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This is not an article about why The Christian Cross Is Pagan. That has been amply proved in the article of that title by Crystal. Nor is this an article on why, even if the cross WEREN’T pagan, you shouldn’t worship it. Because having pictures or symbols, even of the TRUE Jesus, are a SIN! And God does not want you even revering a picture of HIM!

Deuteronomy 4:12, 15-16 (BBE) And the voice of the Lord came to you out of the fire: the sound of his words came to your ears but you saw no form; there was nothing but a voice. … So keep watch on yourselves with care; for you saw no form of any sort … So that you may not be turned to evil ways and make for yourselves an image in the form of any living thing, male or female,

God said that when He, PERSONALLY spoke to them from Mt. Sinai, that they did NOT see Him! That He made CERTAIN that they saw NOTHING but a cloud on that day, and made sure that they COULD NOT SEE ANY PART OF HIM, because He knew that if they saw ANYTHING they would corrupt themselves and make an image of it! and He did not want even a picture or symbol of HIMSELF to be reverenced!

But as I said, this article is not about that, that subject is amply covered in my article “Pictures of Jesus Are A Sin!“. No, this article is for people who understand both – but just don’t really care. Or who think that it’s OK to use this symbol as long as we use it, “for Jesus”. This article demands of you WHY would you even WANT to worship the Cross! Why! Even if it WEREN’T pagan, and even if God DIDN’T hate it! Why would you WANT to? Think about it!

The last day of Jesus’ life was an UNPLEASANT one. Read any of the gospels. It was NOT a happy day, and Jesus did NOT enjoy it.

Matthew 26:37-38 And he … began to be sorrowful and very heavy. Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: …

Was He happy? No! And nothing had happened to Him yet! This was how He felt about what was ABOUT to happen to Him!

Isaiah 53:3-4 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

After that night in the garden He was shamed, spit upon, slapped, beaten, bruised, whipped until He bled, and then forced to carry the instrument that was to cause His death – the cross, as you suppose – weighing perhaps a hundred pounds or more, clear out of town to the gruesome “place of the skull”. And that was just before noon! Before the day really got into swing!

Matthew 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

Then after those things, He was nailed to the cross, bleeding and dying, fed vinegar and gall (a very, VERY unpleasant taste), poked with a spear until he bled… you get the idea. All while His enemies who were killing Him mocked and ridiculed Him. He was suffering. He felt alone. Then He died.

Now think about this. Imagine that this was YOU. Because He was a PERSON. He had FEELINGS. He HAS feelings today, not unlike your own since you are made in His image. So imagine that YOU went through all this. Imagine that YOU suffered and died. Imagine that YOU spent a day in agony, and died on this cross.

How would you FEEL about that day? Would it be one of your FOND memories? Seriously! Wouldn’t you like to put it behind you, and move on – not to dwell on it day in and day out, and see in every Church the instrument of your painful death proudly displayed for all to see? Much less those churches who display a grotesque statue of your dying self, gasping your last breath in pain, nailed to that same cross? Would that cheer you up?? Be honest!

Maybe you’ve been hurt. Most people have, at some time or another. Maybe you broke your arm. Maybe you had your appendix out. Maybe you were even stabbed, or in a disfiguring car accident. Maybe you lost an arm. So now imagine. Imagine if all your friends made necklaces of an appendix or a smashed up car or half an arm and wore them prominently.

Or better yet! Maybe they all took bloody pictures of you at the scene of the accident, and put them in several prominent places in their home. And every time you visited them, everywhere you looked, all your friends had this thing that reminded you of the enormous suffering and pain you went through. How would you feel about this?

Don’t just shove the thought away! How would you FEEL about being reminded CONSTANTLY about your pain? I, for one, would feel that it was, at best, in poor taste. At worst, downright cruel of people who were supposedly my friends reminding me of the single worst day of my life, a day I would just as soon forget. Isn’t that how YOU would feel?

Hebrews 12:2 … who for the joy that was set before him ENDURED the cross, DESPISING the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Jesus endured the cross! He did not enjoy it! And He DESPISED the shame involved! The only reason He went through with it was because of the JOY that would come AFTERWARDS! Weymouth renders it “looking with contempt upon its shame” – with CONTEMPT He looked upon the shame of the cross! And yet practically every church in the world LOVES and viciously DEFENDS their right to fondly gaze upon that cross, and glory in that shame that Jesus looks on with CONTEMPT, and DESPISES!

But now let’s back up for a moment, and ask ourselves a different question. As Jesus was suffering and dying on the cross, out of all the people in the universe, who do you suppose was enjoying himself the MOST that day? Who was partying and celebrating as our Lord was gasping his last painful breath?

And who is it, do you suppose, who feels he won a great victory that day – one of the few victories of his long struggle as the adversary of God? And who is it, do you suppose, who would ENJOY looking at a gory picture of the death of God? Who would feel HAPPY, and want to see the instrument that killed him exalted, on the top of nearly every church on Earth? There is only one such being. And of course… his followers.

Psalms 22:7-8 All they that see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the LORD that he would deliver him: let him deliver him, seeing he delighted in him.

Satan felt this way when he saw Jesus dying, and every time he sees a cross he is reminded of that joyous victorious feeling! It is his most fond memento! Psalm 22 is a prophecy of the last few hours of Jesus’ life, and during that time where you suppose Satan was? Where do you suppose his devils were? Off somewhere, sleeping? Or right there on the front row, savoring every gasp of pain that slipped from Jesus’ lips??

Psalms 22:12-13, 16-17 Many bulls have compassed me: strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round. They gaped upon me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion. … For dogs have compassed me: the assembly of the wicked have inclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet. I may tell all my bones: they look and stare upon me.

Dogs in the Bible represent the wicked (Philippians 3:2, Revelation 22:15), as do the bulls of Bashan (see Amos 4:1). And in this case they both represent Satan and His demons. Compassing Christ about, gaping, laughing, and mocking Him. And they do that to this day! For they still have the Cross, and still have a suffering Jesus on a cross to remind them of that glorious day!

And in Satan’s favorite Church, the one at Rome, you will find the most gory pictures of his greatest enemy – the true Jesus Christ – being tortured on a Cross. I could show pictures of some of the violent, gruesome portrayals of Jesus you’ll find in Catholic churches, but you already know what I mean. Jesus HATES being reminded of that. He did NOT enjoy that last day of his life!

But Satan DELIGHTS in it! He breaks into a SMILE every time he sees a cross, and ESPECIALLY a cross with a blood-dripping, defeated-looking, totally-helpless Jesus!

So why do YOU enjoy it! Why do YOU like having a cross around! Why do you have one or two, or perhaps a few dozen, crosses and crucifixes around, to remind you of the worst day of God’s life?? Because YOU have been deceived by Satan! Because you are following HIM, not God! And so YOU ENJOY watching God die! Because you think that is a GOOD thing! Because you would have helped crucify Him had you been there!

And right here you object, strenuously no doubt, saying “I DO NOT! I keep the cross around to remind me that Christ died for my sins!” … or some such excuse. And that’s all it is – an excuse. WHY do you call Jesus your “Lord”, and refuse to DO what He SAID (Luke 6:46)! God did NOT tell you to revere His cross, or keep replicas around your house!! God did NOT once, not even HINT that you should do that! EVER! That was an idea that sounds good to YOU! But an idea that was invented by SATAN! He wants to teach YOU to rejoice in the death of God as much as HE does!

But you are NOT SAVED BY JESUS’ DEATH ON THE CROSS!

Blasphemy? No! Bible!

Romans 5:10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

We are NOT saved by His death! Billions of people have died, millions of them martyred in more painful ways than Jesus was! THEY SAVED NO ONE! We are saved by Jesus NOT because He died on a cross! We are saved BECAUSE HE LIVES! It is because HE was RESURRECTED that we too may obtain life!

John 11:25 Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the LIFE: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:

He said He IS THE RESURRECTION, and that HE IS THE LIFE! And if you believe in Him, YOU will have LIFE! He didn’t say “I am the death, remember my cross!” No! For He is not a God of the dead, He is a God of the LIVING!

Luke 20:38 For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him.

Had the death on the cross been the end of the story, WE WOULD BE DEAD! Without His resurrection there is NO LIFE! The cross would have been WORTHLESS without the resurrection! His death DID NOT SAVE YOU!

Revelation 1:18 I am he that liveth, and WAS dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

He is not dead! He WAS! But today, He is not hanging on a cross! He was for a few hours, ONCE, a long time ago! In the most unpleasant experience of His eternal life, He suffered and died for our sins. Christ’s death was NECESSARY, and something we remember in a yearly memorial, but it was one event! One page of history that is best left turned! One unpleasant experience in God’s life that paid for our mistakes, but that was all! It’s done! He died ONCE, but He lives forever!

But as long as you honor His DEATH, you rejoice with His adversaries that He DIED, you accentuate His moment of greatest weakness, and you celebrate His agony with Satan the Devil and all the great churches who follow Him, their spiritual lover, into the great lake of fire and destruction! Because you know what? He isn’t dead. He is alive. He was dead for a few days. He is alive forever. Which do you suppose is most important?

And now finally, let me put it to you this way. The summation of these three articles is this, and it comes from the tales that Satan himself wrote. For Satan is the God of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4). Satan is the “prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2). This is HIS society, the society that follows HIM. He inspires Stephen King novels and Harry Potter. He inspired Homer and Aesop. He inspires Charmed and the Exorcist. Or do you think a righteous GOD invented those lovely tales? And so since Satan is the one telling these tales, who is the greatest evil? Why, God! To Satan, God is the worst evil imaginable. And so in his tales, the evil ogre, the horrible monster, the 3-headed dragon, they represent a twisted satanic impression of God.

And so in these tales, these twisted horror stories you find on your TV and in classic literature, what use is a cross against an evil monster? Why, it wards off vampires! It protects against all manner of evil influences and spirits! All you have to do to make that evil monster leave is make the sign of the cross! Or carry a cross over your heart! Because if you have a cross over your heart, it keeps the monster from influencing your mind!

What does God want to do? Have access to your mind to influence it! He wants you to obey Him FROM THE HEART! But guess what? Having a cross over your heart DOES prevent that “monster”, as Satan calls Him, from entering your heart!

God WILL NOT enter a heart with a cross over it! Because that cross is a symbol of His enemies, and wearing it means that you have SURRENDERED to those enemies! And He HATES the cross! And God will NOT be in your house if you have a cross – so yes! A cross WILL ward off that so-called “evil spirit” that wants to enter your heart and write His laws there (Hebrews 10:16).

Having crosses is a DIRECT violation of the second commandment (Exodus 20:4). It isn’t really a symbol of Him at all, but a symbol of Satan (see Crystal’s article, “The Christian Cross Is Pagan“), and even if it WERE a symbol or picture of Him, He wouldn’t want you revering it (See my article, “Pictures of Jesus are a Sin“), and finally – the very THOUGHT of worshiping the instrument that killed God is absurd!

Hebrews 6:4,6 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened … If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

Jesus doesn’t WANT Crucified again! He doesn’t want you to even SYMBOLICALLY crucify Him again! He did NOT enjoy the experience the first time! If you have a cross in your home, you are putting Jesus to an OPEN SHAME and crucifying Him all over again every time you look at it!

So keep your cross! Ward off God’s spirit! Invite the evil creatures who love to watch the shame of Christ into your home! That same shame which Jesus despised, and which, if you were a TRUE Christian, one who acted as Jesus acted (1 John 2:6) and thought as HE thought (Philippians 2:5), you would despise also!

If you want to ward off Satan’s spirit however, you don’t need an outward symbol of any kind. If you want a sign that you are GOD’S and not Satan’s… then all you have to do is obey God.

John 13:35 BY THIS shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

By THIS – not by a cross on your wall, but by THIS – men will know that you are a follower of GOD! THAT is the sign that you love God. Not some cross or some other physical symbol. And if you want to show you love God, He gives explicit instructions:

John 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

Carrying a cross breaks Commandment #2. You cannot show you love God as long as you own a cross,. But maybe that’s what you want! And so yes! If you want to ward off God’s spirit, buy HUNDREDS of crosses. Better yet, buy crucifixes – really rub God’s suffering in! Make it as vivid and gross as possible! Make it so graphic that it almost makes you want to throw up when you see that wretched Being dying on the cross!

But if you want to invite God’s spirit in your home, then take those crosses – the ones on your wall, the ones on your clothes, the ones in your jewelry box, the ones on the cover of your Bible… burn them! destroy them, grind them to powder and show God that you HATE the symbols of His enemies as much as He does!

Otherwise the day will come when God will do to you what I just recommended you to do with your crosses. Think about that.