Crosses and Signposts

Satellite navigation is a great thing. But it kind of takes the work out of your long trips.

Last week I had to drive from Durham to Calver in Derbyshire to Cliff College to be precise. Cliff is nestled into some amazing countryside in the peak district National Park. I was on my way to have a meeting to discuss my dissertation that will finish off my Masters degree in Mission specialising in Celtic Mission and Christianity.

It's a tricky journey. But this time I decided I was going to go Sat Navless! I was going to rely on the signposts.

I was fine for the first part of the journey down the A1 onto the M1 down to junction 28 and then followed the signs to Chesterfield. I was listening to Talk Sport on the Radio as I drove. I was so engrossed in one of the discussions that I missed a signpost in Chesterfield at a large roundabout.

So I guessed.

I ended up going horribly wrong.

I turned onto a road that I fast realised was a major road out of Chesterfield.

It was fourteen miles before I found a slip road to get off it and turn back round!

I'd gone almost 30 miles out of my way by the time I reached the roundabout where I had gone wrong in the first place!

I connected with the right road this time and found my way to college easily after that.

As I drove through the breathtaking scenery in an area called Hope Valley a really clear voice spoke into my thoughts.

It was a question.

Is the cross a signpost or a destination?

It was a really strange but stirring question.

As I thought about I began to think seriously on the side of the cross can't be a destination as it points to so much more.

For Jesus the cross was not his final destination.

So I guess it could be a signpost.

I thought about the wrong turn I'd just made that had caused me so much stress.

My mind began to show me the times in my life I had got as far as the cross and then took a wrong turn or worse just never went beyond the cross. I began to see the many people I minister to on a daily basis some of whom seem to get to the cross or let me take them to the cross with some baggage or with some issues or with deep seated needs only to decide that they would be better going another way usually deal with things on their own terms. I've done it myself so many times.
I'd not really seen the cross as a signpost in the same light before.

The cross points us to something beyond, to something better, to something that is full of life.

After all that's what the resurrection is about yeah?

The thing is if we see the cross as a destination then what we will find is, well, death?
I know there is real significance in the death of Jesus, of course there is.

But Jesus did not stay dead.

So for him the cross was not a destination.

It was signpost for eternity, to something wildly beyond our deepest dreams.

It seems to be to be so much more of a signpost. Pointing us to a better way.

I saw this in action just last week. In our Church Sanctuary 21 Salvation Army in Durham. We have many broken and needy people who belong to our community. The homeless, the poor, who have virtually nothing get drawn to us as if a massive spiritual magnet is drawing them to us to find a family really.

One of the guys, a guy called David came in last Saturday. David has never been to school. He has difficulty with basic things such as reading and literacy. He is really poor he has nothing. He has few friends.

He is so amazing.

We love him so much at our place.

He came in last Saturday and he looked troubled.

So troubled.

I asked him what's up? He told me in a really sad voice that he had argued with his best friend and he had lost his temper and had shouted at her and they were not talking. One of the things David does is that he draws. He loves to draw pictures. He asks everybody can I draw you something. Lots of people in our community often get drawings. I certainly get a different drawing every day almost!

It is such an honour to receive them.

He has no-one else to give his pictures to. And I love to watch his face as people tell him how amazing these pictures are as they thank him for them. It somehow makes a difference to him, he almost wears a sense of worth, something he doesn't experience from the world. The drawings are really childlike. But they are usually pictures he draws straight from bible stories. Just after he had told me about the argument, he asked me could he draw me a picture today? I said of course. He said that he would like to draw a picture of the cross. So he got his little 49p exercise book out and a pencil. I went to make us both a cup of tea as he drew. I watched through the hatch in the kitchen as he drew. I noticed that as he drew, tears were falling from his eyes direct on to the paper. I kind of left him for a few minutes until I knew he was finished. I could see he was having some kind of special moment as he drew the cross. I went back in with our tea, and I sat down opposite him. I asked him why he was so emotional. He said that as he was drawing three crosses on a hill, he began to think about the argument with his friend and he said, "Gary I wanted to draw Jesus on the cross but I realised that he had moved on. And if he could move on after going through what he went through I suddenly knew that I had to ring my friend no matter what she had done and I had to make it up with her."

That is the power of the resurrection guys.

I held back the tears just as he shared this with me. The cross to David that morning was a signpost. A signpost to a better way.

This Easter it's something to think about.

Don't make the cross your destination.

Let it point you to something more.

Much more.

Choose life not death whatever your circumstances.

Be blessed, so blessed this Easter guys.