"If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God." - Paul of Tarsus writing in the sixth chapter of his letter to the church in Rome, verses five through ten.


In his commentary on Romans, John Stott says, "The cross should be enough to break the hardest of heart, and melt the iciest" (117). Do his words describe your relationship to the cross? Or do they indict you and reveal your rather trivial relationship to it? My answer to these questions is conflicted: many times the cross does indeed break my icy heart, but there are certainly other times when I either don't think at all about the cross in my daily living, or worse yet, I don't apprehend...or care about...its significance.

When we aren't moved by the message of the cross, I think it's oftentimes because we've forgotten that we have the deepest, most intimate, personal interest in what occurred 2,000 years ago on a hill just outside the Jerusalem gates. When I conceive of the Gospel as a set of tasteless theological facts that are somehow supposed to affect the way I live, I see it as dry history that is profoundly disconnected from the reality of my daily living. But, when I see the message of the cross for what it really is--an account of when I escaped the wrath of my Creator and Law-giver, when my eternal and covenantal friendship with God began, when my seat at the wedding banquet was won, when His loving kindness to me was forever guaranteed--it quickly becomes painfully personal.

So the Gospel is more than bare history; it is my story and my heritage. How we relate to events in the past is largely dependent on our proximity to the event when it happened. Fifty years from now, school kids will read of the events of September 11th and will, understandably, received the information as...boring history...bland fact. Not so for you and me. Nor for those in New York that day. Certainly not for those who survived the building collapses under rubble. This is the point of what I'm writing about here! We are not nearly as removed from the consequence of Calvary as we sometimes think. The message of the cross is not distant history. It is as real and relavant and potent for me today as it was for the Centurion then. It is as really sewn into the fabric of my life as are my family, my birthday, my first day of college.

Why? Because in a sense...a real sense...I was at Calvary. I was on that cross, my 'old self', as Jesus strained for each labored breath all day long. I taunted him with mockery that day as he faded in and out of consciousness. I was crucified that day; and I crucified him that day. Along with the rest of God's people, I am both a cause AND effect of the cross. How could the cross possibly be more personal than that? The cross of Christ was the currency used to purchase each of the Father's little ones.

Do you see how the threads of your own filthy rags are woven into the tapestry of Divine Redemption? Do you really believe you were crucified and raised to life--life to its fullest--that day? If not, cry out for eyes to see. Pray the Holy Spirit of God to take you back to the hill where perfect love met perfect justice...the hill where you were purchased...the hill where the Father laid His Isac down...for your sake. And while He has you there, listen carefully...and hear the King of Kings spend His last excruciating breaths to whisper, "Father...forgive them...they know not what they do." This is how intimate the Gospel gets...this is the personality of the Cross of Christ.