Reading: Rom. 3:21-25; 1 Cor. 1:18,20; Col. 2:15.
Perhaps the most important thing in this consideration is to
remember that the meaning and the value of the Cross is entirely
bound up with the Person on the cross; that is, the cross
is not some thing in itself, and it is not an incident, or a
method, or a means which could be effective and of value in the
same way, no matter who it was involved in it. We have to recognise
that the value of the cross is that it is the Cross of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and never in our thought or in our language fail to
maintain that fact as a positive thing, and speak of the cross as
though it were some thing in itself, or as though it were an
incident (though a very important incident, with perhaps few
incidents in the history of the universe as important) in the plan
or course of things. We have to keep clearly in view always the
fact that the Cross takes its value entirely from the Person Who
was crucified.
In order to realise how important that is, you have to look more
closely into the Word of God, and perhaps into one fragment of
that Word which has had a very unfortunate translation, and has
never been sufficiently corrected in our Version. The passage in
question is 1 Corinthians 1:18: "For the word of the cross is
to them that are perishing foolishness; but unto us which are
being saved it is the power of God". It should be, "The
Logos of the Cross"! We have only to be reminded that the word
used there by the apostle, and undoubtedly used deliberately, is
the word with which John opens his gospel. His gospel is summed up
at the end in this way: "Many other signs therefore did Jesus
in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this
book: but these are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is
the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye may have life
in his name." The whole of the gospel by John is gathered up
into that, in order that it might become clear to all that Jesus
is the Son of God. Take that right back to the opening statement
of the gospel concerning Him; "In the beginning was the Logos,
and the Logos was with God, and the Logos WAS GOD"; "...and
the Logos became flesh, and tabernacled among us (and we beheld
His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father), full
of grace and truth". Paul takes that up. It is one thought,
one truth: The Logos of the Cross! The Logos was God, and became
flesh!
It matters supremely whose cross it was, and if you are going to
admit that range of things as represented by or included in the
Person on that cross, then the universe is at once bounded. It is
God! Can you get outside of that? In thought, in intent, in
design, in purpose, in will, in power, in wisdom, in any way you
cannot get outside of God. When you have gone through all realms,
at the uttermost limit you find God. Now see that brought to the
Cross. The Cross is cosmic. The Cross is universal. The Cross is
tremendous in its range. All things, in all realms, are gathered
into that Cross, and affected by it.
The word "logos" is a word almost impossible of full
interpretation, or translation. There is only one word in our
language which can make it in any way understood, the word
"reason", but that word is a limited word. It represents what we
may call the rationale of God, the reason back of the universe,
which is God's mind, God's reason for everything. God is
represented in that word as the explanation of everything, the
reason for everything. What is the reason for this? God! What is
the meaning of this? God! Why this? God! How do you understand
that? God! What is history? God! What is creation? God! That is
the answer every time. Everything is traced back to a Divine mind.
If things have gone wrong, are not as they should be, and you feel
everything is topsy-turvy, upside down, confused, a tragedy, and
you ask, "Why?" you have to answer, "God!" - not that God made it
like that, but this is the result of setting God aside,
disobedience to God; in that way the explanation is: God!
That is the meaning of "logos". God is the infinite meaning of
all things, the reason behind everything; and that is personal,
not abstract. Paul brings that in in the first chapter of the
first letter to the Corinthians. Read through that chapter again,
or through the two chapters on wisdom, and power, and you will see
that Paul goes behind of all other powers, behind all other
wisdom, and brings the Divine wisdom in the person of Christ, and
says that He is made unto us from God wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, redemption. How? Christ crucified is the wisdom of
God and the power of God.
The Logos of the Cross - the infinite reason, the infinite wisdom,
the infinite meaning of the Cross - is foolishness to them that are
perishing. In that Person on that cross there are the infinitudes
of wisdom, of power, of meaning, of reason. They are all there in
that. That is the way in which infinite wisdom and infinite power
are operating at this moment in this universe. Perishing men see
nothing but foolishness in the infinite wisdom, nothing but
weakness in the infinite power, but to us who are being saved the
Logos of the Cross, Christ crucified, is the wisdom of God and the
power of God.
We commenced by saying that just a contemplation, as far as it is
possible, of the passages we mentioned will at once reveal how
universal, how cosmic the Cross is because of the Person. No cross
other than His could have the same meaning, the same value. It is
the Person, Christ crucified; not a death as a sacrifice to God,
but God in Christ satisfying Himself. It is not, then, a thing, an
incident, an event, but a Person.
So we see that the Logos of the Cross is central, and abidingly
central, to the whole universe; not only in the hour when Christ
was crucified, but abidingly central. This universe has still at
its centre the meaning of Christ crucified. Even in the coming
dispensation, even when this dispensation closes, and the redeemed
are in heaven, then Christ crucified in meaning and in value will
be central to the universe; a Lamb in the midst of the throne. The
universe as it will be will not just have a Creator at its centre,
it will not just have its Creator as its Lord at the centre, it
will have its Redeemer as its Lord. The eternal theme is
going to be redemption; not creation, but redemption, and the
Redeemer central to all things. It is "the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus", as Paul says in the third chapter of the
Roman letter.
Now we pass on to break this up as to its application in the
various realms of the effectiveness of the Cross. It is important
for us to recognise that there are words used, all of which have
their own meaning and represent a different aspect of the
redemptive work of the Lord Jesus, or of the Cross of Christ. Such
words as atonement, reconciliation and redemption are not
synonymous terms; they are parts of a whole, but they are
distinctive parts; they represent different things in the whole.
While we may be very simple folk, and not theologians at all to
deal with technicalities of this kind, it is important for us,
even as simple believers, to be able to appreciate in order to
rejoice in the many-sidedness of what the Lord Jesus has done, so
do not dismiss it as merely technical or theological.
We are seeking in these meditations to do two things as the Lord
enables. On the one hand we are seeking to be instructive, and on
the other hand we are seeking all the time spiritual uplift,
occasion for rejoicing. We do not want a righteousness that is not
intelligent, that is merely emotional. To note the distinction
between these words is helpful. Atonement is one aspect,
reconciliation is another and redemption is another.
Atonement
We know immediately what the Word means by atonement; it is "to
make good". We say that we have to atone for a certain thing that
we have done. We have done some mischief, we have done some hurt,
and to atone for it we do something to put it even, to put it
right, so that the things, having been balanced properly, can be
set aside; nothing more need be said. The demand of that wrong,
that evil, has been fully met and satisfied, and the thing can be
put out of remembrance.
The Lord Jesus in His Cross has made atonement. The mischief was
taking things out of God's hands which were His right, taking
things away from God by independent action, disobedience,
rebellion. So that God, having as His deepest desire in creation
that there will be perfect oneness in fellowship between His
creation and Himself, has lost that which His heart desired; it
has been removed from Him, broken off from Him and He and that
which He had made for Himself by this rebellion, this
independence, by this disobedience, have been set apart, and the
cause is sin against God. The Lord Jesus has come in, accepted the
judgement for the sin, in Himself taken the punishment (because
sin cannot be unpunished), has made good in His own Person the
mischief in presenting Himself to God as Man inclusively, cosmically.
That is very simple, but it is a very great and important and
blessed aspect of the Cross. You see how far-reaching even
atonement is. It embraces all that which was severed from God by
sin, which was God's right, God's desire, God's purpose. It is all
included in the Person of the Lord Jesus. The sin which led to
that has been judged upon Him, and He has brought it back and made
good. In Christ God has got back everything.
Reconciliation
That is another aspect. It lays stress upon one particular
thought or element in the need for universal redemption.
Reconciliation immediately indicates that there was a breach, and
that in that breach there was offence, not simply that things were
divided but a state had arisen between the divided things which
was in conflict, which was hostile. Reconciliation means first of
all that the cause must be dealt with and removed, and the two
parties brought together. Paul has much to say about the gospel of
the reconciliation, "It is given unto us" he says.
We will speak more about that in a moment. We are reconciled to
God.
Redemption
While redemption is all-embracing, including everything, it has
its own particular significance. If you redeem something it goes
without saying that that something had gone into bondage.
Redemption always brings into view the picture of the slave
market, and that is what is behind the word as used here. In the
slave market certain ones have been sold into bondage to another
mastery. That mastery now has a certain legal right, legal ground
to stand upon. Because of certain things, the taskmaster, the
slave-owner, has legal rights. Those legal grounds have to be
removed, and those slaves have to be redeemed. The Lord Jesus has
removed the legal grounds, man having gone into bondage to the
law.
I want you to follow this very closely. The man is sold into
bondage to the law, and has to be redeemed from under the law
(that is a phrase used by Paul). But it is not left there. Paul
says God's Divine law, being taken hold of by the powers of evil,
that man is thrashed and beaten with the law, so that while man is
in bondage to the law, ultimately there is back of the law the
forces of evil.
Do you know what it is to be beaten, bruised and harassed by the
enemy through the law? "Thou shalt!" "Thou shalt not!" That is not
the Lord harassing you, driving you, worrying you by the law. What
happened when the law was given? "Sin awoke, and I died."
That is not being delivered by the law. It had to be made known,
but it had no power to save. It had to be made known in order that
men should know God's irreducible minimum, and then when man sees
it, he is placed under an eternal obligation to labour and labour,
trying to live up to it unless there is some other way. What was
the other way? God provided the other way. Christ was made, under
the law, to redeem them that were under the law. It is not
just the intimidation of the law. Here is something that the enemy
can come in on. Death worked through the law. There is another who
has the hold of death, the hold of the power of death, that is,
the devil. The law was given and sin awoke! "I had not known sin
but for the law, but when sin awoke I died." There is no life
there. Then I must be redeemed from the law in order to be
redeemed from death. It is written: "Cursed is every one that
continues not in all things that are written in the book of the
law, to do them" (Gal. 3:10). "Christ redeemed us from
the curse of the law, having become a curse for us" (Gal.
3:13).
The devil can take hold of God's things and use them for your
destruction, for your undoing, and to slay you. He has done that
with the law. The law was holy, but there are these cosmic forces
working even by this means to bring man into bondage. Redemption
from the law, freedom from the law, is redemption from death and
from the devil. If you stand on legal ground since Christ has
died, you stand in bondage not only to the law, but to the devil.
The legalists are the people who kill everything, blight
everything. With the rigid legalist all the beauty and life goes
out at once. The legalist is the person who is living in terror
lest he should break the law as an outward observance. In Christ
we do not violate the holy thoughts and desires of God. That is
not redemption from the law; it is redemption from that bondage
of the law which is dead. How are we redeemed? We are saved by His
life. The Lord Jesus as the risen One, and the power of His risen
life within us, lifts us so that the law is no longer something
that is driving and harassing, "Thou shalt love the Lord...".
In the power of the risen life of Christ do you need to be driven
to love the Lord with all your mind, soul, and strength? In the
power of Christ do you want taskmasters to make you love your
neighbour as yourself? Is it necessary to be stood over with the
lash of, "Thou shalt not steal", to one who is living in
the power of Christ? You have a living "something" in you which
means the fulfilment of the law is not irksome to you. You are
delivered, but not so until Christ the living, risen One, is
within.
Redemption means that we are bought out, the legal ground of the
enemy has been dealt with and removed. Remember that the enemy has
legal ground in those who are not in Christ, and in whom Christ is
not. We have spent all this time trying to show that the enemy is
endeavouring to drive us, through the law of God, to despair, to
bring us under his control. He knows quite well that we by nature
can never fulfil the law of God, and he does not hesitate to bring
the law in front of us. Supposing you take the law out of his
hand, that he can no longer bring it in front of you. That is
removing his ground.
So then the Cross of the Lord Jesus goes through all realms. It
goes through the realm of human weakness, inability, right through
all realms of Divine requirement, right out to the cosmic forces
of evil; and redemption is deliverance from everything that these
things represent as an obligation, or an imposition, or a demand.
It has to do with God in the first place. You see the dual
attitude of God revealed in the Word.
First of all, God is offended. God is offended with man, offended
because of sin. God has made that an awful offence, and that
offending thing makes it impossible for God to have fellowship.
Man is regarded from that standpoint as under wrath, and the
attitude represented is from that standpoint, that God can have
nothing to do with man and will have nothing to do with man. He is
offended, and rightly so.
Yet over against that there is another line: "God so loved the
world...". Firstly, God is angry, offended, having nothing
to do with man. Secondly, God so loved the world. How are you
going to reconcile these? Because men have seen those two things
they have chosen between them, and have divided between the
Gospels and Epistles, and very largely between John and Paul, and
said: "These are two different Gospels". They say, "We are ready
to have the teaching of Jesus as represented in the Gospels, but
this later doctrine is something else!" That is what you find
immediately you pick up any books of the modernist inclination on
the doctrine of the Cross.
While the few are there they are not two as opposed to one
another, they are only two sides of one whole. It is true, you
cannot fail to see it, the Bible clearly and fully states that God
is offended and angry. Man is under wrath, separated from God,
alienated and needing to be reconciled. On the other hand, God is
loving, yearning, apparently beneficent, kindly disposed, showing
no signs of being offended. How will you understand this dual
attitude? Is it not found in the complete statement: "God so
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that
whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal
life." Two things! Then man will perish in spite of God's
love if he does not believe, and God's love has declared that
there can only be fruit and its effect, by giving His only
begotten Son. Loving! Ah, yes! But not loving willy-nilly. Loving,
yet needing, as a sheer necessity, to give His Son. Why that? God
loves; why put in that about giving His only begotten Son? Cannot
God love without that? Is not God all love? Why put that bit in?
We know what that means. It means that Christ came, and went to
the cross, and died. Why that? That is the heart of the whole
thing. The very love of God sees that there can be no desired
result of that love in oneness, fellowship, reconciliation, only
by what is bound up with the giving of His only begotten Son. God
loves! Yes, but man will perish all the same unless something is
done which makes for the fruit of that love, makes possible that
for which God is seeking in His love.
God is other than we are. We sometimes might take this simple
attitude (and this is how the theologians have argued): If your
child sinned against you, and you were very angry, and very
offended, and that child said it was sorry and asked to be
forgiven, would you not just receive that child right back again
without any stipulations, simply because you were its parent,
because you loved the child? Surely God is better than the best
parent! Yes, that may be all right from a certain standpoint, but
it is very superficial. You see, this is a moral universe after
all. Great moral questions are involved, and sin from God's
standpoint is a very terrible thing, and cannot just be overlooked
like that. Sin is not just making a mistake. Sin is a horrible
thing which has its rise, not in the sinner, but in the devil
himself, and by sin man is in complicity, in a moral union with
the devil. Sin is the link between fallen man and Satan. Sin is a
terrible thing, because it involves cosmic forces of evil, and God
has got to get back of the sin and destroy the thing lying behind
sin, working through sin in man against God; and therefore man
must know that sin is no mere defect, mere fault, but that sin is
an awful thing, an ultimate thing with God, and relates to His
eternal foe. Someone must enter into the realm where not only sin
is dealt with, but him who is responsible for it. And you never
get, in the New Testament doctrine of the Cross, sin dealt with as
something in itself. It always relates to the devil. It always
goes further back.
So the apostle says in the passage to which we have referred,
that when by His Cross He triumphed, He stripped off
principalities and powers, and made a show of them openly
triumphing over them in it (His Cross). These forces of evil are
bound up with the sin question. It is cosmic. It is not something
incidental, but cosmic, universal. It is bound up with intelligent
beings, and Christ's Cross goes deeper than just sin and man
himself, in that it is not just something to apologise for and
say, "I am sorry!" It is far deeper than that. God may love, but
He can never have the object of His love until that has been
destroyed which will ever be at enmity with God, and so He gave
His only begotten Son. In His Cross He was made sin for us. He who
knew no sin; and being made sin for us, He destroyed sin, He
atoned for sin, but He went further than that in stripping off
principalities and powers. The Son of God was manifested to
destroy the works of the devil.
All this, whether you are able to grasp it or not, directs our
attention to this one thing: that in the Lord Jesus, in His
Person, in the Cross, we touch the whole universe of God, and we
are brought into something not merely fragmentary, but a universal
redemption. The redemption that is in Christ Jesus is a universal
redemption, touching all ranges, and there are practical
outworkings in that for this present life.
We have touched the sin matter. We are going on to touch other
matters. And when we come to finally touch the matter of the
principalities and powers, and see our redemption from them, and
the present practical meaning of that, you will see how great a
thing this redemption is. Let us in the meantime rejoice in the
fact that He hath redeemed us from our sin in His own body, and in
His own Blood, and that He has, in so doing, got behind our sin
and dealt with the forces working through sin to hold us in
bondage.
Remember that it is not just the stage of spiritual growth that
is represented by being delivered from the law; it is a
fundamental thing that we should recognise that we are delivered
from it. If you and I are in any measure in bondage to the law, we
are in bondage to the devil and to death. It is essential that we
recognise deliverance from the bondage to the law. Let us put on
the positive side: it is essential that we live in the power of
the risen Christ, which is the deliverance from the law.