The Triumph of the Cross

The most wondrous event this world has known, or ever will know, was when the Son of God—God manifest in the flesh—bowed His head in death on Golgotha’s cross. To that hour, all events in the eternal past head up. All the purposes of God had it in view. The counsels of the Triune God were framed in anticipation of it. Creation’s acts were only preparations for it. Providential and permissive dealings with mankind, all looked toward it. The histories, lives and deaths of men, the types and shadows of a bygone age, forefigured and foreshadowed it. It was the expectation of faith and hope in patriarchs, prophets, and psalmists. They saw it, spake it, sang its virtues, and relied on its values. It is the Centre of two eternities, on which all eyes meet. Every line of patriarchal and prophetic testimony converged toward it. Every truth proclaimed by evangelists and taught by apostles, diverges from it.

It was the hour of hell’s defeat, of heaven’s victory. The loud voice in which the Holy Sufferer cried, “Finished,” proclaimed His victory. The rent veil in the temple witnessed it. The opened graves announced His triumph over death. His glorious resurrection was God’s vindication of His rejected Christ, His seal upon His finished and accepted work. That “wondrous Cross” has been the theme of preachers, witnesses, martyrs, ever since. The “preaching of the Cross” is still the power of God.

It is the message of peace to all mankind. It never becomes old, it retains the dew of its youth. In the Cross, the Christian glories. It is his title and his passport to heaven. He stands upon its merit, and seeks no other. The Cross defies the blasts and hosts of hell. The devil dreads it, seeks to hide it, and plots in vain to vitiate its power. But “the Cross it still standeth fast”—“Hallelujah for the Cross.” Let it be lifted high as a standard. It is the world’s only hope.

All who look to it—to Him who died upon it as Sacrifice, Surety, and Substitute, are sheltered, saved, and sealed for glory. In its virtues, all who trust the Son of God as personal Ransom, Redeemer, Saviour, are justified. In its values, they are accepted. In its triumphs, they partake. In its loss, they gladly share. Before a scoffing world, they bear its brand of shame, rejoicingly. It will light them through “the valley of the shadow,” up to the gates of paradise. Its sweet savour will meet them on the other shore.

In the coming hour of change from mortality to life and conformity to Christ, of resurrection to incorruptibility and glorification with Christ, it will shine out with a radiance “brighter than the sun.” The Cross will shine in eternal light amid the realms of glory, for “The Lamb is all the glory of Immanuel’s Land.” The first grand note of that great “Hallelujah” to be sung in the midst of the throne of God, by unnumbered hosts of the redeemed, is “Thou art worthy for THOU WAST SLAIN.” And rolling on through all the heavenly throng of crowned elders, white-robed multitudes, palm-bearing hosts, and harping singers, is the chorus: “Worthy is the Lamb, that was slain”—the Lamb of Calvary.

J.Ri.

Article series: Our Glorious Lord