The true ground of the apostle's glorying.
"But for me far be it to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ."
I. THE CROSS OF CHRIST.
1. This is not, as Romanists say, the wooden cross. It would be beneath the good sense of the apostle to say that he gloried in a piece of wood.
2. It was not the metaphorical cross borne by believers—afflictions. "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me" (Matthew 16:24).
3. It was the atoning death of Christ. The apostle did not glory in this because of its moral influence upon his life, nor even because it was a manifestation of Divine justice and love, but because Christ, through his expiatory sufferings on the cross, procured for us eternal life, which he applies by his Holy Spirit.
II. THE ATTITUDE OF THE APOSTLE TOWARD THE CROSS. He gloried in it.
1. It implied that he had abandoned the way of righteousness by the Law.
2. It implied that he trusted in the atoning death of Christ for salvation.
3. It implied the exclusion of all other elements in which errorists might trust as grounds of salvation.
III. THE EFFECTS OF THE CROSS OF CHRIST. "By which the world has been crucified to me, and I unto the world." It is not material whether the double crucifixion here described is referred to Christ or to his cross; for as it is only Christ crucified whom the apostle preached, it is through him the believer is crucified to the world. Christ's cross has sundered the relationship between Paul and the world. They are dead to each other. Luther says, "The world and I are well agreed. The world cares not a pin for me, and I, to cry quittance with it, care as little for the world." Consider:
1. What is the world? It is that sphere of things in which the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life find their natural development. It is the world as opposed to God. "The friendship of this world is enmity with God" (James 4:4).
2. "How is the world trucked to the apostle " It is not that the apostle regards
3. How is he crucified to the world? The world regards him as a dead man, who has no longer any attractions that it should desire him. It regards him no longer as its own, and therefore hates him to the point of persecution. This inter-crucifixion came about through his union with Christ, and that union was effected by the cross. Well, therefore, might the apostle glory in the cross!