- Overcomer Literature Trust
- Swindon
- Wiltshire
THE CROSS AS A PROCLAMATION
By Mrs Jessie Penn-Lewis.
“The word of the Cross is the ‘dunamis’ of God”, said St.Paul. Dr. Mabie points out that the Greek word here is Logos, or Word, not preaching, as in the A.V. It is the same used of Christ Himself in John 1 v1. “In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God”. The Greek Lexicon gives the meaning of Logos as (1) The Word by which the inward thought is expressed, and (2) the inward thought itself. Christ the Son of God in Himself is God’s Word to the world, His inward thought expressed (Heb.1 v3); and He is God’s inward thought clothed in humanity. The Logos of the Cross is also God’s inward thought expressed of the only way in which He could save the fallen human race and re-create them in the image of Christ. The Logos of the Cross therefore contains in itself the power of God. It is dynamic, and through it the Holy Spirit manifests the energizing ability of God to save. It is not the preaching of the Cross which is the power, but the Word of the Cross, and it is this Word of the Cross which is to be proclaimed to a fallen and lost world, as a message from God, announced as a herald announces a proclamation.
This can be traced out in the epistles of Paul. “I proclaimed to you” he said (1 Thess. 2 v9), “the message which I bore”. Conybeare’s footnote says, ‘The original word involves the idea of a herald proclaiming a message’. Again in Titus 1 v3, “At His appointed season He brought His word to light through the proclamation entrusted to me by the command of God our Saviour”. And Gal. 1 v16, “To reveal His Son in me so that I might proclaim Him”.
A proclamation requires a herald, so the apostle writes to Timothy, “Of this gospel I was appointed a herald” (2 Tim. 1 v11). “Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all . . . and for this purpose I was appointed a herald” (1 Tim 2 v6-7). All these passages show the herald nature of Paul’s preaching of the Cross.
Now as to the terms of the proclamation.
It is 1) The Word of the Cross. “Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified: a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles” (1 Cor. 1 v22-23).
2) The Word of the Cross, with its twin-part of the resurrection, “Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead” (2 Tim. 2 v8). Here we have the two-fold message of the Cross stated as the terms of the proclamation. A Messiah crucified and a Messiah raised from the dead. Calvary and the Resurrection. Not one without the other. A real physical death and a real physical resurrection.
3) The responsibility of the herald to proclaim the message. We find this in 1 Cor. 9 v16, where Paul writes, “When I proclaim the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel! . . . I am simply discharging the trust committed to me”. This is strong language, but Paul uses it to show the Divine compulsion upon him. They understood in those days how absolutely a slave had to obey his master. Although the apostle served of his own free will, yet concerning his message, the constraint upon him put him in the same place as a slave.
Oh that the same sense of being constrained by God to herald His message might take hold of each of His redeemed ones, producing that white-heat fire within, which makes them reckless about themselves, so long as they fulfil their stewardship. God would be a poor Master and a strange King if He sent out His heralds without being able to provide for them. But God is a King, sending out a proclamation to the world, and He sees to the supplies of those He sends. It often looks like madness to believe this, but the madness of really trusting God is the highest wisdom. “I proclaim” because “I am compelled” said the apostle.
4) The place of the proclamation in relation to other truth. “For Christ did not send me to baptise, but to proclaim the gospel” (1 Cor. 1 v17). The external ordinances were secondary in importance to the proclamation of the message.
5) The language and the way in which the proclamation is given. “Not with words of human wisdom, lest the Cross of Christ be emptied of its power”. The proclamation does not need the adornment of beautiful words. It has only to be proclaimed in its bare simplicity, for it is the Word of the Cross which is the power of God, not words about it. Here is stated also the solemn fact that the message which contains the mighty power of God can be rendered powerless by the preacher. The words which the human wisdom of the natural man thinks necessary to make the message acceptable have actually the contrary result in making void the power of the Cross itself. This explains why to-day there is so little result even when the gospel is preached. So few really believe that the Word itself, simply stated, has in it the power of God. They are not willing to be simple transmitters of the written Word. They want to preach sermons about the Cross, rather than simply proclaim it.
How did Paul fulfil his commission as a herald with a proclamation? “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling” (1 Cor. 2 v2-4). Oh Paul, have you not mistaken the word? Did you not mean that you were filled with power? No, “I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling”. Conybeare’s footnote points out that this means a ‘trembling anxiety to perform a duty’. The anxious conscientiousness of a slave.
When the solemnity of the trust and the vital character of the message of the Cross is realised by anyone it is bound to produce that trembling anxiety lest they should fail God, or become unfitted for the Holy Spirit to use them with the message. Paul continued, “My message and preaching were not with wise and persuasive words but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power so that your faith might not rest on man’s wisdom but on the power of God”. Here it is again. Paul deliberately avoiding using persuasive words. Human influence and persuasion is not needed in addition to the power of God. The herald simply has to be carefully exact in transmitting the proclamation. And then the responsibility is with God and those who hear it.
6) The urgency of the proclamation. How Paul laboured to prepare Timothy to carry on the work when he knew that his departure was at hand. Listen to his last solemn words to him. “In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus . . . I give you this charge: Proclaim the Word, be prepared in season and out of season, correct, rebuke and encourage - with great patience and careful instruction. For a time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine . . . they will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths”. So the aged Paul was under no misconception as to the attitude of many to the truth of the gospel after he had gone, especially in the latter days in which we are now living. Nevertheless, “I charge you . . . proclaim” is written to us as well as to Timothy.
The passion of his message was in Paul to the very end. The one thing he cared about was his stewardship. When he looked back upon his sufferings, all was swallowed up in the fact that he had accomplished his ministry. “At my first defence, no-one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. And I was delivered from the lion’s mouth” (2 Tim. 4 v16&17) he writes.
Let us finally take a glimpse into the inner life of the apostle so that the spirit of it may get into us, and urge us forward to proclaim the Word of the Cross with new perception of its urgency and its power. The apostle’s words to the elders at Miletus show us vividly the spirit of his labours. “ . . . I served the Lord Jesus with great humility and with tears . . . tested by plots . . . I have not hesitated to preach . . . I consider my life worth nothing . . . if only I may . . . complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me - the task of testifying to the gospel” (Acts 20 v18-24).
7) In 2 Cor. 6 v4-10 we have a glimpse into his service as a herald. “As servants of God we commend ourselves . . . in troubles, hardships and distresses . . . dying and yet we live . . . poor yet making many rich”. Then in 2 Cor. 4 we see how he handled the Word of God. He said, “We have renounced secret and shameful ways: we do not use deception, nor do we distort the Word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God”. Keen as Paul was to win souls to Christ, he used no cunning schemes to reach them. He boldly depended upon an open, straightforward proclamation of the Word of the Cross, believing it to be the “power of God”. He openly set forth the truth in such a way that the consciences of people were reached, both by the plain honest statement of his message and the transparent clearness of his life.
All that is of God can be openly proclaimed to all. There are no degrees of initiation in the Church of God. There are different stages of growth in knowledge but no secret truths which cannot be proclaimed to the whole world. Oh for this bold, straight-forward, open declaration of the Word of God, relying upon it as the power of God. Let us openly proclaim God’s message in the simple terms of the Scriptures, assured of the co-working of God.
The apostasy of the visible church can alone be countered by the proclamation of the Word of the Cross. The Lord Christ died instead of sinners on Calvary and having completed the work of redemption He went back to heaven. And now His messengers are, through the power of the Holy Spirit, to make Christ’s death at Calvary so real that those to whom they proclaim the message may realise that His death was for them and come to Him as a living Saviour. Without the proclamation of the Cross they will not realise the fact of His death for them. The result is that many of these souls give little evidence of regeneration and are not radically changed and made new creatures in Christ.
He is the living Saviour, but we do not come to Him only through His merits or even on the ground of His work at Calvary, but His death on Calvary must be made real to us by the Holy Spirit so that we see our part in it and know that we are born into a new life through His death as our Substitute. This was the way Paul preached. He proclaimed the Word of the Cross as the power of God and he ‘placarded’ Jesus Christ upon His Cross so that, as it were, those who heard saw the crucifixion with their very eyes. This is the message to be proclaimed, just as if you went out as a herald, saying ‘A proclamation from heaven, He was lifted up on the Cross for you. Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world’.
From ‘The Centrality of the Cross’.