…who Himself bore our sins in His own
body on the tree… —1 Peter 2:24
The Cross
of Christ is the revealed truth of God’s judgment on sin. Never associate the
idea of martyrdom with the Cross of Christ. It was the supreme triumph, and it
shook the very foundations of hell. There is nothing in time or eternity more
absolutely certain and irrefutable than what Jesus Christ accomplished on the
Cross— He made it possible for the entire human race to be brought back into a
right-standing relationship with God. He made redemption the foundation of
human life; that is, He made a way for every person to have fellowship with
God.
The Cross
was not something that happened to Jesus— He came to die; the Cross
was His purpose in coming. He is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the
world” (Revelation 13:8). The incarnation of Christ would have no meaning
without the Cross. Beware of separating “God was manifested in the flesh…” from
“…He made Him…to be sin for us…” (1 Timothy 3:16 ; 2 Corinthians 5:21).
The purpose of the incarnation was redemption. God came in the flesh to take
sin away, not to accomplish something for Himself. The Cross is the central
event in time and eternity, and the answer to all the problems of both.
The Cross
is not the cross of a man, but the Cross of God, and it can never be fully
comprehended through human experience. The Cross is God exhibiting His nature.
It is the gate through which any and every individual can enter into oneness
with God. But it is not a gate we pass right through; it is one where we abide
in the life that is found there.
The heart
of salvation is the Cross of Christ. The reason salvation is so easy to obtain
is that it cost God so much. The Cross was the place where God and sinful man
merged with a tremendous collision and where the way to life was opened. But
all the cost and pain of the collision was absorbed by the heart of God.
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