The Cross: Our Way to God

The Cross: Our Way to God

I’m honored that Abingdon Press is publishing The Best of Will Willimon this year, a collection of some of my writing from Abingdon. As we move through Lent, season of the cross, I’m sharing some of these selections related to the theme of the cross.

Despite our earnest efforts, we couldn’t climb all the way up to God. So what did God do? In an amazing act of condescension, on Good Friday, God climbed down to us, became one with us. The story of divine condescension begins on Christmas and ends on Good Friday. We thought, if there is to be business between us and God, we must somehow get up to God. Then God came down, down to the level of the cross, all the way down to the depths of hell. He who knew not sin took on our sin so that we might be free of it. God still stoops, in your life and mine, condescends.

“Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” he asked his disciples, before his way up Golgotha. Our answer is an obvious, “No!” His cup is not only the cup of crucifixion and death, it is the bloody, bloody cup that one must drink if one is going to get mixed up in us. Any God who would wander into the human condition, any God who has this thirst to pursue us, had better not be too put off by pain, for that’s the way we tend to treat our saviors. Any God who tries to love us had better be ready to die for it.

Earlier in this very same gospel, it was said, “The Word, the eternal Logos of God, became flesh and moved in with us, and we beheld his glory” (AP). Now the Word, the Christ of God, sees where so reckless a move ends: on a cross. “I thirst, I yearn to feast with you,” he says, “and behold, if you dare, where it gets me.”

When I was giving some lectures at a seminary in Sweden some years ago, a seminarian asked, “Do you really think Jesus Christ is the only way for us to get to God?”

And I thoughtfully replied, “I’ll just say this, if you were born in South Carolina, and living in America, yes. There really is no way for somebody like me to get to God, other than a Savior who doesn’t mind a little blood and gore, a bit of suffering and grizzly shock and awe, in order to get to me. A nice, balanced Savior couldn’t do much for a guy like me. I need a fanatic like Jesus. For we have demonstrated that we are an awfully, fanatically cruel and bloody people when our security is threatened. We have this history of murdering our saviors. So I just can’t imagine any other way to God except Jesus.”

Will Willimon

 

 

Sounds of Sumatanga is April 21, and it’s a great day to connect with friends from United Methodist Churches all over the Conference. The day will be filled with music and food, activities for kids and more for just a $5 admission. I hope you’re planning to support Camp Sumatanga by attending. Details are available at www.soundsofsumatanga.org .

By: William H. Willimon On 3/12/2012
Topics: Weekly Message from the Conference

Comments

1. Jeff Ponder-Twardy wrote on 3/12/2012 12:22:57 PM
So, bishop, you choose to say THAT to the seminarian instead of, “Yes”? It’s pretty remarkable to me how we liberal, protestant theologians go to such lengths to avoid saying anything that could be construed as an exclusive declaration of faith, that would somehow convey to the world that we trust that there is an answer to the hopelessness and suffering of the world that is not captured or experienced by other religious expressions. I, personally, have been so ‘wrecked’ by our savior, by our heavenly Father and His breath (there I go again, being exclusive) that I can’t help but express a passionate faith in Jesus that would exclude any other potential loyalties or inclusivity regarding possible revelatory truth found in any other recognized faith. I don’t say this to legitimate any bigotry directed toward any other religion (then, again, the bigot usually says she or he is not a bigot). It has been revealed to me that love for God and love for neighbor are the primary commands to follow. My business is always to love. Am I contradicting myself by confessing an exclusive faith in Jesus alone for salvation and saying I love my neighbor?
2. Joe Youngblood wrote on 3/12/2012 1:08:31 PM
I know I tend to read thing a little too closely, so please correct me and tell me I read more into your statement than you intended. Early in the closing paragraph you said, “…if you were born in South Carolina, and living in America, yes…” The inference would be if you were born in Sweden then there could be another way. Please set the record straight, there is only one way to salvation, through the blood of Jesus Christ.
3. jarvis brewer wrote on 3/12/2012 8:12:50 PM
As I read these messages each weekIfeel sad at something I know I should have done at GC in Pittsburg. When the uninvited guests marched in to our meeting I prayed for understanding. I now know that when they threw the dishes and the elements for our holy meal onto the floor and broke the dishes, my regret is that I did not go to the front, pick up the pieces, place them on the altar, and pray to the risen Christ to forgive their acts of showing no love or respect for the great sacrifice Christ made for us all, and forgive me for being slow to act. Jarvis
4. Will Willimon wrote on 3/12/2012 9:06:53 PM
Jarvis, Beautiful thought. The crucified Savior is our model. Our subsequent sacrifices are in response to his grand sacrifice for us. Jeff, I'm confused by your comment. My whole point was that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life, his way -- the way of the crucified God, is the only full, perfect revelation of God. For you to characture my comments as somehow the mushy accomodation of a "liberal protestant theologian" who is somehow apologizing for the cross of Christ seems your misreading of what I said. I had no intentions of saying anything about other faiths, just to speak of the greatness and uniqueness of Christ.
5. Jeff Ponder-Twardy wrote on 3/13/2012 4:53:33 PM
I think a good conversation about such things is rather fun. Honestly, what struck me about your comment to the seminarian was an understanding of the atonement that sounded to me to be conditional. Being raised in South Carolina you were inclined to believe in the classic atonement theory. Now, it’s construed from an understanding that our saviors are always martyred because we are so prone to be such a bloodthirsty lot. “We have this history of murdering our saviors. So I just can’t imagine any other way to God except Jesus.” See, that sounds like an apologetic, American theologian (I didn’t say liberal) who doesn’t have any other way to understand the atonement other than interpreting it through our own bloody history. There’s a cynicism there that obviously struck a sharp chord with me, and that’s funny because I’m led to be cynical, anyway. I guess, bishop, I’ve grown tired of the church that I know so much about intentionally deconstructing the classic Christology that embraces Jesus as the only way to the Father. I’ve seen and heard too many Christians in too many churches that have little to no experiential connection to the Christ of the Bible (there I go, again, being exclusive) because they’ve grown use to a Christ espoused intellectually and treated cynically when it comes to a heart strangely warmed. An interfaith dialogue usually produces rhetoric from Christian theologians that seems to mirror this perspective, in my experience and study. I guess I heard that from what you wrote. I don’t want to try to interpret your heart. I guess I just wanted to share my perspective. Grace and peace to you.
6. Joe Youngblood wrote on 3/14/2012 7:41:50 AM
Jeff – I’m not sure I call this fun, but rather fighting for the heart and soul of the Gospel. Bishop Willimon, I also understand your central theme was the amazing, totally consuming act of love our Redeemer God undertook so God and man could be reconciled. Often we think of Good Friday in terms of solemn assemblies with crisp starched white vestments and forget about the cruel realities. To paraphrase your words, the only think I find more amazing than He did it for you, is that He did it for me! Sadly however, there are many in other denominations and some within our own who have embraced the perversion that there may be another way. Unfortunately Bishop Willimon, your wording was ambiguous. Like Jeff, I do not wish to interpret your heart, but seek a clear, concise statement from you, our leader in North Alabama, as to the nature of your heart.
7. Billy H. Weems wrote on 3/14/2012 5:56:06 PM
How does one start a response to a conversation like this without using some really simplistic verbage like; "Wow!"? Bishop it seems you have been taken a little to task. I must confess, I fall on the side of the spectrum of ideologies that would shout; "YES!" to answer the young theologian. The cross is offensive. Maybe it is time we stop trying to make excuses for our sinful nature, or the sinful nature of everyone else on planet earth. Buddhist, Muslims, Jews, Agnostics,Hindu's, Atheist, Cunfucianist, Animist, and all the philosophical pundates of the world still need a Savior. This is the one thing I would focus on when dealing with world wide religions: can any other religion on the face of the planet offer both Love from their Deity and Forgiveness? "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so" is just as valid today as was when I was a wet nosed kid in Courtland, Alabama. I spent fifteen months in the Philippines from 1972-74. I lived in the "village" as much as I could. The prostitutes, beggars thieves, drug dealers and other gangters there were no different than those in the U.S.. They needed Jesus! I was just not in spiritual shape to help them. I was as lost as they seemed to be. What can wash away our sin? What can make us whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus! People are people wherever we are. Sin still seperates us from God. And the only way to the Father is through Jesus. Now, that I have said this, I would still say this; As a boy from Alabama, I know there are and have been times in my life when I know I needed more of Jesus in my heart and life than the guy standing next to me! I am glad for this dialouge! Keep it up.