The Meaning of the Cross, part 3: Persecution
Jesus uses the Law and giving to the poor as symbols for the true faith which leads to eternal life. He uses the young man’s corrupt religious affections as a witness against him. These are only primers, not ends, to the true faith expressions. It is not in the Word’s prior and unfulfilled pedagogic expressions. A true treasure in Heaven is not by giving to the poor, its first belief in the Prophetic Word of Christ and then putting nothing of value before it. The “rich” will hardly enter the Kingdom of God, implying carnal riches, set against true riches. True riches means rich in truth, rich in faith, rich in works of self-denial, not self-satisfaction, for demonstrating that particular faith in that particular Word. In vss. 33 and 34, Jesus again prophesies his death in Jerusalem, a fulfillment of the Prophets.
3. Meaning of the Cross: Coming down from the Cross.
The phrase by the persecutors further serves to illustrate the meaning of the Cross and the reasons why they are persecuting Jesus and will persecute all believers.
- Matthew 27:40: “And saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross.” That is, give up your oath to the Father to fulfill the prophecies, to fail as the scriptural Messiah in exchange for acclaim as a Rabbi, a King, a good man, or a wonderworking false Messiah outside of the Scriptures.” Messiah is by choice nailed, bound to the oracles to fulfill them, but this saying of the fallen world is encouraging him to willfully remove that binding in a replacement miracle.
- Mark 15:30: The same taunt. Again the inverse expression to taking up the Cross: not to take up the Cross but to put it down. The scoffers and revilers at the foot of the Cross tell Jesus, the one who prophesied the destruction of the Temple that they take as a false prophecy, to come down from it and they will believe in Him (Mark 15:32, Mat 27:40). True disbelief demonstrates true belief. “Come down from the Cross” is an exhortation to fail prophetically. To keep religion but jettison the singular spiritual motivation for all righteous religion. Here is another way of saying “fail as Messiah and we will set you up as King of our religious affections, but not before.” If one disbelieves, one disbelieves messianic prophecy. If one believes, one believes messianic prophecy.
4. Meaning of the Cross: Pilate marks the Cross unwittingly as the Oracles of Messiah.
- John 19:19: “And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS.” The sign nailed to the Cross is Pilate’s nailing, binding, affixing, setting its signification as the Prophetic Word of Jesus with a prophecy. “King of the Jews” is a promise, a prophecy, and the greatest one of all, and also its conclusion in fulfillment. Jesus was fulfilling the credentials for this title KING, as well as the meaning of the composition of true faith. Pilate is, wittingly or unwittingly, saying that Jesus is the prophesied Messiah, to the rage of the Jews who demanded it be taken down.
5. Meaning of the Cross: The Cross as the basis for theology.
- Pertaining to the power and content of the gospel.
- 1 Corinthians 1:17: “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.”
- This has nothing to do with death and everything to do with Jesus’ “prophesied death” as the content to the gospel message. Christ sends Paul to publicize the truth of the Messiah from the prophets, not to teach religion. You can forget water baptism, but you can’t forget that.
- 1 Corinthians 1:18: “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.”
- “Preaching of the cross” is not about Jesus’ “death” or for our own faith or for a religious reason, but for His. It’s a kind of preaching content about the death and resurrection of Jesus as foretold through the prophets. It’s a faith in a particular reason that is miraculous and of the Word.
- 1 Corinthians 1:17: “For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.”
- Pertaining to the aversion to the oracles by the world, or quintessential sin.
- Galatians 5:11: “And I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? then is the offense of the cross ceased.”
- Same as above. The offense of the Cross is also not the offense of the notion of the Messiah dying on a cruel and disgusting cross. Personal persecution is because of the content and implications of the prophetic message we peach.
- Galatians 5:11: “And I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? then is the offense of the cross ceased.”
- Pertaining to the dedication to the Spirit and the alienation from the world, or sanctification.
- Galatians 6:14” “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”
- This power of this Cross of Christ in Paul’s spirit makes the believer crucified, or as physically dead, to the world and his flesh, but alive to the Spirit. This another exclusive statement of Paul as to the content of his faith and the content of his preaching set exclusively upon messianic prophecy. See Gal 2:20; Ac 20:23-24; Ro 6:6; 1Jo 5:4-5.
- Galatians 6:14” “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”
- Pertaining to the gentile’s in-grafting.
- Ephesians 2:15: “Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace.” Ephesians 2: 16: “And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby”. Explained by Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.”
- The Cross and the blood of Christ are, respectively, the entire corpus of the revelation of the Messiah from the OT and the particular fulfillment of Messiah’s death. This revelation is given to the whole world, without respect of persons, and is a unifying truth that brings everyone together through faith as a particular spiritual race prepared for a heavenly Kingdom.
- Ephesians 2:15: “Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace.” Ephesians 2: 16: “And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby”. Explained by Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.”
- Pertaining to the permanent change in the view of the Law
- Colossians 2:14: “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.”
- This is very difficult for us to understand because we don’t get the centrality of the witness of the OT prophets for faith. Never was it meant that the Law was to be fulfilled by mortals. Not that no one can live a life in perfect obedience to the moral and ceremonial Law, but impossible for a mortal to fulfill the credentials of the Messiah except Jesus, which is the superior moral and ceremonial obedience to the Law. The old, unfulfilled Law, which was itself a pedagogic foreshadowing of Messiah, died by the Cross of Messianic Prophecy itself, the new lesson for the new spiritual adult. Its Paul’s way of saying that the reason for the Law was absorbed into the implications of the fulfillment of the prophetic of Jesus. We have no obligation to obey a Law that we never could fulfill. Our spiritually adult, moral obedience comes now comes directly through faith in those fulfilled prophecies by Jesus, who fulfilled them for us. Not that he was fulfilling them in our place, but that he fulfilled them to give to us the ultimate reason for believing in any conception of God: he conclusively proved himself as an objective reality, not an imaginative concept. Luther badly misunderstood this, that Jesus fulfilled the Law in our place as a substitute, which is true, but not by assuming that the Law was only the command of God for us to physically obey, and not that the essence of spirituality to faith is by feelings and religious intuition. It’s about spiritual obedience, and if spiritual obedience through spiritual action it’s through handling and placing faith upon Christ’s fulfillment of the Law through the prophets which were given to us in our place of helplessness to provide it on our own, which is the superior moral fulfillment to a kind which is only an obedience to a stricture. This is a statement that salvation requires work only if “work” is something that goes on by us in our spirits, which is not the idea of “work” which Paul spoke of as being futile by any means.
- Colossians 2:14: “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.”
- Pertaining to Christology
- Philippians 2:8: “And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
- Obedient to the prophecies, our same faith making us obedient to him. “Death” and Cross” are prophecies and the whole of the revelation that predicted Christ’s sacrifice.
- Philippians 2:8: “And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
- Pertaining to the essence of anti-revelational religion.
- Philippians 3:18 “For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
- They are enemies because they do not emulate the oracles of Christ in their own lives. Christ fulfilled them, and they do not by refusing to motivate their faith and religion by them.
- Philippians 3:18 “For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
- Pertaining to the atonement and the forgiveness of sins.
- Colossians 1:20: “And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.”
- The blood of the Cross is the promises of his crucifixion and death and their fulfillment. Peace is peace of a prophetic faith and no longer struggling for understanding and waiting for the prophetic outcome and the completion of the prophetic plan.
- Colossians 1:20: “And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.”
- To the motivation of Jesus in carrying out the plan of redemption.
- Hebrews 12:2: “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”
- Enduring the Cross is enduring the lethal mandate for him to fulfill it. “Author and finisher of our faith” refers not only to the person of Christ but to the promises of Jesus that fulfills our faith.
- Hebrews 12:2: “Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”
The Meaning of the Cross?
The Cross, as well as Jesus, is a sign to be spoken against (Luke 2:34). It’s a stumbling block. The smallest problem that the Christian have, or should have, is magnified into the biggest one it is not returned to its original position as the identification of the essential nature of the doctrines of sin and righteousness.
Please see the next article in this series: The Meaning of the Cross: part 4, the Atonement
Matthew 5 and the Adultery of the Heart: Passing by Nehushtan
An Analysis of the Brazen Serpent Imagery: Passing by Nehushtan
When I Survey the Wondrous Nace, part 1: Passing by Nehushtan
