But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. (Galatians 6:14)

Although we have turned it into a pretty picture, a piece of jewelry, and a steeple topper, the cross is and always has been a symbol of death. Crucifixion is the cruelest means of execution ever dreamed up in the demented mind of a depraved world. 

The torn and bloodied figure of Christ on the cross was anything but pretty to see. Scripture suggests that the Savior was so brutalized and bloodied that He scarce resembled a human being when he hung on the tree. Far from wanting a snapshot to hang on your wall or carry in your wallet, you, like the rest of the crowd on that dark, dark day, would have turned your head away from that horrifying scene.

While we know the cross today as a historical event, few know it as a dynamic spiritual principle. It is this ignorance on our part that explains today’s flesh on parade. Everywhere we turn today we see ourselves and what we can do. Seldom do we get a glimpse of Him and of what He can do, which alone “is marvelous in our eyes” (Matthew 21:42). 

The reason for this present-day scarcity of divine manifestations is found in our failure to take up the cross. Christ can’t live His resurrected life in and through us until we’re crucified and out of His way. Till then, the resurrected Christ will continue to be hidden from the world’s view by an uncrucified Christiandom.      

It is not just the atoning work of Christ on the cross that we need, but also the cross of Christ worked into our Christian lives. Nowhere is this more important than in our prayer lives. All true prayer is prayed under the shadow of the cross. It is prayed by those willing to die to their own will so that they might live to fulfill God’s will. 

It is this struggle in our prayer lives that is most difficult to win. To win it, we, like our Lord, may sweat blood as we contemplate the cross and stumble beneath it as we bear its heavy load (Luke 22:44; John 19:17; Mark 15:21). Still, bear it we must, if we hope to have powerful prayer lives. There is no easy way to Calvary, but no other way to eternal life and prevailing prayer!

WHEN I SURVEY THE WONDROUS CROSS (Isaac Watts)

When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.

See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?

His dying crimson, like a robe,
Spreads o’er His body on the tree;
Then I am dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.