It is interesting to note the difference here betweenOswald Chambers view of the Cross, which is entirely Biblical, and many of the Emergent Church, who see or view the whole act of Atonement on the cross as vile and repugnant and has nothing to do with the God of the Bible. Seeing that they do not believe in the Bible as the infallible and inerrant Word of God, it is no surprise that they do not accept the most important aspect of Jesus coming as a man to die on the cross in our stead, as the greatest humility ever witnessed by man.
All I can add is that they do not know the God of the Bible.
This is what Oswald has to say about the Cross:
THE COLLISION OF GOD AND SIN
“Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree.” 1 Peter 2:24
The Cross of Jesus is the revelation of God’s judgment on sin. Never tolerate the idea of martyrdom about the Cross of Jesus Christ. The Cross was a superb triumph in which the foundations of hell were shaken. There is nothing more certain in Time or Eternity than what Jesus Christ did on the Cross: He switched the whole of the human race back into a right relationship with God. He made Redemption the basis of human life, that is, He made a way for every son of man to get into communion with God. The Cross did not happen to Jesus: He came on purpose for it. He is “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” The whole meaning of the Incarnation is the Cross. Beware of separating God manifest in the flesh from the Son becoming sin. The Incarnation was for the purpose of Redemption. God became incarnate for the purpose of putting away sin; not for the purpose of Self-realization.
The Cross is the centre of Time and of Eternity, the answer to the enigmas of both. The Cross is not the cross of a man but the Cross of God, and the Cross of God can never be realized in human experience. The Cross is the exhibition of the nature of God, the gateway whereby any individual of the human race can enter into union with God. When we get to the Cross, we do not go through it; we abide in the life to which the Cross is the gateway. The centre of salvation is the Cross of Jesus, and the reason it is so easy to obtain salvation is because it cost God so much. The Cross is the point where God and sinful man merge with a crash and the way to life is opened – but the crash is on the heart of God.
This excerpt below is taken from a short article called “A Slaughterhouse Religion?” found in the Lighthouse newsletter of 23/02/2007
This is what Emerson Fosdick had to say about the Cross:
Liberal theologian Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878-1969) said that the idea of Jesus’ death on a Cross as a substitution for the sins of others was a slaughterhouse religion. In his book, The Modern Use of the Bible, Fosdick explains his views, saying that Jesus Christ going to the Cross should be looked at as more of an example of a life of service and sacrifice and not compared with “old animal sacrifices” and “made ‘a pious fraud’ played by God upon the devil” (p. 230). Fosdick believed that the idea that God would actually send His Son to death on a Cross to take our place is the basis for a violent and bloody religion. Fosdick rejected the biblical message of the Cross. And a long trail of “Christian” teachers have followed suit.
