The Foolish Cross (Community in One #2 of 17)
Channel: The Gathering Christian Church
Date: 05/08/2013

Speaker: Don Vanzant
Title:The Foolish Cross
Series: Community in One, #2 of 17
Full Sermon or Excerpt (w/ Link): Full Sermon
Subject: Why a cross?  It might be a trendy symbol today, but the baseness and vileness of it was a sticking point for early Christians, who wanted to mellow out this brutal image.  Paul deals with this issue head on in his letter to the Corinthians.
Date: August 4, 2013
Sermon Notes:
* America loves the cross.  The cross is popular and used as a piece of jewelry by hip hop artists and celebrities, as well as devout followers of Christ.
* For centuries the cross was not a symbol for Christians because it was still  being used as an instrument of torture and death, so Christians did not use it to represent their faith.  
* Evidently, the church at Corinth was beginning to shy away from the reality of the cross in favor of a more intellectual or acceptable gospel.  
* The cross is the great divider.   Just believing in God does give us salvation. Even the demons believe in God and they shudder in fear.   James 2:17  
* To the Jews, the cross meant that Jesus couldn't possibly be the Messiah because the cross was the most vile, degrading, manner of death possible and it meant that you were cursed.
* The only people who will ever find the Cross to make sense in their lives are those people who are called. 
* Who are the called? The men and women who suddenly wake up to the fact that they are nothing more than sinners in need of grace and forgiveness and hope.   
* "The cross is rough and it is deadly, but it is effective." -- A.W. Tozer 
* The cross is the only message that saves.  It is foolishness, unless you have trusted in it. It is silly, embarrassing, brutal and barbaric -- but it is the only message that saves. 
* God chose the weak, the foolish, and the powerless.  Why?  Because God wants to protect you from pride and thinking that you have saved yourself. 
 
1 Cor. 1:17 
1 Cor. 1:18-31
2 Cor. 5:21 
James 2:17 

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