The cross and our response

Travelling west from Lake Louise in Canada, one comes to a point where the highway is spanned by a massive wooden arch. On it is written the words, “The Great Divide”. It marks the boundary between Alberta and British Columbia. The Great Divide in human history is not a wooden arch but a wooden cross. Derek Tidball, Principal of the London School of Theology, says:

On the cross the ultimate sacrifice was offered, the High Priest died, atonement was made, healing was provided, peace was effected, redemption was purchased, access was granted, glory was manifest, a new covenant was established, a new age begun, cosmic renewal set in train.

However, the cross not only divides history into A.D. and B.C., it divides humans from one another. It divides those who respond to God’s offer of salvation from those who refuse or ignore it. In New Testament terms it divides the “children of God” from those who “did not receive him” (John 1:11-13); “the people of the kingdom” from “the people of the evil one” (Matthew 13:36-43); “whoever…has life” from “whoever…does not have life” (1 John 1:12); those in whom “the Spirit of God lives” from those who do “not have the Spirit of Christ” (Romans 8:9); those who are “not condemned” from those who stand “condemned already” (John 3:18); “whoever…has eternal life” from those on whom “God’s wrath remains” (John 3:36). This division, depending on our response to Jesus Christ, is a constant and consistent theme in the New Testament. Though we have the opportunity now to respond to his love in repentance and faith, the day will come when the division is permanent—“eternal punishment” or “eternal life” (Matthew 25:46).

And it is no use looking elsewhere to bridge this particular divide between us and God. Skip Heitzig, in an article in Decision, rightly says:

If we go to a psychiatrist or a therapist, we’ll become well-adjusted sinners. If we go to a doctor or health spa, we’ll become healthy sinners. If we achieve wealth, we’ll be wealthy sinners. If we join a church and decide to turn over a new leaf, we’ll become religious sinners. But let us go in earnest repentance and faith to the foot of Calvary’s cross, and we’ll be forgiven sinners, for we will find that the cross of Jesus Christ is the only bridge that can reach God. The choice is ours. It’s either separation from God or redemption by God.

Obviously, if the New Testament is true, there is no more important issue that we face in this life. And if you are unsure of your relationship with God, then there are ways of making sure. There is a Jewish legend that on the night the Israelites were delivered from slavery in Egypt, the night when the firstborn of every family died unless the sacred blood had been placed on the doorposts, a young Israelite girl lay sick on her bed. As midnight approached she anxiously inquired, “Father, are you sure that the blood is there?” He replied that he had ordered it to be placed there. She was not satisfied until her father had carried her out to see for herself. They were distressed to find that the order had been neglected and there was no blood. Quickly they took steps to remedy the situation before midnight arrived. In Jesus’ parable of the ten virgins, when the cry rang out at midnight, “Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!” it was the virgins who were unprepared who were excluded from the banquet (Matthew 25:1-13).

When the call comes for you to meet Jesus, it will not do that you have been trusting in your good behaviour or your religious observances, or your correct beliefs, to get you into the kingdom of God. Neither will the passing of time cancel out sin. C. S. Lewis, in The Problem of Pain, said:

We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels out sin. I have heard others, and I have heard myself, recounting cruelties and falsehoods committed in boyhood as if they were of no concern of the present speakers, and even with laughter. But mere time does nothing either to the fact or to the guilt of a sin. The guilt is washed out not by time but by repentance and the blood of Christ.

Your trust in the Saviour, who shed his blood for you, is the only sure foundation on which to build a hope of acceptance. And we have to claim for ourselves the gift of forgiveness and reconciliation that he offers. Alister McGrath, lecturer on historical and systematic theology at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford, and author of many impressive books on the Christian faith, expressed this very clearly in an article in Decision magazine, when looking back on his own conversion to Christ: