God on a Cross

Someone once told me, "you Lutherans need to be careful, or you have God on the cross".

I've been thinking a bit about this lately, and, since it's Good Friday, I'd like to note that "God on a Cross" is exactly what we have. "God" is not a term that describes the set to which the members of the Godhead belong - it is perfectly predicated of the Son as well as of the Father and of the Spirit. God is on the cross, in the same manner that God is become flesh.

Present tense? Aren't we commemorating a historic event? Well, yes and no - we think on a historic event today, but it is a historic event that is present with us even now. The crucified Christ is the one who is with us today when we are in church, in our homes, or wherever we might be, as it is of His body that we are members. We are cautioned from thinking of the cross without the resurrection, but also we should take care to not think of the resurrection without the cross - it is the crucified one who is resurrected, and the resurrected one who is crucified (careful readers will notice I've been reading Moltmann again).

In the same way that His resurrection is proleptically present to us as believers, and as members of His body, His crucifixion and death is present to us, His pain and suffering. God's eternal decision was the giving of Himself, and that means that God's suffering and death on the cross is as much a part of who God is for us eternally as His overcoming of death is.

We don't have a God who cannot suffer - we have a God who does suffer, and who suffers with us, because (yes, because!) we have a God who snatches us from the jaws of sin and death and who takes us into His kingdom. And as real as the kingdom is for us now, we remember today, so real is the suffering of God for us and for our sakes.

For this reason, I am humbled by the filled cross and the empty tomb - let us not confuse the two, for all that they are inseparable.