Page |1

The power and authority of the pastorate rests in a correct understanding of Christian theology.

Many theological venues exist but none fulfill this necessary pastoral corollary as well as the theology of

the cross (theologia crucis). In it one finds primary examples of faith, hope, divine love, fellowship, and

power. So it has been since the time of Luther, so it is now. How does the theology of the cross not only

inform and enlighten pastoral ministry, but also offer the recipient of pastoral ministry, the ones to whom

a pastor is called to minister, insights into the God they worship? This we will examine.

A church body demonstrates its confidence in a woman or man to be a minister of the gospel by

the act of ordination. Ordination charges typically follow the directions that the Apostle Paul gave to his

son in the faith, Timothy: “…proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or

unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching. …always be sober,

endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, carry out your ministry fully” (2 Timothy 4: 1-5, NRSV,

annotated). Since these are the commands that emanate from Scripture and are repeated by church

authority, the wise pastor follows them. In the theology of the cross, obvious to all who read the Scripture

and expounded on by such leading theologians as Martin Luther and Jürgen Moltmann, one finds the

means and guidance to accomplish said commands.

“The theology of the cross is a theology of (1) faith—not sight; (2) hope—not finality or

consummation; and (3) love—not power.”1 This is critical understanding in light of the promise of First

Corinthians chapter thirteen: “and now faith, hope and love abide, these three…” Pastors must share the

truth of the Message of Jesus Christ to their congregants in light of Jesus’ fulfillment of prophecy, his

sacrificial and suffering redemption and his glorious rule alongside the Father. Through these guiding

principles from Scripture will be found truthful direction for the pastoral task.

1
Hall, Douglas John. Theology of the Cross: Challenge and Opportunity for the Post-Christendom Church, in
Trelstad, Marit, editor. Cross Examinations: Readings on the Meaning of the Cross Today, Minneapolis, MN:
Fortress Press, 2006, page 255.
 Page |2

“In Christianity the cross is the test of everything which deserves to be called Christian.” 2 So

begins one’s introduction to the theology of the cross. Without the cross and all it entails, one cannot

witness what is truly Christian in nature. This requires faith. Paul Tillich writes,

It is the Church under the Cross which alone can do this, the Church which preaches the Crucified
who cried to God who remained his God after the God of confidence had left him in the darkness
of doubt and meaninglessness. To be as a part in such a church is to receive a courage to be in
which one cannot lose one’s self and in which one receives one’s world. 3

Faith becomes more than mere acquiescence to another’s thoughts when placed in such a shadow of the

cross. It is necessary for it to be accepted as one’s own. Faith grows and extends out of the practice of

Christian living.

In Luther’s own expression, ‘This is clear, that he who does not know Christ, does not know the
hidden God in his suffering.’ Nonetheless, it is still Luther’s contention that the essence of God is
made known in the Cross (theologia crucis). By this he intends to suggest that the true character
of God is made known but in a veiled form open only to faith…. ‘God is exactly such as he is
manifested in the act of Christ. There is no other God [Luther’s phrase]. All other ‘conceptions’ of
God are eliminated. As far as the Christian faith is concerned they are nothing but caricatures.’ 4

When faith becomes one’s own, when it appropriates her being, her heart, her very soul and self, then the

theology of the cross begins to enlighten the story of God that has been “veiled” for too long. This begins

a journey of faith where faith begets faith, where the continuing revelations of God to the one of faith

bring a higher understanding accompanied by increased faith.

“At the heart of the New Testament’s witness to Christ’s resurrection lies the basic confession that

all of Christ’s suffering and death occurred ‘according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God’

(Acts 2.23). Although this conviction is not spelled out with the same theological formulation as that of

Acts, this basic Christian belief provided the motivation for the four gospels to bear witness to the life of

2
Moltmann, Jürgen. The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and Criticism of Christian
Theology, Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993 page 7.
3
Tillich, Paul. The Courage to Be, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1952 page 188.
4
Dunning, H. Ray. Grace, Faith and Holiness: A Wesleyan Systematic Theology, Kansas City, MO: Beacon Hill
Press, 1988 page 112.
 Page |3

Jesus as an unfolding of God’s eternal purpose for the world.” 5 The pastor who understands that it is God

in Christ that is born of a virgin, God in Christ who reveals himself bodily through the Perfect Man and it

is God in Christ that suffers and dies in the City of the Jews will realize that her position is clearly

directed by faith. Faith is empowered in the pastor and in the realm of the pastor’s influence when there is

no “separations of powers” in the Trinity. “However, the New Testament alters this pessimism with the

joyful proclamation that the age to come has broken into history, not with tumult in earth and heaven, but

quietly in the person and work of Jesus Christ, and the powers have been engaged and defeated at the

Cross.”6 This “joyful proclamation” is the pastor’s to share.

The proclamation of such faith cannot but lead to hope. The current world is no different from the

worlds of the church’s predecessors except in the matter of degree. Today’s newspapers daily open to

tragedy. There is every reason to feel hopeless when faced with events on every level; local, state,

national and international. The pastor steps before God’s people to provide hope in the depths of hopeless

times. Alicia Vargas writes on the matter of leading Latinas into the “Cross Story.” However, her

leadership is pertinent to all who live under the shadow of hopelessness and opens hopefulness to those

who will gladly stand in the shadow of Christ’s cross. “Many more deaths and resurrections will occur

while the task of appropriation continues, but, no doubt, the Latinos are up to la lucha, the struggle.

We’ve been there. We have died on the cross with Christ again and again and we have found there the

hope in the resurrections that are the gifts from his cross. In that hope our stories will continue.” 7 Not only

are Latinos up to this struggle, but all of Christ’s followers can claim such success when examining the

theology of the cross. “…it is God who is met in Christ. The act of Christ is the saving act of God (cf.

Phil. 2:6). This is said in an even more exclusive way in Romans 9: 5 (“…to them belong the Patriarchs,

and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God blessed forever”).” 8

5
Childs, Brevard S. Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments: Theological Reflection on the Christian
Bible, Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993 page 476.
6
Dunning, page 387.
7
Vargas, Alicia. Reading Ourselves into the Cross Story: Luther and United States Latinos in Trelstad, Marit, editor.
Cross Examinations page 163.
8
Strecker, Georg. Theology of the New Testament. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996 page 112.
 Page |4

The Apostle Paul is the divinely inspired author of the words, “…and the greatest of these is

love.” The greatest of all things is love and none more so than the divine love of God for his lost and

lonely children.

With a Trinitarian theology of the cross faith escapes the dispute between and the alternative of
theism and atheism: God is not only other-worldly but also this-worldly; he is not only God, but
also man; he is not only rule, authority and law but the event of suffering, liberating love.
Conversely, the death of the Son is not the ‘death of God’, but the beginning of that God event in
which the life-giving spirit of love emerges from the death of the Son and the grief of the Father. 9

The theology of the cross defines for the pastor the love of God in ways previously unimagined. While it

is normal to consider the cross as a means of evil men led by their Father, the Devil, to put a supposed end

to the best of all Men; this is not an actuality. In its place, the theology of the cross opens up an entirely

new conversation about the love of God. “The fact of this love can be contradicted. It can be crucified,

but in crucifixion it finds its fulfillment and becomes love of the enemy. Thus its suffering proves to be

stronger than hate.”10 This may be the greatest paradox of Christian history. Through this paradox,

however, the pastor is given the tools to mediate perhaps the greatest awakening of her people in some

time. Through the theology of the cross, one can come to a realization and experience of the Almighty

that surpasses any past event. Scripture asserts that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). “The one who is capable

of love is also capable of suffering, for he also opens himself to the suffering which is involved in love,

and yet remains superior to it by virtue of his love.” 11

Love requires suffering to be love. Can one love without being willing to suffer for the object of

that love? Forbid the thought! The love of God is such that he is willing to suffer intensely for the object

of his love. Whether it be the Father’s love for us, as testified to in Scripture, or the Father’s love for the

Son, as witnessed in all aspects of the life of Jesus; his love cannot be controverted and it cannot be

denied. The love of God prevents God from avoiding suffering. The love of God cannot allow God to not

9
Moltmann, page 252.
10
Ibid., page 248.
11
Ibid., page 230.
 Page |5

suffer. Just the opposite, as the love of God is greater than any other love, so his suffering must also be

supreme.

One might question the validity of such a claim, that God’s love prevents him from avoiding

suffering. George Eldon Ladd reminds us,

The events in effecting salvation are the age-long hidden purpose of God, the historical fact of
the crucifixion of Jesus, the revelation of the redemptive meaning of the cross in the apostolic
kerygma, illumination by the Spirit in believing response to the proclamation issuing in salvation.
The gospel is, therefore, the proclamation of the historical fact and the redemptive meaning of the
cross, which includes both present and future blessings. Humankind cannot conceive of what
wonderful things God has prepared for those who love him; but God has revealed the blessings
that await the eschatological consummation, for these are implicit in the cross (1 Cor. 2: 9-10). 12

This is the good news that the pastor is called to preach. The love of God is so great as to require his

suffering and so comprehensive as to provide everything his children can need. This is seen most clearly

in the abandonment of Christ on the cross. “[The origin of Christology] lies in what took place between

Jesus and his God, between the ‘Father’ and Jesus, in what was given expression in his (italics mine)

preaching and his actions and was literally ‘put to death’ in his abandonment as he died.” 13 It may be

difficult for one to comprehend just what this abandonment entailed. For if, as we have shown, Jesus and

the Father are one, and, Jesus was in the Father and the Father in him; then, it logically follows that in

Jesus, God himself was crucified and died. In God’s abandonment of Jesus in response to the willing

acceptance of humanity’s sin, God abandoned God.

The cross of Christ is the perfect intersection (┼) of Jesus’ humanity and his divinity. Prior to the

cross, Jesus’ humanity seems at the forefront. Following the cross event, his divinity seems to move to the

fore. But at the perfect intersection of the cross, the complete and complex “God-man” is revealed. The

dynamic love of the Incarnate God, God made flesh, God with us; is evident as he dies abandoned by the

One with Whom he has shared all eternity. God abandons God out of love for his creation. “Why did

Jesus die? He died not only because of the understanding of the law by his contemporaries or because of

Ladd, George Eldon. A Theology of the New Testament, Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans
12

Publishing Company, 1974 page 423.

13
Moltmann, page 149.
 Page |6

Roman power politics, but ultimately because of his God and Father.” 14 This previously un-considered

“perfect storm” of divine/human interaction is the place where pastoral ministry may reside. If the pastor

is wise enough to stay there. The Pauline functions alluded to previously may all be met in the cross and

crucifixion of Jesus. It is in abandonment where God meets humanity. It is in suffering where God

empathizes with humanity. It is divine love that drives God to the ultimate acts of love.

While the pastoral office sees its share of joys and celebrations; it is also subject to the sorrows

and limitations of humanity. Dr. Neil Wiseman tells the story of a family in the church he pastored in

Pompano Beach who had a child die. When he went to call on the grieving family, he did not offer sage

clichés or fatherly wisdom. His response upon the residence door’s opening was, “I have come to cry with

you.”15 While a terrible moment to spend in ministry, this is but one example of the human experience

that a pastor will share. She will also be overwhelmed at times, trying to make sense of tragedy in the

world in her own mind so that she may then comfort her congregants. “Only when it is recognized what

took place between Jesus and his Father on the cross can it speak of the significance of this God for those

who suffer and protest at the history of the world. …God himself loves and suffers the death of Christ in

his love.”16 At the intersection of the perfect man’s divinity and the perfect God’s humanity lies the cross.

There is found in this intersection, in this junction, the love and the grace to soothe the grieving and to

give voice to the voiceless. “And the greatest of these is love.”

When faith, hope and love are experienced through the theology of the cross, fellowship and

community follow. Whether it be the shared joys of salvation that bring together the Body of Christ, or

the shared sufferings of a mistreated or persecuted people; fellowship and community live in the shadow

of the cross. Alicia Vargas writes, “As a community that has to try continuously to assert its presence and

voice, we come together in our faith in the Christ who was also silenced and killed on a cross.” 17 Again,

she writes for the Latino community, but her sentiment can be freely adopted by all of Christianity.
14
Ibid.
15
Personal experience shared with the author by Dr. Wiseman.
16
Moltmann, page 227.
17
Vargas, Alicia. Reading Ourselves into the Cross Story, page 160.
 Page |7

Christians are a community that needs to assert its voice and presence and who also can find a communal

faith in the killing cross. It would be useful for pastors to foster this sense of community among all

Christians. Denominations are not so different that they cannot fellowship together well. They share the

same sufferings, they share the same hopes and dreams; they rely on the same Christ. It is fruitful to be

joined with sisters and brothers of other denominations.

We become true men in the community of the incarnate, the suffering and loving, the human God.
This salvation, too, is outwardly permanent and immortal in the humanity of God, but in itself it
is a new life full of inner movement, with suffering and joy, love and pain, taking and giving; it is
changeableness in the sense of life to its highest possible degree. 18

It is the pastor’s great joy to lead and participate in the communal family of God. God’s family is her

family, God’s joy his joy. When communities of faith realize that they serve a God who was not willing to

send a Surrogate, as Jesus might be supposed to be; rather became Incarnate so that it was God who

experienced the life we emulate. It was God who suffered, it was God who died, it was God who was

raised to new life, as we shall be. It is the Trinitarian God we love and serve.

The power and authority of the pastorate rests in a correct understanding of Christian theology. So

this paper began, so it shall end. But as this activity draws to a close, consider where the concept of

pastoral “power” truly resides.

The Cross may be interpreted as God’s final word to the issue of suffering. The Old Testament
struggles repeatedly with this problem and offers penultimate proposals that point toward the
Cross. The Book of Job is the best known of these attempts. The striking thing about this theodicy
is that the book introduces at least five proposed rational solutions to suffering, but its final word
is found when Job transcends his predicament and comes to put implicit faith in God:

Then Job answered the Lord:

‘I know that thou canst do all things,
And that no purpose of thine can be thwarted.
‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
Things too wonderful for me,
Which I did not know. ‘Hear, and I will speak;
I will question you, and you declare to me.’
I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear

18
Moltmann, page 231.
 Page |8

But now my eye sees thee;

Therefore I despise myself,
And repent in dust and ashes. Job 42: 1-5

This is not a rational but a personal answer. The high point of the Old Testament’s effort to make
sense out of suffering is found in the Suffering Servant passages in Isaiah 40 – 55, where the
suffering of God’s righteous servant is seen to be redemptive. It is but one short step to Calvary,
where the Servant suffers and, in the moment of His most intense agony reflected in the cry of
dereliction from the Cross, masters evil. Thus we see from this perspective, once again, that in
Christian faith evil and suffering are presented to us, not as a problem to be solved, but as a
challenge, as something to be overcome with redemptive consequences. William Robinson
suggests that we see three things in the Cross: (1) We see, in the face of all contrary evidence, that
God is love. (2) We see that God is righteous, that He is not indifferent to moral considerations.
And (3) we see that this is no mere piece of information—‘cold comfort for such distress as ours.
Involved in it is the action of God.’19

Pastoral power and authority are only available through the Crucified God, to borrow Moltmann’s phrase.

God has shown that true power and authority are not lorded over men “as the Gentiles do,” rather it is

sought and found in servanthood and weakness. Through the theology of the cross, one finds a loving and

suffering God who is willing to forsake all power and all glory, who seeks not triumphalism but relishes

in the shared events of his children’s lives and who is willing to invest in “the least of these” to their great

joy.

The theology of the cross is a theology of love, not of power. The contrast between love and
power is both dramatic and subtle. Some people like to speak about the ‘power of love,’ as
though love were just another kind of power, maybe the most powerful. But if it’s a power, love is
the only power that, to achieve its aim, must become weak. A love that ‘comes on strong,’ trying
to take the beloved by storm, is a contradiction in terms. Love that’s real has to accommodate
itself to the condition of the beloved. That is what God, in the crucified Christ, has done and is
doing. As Reinhold Niebuhr put it, ‘The crux of the cross is its revelation of the fact that the final
power of God over humankind is derived from the self-imposed weakness of God’s love.’ Paul
Tillich was fond of quoting Luther on the same theme: ‘If God had come in power, He would not
have won our hearts. ‘God made himself small for us in Christ.’20

Pastoral ministry and mission is summed up in this: God’s love for humanity is such that he was

willing to step away from the power and glory that belonged solely to him as Sovereign and enter into

what he already knew was a dangerous and sinful place. Enough emphasis cannot be placed on the

importance of this. Outside of such, outside of the Incarnation, one merely finds superstition and myth. It

is only through the Incarnation and its attending life, ministry and death, that one finds the True God. The

19
Dunning, page 254-255.
20
Hall, page 257.
 Page |9

One True God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Abba, Father that Jesus loved suffered and died,

not vicariously, but actually, and in so doing directs and informs the lives of his creation. Pastors who do

not forsake the cross, who do not turn from the intersection of God’s own humanity and Jesus’ own

divinity, who do not seek the “seat on the right and on the left,” but, within their own weaknesses and

humility, strive only to love God and neighbor with God’s example of love ever before them; these

pastors will fulfill God’s call on their lives. And God will empower their ministry and mission.