The Pattern of the Cross

“It is the audacity of it” writes non-Christian historian Tom Holland, “the audacity of finding in a twisted and defeated corpse the glory of the creator of the universe — that serves to explain, more surely than anything else, the sheer strangeness of Christianity, and of the civilisation to which it gave birth.”

Two things he mentions here: first, the strangeness of Christianity - which I alluded to last week, that we celebrate a cross, an instrument of torture. And secondly, that Christianity, with the cross at the center, gave birth to a civilization.

His belief is that Christianity - and specifically the idea of God coming and dying on the cross - radically transformed the world. Why is it that we measure the greatness of a man’s soul by the degree to which he shows compassion to the lowly? That’s not how the Greek king Leonidas led. He trained his soldiers in a peculiar form of eugenics, training their young to kill the socially inferior among them. That’s not how Caesar thought, who was reported to have slaughtered over a million Gallic people and enslaved a million more. Their worldview didn’t have any space for showing mercy to the lowly, the unfortunate. Where did that worldview come from?

The cross of Christ was like an asteroid hitting the Atlantic Ocean, sending tidal waves around the world. It introduced an entirely new way to think, to feel, and to live.

And last week we got more personal - we studied our own connection to the cross. Because we are united with Christ by faith, we have a new identity, we have a new freedom, and we have a new inspiration, a new reason. We are crucified with Christ, we are set free from sin - we can actually say no to sin. We are not on Team Sin anymore, and Coach Sin has no authority over us. And now we are compelled to live for him.

And now, we’re going to study the pattern of the cross. An understanding of the cross gives birth to a certain way of thinking, a certain wisdom, a certain lifestyle.

We learn not only that the cross is the center of the universe - the primacy of the cross; not only is the cross the grounds for our new identity, our new freedom, and our new inspiration - the power of the cross. But this morning I want to show you that the cross also provides the pattern for living in this world. It is our example.

Let me say it in a different way. All of Jesus' life is an example for us. We learn from his life how to live - we should be compassionate as he is compassionate, we should be obedient as he is obedient. But what I found incredible as I studied this cross more recently, is that the New Testament doesn't as much exhort us to imitate the life of Christ in general, but specifically, we are to imitate his work on the cross.

What’s very clear is that Peter and John and Paul - as they considered the last hours of Christ - in the upper room, in the Garden, being betrayed, being beat up, being accused, being silent before the accusers, being rejected by all, being nailed to the cross, being left to die - these events became the pattern for living. That’s how I must live.

The life-changing, turn-your-world-upside-down reality is this: the place you should look if you want an example for living is the cross. The person to imitate is a rejected, beaten, bloodied, battered, weak, dying man being shamefully humiliated as he lays down his life to rescue sinners. This is our pattern for living in God’s World. The cross is the key to living.

#1 The cross shapes our wisdom. The cross - yes, the eternal Son of God, humbled to the lowest death - gives us the framework for understanding God’s World. The cross turns conventional, worldly wisdom upside down and gives us an entirely new worldview.

Turn to 1 Corinthians 1:18.“For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” God says that humanity is divided into two categories. First, you have those who see that the cross is foolish. They see a failure. They see a defeated messiah. They see weakness. The world apart from God - called “those who are perishing” here - cannot see any beauty or goodness or value in the cross.

It’s foolishness to them. Why? Because they don’t know what God is like. They don’t see things like God does. They don’t value what he values. They think God is like them, easily impressed by human achievement.

But there’s another category of person. “But to us who are being saved.” To these people, being saved by God’s grace, made alive by God’s spirit - they see the cross differently. It’s not foolishness to them. It’s not failure to them. What is it? “It is the power of God.” These people understand the bankruptcy of human achievement, and thus recognize the cross as powerful.

Look at verse 22: “For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews” (it was unfathomable for Jews to think of the Messiah dying - and especially dying on a cursed cross). “And folly to the Gentiles” - the sophisticated wisdom of the gentiles would have thought it utter folly to worship a religious leader whose life ended in a scandalous, shameful death. Verse 24: “But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”

Let me just explain this. The world is obsessed with human achievement. We are all born builders of the Tower of Babel. We want to build up, we want to be great, we want to reach heaven ourselves, we want to make a name for ourselves. Through that lens, the cross is pathetic. At the cross, you see a defeated man. At the cross, you see a failure. At the cross, you see hopes dashed, goals missed, dreams lost. At the cross, you see a man and a movement utterly destroyed. At the cross, you see is a flop, a cosmic blotch. But that’s man’s perspective.

But the cross is something else. On the cross is not a mere man, it’s God incarnate. At the cross, you do not see someone thwarted, you see someone working out his perfect plan for redemption. The cross is not hope crushed, but hope itself; the cross doesn’t happen because the goal was missed but because it was a bull’s eye. The world sees defeat, faith sees victory!

The cross reveals God’s ways are different from ours. He does not operate according to human expectations. The cross reveals that humanity is so depraved it cannot come to God, God must come to us. The cross reveals the sinfulness of sin, that it deserves the outpouring of his perfect wrath. The cross reveals that human achievement is nothing, that God is not impressed by anyone, and that no one can feel their way to him. The only way to be reconciled to God is by looking at the cross as seeing how holy God is, how serious sin is, how you could do absolutely nothing, and then embrace Christ’s death for you, and trust him entirely.

Has the world understood this? No. The wisdom of the cross is folly to the world. People are totally infatuated by human achievement. They evaluate themselves on what they can achieve. So they give their lives to playing a sport and becoming a star. Some seek achievement by diving into hobbies, beating levels on video games, or advancing in their career. Every decision, all the time, is driven, even in small ways, by this compulsion to achieve something, to make someone of yourself - and the pursuit of happiness is always “more.”

More money. More beauty. More fame. More comfort. More opportunities. More fans. More followers. More subscribers or likes or views or money or clients.

This is the wisdom of the world. This is the wisdom of our age. “Go for it!” The world says. “Get it, claim it. Be you. Get what you want out of life.”

But listen, here’s the deal. The cross lets us in on a little secret. It’s all a scam. Have you ever been scammed? Online scams are huge these days. When I was car-shopping a few years ago, I was looking on Craigslist for a car, and scams were everywhere. And every scam was exactly the same: nice car, low price, the only problem was the car was out of state and you needed to send your cash before you could get the car. It was a scam. If you send the money, you’re not getting the car.

This is what’s happening. The whole world is scamming you. Buy this, be happy! Do this, be happy! Invest in more games, invest in more clothes, invest in more stuff! That will get you happy. But it’s a scam. The god of human achievement can only build an empire of dirt that puffed out of existence the moment you die.

And the shadow of the cross looms over it all and says, “No! Do you want to see true wisdom? True power? Look at the cross.” God’s world does not operating according to the laws of human achievement. True wisdom recognizes that.

Jesus laid his life down. And Christians, following him, adopt his wisdom. We are people of the cross. The way up is down. The mountain peak of greatness is accessible only through the valley of humility. The true pathway to glory is through self-denial, self-abasement, self-sacrifice.

Let the lens of the cross redefine everything for you. Take a look at those martyrs in Egypt a few years back, black bags over their heads awaiting their death. What do you see? Consider the faithful man who greets at the door - who prays fervently, loves loyally, gives generously, - who never writes a book or preaches a sermon. Or the mom who labors at home with no fanfare, no acknowledgment, but does it gladly for God’s glory? In the world’s evaluation, they’re sorry, unimportant, weak, or oppressed.

Friends, these are kings and queens in the next world, heroes and champions, the conquerors, the victors, the great luminaries that show us the way. They are mocked by the world, they are welcomed and approved by the Savior.

We Christians are so used to thinking like the world - we are obsessed with human achievement. Rethink everything in light of the cross.

2) The cross shapes our relationships. Turn to Philippians 2. In verses 1-2 Paul is urging the Philippian church, in light of what Christ has done, to be unified in love. Then he says in verse 3: “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.”

Selfish ambition is a word that was used to describe a politician who is jockeying for greater power and higher office by putting others down. It’s a kind of contentiousness where you’re willing to fight to be noticed, to be recognized. You want to stand out, be impressive.

Conceit is the idea of excessive pride, vanity. It’s a bloated sense of self-importance. It’s feeling that you’re more important than the others in the room. Paul says no Christian should ever be jockeying for power by putting others down, nor thinking highly of your own significance. Rather, look at what he goes on to say: “but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.” Christians are to embrace a low view of themselves, so low, in fact, that they consider others as having more value and significance than themselves.

Verse 4 goes on: “Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” You have interests. You have to look out for them. But are the only interests you are looking out for your own?

Okay, so let’s put this radically transformative instruction all together. We are to never do anything out of selfish ambition, working hard to advance ourselves at the cost of others. We are never to act out of conceit, prideful vanity, a sense of self-importance. We are to be concerned about others' interests, others’ struggles, others problems, others’ needs, others’ questions.

Now I want you to notice what is the pattern for these kinds of relationships. Verse 5: “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.” I want you to think like Jesus, and you can since you’re united to him by faith. Verse 6, “who did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” We this is the way we are to think - like Jesus, not merely in his incarnation, lowering himself to share in our humanity, but in his death on the cross. That’s the mindset we ought to have.

But then look: Vs 9: “Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name” - the self-denial and suffering is temporary. God ensures that those who, in this life, humble themselves to serve others, are exalted in the next life. God brings down the proud and exalts the humble.

The Christian ethic is this: I am so eager to serve you, that if it costs my comfort, if it costs me honor, if it costs me my reputation, if it costs me my very own life, I will give it. We ought to look around at these brothers and sisters and say, without romanticizing it, “I would die for you.” Because we know that this is what honors the Lord, and this is what he values.

So our question: How should we relate to one another? The cross is our pattern. We are people who look around at those around us as ask, “What would it look like for me to carry their burdens? How can I meet their needs? How can I cultivate their faith? How can I encourage them and do them good?” We say, “I’m nothing. I’m not pursuing anything for myself. Everyone here is more important than me. I’m here to look after their interests, I’m here to serve them. My model is the cross. I’m here to give of myself that others might thrive. I’m here to sacrifice for the good of others.”

I’ve always been struck by what Donald McDougal said about how he learned to pray from his father. He wrote, “As I child, I would find my father either reading his Bible or praying very earily every morning. A fellow missionary told me of an occasion when my father was not well, and yet each morning his office light was on at 4:00am. One day she asked him, ‘Why don’t you sleep later in the morning and try to get better?’ He replied, ‘Because I have too many things to pray for, and I can’t afford to sleep in.’” Here’s a man who put others' interests so far ahead of his own, that he was willing to forgo sleep into to pray for them.

I know you pray for yourself, how frequently are you praying for others? I know you carry around your own burdens, how often do you carry other people’s burdens? Who are you serving? Who are you carrying around in your heart?

I wonder how you entered this room this very morning. Did you choose your seat based on your own interests, or in the best interest of others? When we were singing earlier, were you mainly considering your own tastes and preferences, or were you considering the preferences of others? When the service ends, will you serve anyone, or try to escape as quickly as you can?

Are you trying to live the Christian life without sacrificially serving anyone?

3) The cross shapes our love? Turn to Ephesians 5:1. Paul writes to the members of the Ephesians church, “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children.” We are to imitate God. We are God’s children, and there should be a family resemblance. God’s holiness and wisdom and love ought to be increasingly present in us. And specifically, as we imitate God, our calling is specified: “And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” Or, take a look at 1 John 3:16 “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”

You see, there’s a dramatic difference between the love we encounter in the world vs the supernatural love Christians are supposed to have. Worldly love is transactional, emotional, and optional. It’s transactional in that we typically treat love like a transaction. I love the people who can return the favor. I love the people who make me feel good. If they can give me what I want - approval or affirmation or something - then I will love them in return. It’s emotional in that we think love is a feeling. It’s something we can fall into or out of. We think that love is some uncontrollable spontaneous emotion that we either have or don’t. And it’s optional in that we think we have the right to choose whether or not we love people.

The Bible has an entirely different kind of love. Biblical love - true love - is not transactional, emotional, and optional; it’s unconditional, practical, and committed. It’s unconditional in this: there are no conditions you must meet to have my love. My love for you is not dependent on you giving me anything in return. It’s practical in this: it’s not up to whether or not I feel like it, it’s proactive, it’s real, it’s tangible, it’s work, it’s action, it’s costly. It’s not optional, it’s committed. It’s committed love because it’s commanded. We are under orders. “Beloved, let us love one another” the Bible says. You don’t get to choose whether you’ll love.

If we want our love to imitate the love of Christ, it must be unconditional, practical, committed love. And this, by the way, is why we practice church membership the way we do. Church membership is a bunch of us saying, “God has saved me. Christ laid down his life for me. I am commanded to love my brothers and sisters like that. I want to commit to love you unconditionally. I want to commit to love you in real, practical, active ways. And I’m doing this not because it makes me feel good, but because it’s my calling, for God’s glory.

Let me ask you: for those of you who consider yourself regulars at Grace Rancho. Is your commitment here based on your comfort, or your calling?

Do you attend because it provides a level of comfort? There are people you like. You like how Michael leads our singing. You like the quaintness of it all. It reminds you of your old country church growing up. It’s comforting to know people and feel known.

Those are all good things. But what if next week, there’s a revival in the drug-dealing industry and suddenly we’re inundated with people working to shake their addictions? What if the church grows a lot and it’s not as quaint as you prefer it? What if the leadership starts choosing songs you’re just not able to sing? Or relationships are just more challenging?

If your commitment is based on comfort, you’ll leave. Now listen, that’s not biblical love. When marriages are comfort-based, they fail. Biblical love is calling based. When we see the love of Christ as demonstrated at the cross, we see true love. And we learn that we, like Christ, should give ourselves unreservedly, sacrificially, and completely to these people - not because they’ve deserved it, but because we have been called.

In an article some years ago in the Atlantic, author James Fallows bemoaned the deterioration of the U.S. Army ever since the draft was abandoned. During the draft, men were called to prepare to fight. The draft functioned something like a calling. You were called to duty. You were taught submission and loyalty and bravery. There was a sense of pride in fulfilling the call.

But when the draft was removed and replaced with a volunteer force, men joined mainly because of self-interest. They were interested in pay, future lifestyle potential, and retirement benefits. In other words, the pride in the work itself fizzled away, and they became weaker.

Some people commit to a church because of self-interest. What does this do for me? What can I get out of this? How will this improve my life?

The cross shows us that love should be calling based. Love is our happy calling, and we like good soldiers, gladly laying our lives down for one another.

Everywhere we look in Scripture for patterns for godliness, we are taken to the cross.

I wonder if you’ve gone to the cross for salvation? Have you looked in faith at the cross of Christ? Do you see God’s wisdom and power to save there? Turn from every other hope, put your faith in Jesus who died for sinners and rose again. Have your sins forgiven - and then embrace the pattern of the cross as a new way to live.

We should think hard about the cross every day. Even though it’s not natural, we should learn to see greatness there. And then, we should imitate it.

And what will it begin to look like if we pattern our lives more consistently after the cross? Likely, it will be a million little things.

Much gentler in our words

Much quicker to forgive

Eager to jump in and serve; eager to give generously to the Lord’s work

Plan and strategize how to encourage your brothers and sisters to grow

It may also be big things:

You might move across an ocean to lay down your life for an unreached people

You might move closer to your church to invest in God’s people and God’s work

You might commit, for the first time, to join the church and give it your all - not because it’s easy but because it’s your calling.

Friends, if we pattern our lives after Jesus’ cross, we will likely not be noticed. We certainly won’t be understood. We may be considered weak. We may be considered foolish. We may be thought of as ignorant. But that will only be because they do not see the wisdom of the cross.

Dying to self is the path to life. Humility is the path to greatness. Sacrificial love is the path to glory. The cross is our pattern.