LESSON 5

THE CROSS (CONT.)

Continuing on the ethical dimensions of the cross event I find three scripture passages to be compelling. First, Jesus' prayer at Gethsemane indicates the conscious decision he made to follow the Father's will--"not my will but Thine be done." The subject of ethics always relates to decision making and the reasons decisions are made. In this instance it is apparent that Jesus was confronted with a choice to either save himself from the suffering that lay ahead or to commit himself fully to the Father's purpose for his life and death. But this final choice for obedience was enabled by a much earlier choice made by Jesus before his earthly appearance. The second passage makes this clear. Paul informs us that Jesus, "though existing in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, or grasped, but emptied himself and became obedient to the point of death." (Philippians 2) The Greek word for self-emptying is similar to the Hebrew word found in Isaiah 53 in which the Suffering Servant is said to have "poured out his soul unto death." Jesus' emptying of self is his total disregard for anything other than the Father's will. Hence, his final decision to remain obedient to the Father at the point of death flowed from his prior willingness to subjugate his own will to that of the Father. "I and the Father are one." "I always do those things that please the Father." For us, one imprtant lesson is that life's choices flow from a priori commitments, that it is too late to make proper decisions if we have not first emptied ourselves of self will and self rule, something we have surely done at the moment of conversion and must continue to do at every course of life. Remember Paul's "I die daily."

The third passage further reveals the motive behind Jesus' willingness to commit himself to the Father's perfect will for his life and death. And it is also found in a passage exhorting us to ethical purity. The writer of Hebrews admonishes us to "lay aside every weight of sin that clings so closely to us" by keeping our eyes on Jesus, who "for the joy set before him endured the cross." The self-emptied Jesus also looks forward to the day of joy ahead when he is seated at the Father's right hand, a position indicating the Father's pleasure and acceptance of his obedience in life and death. For Jesus, the anticipated joy of having finished the work he was sent to do empowered him through the suffering that followed as the result of his life of obedience. A practical question for us constantly to ask ourselves is: will the choice I am about to make result in a joyful memory or one of regret? We all know the difference in going to bed at might with joy or regret. Jesus never experienced regret. For the Christian all experences are not joyful in themselves--Jesus did not enjoy the cross; he "endured" it. We sin when we try to find ultimate joy in things or in experiences themselves. The joy Jesus anticipated came not from the experience itself but from his obedience. Making the experience of joy itself our chief goal leads to idolatry and religions that attempt to foster experience as the end-all of worship and life lead us inadvertently into idolatry and the constant quest for further heightened experience. Churches become creative in their attempts to foster greater and greater experiences and people become more and more enamored with the experience itself and more needful of repeat experiences. The impact of worship becomes crucial and the creation of feeling becomes the goal. Worship services become grand displays of glitter, sound, emotion and visual stimulation. The result is an experience oriented congregation in need of grander and grander experiences. Jesus was not driven by experience but the joy which followed; whether the experience itself was joyful in itself (as when, perhaps, he brought healing) or painful (the cross). The cross teaches us to seek for the joy which is set before us, finding it, rather than life's experiences, to be our ultimate goal.