by JoAnne Windsinger

Created on: November 09, 2007   Last Updated: November 20, 2007

The Old Rugged Cross My friend lay dying of cancer. One day, while I visited her in hospice, the music therapist stopped by, and played and sang her favorite song, Old Rugged Cross written by George Bennard in 1913. As he sang, I held her hand, one of my most cherished memories of her. The song begins, "On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross, the emblem of suffering and shame."

You see crosses everywhere in the Christian world. People wear them as jewelry. They decorate inside and outside walls of churches and church halls. You see them on billboards. They dot the roadside on property of people who dare to display them. Christ holds a gigantic cross in a statue that overlooks the Andes Mountains between Argentina and Chile.

What does the cross mean to a Christian? To me, it represents a symbol of God's supreme love for mankind in that he sent his son to shed his blood for the remission of our sin and of his suffering for our cause. He could have ordered the rocks and sticks of the field to strike His tormenters dead. He could have called the angels to rescue Him. He could have stopped them from crucifying Him but He carried out God's will. "Not My will, but Your will be done."

If Christ had not shed his blood on the cross, we would have no salvation. God required the spilling of blood for atonement for sins. The song continues, "And on that old cross, the dearest and the best, for a world of lost sinners was slain." The cross symbolizes death. It was the instrument of His death and proof of divine love for humanity.

This death takes many forms in a believer's life. Romans 6:6 & I Peter 2:24 tell you that the old man is dead and a new life begins. When we invite Jesus into our life, we are new creatures in Christ. The slate is wiped clean and we start anew.

In Galatians 6:14 He states "And therefore the world is crucified to me and I to the world." When the new life starts, we lose the desires of the flesh. Money, power, lust, and other worldly obsessions lose their importance. A Christian is a citizen of the world and subject to its laws, mores and conventions, but it is not his true home. We are in the world but not of the world. Our home waits in heaven.

It is death to self. God designed us for a purpose that transcends earthly wants and needs. Jesus said, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." Luke 9:23 At the crucifixion Jesus carried His own cross. At the resurrection, he conquered the grave.

George Bennard's hymn continues: "So I'll cherish the old rugged cross, Till my trophies at last I lay down; I will cling to the old rugged cross, And exchange it some day for a crown." Some day we will lay our crowns at the feet of Jesus and fall down before Him. The cross is a visible promise of that day.

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