Someone Has Said That The Cross Has Become So ...

Someone has said that the cross has become so ordinary that we hardly see it anymore. Isn’t that a deeply sad statement? Can you imagine a time when you could hardly be moved by the death sentence being passed on someone very near to you? Yet church members can act as if they no longer see the message of the Christ and his cross.

Sculpture Theodore Prescott has spent a lot of time thinking about the cross. He has been working on a series of crosses made of different substances and forms trying to restore the cultural punch the cross had on the first century. He made a cross of salt blocks and put it in the pasture for cattle. He calls it the Salt Lick Cross. As the cattle drew sustenance from the salt cross it was shaped in unique ways. The metal rusted do to the cattle’s saliva. The reason for his interest in attempting to restore the power of the message of the cross was a sculpture he made and many saw a cross in the design. He didn’t. That was not his intent. It made him wonder how many times we fail to see the cross in life’s events.

This is what happened to the church at Corinth. They’d lost sight of the power and meaning of the cross and the Christ who died and then vacated that cross. We need to remember what Pilate declared about that specific cross on which Jesus was hung: “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.”