The Cross

Matthew 16.24:

“From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the Law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life…Jesus told his disciples: If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.”

Lent, Easter, the Passion of Christ, all of this is centered on the cross. It is Jesus’ cross that is at the heart of the message of the gospel and of the entire Christian faith. If we take away the cross, we are left with nothing. If we take away the cross, we attempt (in vain) to prevent Christ from being Christ. The suffering of the Messiah is the scandal of Israel, the church, and the entire world. And we cannot afford to avoid this scandal. We must face it head on.

The following is a powerful quote from the book The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer:

“Just as Christ is Christ only in virtue of his suffering and rejection, so the disciple is a disciple only in so far as he shares his Lord’s suffering and rejection and crucifixion. Discipleship means adherence to the person of Jesus, and therefore submission to the law of Christ which is the law of the cross…The cross is laid on every Christian. The first Christ-suffering which every person must experience is the call to abandon the attachments of the world. It is that dying of the old man which is the result of our encounter with Christ. As we embark upon discipleship we surrender ourselves to Christ in union with his death – we give over our lives to death. Thus it begins; the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise god fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls us, he bids us come and die.”

God bless us as we reflect on the meaning, the importance, and the transformative nature of the cross of Christ and what it means for us to share in the fellowship of Jesus' suffering!