“But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”
~ Gal 6:14
We live in an age of substantial drama. Issues come at us 100 miles per hour, whether on social media, the news, or sound bites on the radio. We’re forced to consider and deal with a host of complex moral and societal realities in quick time succession. Often, we’re left with little time to process the event that has just flown by, before another one confronts us.
As we navigate these turbulent times, we may often find ourselves standing firmly on opinions we’ve formed on various issues. While this can be helpful, and is certainly important, Paul makes a remarkable point in Gal. 6:14.
He tells the Galatian church that, on the cross, he was crucified to the world, and the world to him. What’s his point here?
Paul is describing how he views the world around him. There were certainly political opinions in Paul’s day. There were riots. There were racial tensions. There were false ideologies swirling all around.
But Paul saw himself as dead to all those things. Nothing affects a dead man, and a dead man has little or no effect on the world. In other words, Paul saw himself as severed forever from all the intrigue of his day.
He wasn’t overly concerned about who the next Caesar would be. He wasn’t extremely concerned about the events that were around him, generally. Instead, Paul lived his life with a central aim—to proclaim and live out the cross of Christ.
For Paul, everything else took a FAR distant second place. Of course, he probably had a host of opinions about many topics. But those things were almost entirely unimportant in his eyes compared to the Gospel, the Church, and the Glory of Christ.
So…as we wade through the muck of our time, we need to ask ourselves, “Is the main thing still the main thing FOR ME?” If not, let’s look back to the realities of the cross, and remind ourselves that the world is dead to us, and we to it!
