Galatians
5:13, 17-18, 24-25 (NIV) 13 You, my brothers and
sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the
flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. 17 For the flesh desires what is contrary to
the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict
with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are
not under the law. 24 Those who
belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep
in step with the Spirit.
Why do some live with a wrinkled brow of worry while
others seem to exude an air of peace? This question is about living freely, and
the answer lies in remembering there are two sides to the Cross. The front side
of the Cross is what happens when human beings get their own way … the most
devious people but also the most decent. The front side of the Cross is the bondage
we make for ourselves as we try to control and manipulate life independently of
God. But there is another side to the cross, the side no one noticed that day
on Golgotha. From the backside we see that the Cross was a freely chosen
strategy of God in His Son to subject Himself to all of our bondage that He
might loose us from it.
Paul says that the world has been crucified to him, both
the good that the world has to offer and the worst that the world might attempt
to do. When the world gave to Jesus its worst, He continued to trust, and God
honored that trust in raising Jesus from the dead. And that is what Paul means,
that he has already died to the worst that the world can do to him. And, of
course, no one can ever live entirely free until they have broken the bondage
to fear of death’s finality.
What is true of the best the world can offer is certainly
also true of the worst that the world can do to us. The world can offer us
success but it can also deny us success and give us failure. The world can
offer us love, but it can also deprive us of love and give us loneliness. But
certainly the worst of the worst that the world can do to us is what it did to
Jesus. It can take our life and give us death. Death is ultimate bondage and
the most convincing evidence that you and I are not in control, that life is
not at our beck and call, it is not organized around our needs and wants.
The cross is the dividing line between believing in
ourselves and our dreams for our life and trusting in God who has His own plans
for us. The Cross is the place where we either put to death His sovereign will
over our life or we die to our own efforts to keep everything under our
control. We stand either on the front side of the Cross in bondage to the best
that the world has to offer and the worst that the world promises to do, or we
stand on the backside where we are set free.
From a sermon preached by Henry Dobbs Pope October 23,
1988
© Rhonda Hinkle Mitchell
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