Imagine with me adoptive parents who seek to prove to their
adopted son that he belongs to them.
Do
the parents start by describing to the child how they started dating?
Do they begin by describing their decision to
be married?
Do they begin with the story
of their own upbringing, their education, or their plans for the future?
No, chances are they start in the child’s
room.
They sit with him on the floor and
begin to point to all of the furniture and all of the toys that are now
his.
Perhaps they point to the embroidered
family tree where his name is prominently displayed.
They open the closet and show him all the
clothes in his size and the labels they’ve sewn into the collar giving his full
name.
There are a myriad of methods parents
could employ to assure the child of his standing in the family by never leaving
the room.
But let’s say they are successful. Let’s say the child becomes absolutely
convinced of his place in the family. He
has no more doubt, but he never wants to leave his room. The sum total of his exposure to the family
and to his parents is in that room.
Now that seems like a fanciful story and yet it approximates
how many of us view the cross. We see
the cross as the place where our standing in the family of God is established. Through the work of the cross we are redeemed
and adopted into the family of God. More
than that, we are assured of eternal life together with Christ and His
body. But as we’ve been seeing
throughout our series on spiritual warfare, the scope of God’s victory in
Christ is greater than our adoption, or even what happens to us.
This week I received word from a dear sister in Christ who
has been fully engaged in our last two messages, “Satan’s Waterloo.” And while she freely admits to having her
understanding of the cross greatly expanded by considering its implications in
the invisible war that Satan has declared upon God before the beginning of
time, she has had trouble with the notion that the atonement was an “after
thought” or a “side effect” of the cross.
Here’s what I wrote to her:
If I said that our salvation
through the cross was an afterthought I was wrong; it was an egregious
misstatement. The Bible makes it clear that before the foundation of the world
the godhead determined that the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity,
would come to save His people from their sins. And the testimony of the Gospel
is that everything the Father appoints, the Son accomplishes.
But, the point I've been stressing
these past few weeks is that in the invisible war, the war Satan declared
against God well before Adam and Eve arrived on the scene, the cross plays an
even more critical role than the salvation of sinners. The primary purpose of
the cross is to defeat Satan and strip him of his power.
The problem with Christians is that
we, so often see things through the filter of our own self-importance. Psalm 8 speaks
to this when it asks, "What is man that thou art mindful of him?"
Think of it. Well before God created man and woman there was Lucifer. Well before
mankind existed there was a cosmic rebellion against God's character and will
by Lucifer, the Son of the Morning. And
well before there ever was a man or a woman, or even time itself, God
determined to glorify Himself by defeating Satan and his minions by the work of
His hands. And part of that determination was to create creatures of dust, in
His own image, whom He would save, sanctify, and glorify to the praise of His
glory.
It is amazing, therefore, to
contemplate that what happens on the cross is even greater than the salvation
of men and women. This is indeed what Paul is doing in that Roman imprisonment
(Colossians 2:13-15). He sees that the
cross is first and foremost a vivid display of God's glory (which is totally
consistent with Jesus' prayer in John 17). Through the descent of God Himself,
the schemes of Satan are exposed, the power of Satan is destroyed, and victory
over Satan is assured. And part of the proof of that victory is the saving of
us, the marrying of us, and the giving to us of His righteousness, His offices,
and His mission. And He does all of that to the glory of His name. And He does
it all out of dust!
If there is anywhere that we should
resist the temptation to make it all about us it's at the cross. The work of
the cross is great; and it's seen as so much greater when you contemplate it's
implication beyond the parenthesis of time.
I would encourage all of you to review the messages of
the last two weeks and see how the work of the cross has cosmic implications
beyond human salvation. Indeed, that is
what makes redemption so spectacular – we are the instruments through which God
puts His greatest foe to shame.
We are going to dig a little more deeply into Paul’s
words in Colossians 2:15 this week – Easter.
For when you take this text together with Luke 16:19-31; Ephesians
4:1-10; Psalm 68:18; Psalm 16; and I Peter 3:18-22, you find that Christ’s work
on the cross goes even further in putting Satan to shame and triumphing over
him.
Remember last week we spoke of three descents of the
Son of God – to the womb, to the colt, and to the cross. We juxtaposition these descents (Philippians
2:6-8 highlights seven ways in which Jesus lays Himself down) to Lucifer’s five
boasts in Isaiah 14. But, at the end of
the message we mentioned one final descent Jesus makes that can best be
described as His boldest display of Satan’s shame and His triumph. It’s a descent we find referenced in each of
the texts just mentioned.
What’s clear to me is that in Jesus’ post-resurrection Bible
studies with His disciples, and His individualized tutorial of Paul in Arabia,
Jesus must have not only pieced together the events of His death with Old
Testament prophecy, but also with other extant writings and Hebrew cosmology. For what He does on the cross, and
immediately thereafter, is a cosmic triumph that has no parallel.
In preparation for the Easter message you may wish to
consider the following:
1. What
does Jesus mean when He says to the thief on the cross, “Today, you will be
with me in paradise?” Luke:23:43
2. Where
did the orthodox Jews believe “paradise” to be?
3. How
does Jesus’ story (not a parable) in Luke 16:19-31 inform us of this place?
4. Are
Sheol, Hades, and Hell synonyms?
5. How
is God’s grace greater than “unmerited favor?”
6. What
does Peter mean in I Peter 3:18(b) when he says that Christ was put to death in
body, but made alive by the Spirit?
7. Where
does Peter say he goes to preach?
8. What
is the nature of this preaching?
9. How
is it accurate to say that Christ ascended to heaven in Spirit before He
ascends in body, soul and Spirit on the Day of Ascension?
10. What
difference does all of this make in the invisible war and our own future?
See ya on Easter morn!
