coming to the end of oneself

Mark A. Noll in Turning Points:

For [Martin] Luther it was also a pivotal axiom that the cross reveals the all-loving God as also the all-mysterious God. At the cross the creation itself took hold of the Creator; the creation entombed the Creator. At the cross the loftiest heights came down to the deepest depths; at the cross the hands of men pierced the hands that made humankind. There could be no greater mystery.

Thus, as Luther constantly repeated, the cross must always remain utterly scandalous. It was a scandal for Jews, and all who sought God through moral exertion; it was a scandal for Greeks, and all who sought God through the exercise of the mind. The cross, for Luther, revealed the judgment of God that no amount of human work could make humanity successful; no amount of diligent study could make humanity truly wise; no amount of human exertion could provide enduring joy. The cross, in sum, was God’s everlasting “no” to the most fundamental human idolatry of regarding the self as a god. It was God’s final word of condemnation for all efforts to enshrine humanity at the center of existence.

Luther’s “evangelical breakthrough” was an excruciatingly long time in coming for himself, but it also had a remarkable effect once announced, because these denunciations of a theology of glory seemed so fanatical, so excessive, or what we might today call so counterintuitive. But for those who could follow Luther’s chain of reasoning or, as was more often the case, who recognized the pilgrimage of their own hearts in what he wrote, there was great reward. A theology of the cross did not only destroy, it also opened up. And what it opened up was God’s everlasting “yes” to those who had come to the end of themselves. Here is how Luther put it:

For where man’s strength ends, God’s strength begins, provided faith is present and waits on him. And when the oppression comes to an end, it becomes manifest what great strength was hidden under the weakness. Even so, Christ was powerless on the cross; and yet there he performed his mightiest work and conquered sin, death, world, hell, devil, and all evil. Thus all the martyrs were strong and overcame. Thus, too, all who suffer and are oppressed overcome.

With these words, Luther echoed what the apostle Paul had said to the Corinthians. If humans embrace the cross, they may be scorned as spineless and foolish. But that is not the last word, for to embrace the cross is also to embrace the world as it actually is in its most essential reality. We also come to know “the mystery of God . .  . Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2: 2– 3). To embrace the scandalous cross is to be embraced in turn by Jesus. The blood-streaked figure enfolds those who come to him and ushers them into the kingdom of God. The theology of the cross shows how to become a child of God.