TOOLS: "COME DOWN FROM THE CROSS AND SAVE YOURSELF!"
Posted on Saturday, February 09, 2008 at 6:20 PM by Duncan Bouwer
"have you no pride?"
"And they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get. It was the third hour when they crucified him. The written notice of the charge against him read: THE KING OF THE JEWS. They crucified two robbers with him, one on his right and one on his left. Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads and saying, "So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself!" In the same way the chief priests and the teachers of the law mocked him among themselves. "He saved others," they said, "but he can't save himself! Let this Christ, this King of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe." Those crucified with him also heaped insults on him." Mark 15:24-32 (NIV)
INTRODUCTION
The World today is no different from the world in Jesus' time. There is no place for weakness. In our World only strength, beauty, and success are valued! We are taught that in order to survive, we have to pursue control and power. "Mind over Matter", the "Power of positive thinking" and such slogans are drummed into us by every advert and TV show.
Furthermore, we are subtly taught that the appearance of health is more important than actual health. Our pride is taught to say that we dare not admit the truth of what is going on in our minds and hearts. We may be vulnerable, as long as the situation can be remedied with some best-selling self-help book.
"Gmf! Who needs salvation?"
This is the question, which underlies this ethos. The world is geared for a saviourless salvation! In order to achieve this, we will do everything we can to manipulate our way into greater self-actualization. We will be vulnerable in order to achieve our goals: we need to PROVE success. Success at any cost: even to the point of ultimate failure�
The "Human Doing" Vs the "Human Being"
Ironically, we are called "human beings", although our every activity points to the fact that we are trying to achieve a state of "being" by "doing"! So we "Achieve" peace rather than "being peaceful". The phrase self-ACTUALIZATION is held up as an activity to be pursued at all costs. Building a "self" modelled on "what I do" is the result. Self-worth is not a state which is intrinsic, in other words we find our worth in what people say about us, which in turn is based on what we can do to externalise our apparent "self-worth". A vicious circle!
This is not a new world view�
Adam & Eve started it all. Satan appealed to their pride. He offered them equality with God. He tempted them to question God, and they fell for it. "Does God really know all the answers? Why is he so selfish not to want to share what he knows? He must be an awfully petty little god, otherwise he would not hoard all the treasures of knowledge so diligently!" So they took control.
"Jesus! WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ACHIEVE VICTORY?" Have you no pride?"
"Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads and saying, 'So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself!'"
Jesus had a hard time being who he was supposed to be. It went against the grain of the world. In the world's eyes he was a failure! He said he was the Messiah, and yet he had no armies to shrug off the Roman rule. The Jews had their preconceived ideas about what a Messiah should be: he should save the Jews, but he couldn't even save himself!
They presumed that the Kingdom of God would assert control over the environment. They couldn't believe that the Messiah wouldn't zap them all with lightning for being so disrespectful. He had made a promise that the temple would be broken down and rebuilt. Little did they know that he intended to break down what had been built by human hands when Adam and Eve had set out to build their own little self-image which led to the Fall.
They didn't understand that Jesus was showing them a new way; their minds were controlled by the world system where the motto was survival of the fittest, and dog eat dog. They didn't know Darwin, but they might as well!
So Jesus still being on the cross didn't make sense! "Come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe." For them the evidence of the Messiah was determined by their worldview. If he would conform to their (our) standards, and they (we) would believe in him. For them (us) the evidence of Godhood is that he is not vulnerable. We would rather create God in our image. As long as he is like us, we will believe in him.
BUT
I Cor 1:17 says: "For Christ did not send me to baptise, but to preach the gospel--not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power."
We would dearly love to skip over the tragic events of the cross, and cut right to the resurrection, because we instinctively know what the implications of the cross are for our lives!
Human wisdom is bound to fail in its understanding of the meaning of the cross. In our human wisdom the Pharisees see the refusal of Jesus to come off the cross as a failure, when in truth it was no such thing.
The weakness of the cross is its greatest power. It symbolises the death of human systems which Adam and Eve were responsible for. It represents the death of power and control. It represents the death of human "wisdom"; It represents the death of "SELF-actualization".
The truth about God is:
The expression of the nature and love of the Father is demonstrated by One who emptied himself of his rights to be like God! Phil. 2:6, 7 says of Jesus "Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness."
Jesus did not take the opportunity to establish "Jesus Christ Ministries Intergalactic"! What drove him was to fulfil the will of the Father.
YET!
Christians today still have the same problem. We espouse a one-sided triumphalist version of the Gospel which agrees with the Pharisees when they say "come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe", because we see with the world's eyes. Even though we are Christians, we would rather step over the message of the cross.
We want resurrection, without crucifixion!
We want to get to victory, because we conform to the pattern of the world. We want glamour, without going through the pain of death. The worldly "Gospel" of the victorious Christian is a half-truth! It buys into the "human doing" theory, because it says: "I have done everything I know how, and still God doesn't dance to my tune! He must be a liar."
Our faith, our prayer, our goodness, our brownie points!
Like the Pharisees, we measure success by what we do! We measure success by representing the very opposite of what we are actually called to do and to be!
Success is measured by how quickly we can get the weakness of being on the cross behind us.
Biblical Christianity looks different.
Gal 6: 14 says: "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." AND:
Gal 2: 20 says: "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."
We are expected to empty ourselves of control;
We are expected to choose death over rebellion;
We are expected to choose weakness over human strength and manipulation ;
We are expected to choose death of the Unregenerate Self ;
We are in this world but not of this world. The world would like to see the cross of Christ being emptied of its power, because as it stands, it turns Satan's theories on their head.
We have to realise that if we negate his act of weakness, we will live powerless lives.
Jesus feels quite strongly about it. Matt 10: 38,39 says "�and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
We are called to live with the implications of the cross! We are called to carry our weakness with us, make peace with it, and embrace it as that which makes us like Christ and enables us to find him. (Unlike Christ, who was forsaken by the Father, we will never be [left] nor [forsaken] Heb. 13:5)
We need to empty ourselves of our rights to the appearance of having it all together. We are, as Jesus was and is, an expression of the Love of the Father, restoring the world to HIS reality. He says, "the meek shall inherit the earth!" (Matt. 5:5)
Christ's real victory was on the cross. He demonstrated the true Gospel, and his Victory is ours: victory not over the world, but over ourselves. Over the grasping, trumpeting, arrogant son and daughter of Adam, who is our real enemy; over the world system and so over the deceiver who lies when he says we should grasp after power which we have no right to. So, the gentle, defenceless "loser" wins!
Don't come off the cross too soon!
It is an expression of God's REAL nature.
Embrace the cross, and:
Celebrating the power of weakness, so that God may be strong, resurrecting you with the same power that resurrected Christ!
Denying the lie of Eden and putting to death "man as god"