The Way of the Cross

For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

                                 —The Apostle Paul

A good friend of mine and fellow pastor responded to my last post (“Who is Top Dog) by saying: “It is time for you to change tribes. You have indeed become an Anabaptist.” Well, he was only partially correct.

Anabaptists generally are separatists. Many of them do not participate in the political workings of whatever country they inhabit. The Amish are a well known example. Most Anabaptists are pacifists (Mennonites) and would register themselves as conscientious objectors during times of war (as would the Quakers).

I do not yet consider myself a separatist to this extreme. I do however, warm considerably to Anabaptist theology, especially regarding their resistance to violence and war and their penchant for obeying the call of Christ to follow him. Anabaptists place a very high premium on following Christ.

In this regard, I believe Anabaptist theology has a great deal to offer American Christianity today, especially its emphasis on a cross-centered approach to faith. In other words, the cross of Christ is for Anabaptists the very center of their faith.

They bring into sharp focus their views on violence, war, and obedience to Christ by focusing on what they believe to be the central theme of Christianity: The crucifixion of Christ. Some call this a “cruciform” approach to faith.

In fact, it is this cross that provides us an incredible opportunity for engaging the powers in our own time. Granted, for many the way of the cross is regarded as a sign of weakness and is foolishness (1 Corinthians 1:18) and according to Irishman Peter Rollins it is utterly “absurd”.

In his newest book, The Crucifixion of the Warrior God, theologian and pastor Gregory A Boyd points out: “While the early church generally embraced the foolishness of the cross, this became much more difficult once the church stopped being persecuted and embraced the power of the sword that Constantine offered it. ” The so-called “Constantinian synthesis”.

Yes the message of the cross does sound foolish and ineffective in our own time.

In fact, during Jesus’ day the Roman Empire was the big cat in charge, and how did Rome maintain peace: Through the use of crucifixion. Crosses literally littered the countryside of both Galilee and Judea with the corpses of those who opposed the powers or were considered a threat to Pax Romana.

The cross was one of the most horrific instruments of torture and death ever devised by humans to kill other humans. It was an insidiously inhumane and violent method of capital punishment.

But the cross nevertheless became the central and most enduring symbol of our Christian faith.

Ironically God used the cross to confront and subvert the powers that be in Jesus’ day. He became the crucified One who demonstrated that the only way the human cycle of violence could be broken is to respond to it in a nonviolent way. He demonstrated in his own wisdom that the most effective response to Evil is nonviolence and self-giving love.

This he did on Calvary! It doesn’t make sense. It is absurd. It is foolishness.

But it is the way of Christ!

You see, when our main focus of the cross is on personal salvation we naturally miss the broader meaning of Christ’s crucifixion. Yes Jesus died for our sins, according to the Scriptures.

But more broadly speaking the cross was God’s once-and-for-all answer to the problem of Evil and violence in this world. It was God’s way of saying: “It ends right here!” The old hymn “Victory in Jesus” rings true for sure.

So we Christians are called by Christ to follow him in a cross-centered approach to life; carrying our own cross (Matthew 16:24) as a way to call out the powers and subvert their lust for injustice, violence and war.

Perhaps this explanation of the broader meaning of the cross will add new insight for you as you reread Paul’s words: “For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.” Paul was a Roman and he understood that the cross represented Rome’s way of maintaining peace in the Empire—through violence.
But more importantly he came to understand that Christ gave new meaning to the cross and it was one that was based on the nonviolent response of God to the violence of the Empire that crucified his Son.

This, I suggest, is the strategy available to us to engage the political powers of our own time, thus calling them out in a subversive yet loving way by speaking truth to power.