Last Thursday I attended mass for the first time in months. Honestly, it wasn't so much about the mass. It just so happened that since mass was that night, it meant the sanctuary would be open, and I wanted in the sanctuary.
I wanted to sit and gaze upon the crucifix. I wanted to meditate on Christ on the cross.
One of the great mistakes of the Protestant churches I have attended in my life is the removal of the crucifix. Oh, several of them, the older ones, not the more modern ones, have the cross there, but I can't say any of them have a cross with the body of Christ on it, and to me, that is where the power is. The power isn't just a cross. Lots of people wear crosses or have crosses for decorations, and they are just that--decoration. No. The power isn't in the cross. The power is in the crucifixion, and that is what I wanted to focus on, literally and figuratively.
Tonight I attended mass again, and again I arrived early so I could meditate on the cross. As I sat and gazed upon the most beautiful murder of all time, I had a kind of mental conversation with Christ, and it went something like this:
As I sit here and look up at You hanging there, I am trying to take it in. Not just the reality of salvation. I get that, although I still don't understand it in some ways. Why in the world You would do that for Your enemies is beyond me? I know. It's called great love. Some things are greater than I can fathom, or maybe what I struggle to fathom is that we do not have to be great to receive it. We simply have to realize how utterly great our desperation and need is.
And I look at the horror of You, and my chin quivers, and tears fill my eyes because how can I find such stunning beauty in something so ugly as the way You were beaten and mocked and hung on a cross? But You are beautiful. The fact that You did that is so breathtakingly beautiful. Just as I have no words to truly describe the horror of it, I have no words to describe the beauty of it either. So I remain silent because the magnitude of Your beauty is beyond my ability to describe, and too often I remain silent because people who don't understand will mock You...and me...and Your sacrifice is too great to let someone spit on it...except I am here staring at You, trying to connect with what hangs before me because too often...WAY too often...I spit on You.
And I wonder if I could understand the pain, if I could understand the love, if I could understand the mindset...Except I don't.
I cannot fathom the lashes. I cannot grasp the pain of the nails cutting into Your wrists so You can take on the consequences of others' sins. Every time I have wanted to break the skin on my wrists it was to escape the consequences of others' sins.
I cannot comprehend the physical agony. I cannot imagine suffering like that willingly when it wasn't Your fault. I struggle and plead for mercy from the pain when it is my fault. How did it feel to You for Your pain and suffering to be the mercy I plead for? For You to be mercy incarnate and for mercy to hurt that badly?
No. I cannot comprehend.
But if I could, would I be less petty? Would I be more willing to throw off the sins that I wrap in like someone with an entitlement complex? Would I see through the mirage of world and choose the better life, the sacrificed life?
If I could truly grasp You on the cross, would I run to the cross and die on it with You because knowing what it took for You to hang on that cross for me makes it impossible for me to not hang on it for You?
Copyright 2016 Jerri L. Kelley
Showing posts with label The Cross. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Cross. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 16, 2016
Sunday, September 21, 2014
Death...and Life...on the Cross
Dear Fallon,
I've been thinking about the cross. It isn't what I was taught it was.
I was taught the cross is the burdens I carry in life. My cross is what I give up to be "good" or the hard parts of living a Christian life. It's the hard stuff of being me. It's sort of the Christian's pity party.
Except that's not true.
The cross wasn't Jesus burden. The cross is where Jesus died.
Jesus' burden was humanity and our sins. Those are things He died for, not on.
The cross is where Jesus took those burdens and in essence said, "As a human being, I can't fix this. I can carry this burden, but I can't fix it," and He allowed God Almighty to put Him on a cross where the flesh and all it couldn't do died, so that in the spiritual those things no longer had power, and what the flesh could not fix, the Spirit made perfect.
That is the cross.
The cross is where we take all the things we cannot possibly do in the flesh and die to our fantasy that these human bodies have any ability to make a difference. The cross is where our arrogance of ability is put to death, and we take up the reality that the only power is the one God Almighty wields. And it is there, waiting for us, on the cross, in the sacrifice of Christ.
All things that are humanly impossible are made possible in Him because He is the door--do we get it, Fallon?!--HE IS THE DOOR! He is the place where the limitations of the flesh die and the possibilities of all of heaven explode into this earth.
How can we ever live the crazy amazing life Christ did? Only on the cross.
Because the cross is where the logic and reason of the world has to die. There is nothing reasonable about the cross, but there is something miraculous. The cross is where this world has to bow to the rule of another kingdom.
When we are told to take up our cross daily and follow Christ, it doesn't mean lug around the burdens that we can't possibly fix. It means stand in the place where the world's logic dies and the limitations of this world cease and take up the reality that there is power to change everything, that we are the place where that power resides.
To take up my cross is to say, "I'm alive in Christ. I choose to live Him and be the place a radical God can invade this earth with heavenly power, and I refuse to make excuses and live in the reasonable limitations of my flesh."
To take up my cross means I lay down all the reasons why I can't do what I'm called to do or why that miraculous thing can't happen or why that person's heart will never change.
You know what sin is? Sin is choosing anything besides God. It means that I've believed there are better ways to live and meet my needs than God. It means I chose to live a lie.
The cross is where those sins were forgiven. The cross is where God says, "Let's try this again. You have the option of choosing me."
It takes crazy deep courage to choose a crazy wild God.
As Joshua said, "Choose you this day whom you will serve. As for me and my house, we choose God."
Choosing to trust the crazy wild God...
Not even totally sure what that means or what that looks like, but He is what I choose
because I cannot imagine choosing anything else...
Me
I've been thinking about the cross. It isn't what I was taught it was.
I was taught the cross is the burdens I carry in life. My cross is what I give up to be "good" or the hard parts of living a Christian life. It's the hard stuff of being me. It's sort of the Christian's pity party.
Except that's not true.
The cross wasn't Jesus burden. The cross is where Jesus died.
Jesus' burden was humanity and our sins. Those are things He died for, not on.
The cross is where Jesus took those burdens and in essence said, "As a human being, I can't fix this. I can carry this burden, but I can't fix it," and He allowed God Almighty to put Him on a cross where the flesh and all it couldn't do died, so that in the spiritual those things no longer had power, and what the flesh could not fix, the Spirit made perfect.
That is the cross.
The cross is where we take all the things we cannot possibly do in the flesh and die to our fantasy that these human bodies have any ability to make a difference. The cross is where our arrogance of ability is put to death, and we take up the reality that the only power is the one God Almighty wields. And it is there, waiting for us, on the cross, in the sacrifice of Christ.
All things that are humanly impossible are made possible in Him because He is the door--do we get it, Fallon?!--HE IS THE DOOR! He is the place where the limitations of the flesh die and the possibilities of all of heaven explode into this earth.
How can we ever live the crazy amazing life Christ did? Only on the cross.
Because the cross is where the logic and reason of the world has to die. There is nothing reasonable about the cross, but there is something miraculous. The cross is where this world has to bow to the rule of another kingdom.
When we are told to take up our cross daily and follow Christ, it doesn't mean lug around the burdens that we can't possibly fix. It means stand in the place where the world's logic dies and the limitations of this world cease and take up the reality that there is power to change everything, that we are the place where that power resides.
To take up my cross is to say, "I'm alive in Christ. I choose to live Him and be the place a radical God can invade this earth with heavenly power, and I refuse to make excuses and live in the reasonable limitations of my flesh."
To take up my cross means I lay down all the reasons why I can't do what I'm called to do or why that miraculous thing can't happen or why that person's heart will never change.
You know what sin is? Sin is choosing anything besides God. It means that I've believed there are better ways to live and meet my needs than God. It means I chose to live a lie.
The cross is where those sins were forgiven. The cross is where God says, "Let's try this again. You have the option of choosing me."
It takes crazy deep courage to choose a crazy wild God.
As Joshua said, "Choose you this day whom you will serve. As for me and my house, we choose God."
Choosing to trust the crazy wild God...
Not even totally sure what that means or what that looks like, but He is what I choose
because I cannot imagine choosing anything else...
Me
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