When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come proclaiming the mystery of God to you in lofty words or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I came to you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. My speech and my proclamation were not with plausible words of wisdom,but with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God.  (1 Corinthians 2:1-5, NRSV)

 

 

     A number of years ago, the New York Times printed the results of a survey that asked people to rank one hundred historical events in order of their importance. The results were quite interesting. Those who responded declared the so-called discovery of America by Christopher Columbus  to be the most important event in history – this in spite of the fact that Columbus didn't actually discover America! A number of other things followed, until finally they came to fourteenth place, where three historical events were locked in a tie: the discovery of X-rays, the first airplane flight by the Wright brothers, and the crucifixion of Jesus. Fourteenth place is all the crucifixion could manage – and a tie for fourteenth place at that. Even the Leafs managed to finish in twelfth place! But the world neither respects nor understands the crucifixion of Jesus. Just the other day, a picture was posted on Facebook of a note that had been written by someone. The note simply read: “Justin Bieber is being crucified by the world. Justin Bieber is the Messiah.” This is the respect the crucifixion of Jesus is given – to be compared to the self-inflicted troubles of a self-indulgent and spoiled teen idol.

 

     Whether it's the survey or the comparison of Justin Bieber to Christ, it makes me ask the question of what we as Christains should think about Jesus' crucifixion. Is the crucifixion just another one of the important events in human history that caught people's attention, or is it a defining moment (perhaps the defining moment) in human history – a moment so significant that it caused Paul to say that he had “decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.” 

 

     One of the things we have to admit – if we're being honest – is that our thoughts about the crucifixion are shrouded in mystery. When we stand at the foot of the cross, we tremble. We see a picture of a man living his last hours in horrible agony, with blood flowing out of his hands and feet, left hanging in the hot sun, thirsty, with life draining out of him. It's offensive – it's even gruesome! And yet, however ugly it might be, when we let ourselves ponder the cross for a while, we find that the cross brings us very near to the heart of God. Even if we can't fully understand the cross, we can experience the cross. We can feel its power. We can sense its importance. The power of the cross is found in the fact that for those who believe, the cross is where we meet both God and ourselves. 

 

     You see, the cross teaches us about ourselves. It demonstrates to us the awfulness of the human condition. It reminds us that all of us are desperately in need of the grace of God. Though some have tried, the cross can't just be explained away as the result of a corrupt political system or a religion that had become spiritually bankrupt. If that's all it was, then fourteenth place ain't so bad really! But to look at the crucifixion that way is to remove ourselves from the scene and make us merely passive observers. The truth of the matter is that when we confront the cross, we discover ourselves there – perhaps to our great discomfort. When we fully grasp the significance of the cross, we realize that we can't lay the blame for the cross on “the system” or on a “religion.” We can't find anyone or anything to lay the blame for the crucifixion on simply because the crucifixion was the result of the human condition – and we, with all our weaknesses and sins and failures – are the modern day representatives of the human condition. So, when we look at the cross we should see ourselves standing behind it and not others. The cross should cause us not to lay blame but to take responsibility.

 

     But if the cross causes us to confront things we really prefer to avoid – pain and blood and ugliness and sin and guilt (ourselves at our very worst, you might say) – there is nevertheless something else. At the cross is also where we see the love of God shining forth most powerfully. God was involved in what He created from the very beginning. In Jesus' birth and life, we saw God directly involved in the world He created. But it was in Jesus' death that God's involvement with the world and God's involvement with each of us became personal. The one who came down from heaven to take on human form was obedient even to death on a cross, as Paul says in Philippians. Jesus' life wasn't just a life – it was love poured out, and never was it poured out more freely than at the cross. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son ...” God gave the best and most precious He had so that we could know the fullness of life. And this kind of love – the kind of love that shows itself in a man who's willing to give everything He has for people He hardly knows (the kind of love shown by Jesus) – has the power to attract people. It has the power to call forth commitment from our hearts and souls.

 

     The crucifixion shows us the most powerful of lives – the life that gets freely poured out for others. Most of our thinking and most of our preaching on the crucifixion – when we think about it or preach about it at all – never quite gets that far. We do exactly what Paul tells us not to do. We speak words of human wisdom. We define the crucifixion, we defend it, we explain it – but when all is said and done we generally go back out into a secular world and we live as though the crucifixion has little relevance to our daily lives. We'd be a lot more faithful if we actually did what Paul talked about – if we actually went out into the world “with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power” - a demonstration we make by actually living the crucifixion. That sounds challenging, but it's really rather simple. The crucifixion being put into action is simply our lives being poured out in the service and for the well-being of others.

 

     When we look at the crucifixion this way, then we start to realize that it isn't just another event in history. The crucifixion is a way of life. It's life that's lived not out of self-love, but rather out of self-denial. It's life that's lived not for ourselves but for others. It's only when the crucifixion becomes a way of life for us that Christian faith starts to make a difference. Unless a person really starts to live the crucifixion, it's hard to say that they're living a Christian life.

 

     So, then, what are we going to say about the crucifixion today? It's easy to become emotional about it. It's easy to become overwhelmed by the agony of Jesus' death, by the gruesome and bloody scene of the execution. Maybe we become so overwhelmed that tears come to our eyes. But it isn't tears that we need in response to the crucifixion. Not really. What do we need then? There's an old gospel hymn that says, “Drops of grief can ne'er repay the debt of love I owe.” If not tears (those drops of grief), what then? The hymn-writer goes on: “Here, Lord, I give myself away; 'tis all that I can do.” That's what we need. That's the meaning of the crucifixion. That's how we live the crucifixion each day – by giving of ourselves for the sake of others, and not counting the cost, just as Jesus did – an abandoned man, the Son of God, left hanging on a cross to die, and doing it for the sake of the world – including each one of us. What a debt of love, indeed!