The Glad Tidings

The Revelation of the Cross

In Galatians 3:13 we are brought back to the subject presented in Galatians 2:20 and 3:1,—the ever-present cross. The subject is inexhaustible, but the following few facts may serve to open it up to our minds:— GTI 119.2

1. The redemption from sin and death is accomplished through the cross. Galatians 3:13. GTI 119.3

2. The Gospel is all contained in the cross; for the Gospel is “the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth” (Romans 1:16), and “unto us which are saved” the cross of Christ “is the power of God” (1 Corinthians 1:18). GTI 119.4

3. Christ is revealed to fallen men only as the Crucified and risen One. There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby salvation may be obtained (Acts 4:12), and, therefore, it is all that God sets forth before men, since He does not wish to confuse them. “Christ and Him crucified,” is all that Paul wished to know; it is all that any man needs to know. Thus the one thing that men need is salvation; if they get that, they get all things; but salvation is found only in the cross of Christ; therefore, God puts before the eyes of men nothing else: He gives them just what they need. Jesus Christ is by God set forth openly crucified before the eyes of every man, so that there is no excuse for any to be lost, or to continue in sin. GTI 120.1

4. Christ is set forth before men only as the crucified Redeemer; and since that from which men need to be saved is the curse, He is set forth as bearing the curse. Wherever there is any curse, there is Christ bearing it. We have already seen that Christ bore, and still bears, our curse, in that He bears our sin. He also bears the curse of the earth itself, for He bore the crown of thorns, and the curse pronounced on the earth was, “Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth.” Genesis 3:18. So the whole creation, which now groans under the curse, has been redeemed through the cross of Christ. Romans 8:19-23. GTI 120.2

5. It is only on the cross that Christ bears the curse, for His being made a curse for us was indicated by His hanging on the cross. The cross is the symbol of the curse, but also of deliverance from the curse, since it is the cross of Christ, the Conqueror and Deliverer. The very curse itself, therefore, presents the cross, and proclaims our deliverance. GTI 120.3

6. Where is the curse? Ah, where is it not? The blindest can see it, if he will but acknowledge the evidence of his own senses. Imperfection is a curse, yea, that is the curse; and imperfection is on everything connected with this earth. Man is imperfect, and even the finest plant that grows from the earth is not as perfect as it might be. There is nothing that meets the eye that does not show the possibility of improvement, even if our untrained eyes can not see the absolute necessity of it. When God made the earth, everything was “very good,” or, as the Hebrew idiom has it, “good exceedingly.” God Himself could see no chance, no possibility, for improvement. But now it is different. The gardener spends his thought and labor trying to improve the fruits and flowers under his care. And since the best that the earth produces reveals the curse, what need be said of the gnarled, stunted growths, the withered and blasted buds and leaves and fruits, and the noxious, poisonous weeds? Everywhere “hath the curse devoured the earth.” Isaiah 24:6. GTI 121.1

7. What, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter? Is it discouragement? Nay; “for God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1 Thessalonians 5:9. Although the curse is visible everywhere,— GTI 121.2

“Change and decay in all around I see,”— yet things live, and men live. But the curse is death, and no man and no thing in creation can bear death and still live. Death kills. But Christ is He that liveth, and was dead, and is alive forevermore. Revelation 1:18. He alone can bear the curse—death—and still live. Therefore, the fact that there is life on the earth and in man, in spite of the curse, is proof that the cross of Christ is everywhere. Every blade of grass, every leaf of the forest, every shrub and tree, every flower and fruit, even the bread that we eat, is stamped with the cross of Christ. In our own bodies is Christ crucified. Everywhere is that cross; and as the preaching of the cross is the power of God, which is the Gospel, so it is that the everlasting power of God is revealed in all things that He has made. That is “the power that worketh in us.” Ephesians 3:20. Romans 1:16-20, compared with 1 Corinthians 1:17, 18, amounts to a plain declaration that the cross of Christ is seen in all the things that God has made—even in our own bodies. GTI 121.3