The Power of the Cross

When you got saved, God delivered you from hell. But Dr. Tony Evans says there's more to Jesus' death on the cross than simply our salvation. Now that you and I are being saved, He's delivering us from earth. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. Because of Jesus' death, those of us who believe have life.

But today we'll find out that it's not just a life that begins when our physical bodies die. Let's turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 1 as we join Dr. Evans. Our series is called Returning to the Cross. Our concern is that far too many of us have distanced ourselves from the cross. Or we have turned the cross into something it was never meant to be.

A piece of jewelry or a symbol on a building indicating it's a church. Not that any of those things are in themselves wrong, but there's no power in jewelry and there's no power in symbols that stand alone. But there is power in the cross. The power in the cross is not the power of wooden sticks that are crossing each other, one vertical, one horizontal. That's not where the power is.

The power is in who died there, why he died there, and what was accomplished in his death there. That's the power of the cross. And so the power of the cross is inseparable to the person of Jesus Christ. As Christians, we hold on to the cross, not the crucifix. A crucifix is a cross when somebody's still there. There's still a figure on it. There's power in the cross because no one is there.

His work still continues to be ongoing and effective. Paul writes to the church at Corinth and he wants to talk to them and us about the power of the cross, a power that if we would ever understand it and utilize it, we would also experience it. There was a problem in the church of Corinth. There were many problems in the church of Corinth. This was a New Testament church that was a mess.

He brings it up in verse 10, I exhort you, brethren, see they're already saved, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you might be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment. For I have been informed concerning you, my brethren, that there are quarrels among you. Each one of you saying, I'm a Paul, a Paul of Cephas and of Christ. There were cliques in the church. There was a party spirit in the church.

There was a I like him and I like him and I like him. They were a divided congregation. They were not of the same mind and of the one spirit that Paul talks about. Jesus has already died. Jesus has already risen, but for Paul, the cross of Christ still was working, even though it had already taken place, like it has already taken place for us.

Now watch this. Paul makes it clear it is possible for the work of the cross to be voided out in the life of the believer, even in the life of a church. Its effectiveness can be canceled in our lives, in our personal lives, in our families, in our churches, even in our culture, but he's specifically speaking to Christians here, so that what the cross offers, you don't necessarily get if it's voided out. Verse 18, for the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.

There it is. He says the cross is the power of God. If you want to see God's power, that power is attached to the cross. If you want to see God working, that working that you want to see from God is attached to the cross. So then, if I am not experiencing the power, then there has been a disconnect with the cross. The cross has become voided out or rendered non-effective in my experience, not because there's not enough in the cross to handle it, but because something has created a disconnect between me and the cross.

Thus, the series returning to the cross. The cross exists for one reason and one reason alone, to address sin. Jesus Christ died on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins, but that's not the only reason He died on the cross in relationship to sins. Notice He says, to those of us who are being saved. That's a different group than those who need to get saved. People who need to get saved are sinners. They need to trust Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of their sins and the gift of eternal life to get saved.

In other words, to get saved, forgiveness is necessary. But He's not writing to people who need to get saved. He says to those of us who are being saved.

That's a different group. These are folks who've already gotten saved. They've already trusted Jesus Christ. Now they're in the process of being saved.

When Jesus Christ was nailed on the cross, He was not only nailed on the cross for our forgiveness, He was also nailed on the cross for our victory, our deliverance. The Christians at Corinth were not being delivered. They still had that same old mess going on that they had when they were non-Christians. They had that same old defeat going on, that same old quarreling going on, that same old war going on that you would have expected non-Christians to have.

He's going to reference that in a moment. Why was that mess, now that they're Christians, like they would have been messed when they were non-Christians? Because the cross of Christ had been voided out.

Now I must warn you as I continue. The word of the cross is foolishness. He says that this message, the word meaning message, this message of the work of the cross will sound silly. It won't make sense.

It will seem like it's ridiculous. The word of the cross sounds like foolishness. Now unfortunately, many who have gotten saved and no longer look at it as foolishness for heaven consider it foolishness for earth. The reason why the church at Corinth was a mess and was not experiencing the power of God was because they had become disconnected from the word of the cross. But what disconnected them from the word of the cross, here it is, was the intrusion of human wisdom into the church. They had brought the thinking of the world into the church, which voided the work of the cross so that they were not experiencing the power of God. When you bring human wisdom into the church, that is man's point of view, when you bring man's point of view into your life, into your home, into your church, what you've just done is canceled not the content of the cross, but the power of the cross at work in you. When the wisdom of God has the final say so, then the cross of Christ can be appealed to for power.

Why? Why can the cross of Christ be appealed to in that situation? For one simple reason, the cross of Christ exists to only deal with one thing. There's only one thing that the cross of Christ deals with, and that's sin. Once you can, having observed the problem, in this case it was the problem of division, then you identify the sin. If there is a problem, there is a sin somewhere. It's either your sin, somebody else's sin, or both of your sins. But if there is a problem, there is a sin. The cross of Christ only exists to deal with sin. When the cross can identify and address the sin, there is a response to the sin, now you can address the problem. The reason why the world can't fix its problem is it doesn't want to take seriously identifying its sin. They have prayer meetings that are voided. Let's pray to God about this. God voids it. Because you're not willing to deal with the sin, then you don't really want to solve the problem.

Because the cross of Christ, which is tied to the power of God, only exists to deal with the sin. Dr. Evans will have more on the power of the cross when he continues our message in just a moment. Are you hungry for more of God, more of His truth, more of His power, and more of His wisdom applied in your life? Then you need to connect with a community of passionate believers who are growing in God's Word through the Tony Evans Training Center. With exclusive video and audio teaching from Dr. Tony Evans, this interactive online study experience allows you to explore theology, biblical history, and real-life application of the kingdom agenda anytime, anywhere. Visit tonyevanstraining.org to get started today.

That's tonyevanstraining.org. This April, churches across the country will be getting ready to put out extra seats on Easter Sunday for all those people they may not see again until Christmas. You'll see crosses a lot more often, maybe around someone's neck or as part of a floral arrangement. But Dr. Evans says we need to see the cross as much more, not just at Easter time, but all the time.

In his book, The Power of the Cross, he explains what makes the cross so pivotal and why the entire Christian faith would fall apart without it, why it makes the difference between a victorious living faith and a dead, empty religion. Right now, we're bundling this book along with all 14 messages from Dr. Evans' two-volume teaching series, Returning to the Cross, and making them all available as our gift to you. And thanks for your donation to help support our outreach here on this station and others like it. Just visit tonyevans.org to get the details or give us a call at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our friendly team members help you. Again, that's 1-800-800-3222 or online at tonyevans.org.

Well, let's get back to Dr. Evans now with more on The Power of the Cross. The big thing now is to have your private analyst, to have your private counselor. Okay? Look, I'm trying to save some folks some money here. I'm trying to save you some money. Now, there is a place for Christian counseling.

It's one of the gifts, so there is no problem with that. But to go week after week, month after month, year after year, decade after decade, that tells me you're not being delivered. He said to those of us who are being saved, the word of the cross is the power of God. It is identifying the problem, what is the sin that is at the root or the source of the problem. How does God say, address that sin? And once that sin is addressed, now we can fix the problem. And the time of counseling you need is time enough to do that.

And some people's issues are deeper than others, and it may take a little longer than some than others, and I'm allowing for all of that. I mean, you got all these philosophies. The Greeks, he talks about the Greeks love wisdom. The Greeks love wisdom. And, you know, they had 50 different philosophical schools in Greece that you could go and you could, you know, I am because I am. You know, just Kant and Hegel and Schleiermacher and Kilkegaard. You could look into all these world views and all this analysis, and then they changed their mind. They were wrong, and then they rethink it.

You need something you can count on that ain't gonna change next year. Wisdom of this world is always changing, and the reason why is because God makes them foolish, he says. He creates it so that they find something that they didn't know which shows they were wrong in what they were telling people all the time. He is in the business of canceling the foolishness of the world, which oftentimes makes God seem like he's the foolish one. In letting you share in his power, based on the word of the cross, God will sometimes in fact many times look like he's the foolish one. That's why Paul calls it the foolishness of God. Not because obviously God is a fool, but his mechanism often seems foolish. When God told Naaman, go dip seven times in the Jordan River, because that's the way you're going to be healed, Naaman said, that's crazy. That's crazy. First of all, it's dirty water.

I'm too big for that. Elijah's position is you don't want to get better. I hope you know some folk don't want to get better. They sound like they want to get better, but they don't want to get better because if you really want to get better, and you really believe God is God, then you will surrender to his way of doing things.

Then you'll get the power of the cross, and you'll see transformation occur because you are being saved. You take your car to the car wash, presumably because it's dirty. How many of us when we go to the car wash instruct the car wash people on how to use the machines? They're going to spray down the car.

They're going to put the wax on it. I mean, how many of us do an analysis of their machinery? How many of us when we go to the cleaners tell the folk, I mean, we tell them what we want them to do, cleaning press or whatever, but how many of us give instruction on how they should work the machine to bring us out clean what we brought them in dirty?

You know what we do? We go up, and we follow their instruction. Put your car in neutral, wind your windows up, and then they say, we got it from here.

They connect your car to the belt, and it moves through, and they have already built in what is necessary for it to come out looking like what it's supposed to look like because your car is being cleaned. You take your clothes to the cleaners, and what do you do? You hand it over because your assumption, if it's a good cleaners, is that the folks cleaning know what they are doing. They've got enough sense to know if it's a good cleaners how to clean your clothes properly. All you do is take it in and pick it up.

Then help me somebody. How can you come to the house of God dirty, leave dirty, when the power of God is supposed to be there? It must be because you want to tell God how to clean you up. Something you don't do at the car wash, something you don't do at the cleaners, we want to do with God. You know why we don't do it at the car wash? We don't know enough. You know why we don't do it at the cleaners?

They have pros there. We don't know enough. What makes us think? We don't know enough to wash our car. We don't know enough to clean our clothes, but we know enough to tell God how I want to run my life.

Somebody help me please in this place. He says what we have done is voided out. A lot of us are in financial problems because God has voided out the power of God in delivering you. He writes void every time you pray for a better job, a new job moment, he writes void because you know better than he does.

Or fixing this situation in my life, it gets voided because the cross of Christ has been demoted. The wisdom of man has been elevated. Verse 19, he quotes from Jeremiah, actually, 29, 14, you don't have to turn there, but he says, the way I'm going to deliver Israel is I'm going to show my wisdom in confusing the enemy. Do you know how many times God delivered his people by confusing what the enemy was trying to do?

Ambushing the enemy, the Bible says it, and routing the enemy. God intervened. What we are often doing is voiding out God's intervention with the use of the human point of view when it comes to living life. And so the reason for the cross is only one, to deal with sin. With that comes the power of the cross to deliver us for life, for life to be lived as God intended it. And so what this means is, what you and I regularly need is the message of the cross. The message of the cross. Notice, he says in verse 17, I did not come to you with cleverness of speech. He says in verse 18, the word of the cross. He says in verse 21, the end of the verse, the message preached to save those who believe. Jesus has already died.

So they're just like you and I here in the 21st century. Jesus is not there physically. They haven't seen the cross, the actual cross.

I mean, they're just like you and I. But he says this message of the cross is still relevant for the believer today because it is the power of God to those of us who are being saved, to those of us who are in the process sanctification. Verse 30, but by his doing you are in Christ Jesus who become to us wisdom from God and righteousness of sanctification and redemption. Why is God doing this?

Why is he doing it this way? He tells you in verse 31, let him who boasts boast in the Lord. So only God gets the credit. So here's what God's going to do.

Let me make it real simple. He's going to confuse your human attempts to live life independently of him. He's going to make sure it doesn't work. That's why it's not working. That's why new plans, new strategies aren't working. But what he will do is take his foolishness, that which seems like it doesn't make sense. It won't work. It's ridiculous. Because see, when it comes to that, then you're going to have to humble yourself.

See, then you're going to have to say, I guess I don't know all the answers. Because until you humble yourself, the power of God working through the cross will not be our experience. You got to humble yourself to say his way, not my way, his word, not my word, his wisdom, not my wisdom. The work of the cross, which is still active and full, can be voided when the wisdom of the world dominates. And Dr. Tony Evans, talking about how we can get connected and committed to the power of the cross. Today's lesson comes from Tony's two-volume teaching series, Returning to the Cross. It's a powerful collection of sermons that focus on the most important concept of the Christian faith. You can get all fourteen lessons in this series, along with a copy of Dr. Evans' book that perfectly complements these messages.

It's called The Power of the Cross. Don't forget, you can get this audio and book package as our thank you when you support the alternative with a financial donation. But this offer is only available for a limited time, so be sure to visit tonyevans.org today. Again, that's tonyevans.org. Or call our 24-hour resource request line at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our team members help you. That's 1-800-800-3222. Whether you're threading a needle or performing surgery, working in the dark practically guarantees failure. Be sure to join us on Monday when Dr. Evans explains how to shine some light on your situation.