The Cross Our Statue of Liberty

There is no liberty from sin or any consequence of sin except the Cross of Jesus Christ. It alone stands at the center of all human history. It divides time, cultures, geography, politics and religions. It is the dividing point of all gods and reveals the one God that was willing to give His Son. Missionaries through the years have found the one truth that resonates with the pagan populations is to declare the God that sacrificed His Son not the gods that demand their son. There is no hope of salvation apart from His cross where He paid the ultimate price as our substitute. The greatest duty of His church is to never allow anything that makes the Cross of none effect.

Apostle Paul appeared to tremble profoundly as he wrote, “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.” (1 Corinthians 1:17) The most learned of all the apostles could sacrifice “the wisdom of words” lest the power of the cross be replaced with human intellect. The “truth of the Cross” is so breathtaking that to speak with human eloquence is to create a contest with the Divine. No one can question that the history of the church is flooded with what occurs in God’s house when educated eloquence occupies the pulpit. The altars turn bare and the shouts of conversion go silent the very moment that the beauty of humanism takes the stage.

The language of this modern era talks of making the church relevant. This very language is clever but deadly. That was the concern of the Apostle when he said, “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.” (1 Corinthians 1:18-21) You cannot make the Gospel relevant to the lost and the worldly-wise unless you are willing to sacrifice the heavenly glory that accompanies His death.

Listen to the language of the sinner-friendly church and their talk of twelve-step programs to help their converts experience the victory of the Kingdom. When the power of the Cross has been sacrificed to the psychology of human helps, the convert ceases to be converted. Every minister I speak with confesses to me that the church is full of the unconverted.

The glory of the Cross is the most proven fact of church history. When the Cross is the center and the heart and joy of the saints and the minister, slowly but surely, a body of believers arises from its stream until a mighty river begins to flood the realm of that churchÂ’s influence. It is never a quick fix as demanded by our mega-church mentality. The Cross is a glory that arises from the hearts of the set apart as they wait before Him for the strength He manifests to His chosen. The Cross cannot and will not sanctify the false or the unbiblical. The Cross cannot be mixed with flesh. Its glory is in the honor it gives to God alone.

The Cross is the triumph of the ages. The empty Cross is the only identification of His church. The Cross is never occupied because it is a finished token of a completed redemption. It is never to be decorated or to be ornate. Its rugged style stands for the simplicity of its “stand-alone glory.” The victory of the Cross is supernatural. He would have died for one soul as surely as He died for everyone. The sinner that bends at the foot of the Cross will never leave as he came.

The world has not changed. “For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom: But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” (1 Corinthians 1:22-25) When men speak of our modern world and our need to be relevant, they are deceivers, “making void the Cross.” The unfailing promise still stands, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” (John 12:32)

The glory of the Cross has a luster and beauty that consigns the great glory of all else to the ash heaps of history. All the books of human history stacked together could never match the untarnished Gospel of Jesus Christ. ”But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” (Galatians 6:14)