What do you understand about the Cross?

Luke 23:26-

How conflicting the ways of God are to mere humans, and Isaiah the great prophet of God would agree that this is a clear message to all of us.  “Seek the Lord while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.  For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:6-9)  If you are reading this God is near, stop and talk with Him, seek Him while He is near, and pay attention to God’s word from James 4:8 – “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

Do you grasp the darkness of this culture, where the enemy has been working to undermine the ways of God, and most freshmen in college have no understanding of history, they cannot tell you who won the Civil War, and that same enemy is now trying to remove it from history by calling it offensive, do you have any knowledge of what the South stood for?  That is alarming but they are asking the wrong questions on the campuses of our nation, instead of asking these young minds; who is the current V.P. of the nation, they should be asking who is Jesus?  What has He done, and what do you understand about the Cross?

Before writing on the Crucifixion, we need to grasp why the apostle Paul tells the church at Corinth it is an offence to the world, why the enemy of our soul hates the Cross.  The Romans always chose a place for the crucifixion in a very public place where the bodies were left to rot.  In Israel, crucified prisoners were taken down in observance of the Sabbath.  The song, on a hill for away sounds great, but it was more than likely on a major road leading to Jerusalem, where the scull can be seen in the hill.  Under Roman law the practice of crucifixion was common for non-citizens, it was for slaves and the worst of criminals, and for political or religious activists.  In my research of the Cross, it did not come as a shock that some so called scholars are saying they have evidence it was not as stated in the Bible, and some of that same group have also said the Holocaust never happened in 1939-1945 where millions of Jewish people were killed.

Back to 1 Corinthians 1:18-19, “For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”  It requires one to agree with Isaiah, for a mere man cannot grasp the Holiness and the Love of God, much less His desire to be worshipped by His creation, who He gave a free-will knowing they would reject Him. 

The enemy of the Cross knows it is an offence to the so called wise of this world, but when the Cross is preached it has the power to bring sinful people to the understanding of the great price God is willing to pay to restore and redeem mankind.

Let’s look again to Paul’s letter to the people of Corinth; “Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”  (1 Corinthians 1:20-25 ESV)

The Cross of Christ revealed to mankind the fullness of God’s love and grace and mankind’s need of forgiveness that is keeping them from entering into a relationship with a Holy God.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice