As a young Christian, I had a number of impassioned conversations with close friends about this subject. I would insist that the message of the cross was the center of the Gospel. They would insist, with the same emotional forcefulness, that the resurrection stood at the center since it culminated in the new creation. Citing Romans 4:24-25, one friend went so far as to say that the resurrection of Jesus was more important than His death on the cross.

What is the central message of Christianity? This is a subject of timeless importance in a day when many insist that the central message is kindness in interpersonal relations; or that it is justice in its variegated societal implementation. However compelling the case may be made for either of these, the Apostle Paul gave us the divinely inspired center of the Christian message when he wrote, “I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). It is quite clear that the atoning death of Jesus stands at the center of the Christian message. “Christ died for sinners” is, in the words of Geerhadus Vos, “the center of gravity” in Christianity. But, this opens another question, namely, “How then should we view the resurrection?”

As a young Christian, I had a number of impassioned conversations with close friends about this subject. I would insist that the message of the cross was the center of the Gospel. They would insist, with the same emotional forcefulness, that the resurrection stood at the center since it culminated in the new creation. Citing Romans 4:24-25, one friend went so far as to say that the resurrection of Jesus was more important than His death on the cross. A number of years later, several colleagues in ministry encouraged me to read more Richard Gaffin, since he argued more persuasively that the resurrection, rather than the crucifixion of Jesus, was the epicenter of the Christian message. Interestingly, as I read Gaffin, I came across statements that seemed to go against that idea. Reflecting on Paul’s teaching in 1 Cor. 1:18-3:22 and Galatians 6:14, Gaffin makes the following assertion: “Paul’s exclusive and comprehensive epistemic commitment is to the crucified Christ.” This, of course, doesn’t mean that the cross is more important than the resurrection. In fact, I was imbalanced in my own understanding of the central message as a young Christian, because I didn’t yet understand that the saving work of Christ couldn’t be bifurcated without doing damage to the message of Christianity as a whole. This is why the Apostle Paul summarizes the heart of the Christian message in the following way when writing to the church in Corinth:

“I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3).

The wrath-propitiating, sin-atoning, Satan-conquering death of Jesus on the cross, together with His burial and His resurrection form the central message of the Christian faith. When the Apostle Paul said, “I determined not to know anything among you expect Jesus Christ and Him crucified,” he was utilizing a theological synecdoche (i.e. the part for the whole). Apart from the death of Jesus, the resurrection is a legal fiction. Apart from the witness of His resurrection, the death of Jesus is a tragic failure.

One of the greatest assurances of salvation that we can have during our pilgrimage in this world comes from our knowledge of the definitiveness of our redemption in Christ. The fact that Jesus’s death actually atoned for our sins, produces a confidence in believers that nothing will separate them from the love of God. If Jesus died for us, who can undo what Christ has done? Jesus would have to be dethroned and His body put back in the tomb, for His saving work to be emptied of its efficacy. The work of redemption can never be reversed or overthrown because it was accomplished by the infinite and eternal, sinless Son of God whose death on the cross was a perfect sacrifice of infinite and eternal value. The efficacious death of Jesus is captured by the writer of Hebrews in the benediction he pronoucnced over the members of a church that was tempted to turn away from Christ.

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