Without the knowledge of right division between Israel's program of prophecy and law and the Paul's program of grace and mystery, one will find many supposed discrepancies or contradictions in the Bible. These, however, are easily explained when you understand that the two passages below each come from one of the two separate programs, in which life, faith, conditions, and divine instructions were very different. In the same way, the cross was seen as a very different object between the two dispensations.
The following scripture is based on Israel's Kingdom program (before the revealing of the Grace program given to Paul by the glorified and risen Jesus Christ). In this passage the apostle Peter is preaching to Jews and mentioned that they killed their Messiah, allowing Him to be nailed to a cross, which was one of the most shameful and cursed positions to be placed in during those days (Galatians 3:13; Deuteronomy 21:22-23). (See the appendix at the bottom of this post for more information about this fact)**.
Acts 3:13-15 The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go. 14 But ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted unto you; 15 And killed the Prince of life, whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses.
In Romans 1:16, which belongs to our grace dispensation, Paul writes something so utterly contradictory to the understanding of the cross in his day, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ (ie: that Christ died on the cross), for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes ...". Why would Paul say he is not ashamed of the cross? Well, the reason is (as we have read above), that the cross was the most dishonourable and despicable of all objects, and to be sentenced to a cross was the most vile, shameful and cursed thing place to be. But something must have happened for Paul to have such a profound change of view about the cross. It was a mystery, a revelation of the secret meaning of the cross that God revealed to Paul that completely changed his views, his life and his ministry.
Paul's view (and that of every Christian after him) is to see the cross not as a curse, but as a saving grace. God changed the meaning of the cross of Christ to something so deeply graceful, loving and redeeming, that our eternal existence is connected to what Christ did on that object.
Galatians 6:14 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 unto the world.
God forbid that I too will glory in the cross of Christ and the very gospel of grace that contains this good news. Hallelujah for the wisdom and grace of our God!
**ADDENDUM
In the ancient world crucifixion was nothing to boast about. It is to be noted that the cross was an offense to the Romans and a curse to the Jews. The New Testament Scholar F. F. Bruce writes that the object of Paul's present boast, the cross, was by all ordinary standards of his day, the most dishonourable and despicable of all objects — a matter of unrelenting shame, not boasting. It is difficult, (after sixteen centuries and more, during which the cross has been a sacred symbol), to realize the unspeakable horror and loathing which the very mention or thought of the cross provoked in Paul's day. The word "crux" was unmentionable in polite Roman society (Cicero, Pro Rabirio 16); even when one was being condemned to death by crucifixion the ruling verdict used an archaic phrase to avoid the "dreaded" word: arbori infelici suspendito, "Hang him on the unlucky tree" (Cicero, ibid. 13). In the eastern provinces of the empire the Greek word stauros ("cross") must have inspired comparable dread and disgust to its Latin equivalent.1
Thus, it was shocking for Paul even to mention the cross, let alone boast about it. If anything, one would expect the first Christians to deny that Jesus died on the cross. Or at most, if they were honest, to admit this fact only with the greatest reluctance.
Far from being reluctant, however, Paul was eager to boast about the cross. As John Stott explains, "That which the average Roman citizen regarded as an object of shame, disgrace and even disgust was for Paul his pride, boasting and glory." 2 Indeed, the English word "boast" is not strong enough to express his attitude about the cross. There is no exact equivalent in the English language to the Greek word, "kauchaomai". It means: to boast in, to glory in, trust in, rejoice in, revel in, live for. The object of our boast or 'glory' fills our horizons, engrosses our attention, and absorbs our time and energy. In a word, our 'glory' is our obsession.
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1 F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians: A Commentary on the Greek Text,
New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans,
1982),p. 271.
2 John R. W. Stott, The Cross of Christ (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1986), p. 349. Ibid., p. 349.
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