me “None of us are going to get out of this alive.”  I had an aunt who had terminal cancer and she spent the last year of her life obsessing about it, planning every detail of her final moments on earth.  What I am talking about, of course, is death.

We will all have to go through it.  None of us can avoid it.  It is a fact; we all have to die.

Jesus was no different.  He knew He was going to face death.  But then again, Jesus was different; Jesus was God.  Christians believe He had divine powers, extraordinary insight, a sense of purpose for all that He did in His life.  In the post “Looking  Into the Mind of Jesus” [November 8, 2020, St. John Studies] I summarize John Stott’s argument that Christ knew He had a purpose for His life and that purpose centered on His crucifixion.  Stott even tried to make the case that Jesus intended the cross to be the central symbol of Christianity. That idea was in Christ’s mind from the beginning.

That may be, but some would say that is a bit far-fetched.  How could anyone plan for a religion to adopt a symbol that represented a horrific method of execution?  How can Stott write an outrageous sentence like “the centrality of the cross originated in the mind of Jesus Himself.” Others might say that of course Jesus could have done that; He is all powerful.  He is God.    

Whatever one chooses to believe about this matter, let’s put this centrality of the cross debate aside and deal with more practical matters about the imminent death of Jesus Christ.  Stott states that there were three “earthly” factors that led to the death of Jesus Christ.  Jesus was very aware of these factors, in fact some would say He did very little to avoid His death.  He knew that Jewish national leaders hated Him, He knew that Biblical Scripture predicted His death, and there is evidence that He made very deliberate choices which led to His death.  

Can we argue about the centrality of the cross as a plan in the mind of Jesus?

Yes…

Can we argue that Jesus was surprised that He was going to die a horrific, violent death?

No…

Jesus knew that Jewish leaders were actively trying to find a way to have Him killed.  Christ did not have a rigid attitude toward the Law, especially the Law regarding The Sabbath.  When Jesus encountered a poor man with a shriveled hand in a synagogue on Sabbath day, He did not hesitate to help the man.  He healed his hand.  The Gospel writer Mark comments that the “Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus” [Mark 3: 6].  Christ knew this and He also was well aware that other important prophets had already been persecuted.  Essentially, Jesus threatened the power structure of the day.  Stott recounts Jesus’ interpretation of Isaiah 61 in the synagogue when He expressed a “divine preference” for Gentiles.  As recorded in Luke 16-30, the Jews in attendance drove Jesus out of town, took Him to a hill and were ready to throw Him down a cliff.  Jesus walked away from this threat, but He knew that eventually they would succeed in their mission to kill Him.

Furthermore, Jesus Christ knew the Scriptures.  It was foreordained that the Messiah would have to suffer, would have to die, would be resurrected and would experience God’s glory.  Stott comments on Jesus’ Old Testament references about His fate but for me, the strongest forecast of His death comes in Isaiah.  As a novice Christian, I was not an avid reader of the Old Testament, but when I had to read Isaiah as part of a Bible study at church, I marveled at the words from the Eighth Century B.C. Prophet.   Yahweh is “despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.”  He was “pierced for our transgressions” and “crushed for our iniquities.”  He is “raised and lifted up and highly exalted.”   The thoughts of Isaiah influence so much of what Jesus said in His last days.  When He commented that He “must suffer many things” and has “not come to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many” His thoughts allude to Isaiah 53.  Stott comments: “It was from this chapter more than any other that He learned that the vocation of the Messiah was to suffer and die for human sin and so be glorified.”  It all makes sense when Jesus turned to the disciples on the road to Emmaus and said “Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter His glory?”  Christ knew the Scriptures; He knew He had to die for mankind.

Finally, one can analyze Jesus’ choices that led to His death.  I have always wondered why Jesus did not summon Angels to save Him from the suffering He had to endure.  I have always wondered why Jesus had to answer Pilate’s query about Jesus being king with “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth My voice.”  He could have just said “No!”.

He was the Son of God; He had the power.  He had a mind and could make choices; He did not have to condemn Himself.

Yet He did…

Stott writes that Jesus was determined “to fulfill what was written of the Messiah, however painful that would be” [37].  It was not due to a sense of fatalism or a desire to be a martyr for the faith.  He believed the Old Testament Scripture and was determined to do the will of His Father.  “Father, if You are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from Me. Yet I want Your will to be done, not Mine.”  The human side of Jesus knew that He was headed for great suffering but He chose to accept the will of His father over the dread of the pain ahead.  He did not have to go to Jerusalem for Passover, but He went.  In His last days His language changed.  The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected.  What has been written about Him must be fulfilled.  When He did not appeal for Angelic help it was because God’s strength must shine forth in His weakness.  “It was not because He was the helpless victim of evil forces arrayed against Him or of any inflexible fate decreed for Him, but because He freely embraced the purpose of His Father for the salvation of sinners, as it had been revealed in Scripture” [Stott, 37].

Without a doubt, Jesus knew His days were numbered as He travelled to Jerusalem to celebrate His last Passover.  It was clear to Him that the people who hated Him the most were the ones who had the most power.  It was clear to Him that the Scripture foretold that He would have to suffer many things and He would have to give His life as a ransom for many.  It was also clear that He had to make hard choices in order to bring about His Father’s will.  He was a man on a mission and His own death dominated His mind.  He knew that He had come to save mankind, to suffer for our sins. 

He was not surprised by His death; in fact He knew it was coming. He knew when it would come and how it would come.  This foreknowledge does not compare to my knowledge that I will die one day; it is much more.  He did not ask to be delivered from death because that is the reason He came to earth, for He knew His death was “glorification”…

We know why He came to earth, for in His death we are saved.

“For I have not come to be served, but to serve, and to give my life as a ransom for many.”

“God made Him who had no sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God”**

*This post is from a series done on John Stott’s book The Cross of Christ.

**2 Corinthians 5:21

Attribution…

It is a normal part of everyday life.  People around us do things and we make guesses about their behavior.  I use the word “guesses” on purpose because it is pretty impossible to be certain about why people do what they do.  Maybe the best words to describe the process of attribution are we make interpretations of others’ behavior.   This is not an exact “science” to say the least.*

The reason I start my comments with this discussion is the following statement by John Stott:  “The fact that a cross became the Christian symbol, and that Christians stubbornly refused, in spite of the ridicule, to discard it in favor of something less offensive, can only have one explanation.  It means that the centrality of the cross originated in the mind of Jesus Himself” [Stott, 35].

Sounds to me like Stott has ventured into unknown territory.   He is saying that our emphasis on the cross came from the life that Jesus led and the things that Jesus said.  He is attributing the cross to “the mind of Jesus.”

The next question follows: How can he say that?

Here is a summary of his argument.

Granted, the popular opinion of the Jews of Jesus’ day was that the Messiah would be a revolutionary political leader.  Instead we all know the story; that the Messiah was born of a virgin in a manger in a livestock shed.  We know of no sign that Jesus was even aware of His divinity until He was twelve years old.  He was in Jerusalem with His parents for the celebration of Passover.  They lost track of Him and when they found Him, He was in the temple and when His parents approached He said the following words: “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” [Luke 2: 41-50].  Stott points to how He said this as a sign that He knew He was on a mission.  God had sent Him into the world for a purpose.

The next momentous occasion was His baptism and the moments of temptation after His baptism with the devil in the desert.  There was no hesitation in His response to the temptation.  He knew to avoid the powerful prizes offered by Satan.  He knew His purpose.

In His public ministry, Jesus began to reveal His mission.  When His disciples began to state that Jesus was the Messiah, Jesus told them to “not tell anyone.”  Stott writes that He was aware that the Jews wanted a powerful hero to save them from Roman oppression.  After feeding the five thousand, the crowd intended to force Him to be king, but He slipped away.  He knew His mission must be completed through His crucifixion, not elevation to some earthly throne.

Peter blurted out that Jesus was the true Messiah, but what was Jesus’ response?  “Out of my sight, Satan!  You do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of man.”  Again, He knew this statement by Peter would only impede his pathway to the cross.

Jesus took His disciples aside several times and predicted His future.  We see this in the book of Mark: “We are going to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law.  They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles, who will mock Him and spit on Him, flog Him and kill Him.  Three days later He will rise.”  We see this prediction three times in Mark 10, Matthew 20 and Luke 18.  This was a man on a mission.

In the last week of His life on earth, Jesus referred to perfume that was going to be poured over His head as preparation for His burial.  He gave out bread and wine as emblems of His body and blood, a sign that He knew that these elements would be in commemoration of His death. 

In the Garden of Gethsemane, He could have called on men and angels to help Him in His time of need but He didn’t, saying “how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen this way.”  Stott writes that Scripture “bears a common witness to the fact that Jesus both clearly foresaw and repeatedly foretold His coming death [on the cross]” [brackets mine].

What we are discussing here is Jesus’ perspective on His own death.  What Stott is arguing here is that Jesus knew He had crucifixion in His future and He responded to events in a way that would get Him up on that cross.  Repeatedly Jesus used the expression “My time has not yet come” to say that circumstances were not quite right yet.  When He changed water into wine, He was urged to go Jerusalem and declare His divinity and He said “My time has not yet come.”  When he made what the Jewish leaders labelled as blasphemous statements there was a push to seize Him but He slipped away “because His time had not come yet.” 

But when circumstances were right, He changed His expression.  He went from “My time has not yet come” to “the hour has come for the Son to Man to be glorified.”  In Jerusalem when some Greeks asked to see Jesus, he repeated that sentence about His glorification.  He commented later on His death and said that it was to glorify the name of His father.  Twice in the upper room He said that it was almost time for Him to leave the world and be “glorified.” 

This shift to “my time has not come” to “the hour has come” is solid evidence that Jesus knew the reason He had come into the world.  He knew that He was destined to meet a violent, premature and purposive death on the cross and He was directing Himself to that end. 

Stott goes further in his writing: “From this evidence supplied by the Gospel writers, what are we justified in saying about Jesus’ perspective on His own death?  Beyond question He knew it was going to happen” [Stott, 35].  Are we willing to go as far as Stott and say “the centrality of the cross originated in the mind of Jesus Himself?”

As in all attributions, Stott may be right or he may be wrong.  It all boils down to his interpretation of the Scriptures.  Stott feels that the cross became the Christian central symbol of the faith because of loyalty of Jesus’ followers and Jesus intended for it to be that way. 

In the next post, we will discuss three more reasons for the cross to be central to the faith, what Stott calls “three intertwining reasons for its inevitability.”  However, he already feels justified in saying that Jesus was following God’s plan for Him to be crucified.  He already feels justified in saying that the cross of Christ is the central symbol of Christianity.  He has looked at Jesus’ words and Jesus’ actions and feels he knows the plan.  We have the cross at the center of our faith because Jesus wanted it that way.

It was supposed to be that way all along…

*Attribution is a core concept in the study of human communication.  As humans, we are geared to make meaning out of others’ verbal and nonverbal expressions, even though we “miss the mark” a lot.

In 1979, the contemporary sanctuary of St. John United Methodist Church* was dedicated.  As part of the preparation for that dedication day, two members** of the church designed a large cross and suspended it from the ceiling of the church.  To their amazement, the lighting in the church produced two shadows one on each side of the cross, making it symbolic of the cross at Calvary. This captured the imagination of church members so much that the cross has never been taken down and remains in place today.

Needless to say, when one visits my home church, the cross is central to the worship service, you might say it is “front and center.”

But for Christians, the centrality of the cross is not that unusual.

John Stott begins his book The Cross of Christ with some explication of how the cross is prevalent in Christian art, architecture and every aspect of Christian worship.  His example of art is the painting by Holman Hunt entitled The Shadow of Death.  His example of architecture is St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.  His explanation of the centrality of the cross in worship is expressed from the viewpoint of a “stranger” who is visiting a worship service at St. Paul’s. 

As I read his discussion of worship at St. Paul’s, it made me consider the symbol of the cross in my church and I have to admit, it shows up everywhere, from bulletins to crosses around members necks.  From the antependium [that cloth that is draped over the pulpit] to the lapels on parishioners’ jackets.  We have so much beautiful stained glass at St. John UMC and it is full of crosses.

Maybe it is in so many places that we take the cross for granted.  It was not always so.

Stott explains that early Christians did not even use the symbol of the cross to signify their faith.  First of all, they were afraid to use it because of its close association with the death of Jesus.  Persecution was so common that there was fear that its use would make it easier to identify Christian worshippers, and therefore allow Romans and Jews to find them and to exact punishment.  Despite the fact that Christ died on the cross, in the First Century, crucifixion was regarded as a shameful way to die, a punishment reserved for common criminals.  When a person was convicted of murder, rebellion or armed robbery in the Roman world, they met their end on the cross.  This method of punishment was barbaric [literally]; the Romans began the practice after discovering its use by peoples at the edge of the known world.  Crucifixion was an extremely slow death and most often criminals suffered additional torture while hanging on the cross.  The use of a cross as a positive symbol in those times would have been unusual. 

Roman citizens in the First Century were exempt from crucifixion, except in extreme cases of treason.  Stott writes that Romans regarded crucifixion “with horror”. 

Jews in the First Century also regarded crucifixion as a disgusting way to die.  They cited scripture from Deuteronomy which says “anyone who is hung on a tree is under God’s curse” [Deut 21: 23].  One reason that they could never accept Jesus as The Messiah is that they believed He died under God’s curse because He was crucified on a tree.  Their experience with crucifixion was often at the hands of vengeful Roman generals.  The Roman general Varus crucified two thousand Jews in 4 B.C. and  general Titus crucified so many Jews that they ran out of space on the main road and they ran out of trees to make crosses.  They hated the symbol of the cross.

Today’s Christian might think the symbol of the cross has been around since earliest days of Christianity, but that is just not the case.  Early Christian symbols that were accepted were drawings of a peacock [meaning immortality], the dove, the athlete’s victory palm or the fish. 

In the second century, Christians began to depict significant themes of redemption in their art.  Noah’s ark gained popularity as well as Abraham killing the ram instead of Isaac, Daniel in the lion’s den, his three friends in the fiery furnace and Jonah being disgorged from the belly of the whale.  These symbolic paintings were less incriminating than the cross and only those instructed with the Christian interpretation of the art would understand their significance for the faith. 

Christian symbols for Jesus could have been the crib, the manger, or a carpenter’s bench.  Other choices could have been a boat, where Jesus taught the crowds at Galilee or the apron He wore to wash the disciples’ feet.  The throne could have symbolized the sovereignty of Jesus or even the dove, the symbol of the Holy Spirit.  Instead, the two bars of the cross eventually became the preeminent Christ symbol because they commemorate Jesus’ death.

In the second century Christians began to draw, paint and engrave the cross as a symbol of their faith and they also began to make the sign of the cross on themselves.  Tertullian recorded the practice of Christians “signing” the cross in his writings in A.D. 200.  Hippolytus, the Roman historian writes of signing the cross as a common ritual in A.D. 215.  He also comments on a Christian bishop who made the sign of the cross on the forehead of candidates for confirmation. 

In the sixth century, the crucifix began to be commonly used by Christians. This symbol of the cross with Jesus attached was an obvious reference to His sacrifice for us and it solidified the cross as Christianity’s central symbol. 

Of course, there have been periods in Christian history where the cross has been attacked.  Puritans in England in the Sixteenth Century felt that the cross was a sign of Roman Catholic “popery” and discouraged its use.

But today Stott writes “the cross is the universal symbol of Christianity.”

I have joined the choir at St. John and the choir sits right under the large cross at the front of the sanctuary.  As I look up from the choir loft, I realize that I am only fifteen or twenty feet away from this large symbol.  We don’t sing the hymn When I Survey the Wondrous Cross by Isaac Watts too often but if we would sing it and if we would all gaze upon the cross, the meaning for any Christian is only too obvious. 

When I survey the wondrous cross

On which the Prince of glory died

My richest gain I count but loss

And pour contempt on all my pride.

The cross of Christ—the universal symbol of our faith.

*St. John United Methodist Church, Hopkinsville, Kentucky.  **Cecil Hammonds and Arch Hitch