Using the Cross to Hate Sin
The cross is central to Christianity. It encourages us to know Jesus has paid the price to secure our salvation. All our sins are wiped away with the precious blood shed at Calvary. We should reflect often on the cross simply by virtue of its value in our redemption. However, it is easy to forget that the cross can also have a place in how we respond to our salvation with a godly life. Reflecting on the cross can help us in our sanctification.
At the cross, we see our beloved Saviour suffering horribly. He suffered in his body. Crucifixion was a slow and painful way to die. The Romans designed it as such. Those they crucified would eventually asphyxiate – that is, if they did not perish from blood loss. Our Saviour hung there naked, dressed only with a crown of thorns. The Carpenter from Nazareth had roughhewn nails driven through his body to affix him to the cross.
Then the lights went out. God caused a supernatural darkness to fall on the land. He took the light of life away. In this darkness Jesus suffered something we cannot comprehend: the infinite wrath of God against sin. There on Golgotha he bore my name on his heart, but then also the curse attached to my name. He took my place and suffered what I deserve. As Paul says in 2 Cor. 5:21, Christ became sin (what God hates) so that in him I might become God’s righteousness (what he loves).
On the cross, Christ suffered in body and soul. Why? Out of love for me and everyone else who trusts in him. He literally loved us to death. It’s awe inspiring, leading you to worship.
In his book Gospel Worship, Jeremiah Burroughs explains how we should let these reflections on the cross lead us from worship to our walk:
If you saw the knife that cut the throat of your dearest child, would not your heart rise against that knife? Suppose you came to a table and there is a knife that laid at your plate, and it was told you that this is the knife that cut the throat of your child. Fathers, if you could still use that knife like any other knife, would not someone say, ‘There was but little love to your child’? So when a temptation comes to commit any sin, this is the knife that cut the throat of Christ, that pierced his sides, that was the cause of all his sufferings, that made Christ to be a curse. Now will you look upon that as a cursed thing that made Christ to be a curse? Oh, with what detestation would a man or woman fling away such a knife! And with like detestation it is required that you renounce sin, for that was the cause of the death of Christ. (pp.242-243)
That’s how we use the cross to hate and flee from sin. That’s how the cross can function in our sanctification.
I would suggest that this is also a good reason for a more frequent Lord’s Supper. Every sermon should take you to Christ, true, but not every sermon necessarily takes you as explicitly and directly to the cross as the Lord’s Supper does. As the Lord’s Supper does this, as you remember the suffering and death of Christ, you’re more equipped to apply it to your sanctification in the days following.
So if you’re struggling with some sin, take some advice from Jeremiah Burroughs. Reflect on Christ’s cross – see your sin as the reason why your beloved Lord suffered and died. Let that thought make you hate it and turn from it.
