CHALLENGE 1-B
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Read the online version of Challenge 1, Part B below.
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CHALLENGE 1: ALL-IN
Part B - The Cross
A Glorious Symbol or Blood, Guts, and Gore?
Crosses are ubiquitous, even in our post-Christian culture. They are displayed on church buildings, hillsides, jewelry, tattoos, desks, shelves, signs, hats, t- shirts, car bumpers, and houses. Crosses are so common that we may not even notice them, even when they are all around us. The cross, of course, is the primary symbol for the Christian faith. But why the cross?
In the first century, people in Judea, Galilee, and throughout the Roman Empire associated crosses with crucifixion, the Romans’ favorite means of executing renegades. In fact, Roman law protected Roman citizens from execution by crucifixion. It was reserved for only the worst enemies of the empire.
Throughout Judea and Galilee, it was not unusual to see the bodies of those who opposed the Roman occupation hanging from crosses. The Romans developed and perfected crucifixion as the cruelest means to execute people. Nailing people to a cross prolonged and intensified their suffering. Crucifixion is possibly the most brutal and inhumane means of killing people ever devised. Dying by crucifixion was so horrible it required a new word, “excruciating," to adequately describe the suffering and agony it inflected on its victims.
Even discussing death by crucifixion is unpleasant, but some understanding of it can be helpful for those who choose to follow Jesus. Crucifixion required nailing a criminal to a wooden cross laid on the ground. The victim’s hands or wrists were nailed to the horizontal plank and the feet or ankles were nailed to the vertical post. The nail targeted the main nerves on the arm (think of the pain when your “crazy bone” in your elbow joint receives a blow) and leg (consider the misery of those whose sciatic nerve is pinched or inflamed). Then the cross was raised until it was upright.
At this point, the victim was hanging from the cross by rusty iron nails. They hung there naked until they died, many hours or even days later. Crucifixion usually killed by suffocation (asphyxia). When the full weight of the victim hung from his outstretched hands or wrists nailed to the horizontal piece, it forced the air from his lungs and prevented him from inhaling. To breathe, the victim had to force his body upward by placing his full weight on his feet or ankles nailed to the vertical post. As long as the victim continued shifting his weight back and forth between his hands and feet which were nailed to the cross, he remained alive. When he passed out or was too exhausted to continue shifting his weight, he died.
Jesus had been wounded even before he was crucified. First, he was beaten and berated at his trial before the Sanhedrin (counsel of religious leaders) the night before his crucifixion.
“Then some of them began to spit at him, and they blindfolded him and beat him with their fists. ‘Prophesy to us,’ they jeered. And the guards slapped him as they took him away.”
Mark 14:65
Early on the next morning, the religious leaders took Jesus to Pilate, the Roman governor, who had authority to execute him. John’s gospel describes what happened next:
¹ Then Pilate had Jesus flogged with a lead-tipped whip. ² The soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they put a purple robe on him. ³ “Hail! King of the Jews!” they mocked, as they slapped him across the face.
John 19:1-3
Being flogged with a lead-tipped whip was also a brutal form of torture. The heavy lead tips penetrated the flesh, shredding muscle and tissues, and sometimes exposed the victim’s internal organs. The profuse bleeding led to dehydration and often triggered shock. Some prisoners did not survive it. And like the religious leaders, as the soldiers tortured Jesus, they also mocked and belittled him by putting a purple robe (a sign of royalty) and a crown of thorns on him while pretending to worship him. Jesus was critically injured and weakened even before he was nailed to the cross.
Humiliation
Death by crucifixion killed very slowly, inflicting the maximum amount of physical pain and suffering before the one condemned died. But it also humiliated and dehumanized the victim. Crucifixion was a form of both physical and psychological torture, erasing any remaining trace of human dignity or value. The mental and emotional cost was enormous.
³⁹ The people passing by shouted abuse, shaking their heads in mockery. ⁴⁰ “Look at you now!” they yelled at him. “You said you were going to destroy the Temple and rebuild it in three days. Well then, if you are the Son of God, save yourself and come down from the cross!”
⁴¹ The leading priests, the teachers of religious law, and the elders also mocked Jesus. ⁴² “He saved others,” they scoffed, “but he can’t save himself! So he is the King of Israel, is he? Let him come down from the cross right now, and we will believe in him! ⁴³ He trusted God, so let God rescue him now if he wants him! For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’” ⁴⁴ Even the revolutionaries who were crucified with him ridiculed him in the same way.
Matthew 27:39-44
³⁶ The soldiers mocked him, too, by offering him a drink of sour wine. ³⁷ They called out to him, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!”
³⁹ One of the criminals hanging beside him scoffed, “So you’re the Messiah, are you? Prove it by saving yourself—and us, too, while you’re at it!”
Luke 23:36-37, 39
For me, nearly two-thousand years later, the mockery, taunts, and insults are as painful to read as the descriptions of his physical suffering. Their cruelty was extreme, unjust, and misdirected. I have often imagined what would have happened if Jesus had responded to their taunts and insults and calls to save himself by jumping down from his cross.
Calls to come down from the cross were meant to be taunts, but they were also temptations. Jesus could have stepped off the cross just as he could have succumbed to Satan’s temptations in the wilderness by turning rocks into bread or doing stunts like jumping from the temple (Matt 4:1-11). The Evil One sought to divert Jesus from the cross (abandon his mission) by urging him to perform sensational miracles so that people would follow him. Jesus could have taken the easy way and stepped down from the cross, but he chose to remain there to the inevitable end. He understood his suffering and death to be the culmination of his mission. In anticipation of the cross, Jesus had explained,
¹⁸ “No one can take my life from me. I sacrifice it voluntarily. For I have the authority to lay it down when I want to and also to take it up again. For this is what my Father has commanded.”
John 10:18
The O.T. prophecies had to be fulfilled, (including Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22:12-18). Jesus knew his mission as the Messiah would take him to the cross. The cross was not an unfortunate accident, but a Messianic necessity.
A Mystery
Knowing Jesus could have avoided the cross, or left it, points us to an even deeper mystery. “Then at three o’clock Jesus called out with a loud voice, ‘Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?’ which means, ‘My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?’” (Mk 15:34). In Mark’s gospel those were Jesus’ last words from the cross. Jesus, the Son of God, the second person in the Trinity, was abandoned by the Father as he died on the cross. I believe his separation (abandonment by the Father) generated his greatest pain and anguish.
At that point, the sinless one was bearing the penalty for our sin. We call it the substitutionary atonement (covering, as in covering our sin). Jesus bore the punishment for our sins. He died in our place. He died so we could live. However, to bear our sins, he had to be abandoned by the Father because sin separates humans from God. Utter desolation. Nothing could have been more difficult or painful for Jesus than this. The pure and Holy One, the anointed Messiah, the sinless Son of God suffered the punishment for our sins. The only one who had no sin, carried all the ugliness of every sin ever committed. He persevered in bearing the just penalty for the putrid filth and slime called sin, our sin. He did it alone. God the Father turned away, leaving the Son completely alone in the gutter of hell.
Recognize, however, the Father suffered as much as the Son. To abandon the Son and to accept the sacrifice he made was excruciating for the Father as well. When the Father turned away while Jesus suffered, darkness came over the land (Matt 27:45, Mk 15:33, Lu 23:44). The Father suffered with the Son, just as a parent suffers with their cancer-stricken child. To turn your back on that child in their time of greatest need would be unthinkable. But in order to save us, the Son had to die in our place and the Father had to turn away because sin separates and isolates. The penalty for sin is death (Romans 6:23) and separation from God.
This was a unique moment in history. The afternoon was plunged into darkness as the Father and the Son each suffered the unbearable consequences of sin alone. At the moment Jesus died, the curtain in the temple that prevented people from entering the Holy of Holies (or the Most Holy Place) was torn in two, from top to bottom. Before that moment, only the High Priest could enter the Most Holy place (in which God was thought to reside). Anyone else entering would be struck dead. The torn curtain signified Jesus’ death had opened the way into God’s presence—the Jesus Way. Ordinary people could now approach their holy God without fear.
Incomprehensible Love and Bitter Sorrow
We return to the question from the first paragraph in Part B. The cross is a bloody story filled with pain and gore. How did it ever become the primary symbol of the Christian faith? The answer is that the cross of Jesus is the only means by which we can be reconciled to God, who is just and righteous. God had warned the first human that if he ate the fruit from “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” that he would “surely die” (Gen 2:17). Sin inevitably leads to death and separation from God. But Jesus paid the penalty for our sin on the cross. The cross of Jesus—and only the cross of Jesus—cancels or covers (atones for) our sin and reconciles us to God. The greatest gift of God, the cross, meets the greatest need of humanity: to be made right with God. The Apostle Paul explained it best in this passage:
²¹ But now God has shown us a way to be made right with him without keeping the requirements of the law, as was promised in the writings of Moses and the prophets long ago. ²² We are made right with God by placing our faith in Jesus Christ. And this is true for everyone who believes, no matter who we are.
²³ For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. ²⁴ Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. ²⁵ For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood. This sacrifice shows that God was being fair when he held back and did not punish those who sinned in times past, ²⁶ for he was looking ahead and including them in what he would do in this present time. God did this to demonstrate his righteousness, for he himself is fair and just, and he makes sinners right in his sight when they believe in Jesus.
Romans 3:21-26
Many people, when they think about the cross, see only blood, guts, and gore. Disciples, however, are attracted to the cross like steel is drawn to a powerful magnet. God made a way for sinful humans to become acceptable in his sight through the cross of Jesus. The Father and the Son’s great sacrifice made reconciliation and forgiveness possible. In a sense, the cross became the conduit through which all of God’s wonderful gifts flow into our lives, including his unfathomable and unconditional love, mercy, grace, and forgiveness. God transformed the unspeakable evil of death by crucifixion into a life-giving force for good, and the primary symbol of the Christian faith. This symbol and what it represents is unique to the Christian faith. No other religion has anything like it. The cross declares God paid the price, but we receive the benefits. The symbol simply, but eloquently communicates the good news.
Reflect on the subtle but profound way Isaac Watts described the cross in his famous hymn,
WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS (verses 3 and 4)
See, from his head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down;
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
or thorns compose so rich a crown?
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.
ISAAC WATTS July 17, 1674 - Nov. 25, 1748
Watts, an English Congregational minister and theologian, was also a prolific hymn writer credited with nearly 750 hymns. One of his most familiar works is the Christmas favorite, “Joy to the World”.
The cross continues to be an almost incomprehensible revelation of God, combining gut-wrenching sorrow with unfathomable love. It was cloaked in evil, cruelty, darkness, and death. God suffered. Yet, God’s suffering somehow transformed the cross into something that brings and illuminates life. What was evil and ugly was transformed into something good and beautiful. Through the cross God turned hate into love, sorrow into joy, and death into life. That which was unspeakably evil now inspires awe and love. Only God could transform the blood, guts, and gore of the cross into a beautiful means of life and a glorious symbol of his sacrificial love.
Closing Thoughts
As we near the end of Part B, it is helpful to see how the different parts work together in Challenge 1:
PART A discussed how our sin made the cross necessary.
PART B focuses on the cross, how God responded to our sin by sending Jesus to die in our place.
PART C will reflect how we are made right with God through the cross. It also will supply answers to some of the lingering questions that have not been addressed in the first half of this chapter.
PART D will complete the first challenge by examining the significance of Jesus’ resurrection.
In the meantime, we reflect on how going all-in for Jesus is an expression of saving faith. It is the appropriate response to God’s gift of unconditional love and forgiveness offered to us through the sacrifice of Jesus.
THINKING IT THROUGH
“Christ suffered for our sins once for all time. He never sinned,
but he died for sinners to bring you safely home to God.” 1 Peter 3:18
THE TRUTH: Jesus went all-in for me on the cross.
YOUR CHALLENGE: Will I go all-in for Jesus?
Each part of every four-part challenge concludes with a “Thinking it Through” segment which consists of a list of Scriptures related to the topic being considered, questions for group discussion and personal reflection, and notes. Each of the twelve challenges will end with an exercise to guide you through the process of naming lies, believing the truth, and clarifying the personal implications and applications of the truth to your life. Truth, if believed, must be lived, and living the truth brings personal transformation (Kingdom living). Please consider this section as a tool to help you to understand the truth, not as a test or as busy work.
Related Scriptures
1 Corinthians 1:18-25 ¹⁸ The message of the cross is foolish to those who are headed for destruction! But we who are being saved know it is the very power of God. ¹⁹ As the Scriptures say, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent.” ²⁰ So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, and the world’s brilliant debaters? God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish. ²¹ Since God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him through human wisdom, he has used our foolish preaching to save those who believe. ²² It is foolish to the Jews, who ask for signs from heaven. And it is foolish to the Greeks, who seek human wisdom. ²³ So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. ²⁴ But to those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. ²⁵ This foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God’s weakness is stronger than the greatest of human strength.
Psalm 22:1, 14-18 ¹ My God, my God, why have you abandoned me? Why are you so far away when I groan for help?
¹⁴ My life is poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, melting within me. ¹⁵ My strength has dried up like sunbaked clay. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. You have laid me in the dust and left me for dead. ¹⁶ My enemies surround me like a pack of dogs; an evil gang closes in on me. They have pierced my hands and feet. ¹⁷ I can count all my bones. My enemies stare at me and gloat. ¹⁸ They divide my garments among themselves and throw dice for my clothing.
Galatians 3:1, 6:14 ¹ Oh, foolish Galatians! Who has cast an evil spell on you? For the meaning of Jesus Christ’s death was made as clear to you as if you had seen a picture of his death on the cross.
¹⁴ As for me, may I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world has been crucified, and the world’s interest in me has also died.
Romans 5:8 ⁸ But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.
Colossians 1:19-20 ¹⁹ For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, ²⁰ and through him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross.
1 Peter 2:21-25 ²¹ For God called you to do good, even if it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you. He is your example, and you must follow in his steps. ²² He never sinned, nor ever deceived anyone. ²³ He did not retaliate when he was insulted, nor threaten revenge when he suffered. He left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly. ²⁴ He personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right. By his wounds you are healed. ²⁵ Once you were like sheep who wandered away. But now you have turned to your Shepherd, the Guardian of your souls.
Isaiah 52:13 - 53:12 ¹³ See, my servant will prosper; he will be highly exalted. ¹⁴ But many were amazed when they saw him. His face was so disfigured he seemed hardly human, and from his appearance, one would scarcely know he was a man. ¹⁵ And he will startle many nations. Kings will stand speechless in his presence. For they will see what they had not been told; they will understand what they had not heard about.
¹ Who has believed our message? To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm? ² My servant grew up in the Lord ’s presence like a tender green shoot, like a root in dry ground. There was nothing beautiful or majestic about his appearance, nothing to attract us to him. ³ He was despised and rejected— a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. He was despised, and we did not care. ⁴ Yet it was our weaknesses he carried; it was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins! ⁵ But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. ⁶ All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own. Yet the Lord laid on him the sins of us all. ⁷ He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter. And as a sheep is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth. ⁸ Unjustly condemned, he was led away. No one cared that he died without descendants, that his life was cut short in midstream. But he was struck down for the rebellion of my people. ⁹ He had done no wrong and had never deceived anyone. But he was buried like a criminal; he was put in a rich man’s grave. ¹⁰ But it was the Lord ’s good plan to crush him and cause him grief. Yet when his life is made an offering for sin, he will have many descendants. He will enjoy a long life, and the Lord ’s good plan will prosper in his hands. ¹¹ When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish, he will be satisfied. And because of his experience, my righteous servant will make it possible for many to be counted righteous, for he will bear all their sins. ¹² I will give him the honors of a victorious soldier, because he exposed himself to death. He was counted among the rebels. He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels.
Questions
You are encouraged to use these questions for group discussion or personal reflection. Respond to the questions that are most relevant or interesting to you (I urge you to write your responses in a journal or notebook).
Read 1 Cor 1:18-25 (you can find it in the Related Scriptures section). The cross is offensive to some and foolish nonsense to others. Yet Paul taught it reveals the power and wisdom of God. Have you ever considered the cross offensive or foolish? If so, explain why. Then write three words or three phrases that you associate with the meaning or significance of the cross.
On the cross Jesus suffered intense physical, spiritual, and psychological pain. It was the most supreme injustice in history. No one has suffered more. Subsequently, Jesus more than anyone else, understands your most painful problems and suffering. He’s been there. Reflect on this and write a paragraph on why it is important that the Savior understands human pain, suffering, and injustice.
It was inconceivable that God could suffer in the ancient world. Humans suffered, not the gods. Why is the insight that God suffered and died voluntarily, of any importance or significance? What does it say about God?
The curtain that separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple was torn from top to bottom at the moment Jesus died. Explain why this is still significant twenty centuries later.
The afternoon Jesus died and the curtain was torn in two, the land area was plunged into darkness. What does the darkness communicate to you?
It has been said that at the cross the greatest gift of God met the greatest need of humanity. Reflect on this quote. Do you believe the cross meets your greatest need? Why or why not?
When John the Baptist saw Jesus, he said, “Look! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (Jn 1:29). Explain why John called Jesus the “Lamb of God.”
The last line of an old Isaac Watts’ hymn, “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross,” states: “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.” It’s a concise description of what going all-in for Jesus means. Reflect and write a paragraph on why Watts described Jesus’ death as “amazing.” Then write a second paragraph on why such amazing love compels him to declare it demands his soul, his life, and his all.
Paul wrote, “when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense” (1 Cor 1:23). Why would the cross offend anyone? Do you know anyone who is offended by the cross or who considers it nonsense?
The truth in this first challenge states: Jesus went all-in for us on the cross. Make it personal by altering it to say, “Jesus went all-in for me on the cross” and see if this changes the meaning.
Notes
Blood has a special meaning in the Bible. It was used as a synonym for “life,” much like when we use the phrase “life-giving blood” or “flesh and blood.” Blood in many contexts was considered to be holy. Blood had to be drained from the carcass of an animal before it could be eaten. Animals were slain and used as blood sacrifices in the OT sacramental system. The role and importance of blood is reflected in these two verses:
Deuteronomy 12:23 “But never consume the blood, for the blood is the life….”
Hebrews 9:22 “In fact, according to the law of Moses, nearly everything was purified with blood. For without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”
The Hebrew slaves (descendants of Abraham and Sarah, who later were called Israelites) smeared blood on their doorposts before the original Passover, the night when the firstborn Hebrew sons were spared because the lamb’s blood protected them, while the firstborn sons of the Egyptians were killed. The firstborn livestock of the Egyptians were also killed. The blood of the sacrificial lambs protected the Hebrews (See Exodus, chapters 11-12 to read the Passover story) Jesus was crucified on the Friday of the Passover celebration.
The Sanhedrin, at the time of Jesus, was an elite council of Jewish leaders which exercised final authority of all things pertaining to their religion. It was comprised of two key groups: Sadducees and Pharisees. The Sadducees were the most influential priests from the priestly tribe of the Levites. The Pharisees were ultra-pietistic lay people who were experts in the OT law and Jewish traditions.
“The atonement is the center of gravity in Christian life and thought….” And “it is the event of Christ’s death which the NT consistently underscores as all-important, and his death interpreted not as a martyrdom, brought to pass by a miscarriage of justice, but as the offering of a redemptive sacrifice (Heb 10:1-14). The event, this saving deed, in the whole range of its results, is commonly called the atonement." (Vernon Grounds, “Atonement” in Baker’s Dictionary of Theology, 1960)
The Sample Prayer for Going All-in for Jesus
Reflect: The next paragraph is the same prayer that concludes each part of the first challenge. It is merely composed of printed words. Any literate person can read it, but to make it into a prayer by sincerely speaking it to God is much more challenging. If you choose not to pray this, I encourage you to ask yourself what prevents you from doing so? What do you fear would happen if you prayed this? Following Jesus is a life-long journey of learning, trusting, and surrendering. But it’s true, every journey begins with a first step. The journey we are calling the Jesus Way, begins when you respond positively to Jesus’ invitation: “Follow me and be my disciple” (Matt 9:9). Jesus does not expect perfection, but he does expect faith—a faith that is expressed in actions. The first step is merely telling Jesus, in whatever words and way you choose, “Yes, I want to follow you.”
Loving God, I still have questions and doubts, but I don’t want to say “no” to your love any longer. Please forgive my self-centeredness and attempts to run my own life. I believe your way is best, not mine. Thank you for your “all-in” love for me which seems too good to be true. Yet I need and crave your love, even though I don’t deserve it. I surrender to you unconditionally, without consciously holding back anything or any part of my life from you. I give you my life, my strengths and weaknesses, my successes and failures, my joy and pain, my limitations and dreams, my needs and wants, and all of my relationships. I am “all-in” for Jesus. From this moment on, Jesus leads, and I will do my best to follow. Thank you Lord for your loving guidance. Amen.