The Cross

We know that Christ died on the cross to save us. He has suffered for us, and we must suffer for him. This statement is true, and I think it is generally understood in this sense: It would have been so much easier for us if Christ had chosen another way of our redemption. But because he chose the way of the cross, it must also be our way. To some extent, we must expect our journey to be challenging because it means following Christ. The shadow of the cross falls on our lives as it did on his. We express these ideas in various ways. We discover them in our songs and poems: “The shadow of the cross has risen above a lonely hill.” The non-Christian poet Swinburne wrote, “You have triumphed, pale Galilee; the world has grown old with your breath.” As Christians, we reject this last statement. They were already there because they are the fate of fallen mankind. The cross does not cast a shadow on man’s life. The shadow of the cross fell on his life through us. His cross is just light. The light of God’s love came into the world to save it and to suffer with it. Suffering was the need for death. We had to suffer and die. But Christ did not have to. But he wished he could take us back to God. He took the cross from our lives. We must learn to take love from his love. It is essential to see these things in their right perspective. There is a prayer that is often said to stop the Stations of the Cross: “Jesus, for love of me, you brought the cross to Calvary. In his sweet mercy he has made me suffer and die with you.” These and similar prayers must be understood correctly. Death is connected to Christ, and through suffering and death his love will lift us into eternal life. Christ did not tell us to take his cross. “Let him deny himself; day after day he takes on his cross and follows me “(Lk 9:23). The cross of Christ does not lie on our shoulders, but our cross lies on his shoulders. “(Isa. 53.6). Our cross lay on his shoulders, and because it weighed so heavily on us, it rested much easier on us. The “self-denial” of which the Lord Jesus speaks was always necessary for the sinful man to regain his friendship with God. He was already before the cross of Christ. This act is not his consequence. This punishment is only one aspect of the doctrine of original sin. God created man for eternal union with him. Initially, Adam was enthralled by the personal union with God. He lived a life in which he was ruled by God’s love, was open to the influx of divine life and love, and was creative, strengthening the love of God. He lived his whole life in loving guilelessness, connected with the unity of all the forces of his nature; this state helped him serve God easily and with pleasure, live in loving dependence on God, and receive from him everything he was and had. His Providence provided His children, protected them from suffering, and planned to elevate them to eternal life without having to die. If this happy state of affairs were to continue, any child born into Adam’s family would also be born into the “household of God” or, as we say, “in a state of grace”. Every child, as the object of God’s creative love, would receive the same gifts as our grandparents. Adam’s sin was declaring his independence: he chose to centre his life on himself, seeking above all his own good and glory, wanting to be only what he could do himself. We all sinned in Adam (Rom 12). We were born outside God’s “household”, without his mercy and friendship, with a nature that was centred on ourselves. Adam passed on to us. Therefore, it was impossible for man not to seek Himself instead of God. For he was without God’s grace. That is why humanity was trapped in its closed circle, lived in it, and death was not a liberation from it, for death kept man from surrendering to God’s hands. Human nature chose to be what it could be on its own. In the world of egocentric beings, there could be nothing but clashes, each seeking the other in every possible selfish way. He could not go by himself.” He renounced himself; he took on human nature with its physical weakness and the ability to die and took on the mission of dying for the salvation of men. His human nature was frightened of death because she wanted to keep her life. If he freely chose to be subject to bodily weakness, even when it was dedicated to death, it was also the most intense effort to reach God, for it was a submission to obedience. She took a man out of the autonomy of his body and carried him to God when he renounced himself. This renunciation culminated in death. Against all the natural resistance to death experienced by his human nature, Christ forced her in a mortal struggle to renounce herself as a gift to God. And now we are “reborn”, baptised into Christ, becoming through him what we could never have been without him: members of God’s family and children of God once more. We are baptised into Christ’s death and resurrection; we die to ourselves and enter into life in God (Rom 6). We had to die before Christ’s death. But Christ’s death made it possible, and his love now gives it value.