Men's Weekly Spiritual Challenge


Leaders Remember the Cross

Posted by Dean Gage

Hebrews 9:22  “Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.” 

I pray that you and your family had a blessed Easter and took time to reflect on God’s greatest act of love through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross for us. Easter is about both the crucifixion on the cross and the resurrection from the grave. One without the other is incomplete of what God promised and completed. When I visited Israel a few years ago, I will never forget the time spend at the site of the cross and then the empty tomb. As I looked at the site of the cross along a busy road in Jerusalem, God touched my heart with the image of how cruel and agonizing the crucifixion must have been. It was a public display of shame. Before Jesus died on the cross, it had a far different meaning than it did after he died. No one before the crucifixion wore a miniature pin or necklace with a cross. The cross was a means of cruel execution reserved for criminals and was viewed as repulsive. No one would have worn it due to what it depicted. Its meaning totally changed on that Good Friday some two thousand years ago and it will never change back for a Christian.

 “Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.”


HEBREWS 9:22

Today, many believers wear the cross as a sign or symbol of their faith. The cross and resurrection cannot be removed from Christianity. We could not have been saved if Christ had not been crucified and resurrected on the third day as promised in God’s Word. We know that there can be no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood. On that cross, Jesus bled and died for our sins in order for God to grant us forgiveness. When we see a cross, it should remind us that it was the means of execution. We should immediately thank Jesus for what He did for the eternal salvation the Father has given us through the resurrection. Jesus completely changed the meaning of the cross from one of shame and sin into one of victory over sin and the enemy. It changed the meaning from death to life. What goes through your mind each time you see someone wearing a small cross? When you look at a cross, remember these words from Hebrews 12:2 “Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”