Mon 30 Mar, 2009
Reason 33 – Jesus Came to Die To Make His Cross the Ground of All Our Boasting
Comments (2) Filed under: Lent
“This seems over the top. Boast only in the cross! Really? Literally only in the cross? Even the Bible talks about other things to boast in. Boast in the glory of God (Romans 5:2). boast in our tribulations (Romans 5:3). Boast in our weaknesses (2 Corinthians 12:9). Boast in the people of Christ (1 Thessalonians 2:19). What does “only” mean here? It means that all other boasting should still be a boasting in the cross. If we boast in the hope of glory, that very boast should be a boast in the cross of Christ. If we boast in the people of Christ, that very boasting should be a boasting in the cross. Boasting only in the cross means only the cross enables every other legitimate boast, and every legitimate boast should therefore honor the cross. Why? Because every good thing—indeed, even every bad thing that God turns for good—was obtained for us by the cross of Christ. Therefore all our boasting in these things should be a boasting in the cross of Christ.”
Far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. (Galatians 6:14)
This verse is so, so important to anyone who claims to be a Christian. In it, is contained the preservation of the grace of God in all things. It takes away my ability to take pride in myself or my accomplishments. It removes absolutely every possible thing that I could claim I did that made me different from everyone else. I think most Christians miss this point. Christians are not Christians because of something they did like cleaning up their life, going to church, saying prayers, picketing people they disagree with, etc. Christians are in fact Christians because God loved them in spite of their utter sinfulness, arrogance, pride, self-righteousness and sin. God had mercy on them so that they could not and ultimately would not be arrogant, prideful and self-righteous. A person claiming to be Christian can not say he or she is any better than any other human being who lives on this earth. There is no justification for it. Doing so only ridicules the love of the God they claim to profess. An arrogant, prideful, self-righteous Christian is an oxymoron.
Questions: Have you ever thought yourself better than someone else because of something you did? How did you justify it? What in that act separated you from a person who didn’t do the same thing? Is it possible that another person could do something better than you did? What would that make you?
Quote from “The 50 Reasons Jesus Came to Die”.
Questions and reflections by me.
Picture – The cross at Mount Erebus, Antarctica, commemorating the 1979 Air New Zealand Crash near Mount Erebus.
Ilze Henderson says:
Interesting the book you quoted from. I didn’t know about it. As I battled with the concepts myself; why did Jesus have to come and die? Why did it have to be in such a brutal way on the cross? Why couldn’t He have died a more dignified death? All these questions swam in my head and the Lord in His Grace revealed the answers to me through the book “The Bible: Behind the Scenes”. I am so grateful and have learned so much from it. It gave me a new perspective. So thank you for your blog today.
Art says:
Ilze: Thanks for the comment. If you are interested in finding out more about John Piper’s ministry, you can visit his website at http://www.desiringgod.org. His God-centered view of all things is very inspiring. It’s great to know we serve a God who is infinitely gracious to his children.