“Christ’s blood is heaven’s key.” - Thomas Brooks

“The cross is God’s truth about us, and therefore it is the only power which can make us truthful. When we know the cross we are no longer afraid of the truth.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“The cross means this: Jesus taking our place to satisfy the demands of God’s justice and turning aside God’s wrath.” - James Montgomery Boice

“Man of sorrows! what a name
For the Son of God, who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim!
Hallelujah, what a Savior!”
- Phillip Paul Bliss

“What shall I say to the commendation of Christ and His Cross? I bless the Lord He has made my prison a palace to me. And what am I that He should have delt thus with me? I have looked greedy-like to such a lot as this, but I still thought it was too high for me when I saw how vile I was.” - Isabel Alison (excecuted for her faith on January 26th, 1681)

“I wish that our ministry - that mine especially - might be tied and tethered to the cross.  I would have no other object to set before you than Jesus only.”- Charles Haddon Spurgeon

The heart of Christianity is Jesus Christ.  He is God who became flesh, lived a perfect life, and died on the cross.  Jesus was very mission guided.  His mission was to come and die.  Jesus came to be the mediator between a righteous and holy God and a sinful people.  His mediation, however, was not a mediation handled with words, but rather it was a mediation in which Jesus bore the sins of the people and took upon Himself the wrath of God on behalf of the people.  This is the story of undeserved and unfathomable grace given to people who did not deserve it.  This is the gospel.  Leading up to Good Friday, we will reflect on this amazing truth through some statements from Christians throughout the centuries.  May you be lead worship and adore Jesus and to seek a deeper relationship with Him as we journey to the cross.

We so often get consumed with holding onto stuff that we should surrender to Jesus.  It is so easy to get caught up in holding onto our past failures and sins.  Satan finds it fun to bring these back up again and again in our minds.  He reminds us that we have done ___________ and therefore who are we to serve God and minister to people.  He brings up not only the sends of the long ago past but the failures of yesterday.  He focuses our minds on our walk with Christ as being a time of continual failure and sin.  He then plants thoughts into our minds and hearts that Jesus is looking down on us with a frown and that we will never measure up.  This is true in one sense that we will never measure up to the holy standard of God.  This is why Jesus came to be adequate on our behalf.  This is one thing that we so frequently hold.  Another think that we hold is our successes.  We look back on our resumes and accomplishments and decided that we can do it on our own.  We think that we are smart enough, good enough, and strong enough and that we do not need God.  In both of these times you have full hands which inhibit you in two ways.  The first way is that they keep you from letting the Holy Spirit hold your hand and walk you along this journey of faith.  Your hands are either so full of your failures that you do not think His hand is there or so full of your successes to think that you do not need the hand that is offered.  The second thing that they do is they keep you from reaching out to others.  Your hands are so full of your own failures or successes that you do not have a hand to reach out to others around you in love and be the hands and feet of Jesus.  So it is really important where you have your hands and what they are full of.  This was inspired by the following video.  I hope that this is both a challenge and encouragement to you.

Click here to see the video clip.

This post was written in the spring of 2007:

A few days ago, I was listening to one of my friends share with a group of high school students at Hoover High School’s First Priority.  He was sharing about Satan being the ruler of this world which is something that I have heard spoken upon millions of times over the course of my life growing up in church and a Christian school.  This time, however, he had a new perspective that I had never thought of before.  He was talking about Satan using culture to get our focus off of God.  He said that media tells us who to worship, what image we should shape ourselves into, and how we should live.  I had never thought of worship in this way before.  We constantly worship people, images, clothes, music, friends, and the list goes on.  We worship anything that we put before God on the throne of our hearts and lives.  All of our sin tends to flow from misplaced worship.  When we take Christ off of the throne of our hearts and lives and replace Him with something else that we deem more of a priority that is when we begin to fall back into sin.  When the Word and my relationship with Jesus take a backburner to something else, that in when I am falling into sin.  When pleasing God, worshiping God, and serving God are my focus, I am in tune with the Holy Spirit and His daily leading of my life.  When I drift away from that as I so often do that is when I am going to live a life that does not reflect Christ.  I am reflecting what is on the throne of my life whether that be my ego, my friends, my desires, or my Savior.  It is a daily decision to follow Christ.  The question is: Who will I worship today?

Ever feel like you are not good enough?  Ever feel that God could never use you do to the sins that you have done in your past?  Well that was how I felt recently.  The feeling of guilt and sorrow for falling back into sin was taking over.  I did not feel adequate.  “I am a failure.”  “I am a terrible person.”  These thoughts were filling my head.  The demon of guilt was taking over.  Then the Holy Spirit brought me back to a passage that he had shown me at Passion.  It reads this way: 

“Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me.  I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my cause and executes judgment for me.  He will bring me out into the light; I shall look upon His vindication.” – Micah 7: 8-9 ESV

 Jesus Christ has paid the price and taken away the guilt and shame of my sins.  There is no need for me to fear but only for me to trust in God to pick me back up again.  I get the picture of a little baby who is trying to walk.  He slowly stands and then begins to take a step.  He immediately busts flat on his face.  He then begins to cry because he has fallen.  His Daddy comes over and picks him up, wipes his tears away, and then holds his arms and helps him along the way as he returns to the walk.  I think that this description adequately describes how my relationship with Christ goes a lot of the time.  I fall down and cry out and wait for my Abba Father to pick me up, dry my tears, and set me on the path again.