Exhortation, First Sunday of Lent

What is the cross? Originally a Persian invention, crucifixion became a Roman method of execution, reserved for slaves and for the most dangerous political criminals. Josephus described it as the “most wretched of deaths,” as a victim slowly suffocated with the weight of his own body. One writer describes crucified victims as “evil food for birds of prey and grim pickings for dogs.”

Though the Roman government saw crucifixion as an effective deterrent, it was so abhorrent to Romans that crucifixion could not be mentioned in polite society. “Go crucify yourself” was used by prostitutes and lowlifes as a vulgar taunt. Varro said that the very word “cross” – Latin, crux – was as harsh and grating as the execution itself. It was called an “infamous stake,” “criminal wood,” “terrible,” “shameful.”

Greece knew of dying and rising gods. Adonis was torn by a wild boar, Dionysus was ripped apart by the Titans, Heracles offered himself as a sacrifice. But for cultured Greeks and Romans these were the most primitive legends from the murky beginnings of the world. “The real gods of Greece and Rome could be distinguished from mortal men by the very fact that they were immortal – they had absolutely nothing in common with the cross as a sign of shame” (Hengel).

For Greeks and Romans, the Christian confession that the eternal Son of God, Creator of all things, “had appeared in very recent times in out-of-the-way Galilee, as a member of the obscure people of the Jews, and even worse, had died the death of a common criminal on the cross, could only be regarded as a sign of madness” (Hengel).

From the earliest ages, Christians have sought ways to soften the offense of the cross. Most of the Christological heresies of the early church arose not so much from philosophical speculation as from the effort to avoid the madness of a crucified Savior. Yet, this is the madness we confess, and celebrate, during Lent. We are the people of a crucified God, and as we confess the cross we also confess that the weakness of God is stronger than men, His folly wiser than all human wisdom, His madness saner than the clean sanity of all sophisticates of every age.