The cross reminds us God cares …

As Easter looms just a couple days away, many of us find our thoughts returning more and more to the cross. We’re reminded of Jesus offering Himself on our behalf there. And we remember just how much God cares about us.

God could easily have been indifferent about our plight.

We ruined things with our choice for sin instead of obedience. It would have been easy for God to let us face the full brunt of our circumstances of our choices. But the cross of Christ is a loud and commanding demonstration that God cares for us, He is not an indifferent God.

Imagine what it would be like if God had chosen to be as indifferent toward us as we routinely are toward others. Renowned humanitarian and author, Elie Wiesel, once addressed Congress about “The Perils of Indifference”:

What is indifference? Etymologically, the word means “no difference.” A strange and unnatural state in which the lines blur between light and darkness, dusk and dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil. What are its courses and inescapable consequences? Is it a philosophy? Is there a philosophy of indifference conceivable? Can one possibly view indifference as a virtue? Is it necessary at times to practice it simply to keep one’s sanity, live normally, enjoy a fine meal and a glass of wine, as the world around us experiences harrowing upheavals?

Of course, indifference can be tempting — more than that, seductive. It is so much easier to look away from victims. It is so much easier to avoid such rude interruptions to our work, our dreams, our hopes. It is, after all, awkward, troublesome, to be involved in another person’s pain and despair. Yet, for the person who is indifferent, his or her neighbor are of no consequence. And, therefore, their lives are meaningless. Their hidden or even visible anguish is of no interest. Indifference reduces the Other to an abstraction.

Indifference, after all, is more dangerous than anger and hatred. Anger can at times be creative. One writes a great poem, a great symphony. One does something special for the sake of humanity because one is angry at the injustice that one witnesses. But indifference is never creative. Even hatred at times may elicit a response. You fight it. You denounce it. You disarm it.

Indifference elicits no response. Indifference is not a response. Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor — never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten. The political prisoner in his cell, the hungry children, the homeless refugees — not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory. And in denying their humanity, we betray our own.”

God was not indifferent to our plight, as the cross clearly shows.

His love, His compassion, His grace, His holiness were all too perfect to keep Him from acting.

And act He did!

As the cross demonstrates.

As a child of God, are you indifferent? Or are you acting on the behalf of others, in Jesus’ name?

Scotty