Even though He had power and authority, Jesus stayed on the cross to die because He loved you. Hear more about His sacrificial death in this Billy Graham sermon preached in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1982. Watch more #MondayNightClassics every Monday at 8 p.m. EDT. CONNECT with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association: on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BillyGrahamE… on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/BGEA on Twitter: https://twitter.com/BGEA on Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/bgea on YouTube:    / billygraham   on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@bgeaofficial

from our archives the Billy Graham

classics

now tonight I want you to turn with me

to a familiar passage of scripture

Galatians the sixth chapter Galatians

the sixth chapter and the 14th verse but

God forbid

that I should Glory save in the cross of

our Lord Jesus Christ by whom the world

is crucified unto me and I under the

world

just after the war Cliff barrows and I

came together he led the singing and I

did the preaching

and his wife and my wife and the four of

us went to England and we lived in

England during the winter of 1946 and

47. now London was almost totally

devastated and one of the things I

remember is that in all that Devastation

after the war and all the rubble there

stood Saint Paul’s Cathedral and on top

of Saint Paul’s was a cross

I remember when Coventry cathedral was

being built because it had been

destroyed during the war

and he was nearing completion a cross

was lured by helicopter and placed on

the top

a huge 25-foot wooden cross stands above

the fields of the Barrett horror of

Belson concentration camp

a tiny cross placed there by Sir Edmund

Hillary the first man to conquer the

peak of mountains is buried on the snow

and the ice at the summit of Mount

Everest

now you many of you are very religious

and you have embossed upon your Bibles

across or you wear a cross around your

neck and the thing that I want to ask

you tonight is this what does the cross

mean to you

why do all the Catholic churches and all

the Protestant churches have a cross

that’s the one thing we agree on is the

cross

the whole Christian world

Looks To the Cross

why did Paul say that he gloried in it

more than anything else in all the world

Paul could have gloried in his education

he was one of the most educated men of

his time he could have glory in his

religion he was very religious he could

have glory and his ability to speak

several languages he was fluent in

several he could have glad in the fact

that he was a Roman citizen but he

didn’t

or he could have glory and certain

things about Jesus Christ other than the

cross his spectacular miraculous birth

born of a virgin the Virgin Mary or the

great teaching of Christ even today

Educators say there’s never been a

teacher like Jesus Christ

or his great social work

his compassion for the poor and the

needy his concern for the hunger and the

sick

his amazing Resurrection from the dead

his future Glory when he’s going to rule

the world

and his kingdom is going to come

he could have glory in any of those

things but he said no I Glory only in

the cross and he said God forbid that I

should glory in anything else except the

cross

why

well I want you to think a moment and

look at that cross

it was the most cruel of all punishments

because the victims sometimes would hang

there for several days it took them

several days to die

and on this occasion they were

crucifying three people

two thieves murderers and Jesus in the

middle

the soldiers entered the guard house and

brought Jesus with the two other

condemned men they were beaten 33 times

so 39 times on their barebacks with

leather thongs with steel pellets on the

end a crown of thorns had been put on

Jesus brow a cross was laid upon his

back the procession started

Jerusalem was filled with a

carnival-like atmosphere at that time

and the procession went through the main

street so that all might see

that the criminal

and be warned of a similar fate if he

broke the laws of Rome a big crowd was

following

just a few of Jesus friends were

following

and Jesus became weakened by the loss of

blood then he fell

and so Simon of cyrenian Africa and

helped him Carry the Cross

the soldiers went quickly and

methodically about their task of driving

home the nails in his hands and despite

through his feet the crowd Mills around

jeering he saved others

himself he cannot save

they laughed and they mocked and they

made fun of him

come down do just one more Miracle they

say