A Powerless Cross
“And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.”
— 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 ESV
To write the words "powerless" and "cross" together in a sentence might sound like blasphemy, but it's not. To consider the possibility that the "cross" might be "powerless" may sound like a blaspheming message about God, but it's not. It's an important message about the way we approach God. I think many of us in the western side of the world have actually lost the ability to understand the movement and power of the spirit that lies outside of emotional music and fog machines. That, or we never had it to begin with.
In the present time, we are more focused on the performance of the music crew and the preacher's ability to move our hearts than we are on how we bring ourselves to God. We look to the preacher to move our hearts instead of focusing our attention on Christ. We show up late and rushing, expecting the music and the preacher to get us into the right headspace. This is not how it's been for generations before us, yet now in our present busyness we've allowed our responsibility to fall onto the preacher and worship team. We think that our job is simply to show up, and it's the preachers job to move us. Like somehow just showing up is us doing our part, not preparing our own hearts for a meeting with God.
May this not be the case with us. May we not be focused on the expectation of an eloquent speaker to tickle our ears, but may we recenter our own hearts and minds on what is the real point: Christ and Him crucified. Paul said in 1 Corinthians that he came to them without great speech or eloquence in his words in order that the cross would not be emptied of its power:
“For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.”
— 1 Corinthians 1:17 ESV
The way we approach the message of the cross can potentially empty the cross of its power, and we don't even realize it. If we focus so much on the music and words and message articulation, we will simply miss the point. If we compete for the best articulation of the message so that we gain the most followers then we are missing the point. If we seek to gain some kind of competitive edge over the next congregation by the way we approach the articulation of the cross, we empty the cross of its power and we make it about ourselves.
If this is us, may we repent of such short sighted living and recenter our focus on what matters most, Christ and Him crucified.