Christianity is different from every other religion in the world in its understanding that God suffers with the humans he has created. As John Stott wrote, “I could never myself believe in God if it were not for the cross. The only God I could believe in is the One Nietzsche ridiculed as ‘God on the cross.’”[1] The cross of Jesus can help us understand and even live with suffering. The cross is the place where God meets us in our pain. The cross is the ultimate demonstration of the very nature of God–what God is like. “When the crucified Jesus is called the ‘image of the invisible God,’ the meaning is that this is God, and God is like this. God is not greater than he is in this humiliation. The nucleus of everything that Christian theology says about ‘God’ is to be found in this Christ event. Here he himself is love with all his being.”[2]
Much of our suffering has come about because of humanity’s selfishness, brutality, and godlessness. The question “Why is there suffering in the world?” could easily be met with the questions “Why did the first person have to die?” and “Why does anyone have to die?” Theologically, the answer to these questions involves our own free choice. In love, God allows humans to make their own decisions. Love requires free choice; otherwise, it is not loving, and God is love. So love allowed (and allows) for the possibility of evil because of our freedom to choose. But this freedom to choose introduces all sorts of issues into the universe, such as justice. Shouldn’t you be paid back for the evil thing you did to me? And evil seems to have a multiplying, corrosive effect on humans and culture.
If God permitted it, the evil that humans have introduced would eventually contaminate, unravel, and destroy His universe (what if Adolph Hitler were allowed to live and destroy forever?) Death puts a limit on the evil of humanity. But God is not limited by death nor is he overcome by evil. In fact, the Bible tells us that even before God created us, He had already dealt with our selfishness, brutality, wickedness, and evil. Peter says that Jesus was chosen before the foundation of the world to redeem us by his precious blood (1 Peter 1:20). In Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, God embraces us in our suffering and takes away all shame. Every parent knows this experience–our children make rebellious, foolish mistakes, and we can either abandon them or suffer with them. While love requires that we allow our children to make mistakes, love also requires that we suffer the consequences with them. And herein lies the very nature of God.
WHAT IS MORE POWERFUL THAN DEATH OR EVIL?
The day when God banished man from His Presence, when His just verdict said “Death,” His heart was crushed. He knew what this meant. He knew that He would have to bear the consequences. His love demanded it. In love, He had allowed humans to make their own decision. But love has even greater concerns than free choice. The Father’s concerns ran in two directions: preservation and redemption. As any good father must, He was concerned about preserving His universe. But His deepest concern was in rescuing His children. He was concerned about undoing all the consequences of evil; to uphold justice and, at the same time, rescue humankind from the grip of evil. How does he do this?
A beautiful children’s story helps us understand this wonderful mystery. In C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Aslan the Lion represents Jesus Christ, and in the story, Aslan’s sacrifice points to God’s answer: there is a “Magic” that is deeper than evil, a Magic that runs from before time began. This Magic says that “when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor’s stead, the [Stone] Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.”[3] And so Aslan offers himself on the very Stone Table that demanded justice. Lewis’s story provides a picture of what actually occurred in history. Jesus, the innocent, offered himself willingly on the very cross where we should all be. The only way to make it right was for God himself, the only innocent one and the Judge of all, to bear the punishment and consequences in human flesh. Because He took the punishment, no one can accuse God of not being just; now, no one can blame us any longer for our failures. If God does not condemn us, who can?
In the cross, we see something worse than death–it is evil. But in the cross, we see there is something more powerful than evil–it is love. At the heart of the universe is a furious, blazing, holy Love that will stop at nothing to change His children. This Love has healed our souls by searching for us, calling for us, joining us in our pain, rescuing us from the fears and anxiety that destroys us, carrying us back in His arms, healing us from the terrible wounds of our sin. “[God] becomes a creature, man, flesh…He takes upon Himself [our] consequences. If we think that this is impossible it is because our concept of God is too narrow, too arbitrary, too human. He shows Himself to be more great and rich and sovereign that we had ever imagined.”[4] Like a Shepherd searching over every hill and valley for a senseless, lost sheep, God has entered humanity to search for you and me through the moments and pain of our lives. If we catch a glimpse of that kind of Love, we cannot help but respond with hearts wide open and allow Him to heal, protect, and rule our hearts forever.
[1] John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Downers Grove, Il: Intervarsity Press, 1986), 335.
[2] Jurgen Moltmann, The Crucified God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press,1993), 205.
[3] C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (New York: HarperTrophy, 1994), 163.
[4] Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics IV.1 (London: T&T Clark, 1956), 186.