I’ve only been on this earth less than six full decades, but I have noticed a very obvious trend among American Christians. It isn’t Horton’s “Christless Christianity” so much as “crossless Christianity.” The vast majority of even mega-churches touched by New Thought talk about “Christ.” What’s increasingly absent is preaching, teaching and singing about the death of Jesus Christ–especially his bloody, sacrificial death on a Roman cross that offends our sophisticated sensibilities.
When was the last time you heard a good sermon (or any sermon) solely about the cross–especially one that actually used terms like “blood” and “agony” and “sacrifice” and “wrath?” (Don’t worry, dear followers, I still regard the main motive of the cross as God’s love, but we neglect wrath at our peril and the peril of the holistic gospel.)
Am I sounding like a fundamentalist? Well, they aren’t wrong about everything!
I should say right now that my pastor is teaching a series on the atonement on Wednesday evenings. That’s wonderful. But I would like to sing about the cross on Sunday mornings, too. And to hear powerful preaching about the blood of Jesus. I grew up with those and they are still part and parcel of my evangelical faith.
Some years ago the college where I taught built a beautiful new auditorium for chapels and concerts. There is a large blank space on the outside and some folks suggested it would be a good place to display a cross as a sign of our evangelical commitment. It never happened.
Mark Noll and David Bebbington identify four hallmarks of evangelicalism: biblicism, conversionism, crucicentrism and activism (missions and social transformation). Of those four, I’d say the one most threatened is crucicentrism.
Some years ago I organized an “old time hymn sing” at the college where I taught. Most of the music in chapels was “contemporary” (praise and worship songs). There was obviously a pent up demand for singing familiar (and singable) hymns and gospel songs, so I organized a once-monthly event and recruited colleagues to play instruments. Two of my dear colleagues who I love and respect refused to play their instruments to hymns and songs that include lyrics about the “blood.”
Why this trend over the past 50 years away from preaching and singing about the cross of Jesus? Why do we no longer sing “What can wash away my sin (nothing but the blood of Jesus)?” or “There is a fountain filled with blood” or “At the cross, at the cross, where I first saw the light”? Or at least similar hymns and songs about the cross?
I know, yes, evangelical churches do still occasionally sing songs (including some contemporary choruses) about the cross, but I notice that my ears really perk up whenever that happens because it’s so rare. I’m not picking on my church; I visit a lot of churches and it’s a trend across the board in evangelicalism.
What can explain this? Given the centrality of the cross and atonement in the New Testament and in evangelical tradition, the only explanation I can think of is accommodation to culture. We know talk about “the blood” is offensive to many people and maybe it is to us as well. It doesn’t fit very well with our shiny new sanctuaries and all the shiny new cars in the parking lots. We’re educated and upwardly mobile now. We’re affluent and sophisticated. The imagery of the cross just doesn’t sit very well with us.
Another possible reason for the dearth of language about the cross (especially blood, wrath of God, etc.) is that churches that consider themselves moderate and non-fundamentalist don’t want to do anything that smacks of fundamentalism. But I ask why give the rich New Testament and historical evangelical emphasis on the cross over to the fundamentalists? We are so often ruled by what we’re against or afraid of. We need to overcome that.
I would go so far as to say that crossless Christianity is not real Christianity. Or at least it is seriously defective, accommodated, negotiated, shallow Christianity. (Of course, most evangelical churches are not quite totally “crossless” yet, but my fear is they may be on that path.)
How I long for a good, meaty, offensive sermon on the blood of Jesus, the wrath of God against sin and wickedness, the cruelty of the cross and the blessing of the atonement. And how I long to sing songs about the cross, the blood, the atonement. Those sermons and songs were NOT (I apologize for shouting) just a fad or part of a sectarian movement; they were expressions of THE central truth of Christianity (alongside of and sandwiched between the incarnation and resurrection–two themes that get much more attention in evangelicalism than the cross!).
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