Graham Cole Reflects on Leon Morris

Over at the Ridley website, Graham Cole (Prof. of Theology at Beeson Divinity School and former Principal of Ridley) reflects on the life and work of Leon Morris.

He writes:

Leon knew how to preach the cross too. I recall meeting folk in Melbourne who had been brought to Christ through a sermon on the cross preached by Leon. One personal experience of his ministry stands out for me. I refer to it at least once a semester in my classes. Leon came to the chapel at Ridley to preach. He was frail but in good voice. He preached on the cross. No surprise there. The chapel was in the round and quite an intimate space. He paused then surveyed the gathered crowd of faculty and students. Next very slowly, very deliberately he pointed to his right and said quietly, ‘You have been died for’, to the middle ‘You have been died for’ and to the left ‘You have been died for.’ It was electric. I knew that to use Pauline language that I had been bought with a price. The cross and what Christ achieved there as the propitiation for our sins – take that C. H. Dodd – was for Leon no mere theological construct but the life transforming truth from God. My book on the atonement has four lines of reference to his works in the index. Anyone who writes on the cross of Christ and neglects the scholarship of this humble Christian man is foolish in my opinion.