The Beauty of the Cross
4:12:00 PM
The Beautiful Cross
Brian Tolle
I am an artist. All of my life I have been lured by the beauty and mystery of artistic imagination. Whether it's music, painting, or literary writing - there is something in my soul that longs for entering into artistic expression. I can't get enough.
Christianity is the same, in a sense. Christianity is something we enter into. Like the doorway to Narnia. There is a magnetic pull into the Gospel of Jesus that many just can't see or even understand. But, our human heart seeks after it. And at the center of that divine mystery and beauty is the Cross...
I have come to recognize that many modern Christian churches in the United States (and perhaps elsewhere) do not display crosses anywhere on their property. They are simply absent. There are many opinions and defenses as to why that is - and I am not going to address those opinions here or even argue with it. But, what I would like to talk about, is the power and beauty of the cross of Christ that seems to have been lost in our post-modern age. Can we recover the beauty of the cross?
I believe the Church is in need of a re-formation. Many people that I have spoken with in the Church today are unable to say with confidence, why Jesus is beautiful and transforming in their lives. I'm given responses that are better described as theories or reciting the "right answers". Coming to church for many becomes a "thing we do". It's something we perform. Something we can consume. But many do not even know why. This is tragic. The Church is not another version of the world with a seasoning of Jesus on it. The Kingdom of Jesus is upside down - radical and beautiful!
One of the reasons I believe this is happening is because we need an ideal form, an accurate picture, and faithful example to which we can look, to which we can conform. For the past two thousand years of Christianity, it has always been Christ on the cross. The same cross that threw St. Francis of Assisi on his knees and began a movement that has yet to be matched in history (not counting Jesus and the birth of the Church of course!). But this is ghastly ironic because the Roman cross was an instrument of horrific death and psychological terror. This is a divine mystery. The crucifixion of Jesus, which completes eternal glory through his resurrection, is the centerpiece of Christianity around which everything else orbits.
The cross is what simply makes Christianity beautiful! On the cross we encounter abundant forgiveness in its most beautiful form.
But the question remains - can we see it? Do we believe it? In a society that idolizes and craves success or the corporate ladder, are we able to see the beauty in the cross?
The cross is the divine representation of love and forgiveness where revenge is vacated and outcomes are handed over to the hands of God. The cross is soaked in mystery. At first glance it looks like a failure. It looks like loss. It looks like death. It is death. But at the same time it is the wisdom of God. Paul explains it in the letter to the Corinthians:
For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
1 Corinthians 1:18-25
This is mysterious and fascinating at the same time. To those who value power and control, the cross looks like weakness and murder. But to those who have eyes to see, the cross shows the most beautiful transcendent quality of God - the beauty of love and forgiveness. I wonder if the cross makes some of us nervous? The cross certainly brings out the reality of suffering. I think sometimes we try to replace Christianity with everything that is perfect and wonderful all the time (insert smiley face). But that's not the reality we live in all of the time.
If we are uncomfortable with suffering, we passively enforce a kind of forced happiness in our churches. But we are called to weep with those who weep. It is a way that alleviates the burden of suffering - when we comfort one another.
Studying art in college gave me a wonderful privilege and opportunity to learn a lot about ancient cathedrals and architecture. I even traveled to Rome and visited many of the cathedrals there. It was absolutely breathtaking. It was like stepping into another dimension to walk in and see the light pouring through the stained glass. The ceilings were unbelievably high. Incense and candles set the atmosphere in so many beautiful ways. I felt like I was in sacred space. I'm afraid we've lost mystery and beauty and the power they have to produce the kind of wonder that naturally leads to worship. This is not a critique of churches that aren't cathedrals. But, what we need is a type of Christianity that can produce in people the kind of wonder a cathedral can have on our imagination.
Christianity is not a tool we use, but rather like a cathedral of wonder that we can enter into. Christianity is not something you "add to your life"; it is something you enter. Christ is the doorway.
Empires of the world promise peace and prosperity. And maybe to some degree they do. But empires achieve peace through means of violence and brutality. It was the peace accomplished by the Roman cross as an instrument of violence. Jesus would bring the entire world a new kind of peace through a radical re-envisioning of the same Roman cross. How did Christ do it? Through forgiveness!
Followers of Jesus are called to be peacemakers (Matthew 5:9) by following the refusal of violence in favor of forgiveness. This is what Jesus did on the cross - he took the most horrific instrument of death and turned it into a symbol of forgiveness. That should give us hope that in Christ all things can be made beautiful!
Our task is not to protest the world into a specific moral conformity or join the culture or political wars of our time. We are to attract the world to the saving beauty of Christ. How do you vision the cross now?
If we are uncomfortable with suffering, we passively enforce a kind of forced happiness in our churches. But we are called to weep with those who weep. It is a way that alleviates the burden of suffering - when we comfort one another.
Studying art in college gave me a wonderful privilege and opportunity to learn a lot about ancient cathedrals and architecture. I even traveled to Rome and visited many of the cathedrals there. It was absolutely breathtaking. It was like stepping into another dimension to walk in and see the light pouring through the stained glass. The ceilings were unbelievably high. Incense and candles set the atmosphere in so many beautiful ways. I felt like I was in sacred space. I'm afraid we've lost mystery and beauty and the power they have to produce the kind of wonder that naturally leads to worship. This is not a critique of churches that aren't cathedrals. But, what we need is a type of Christianity that can produce in people the kind of wonder a cathedral can have on our imagination.
Christianity is not a tool we use, but rather like a cathedral of wonder that we can enter into. Christianity is not something you "add to your life"; it is something you enter. Christ is the doorway.
Empires of the world promise peace and prosperity. And maybe to some degree they do. But empires achieve peace through means of violence and brutality. It was the peace accomplished by the Roman cross as an instrument of violence. Jesus would bring the entire world a new kind of peace through a radical re-envisioning of the same Roman cross. How did Christ do it? Through forgiveness!
Followers of Jesus are called to be peacemakers (Matthew 5:9) by following the refusal of violence in favor of forgiveness. This is what Jesus did on the cross - he took the most horrific instrument of death and turned it into a symbol of forgiveness. That should give us hope that in Christ all things can be made beautiful!
Our task is not to protest the world into a specific moral conformity or join the culture or political wars of our time. We are to attract the world to the saving beauty of Christ. How do you vision the cross now?
Amen.
Brian
(The artwork is The Beautiful Cross by Jean Kieffer)
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