The Wonderful Cross

I love this song. On this Easter Season I had to make myself pause and ponder Easter. Our life has gotten really crazy lately. Darin is up for a promotion at his new job and he has had to work long hours to show that he is ready for it. I have been working long hours with my job trying to meet the qualifications to move up in my company and with three kids it has been CRAZY! With school, church and baseball season kicking off I feel pulled in so many different directions. Easter is more that dress shopping and shoe shopping and getting Easter baskets ready. I just had to stop and take a minute to breathe. Breathe in God's goodness and peace while pondering the reality of the cross.


What does it mean to me? A couple of years ago I was shopping in Fredericksburg with my sister-in-laws and one of our other friends. We were having a girl’s day. (Which reminds me. We need another one of those soon!) Let me explain the difference in my sister-in-laws and me for this story to make sense. I am a Texas gal. Big hair, bright clothes and I love BLING. I am a zebra print and hot pink kind of gal. My SILs are very Pottery Barn style. They are very elegant and minimal with their styles. Now we all love jewelry but our tasted are completely different. So we were in a jewelry story in Fredericksburg and I found some of the prettiest big crosses to wear on necklaces. They had all stones, all sizes and all colors. I was so excited and could not pick which one I liked the best. My SIL laughed and said, "Yes those are you. I just can't bring myself to wear the cross like that. It is beautiful on you but feel sacrilegious to me." She did not mean it judgmental and I did not take it that way. (It did make me stop and ponder because on my shopping list for the day was a shirt with a bedazzled cross on the front, like they sell in Fredrick berg.) It has been a joke between us since then. The next year for Christmas, she got me a gift card to my favorite store, Hannah D's. In honor of her I purchased a big teal and bling cross and a pink ball cap with a cross on the front in jewels. But I have thought about her statement since then. Why do I wear the cross and am I personally convicted that I wear it for fashion. I collect crosses too and have them in every room of the house. I am not debating whether we should wear the cross or not decorate our houses with it. But ponder what the cross means. I want my children to know what it means and what it means to me. "Oh the Wonderful, Cross. Oh the Wonderful Cross. Bids me come and die, and find that I might truly live. Oh the Wonderful, Cross. Oh the Wonderful Cross. All who gather here by grace draw near and bless your name." I am humbled by the sacrifice of the cross and am nothing apart from it. It is the visualization of the amount of love Jesus lavished upon me, paying my debts with his own life. It is power of his resurrection that flows through me to live a life above fear. I think that my personality is just bigger and the bigger the cross around my neck or in my house just is my way of expressing the love I have for my King in my own way.

Oh Jesus. Thank you for the Wonderful Cross. Thank you for enduring a shame that was never yours to carry. Let me live my life in a way that is worthy of that sacrifice and the love that you lavish upon me.