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The Centrality of the Cross.

By Mrs Jessie Penn-Lewis.


The Cross of Calvary is the central pivot of God’s dealings with the universe, and we need this fixed point as the centre and foundation of our lives. It is because we Christians get away from the Cross that we wander into all kinds of error.

In Romans 4 v25 we read, “He (Jesus) was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification”. Throughout the epistles of Paul we find this repeated again and again. The death of the Lord Jesus Christ was a substitutionary sacrifice. 


The Cross, the centre for the forgiveness of sins and the justification of the sinner.

In Romans 5 v6-8 Paul wrote, “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless (in our sins), Christ died for the ungodly . . . God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us”. Then in verse 9, “Since we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him. For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through His life”.

These verses show that Christ’s death on Calvary was a death for sinners, and the reconciliation with God of sinners who were in a state of enmity against Him. Also it is salvation for those sinners through a share in the life which Christ, as their Substitute, obtained for them out of His death.

For a clear unveiling of the Cross as the foundation for the Christian’s victory over sin we turn to Romans 6. It is the key chapter in the whole of the New Testament where the deep meaning of the death at Calvary is set forth. 

In God's plan, the death of the Lord Jesus Christ was the atonement and the propitiation for sin, and in Romans 6 we are shown the Cross dealing with the sinner. Here is the vital message to the sinner, showing him the way of deliverance from the power of sin. Calvary is the foundation for the personal life of the believer.

“What shall we say then? Shall we go on sinning, so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin.” Christ’s Cross was also the sinner’s cross, taking the old creation life to death, that the believer should be delivered from the power of sin, not by conquering it but by dying to it.

When we sincerely want deliverance from the power of sin, it is within our reach. For the sake of a lost world let us know the reality of the Cross. If we were willing for the deepest work of the Cross to be worked out in our lives there would be a trembling of the powers of hell. The pivotal secret of God’s plan for the redemption of a lost world lies in the meaning of Romans 6. The central fact of the Cross is that it is the sinner’s cross as well as the Saviour’s.

This Romans 6 meaning of the Cross must be recognized as the root foundation of the Christian life. “We died to sin . . . don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus, were baptized into His death? We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life”. Now listen carefully to the next words, “If we have been united with Him like this in His death, we will certainly also be united with Him in His resurrection”. 

Note the repetition of the words about the Cross, “We died” - Calvary! “His death” - Calvary! “United with Him . . . in His death” - Calvary! In verses 6 and 8 “Crucified with Him” - Calvary! “Died with Christ” - Calvary! The Cross of Christ is the sinner’s Cross, because the whole Adam life of nature is absolutely fallen. It cannot be improved. It is fallen and poisoned by the serpent in root and branch.The whole scheme of redemption lies in the fact that God must begin again and make a new creation. Through the Cross He plans to bring to an end the old Adam life of the fallen race and build a new creation in the midst of its ruins. There is not even a divine spark in the fallen nature which He can fan into life as the basis for the new. 

This fact is vital for the understanding of God’s plan of redemption through His Son’s death upon a Cross. The devil opposes the doctrine of the Fall, because he knows that if we believe there was no Fall we have no sense of need of the Cross. We must therefore be brought by the Holy Spirit to the place where we realize that we have nothing in us that can be improved, and be willing to come to that Cross and to say, ‘When He went to Calvary, He took me too’. Oh defeated child of God, by faith take His words as fact, that you died with Christ upon His Cross, that you were baptized ‘into His death’ - put right into Him, and buried out of sight - and there leave yourself, reckoning that you have died to sin, and as far as you are concerned, have finished with it. Then reckon on union with Him in resurrection, that you have in Him a new life. 

This is truly a gospel of glad tidings - the Cross is the place of victory over sin as well as the place of reconciliation with God.


The Cross as the centre for deliverance from the rule of the sinful nature.

“Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires” (Gal. 5 v24). Those who understand this meaning of death with Christ have proved that it is possible to walk at liberty with the ‘desires of the sinful nature’ having no mastery. In verse 16 of this chapter, we read of the conflict there is bound to be between ‘the sinful nature’ and ‘the spirit’. Each are opposed the one to the other. When the spirit dominates, the desires of the sinful nature are dormant.

Verse 24 reveals that it is possible for the spirit to have dominance through the Cross. The sinful nature is not only to be kept dormant but ‘crucified’. Alas, the ‘sinful nature’ is often pandered to among God’s children in a way that spoils their testimony for Christ. “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.” This deals with habits and desires of the physical nature of every kind. (2 Cor. 10 v3 and 1 Cor. 6 v12.)


The Cross as the centre for victory over Satan.

The passage in the epistles which shows this clearly is Colossians 2 v14-15. “He forgave us all our sins . . . And having disarmed the powers and authorities, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” These words take us back to the triumphant statement of our Lord in John 12 v31-33, where He said on the eve of the Cross, “Now the prince of this world will be driven out. But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself”. And again in John 16 v8-11, He said “When He (the Spirit) comes, He will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment . . . in regard to judgment because the prince of this world now stands condemned". So the Holy Spirit has not only to deal with us convicting us of the sin of not believing God, convincing us that Christ is our righteousness in the Father’s presence, but He also has to convince us of the conquest of our foe at Calvary. In John 12 v31, the Lord states plainly what would occur at the Cross, and in John 16 v11, He emphasizes and repeats His statement.

In the face of all that Satan is doing in the world, and his apparent increased power, only the conviction of the Holy Spirit as to Christ’s victory at Calvary can keep our hearts at rest. Moreover, if we believe in Christ’s victory over Satan, we will find how essential it is that we know the Cross to be the place where the old Adam-life was crucified, and prove that the prince of this world has been cast out. He is conquered. Christ defeated him, and all his powers, when, in the eyes of the world they apparently triumphed over Him.

The Cross must be central in all things. It is vital and central in connection with justification by faith; vital and central in connection with our victory over sin; vital and central in relation to our personal lives and habits; vital and central in connection with our victory over the foe. 

Believers who know these aspects of the Cross find themselves standing on the solid foundation of the finished work of Christ, so that all hell cannot shake or overthrow them. However varied their experiences may be, the foundation of God stands sure. They are on the rock-ground of His finished work at Calvary, comprising not only a complete atonement, but victory and deliverance from the world, the sinful nature and the devil. Even though it may not be worked out in their experience in all its fulness, they rely upon all its completeness as theirs when they lay hold of it in their hour of need. Their faith is in what Christ has done, not their experience of it. They know that the “Word of the Cross . . . is the wisdom of God”, not man’s thoughts about the Cross, nor even the preaching about it, but the Cross itself and all that it involved for Christ and for the sinner. The Cross expresses God’s plan as to the way in which He could deliver fallen man from the results of the Fall, and defeat the foe. 

The fallen Archangel was defeated and the fallen Adam crucified at Calvary.


‘From: ‘The Centrality of the Cross’.


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