Sick unto Death

“If we think of Christian theology and ethics purely in terms of forgiveness, we will have neglected a central aspect of God’s own character and will be in no position to understand the cross in its fullest dimension.”

“From beginning to end, the Holy Scriptures testify that the predicament of fallen humanity is so serious, so grave, so irremediable from within, that nothing short of divine intervention can rectify it.”

“Justice for everyone is an alarming thought because it raises the possibility that it might come upon oneself after all. As the author of Ephesians puts it, 'by nature' we are all 'children of wrath, like the rest of mankind' (Eph. 2:3).”

“The New Testament writings all presuppose that the fallen human race and the equally fallen created order are sick unto death beyond human resourcefulness.”

“Sentimental, overly 'spiritualized' love is not capable of the sustained, unconditional agape of Christ shown on the cross. Only from the perspective of the crucifixion can the true nature of Christian love be seen, over against all that the world calls 'love.' The one thing needful, according to Paul, is that the Christian community should position itself rightly, at the juncture where the cross calls all present arrangements into question with a corresponding call for endurance and faith.”

“The crucifixion is the touchstone of Christian authenticity, the unique feature by which everything else, including the resurrection, is given its true significance. The resurrection is not a set piece. It is not an isolated demonstration of divine dazzlement. It is not to be detached from its abhorrent first act. The resurrection is, precisely, the vindication of a man who was crucified. Without the cross at the center of the Christian proclamation, the Jesus story can be treated as just another story about a charismatic spiritual figure. It is the crucifixion that marks out Christianity as something definitively different in the history of religion. It is in the crucifixion that the nature of God is truly revealed. Since the resurrection is God's mighty transhistorical Yes to the historically crucified Son, we can assert that the crucifixion is the most important historical event that has ever happened. The resurrection, being a transhistorical event planted within history, does not cancel out the contradiction and shame of the cross in this present life; rather, the resurrection ratifies the cross as the way 'until he comes.'”

― Fleming Rutledge, The Crucifixion: Understanding the Death of Jesus Christ

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Dear Kate,

What am I to write after quoting six times possibly the greatest modern classic on understanding the crucifixion of Jesus Christ?

I will write about why I think in practice these insights might be impractical, my reasoning circular but the very opposite of oblique: that we are sinful, "sick unto death beyond human resourcefulness."

You are someone who likes to declare easy victories; you must know what I mean.  We avow to wake up with (and as) a clean slate, tabula rasa, as if just by being sincere and intentional we can do away with our past and get away in our future.  It is not constructive--actually morbidly irritating--to consider how evil shall perpetually lurk around our next corner and like a lion devour us.

Aren't we "saved," and, safe?  Aren't we already crucified properly and now resurrected, living, not dying?  For how long and how many times more shall we circle our way back to the foot of the cross and be punished all over again for being naughty?  Forgive and forget already, Father God!!!

I used to go to a megachurch that loves to put on huge shows, earthshaking musicals, heavenbound chorales, and Christmas, naturally, has been the all-out celebration of a year, nothing held back, our hearts yearning and giving and on their best terms with God.  When it came to Good Friday the song leaders would need to remind everyone the unwanted gloom and boredom we were experiencing for the very brief moment weren't meant for long, for Jesus was already unbandaging Himself and trying on His technicolor dreamcoat and, Please, do come back on Sunday, and you will see we can do a better job engaging you more positively.  Don't go writing your scathing review just yet (and don't tell the church board I am asking you to hold your tongue).

Meanwhile Jesus is hanging high and dry, playing out an overcooked melodrama vis-à-vis our modern sensitivity, updated understanding of our enlightened selves.  The movie "The Passion of the Christ,"--you remember?--is a waste of strawberry jam, considering our theology is only asking for peanut butter sandwiches.

In that sense no one should circle back to the foot of the cross, and that's precisely what the church has found and found ways to dance with our back against it.  We are ashamed of Jesus censuring us as He is being censured.  Like, come down already and stop putting our shame on display!  The globe is warming and you are warming us with your blood!  Can't we talk about issues that matter and cash in a bit of the promises you've been making all them years?  The last thing we need is more depression pressing down on the ones we are already carrying, which, by the way, you somehow failed to take away.

Joylessness, thanklessness, listlessness, see them in a life, and you know to the foot of the cross it has never been.  We can claim to do good work on our blank slate and still wake up to estrangement from God and everyone, every single atom in the cosmos, wide open to the risk of taking no risk, the lion that is bound to pounce on us, spilling our blood, not Jesus'.

Yours, Alex