One Word

The question was asked,

"In one word, what does the cross mean to the world today?"

I said nothing, in part because I was still suppressing laughter over irreverent fried chicken jokes, but more importantly, because I value words. If someone asks me to answer a question, especially one as significant as the one above, in just one word, that one word had better convey everything I need it to communicate. I won't be shouting out the first thing that comes to mind because I know it won't be sufficient. I'll keep my mouth shut, probably look like I'm apathetic or a million miles away or just plain rude.

But I don't ignore the challenge. Now that I've had a few hours to mull it over, I think I have my word.

Redemption.

Not love or sacrifice or peace or reconciliation or even salvation, though those are all a part of it.

Surely Christ loved us. Surely he sacrificed himself for us. Surely we have peace with God through Jesus Christ. But somehow these words don't go far enough for me, don't encompass the essence of the cross.

Redemption: the act or process of buying back. Repurchase.

Because from Eden till Calvary, from Calvary till now, and from now till Christ's return, God has been about the business of redemption, of purchasing back from Death all that was lost in the Fall. He has not just saved us, like one might save a man from drowning by throwing him a rope without cost to oneself. No, there was an exchange of currency in our salvation. God redeemed us, purchased us from Death with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. It was not free, not for Him.

Some might like the word reconciliation. We have, after all, been reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. I almost liked the word myself. And I do like it - in that it expresses our current state of relationship to God - but it fails to communicate the means by which our peace was attained. Reconciliation, as a word, conveys little more than a shaking of hands and a shrugging off of past differences. The cross was much more than man making nice with God or God making nice with man. It was God paying the high price of his only Son to free us from the darkness of Death and bring us - as a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God - into His Kingdom of Life.

So I'm back at redemption.

For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver and gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. (I Peter 1:18-20, italics added)

And in the words of the four living creatures and twenty-four elders in John's vision:

You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth. (Revelation 5:8-10, italics added)

Redemption.

That's what the cross means for our world today - as much as it did for the world 2,000 years ago and as much as it will for all the years to come.