"I wish I had a kryptonite cross, because then you could keep both Dracula AND Superman away."
- Jack Handey [Deep Thoughts]
What does the symbol of the cross conjure up in our minds? And what does it actually mean? Sacrifice, death, punishment, judgment, the wrath of God; payment, substitution, atonement...hope? Are we right to think of the cross as a symbol of hope? In the order of salvation, should the cross itself produce hope in us? Or should it produce death?
We are told in 1 Peter 2:24 that it was necessary for Christ to die on the cross so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; the point being that Christ's death on the cross made it so that we can consider ourselves dead to sin. The penalty for all the sin of the world was paid there. He goes on to say that it is by his wounds that we are healed, and that our salvation is accomplished through the resurrection of Christ (3:21). For us, the cross functions as a remembrance for what Christ actually did and also as a symbol of the death that we must die to our selves each day. It is an execution, and a starting point. As followers of Christ, we believe that Christ died on the cross, and in him, we have also died to ourselves. We are called daily to pick up our cross and carry it. But this is a picture of personal sacrifice, not the wrath of God poured out on us, or the separation from God that he experienced on the cross. Because Christ has gone before us we do not endure divine wrath and separation from God. We are to carry with us what ultimately is behind us: sin and death.
The cross is not something that we cling to for future hope, but boldly proclaim as past reality. We proclaim that we are right with God through the work of Christ on the cross. And while his sacrificial death on the cross was essential in the program of redemption, it was not its completion. What happened on the cross was not sufficient in itself to redeem us. Every last one of us is still faced with the certainty of pain and death. The cross does not save us from pain and death, and does not impart life. Whether the death is substituting or atoning it is still death in its very essence. It cannot give a sufficient answer to the problem of our impending death. The cross should not give us hope, but should leave us in anticipation of hope for what comes next.
The death of Christ on the cross showed us the severity of our separation from God. It also showed us the medium through which redemption must occur. At the cross, a life was swallowed up whole by death, the enemy. And there were three days that separated Christ's death on the cross and his resurrection from the dead. It seems that because of this tension, death and hope are meant to have an interval of space between them.
However, some say that the cross is the only hope for salvation. In his song, "I cling to the Cross," the popular contemporary Christian worship artist, Paul Baloche, does the opposite of beholding this tension as he merges death and hope by proclaiming that the cross is "the only hope for saving me." In doing so, he is portraying the cross as a symbol of hope. The second verse of the song does proclaim Christ's resurrection, but the emphasis of the song is clinging to the cross for hope. At the end of the song he adds a repeated final verse from the classic hymn I have decided to follow Jesus, repeating over and over, "the cross before me, the world behind me."
There is so much truth and conviction in the decision to leave worldly desires behind and to turn one's affection toward Christ. But is this the correct language? While preparing for a sermon a few months back it occurred to me that we can also proclaim the opposite: "The cross behind me, the world before me." In consideration of Christ's resurrection, I'm beginning to think that this may be a more accurate statement of what it means to follow Jesus. To loosely quote a friend of great influence, "Jesus has moved on from the cross, and if we want to follow Jesus, we need to move on as well."
A historical sacrificial death is found at the cross, not a future hope. As Eugene Peterson says,
"Something is wrong here, dreadfully wrong. We feel it in our bones. The most conspicuous event in history that arouses within us this spontaneous sense of violation, of outrageous sacrilege, is the suffering and death of Jesus, a suffering and death in which eventually we will all find ourselves involved whether we like it or not.(Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, 134)"
If thinking of the cross produces hope in us, it should only be because it is rightly connected in our minds to Christ's resurrection from the dead. Otherwise, the cross by itself is a symbol of the penalty of sin and lost hope. If this is the end, then we also die alongside of Christ. And if the cross is our crown of hope (i.e. the extent to which we hope in) then we become marionettes of lost hope. Nothing good ends in death.
"For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men." (1 Corinthians 15:16-19)
When the death of Christ is preached as the culmination of our hope, we create a culture of hopelessness that ends at our death and personal sacrifice.
From their 1996 release Songs to Fan the Flames of Discontent, the definitive hardcore punkrock band of the 90s, Refused, expresses an outsider's perspective of a gospel that devotes itself to the cross alone.
Crusader of Hopelessness
Stretch out in your Christ pose
Marionette of lost hope
Your sadness at expense of the world
You're dying to be this
You're living to be this
Energy wasted
Feeling sorry for ourselves
We didn't deserve it
We didn't deserve it
Using a thousand apologies
As a thousand excuses for
Making the same mistakes
Crusader of hopelessness
Crucified by yourself
What do you know about suffering?
So full of reasons not to see
The possibilities to change
This suffocation, turn it into focus
'Cause we don't need this
'Cause we don't need this
Using a thousand apologies
As a thousand excuses for
Making the same mistakes
Forget about your self-pity
Forget about your petty problems
Forget about your small world
Forget about your self-pity
Forget about your petty problems
Forget about your small world
Forget about your self-pity
Forget about your petty problems
Forget about your small world
Using a thousand apologies
As a thousand excuses for
Making the same mistakes, Yeah!
Should the work of Christ make us feel sorry for ourselves? If we are focusing on the cross alone, then it certainly will. It is necessary to behold the cross, but death offers no comfort; and if we remain at the cross we will be a people who find comfort only in our sorrows. But if we consider his resurrection from the dead, and future hope that we have, true sorrow is met with true hope. We must see the cross for what it represents: death; and we must see the resurrection for what it represents: life.
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade—kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials." (1 Peter 1:3-6)
So I ask this question again. Are we able to to behold the vastness and sorrow, and still hope? I think this question is answered in the resurrection of Christ.
