John Milton was one of the great English poets. In 1629, he wrote his ever lovely, "On the Morning of Christ's Nativity."

A year later, he attempted to write a companion poem to it on "The Passion." After some eight toilsome verses had been written, he gave it up. Sometime later, he wrote these words about the unfinished poem: "The subject the author finding to be above the years he had when he wrote it, and nothing satisfied with what was begun, left it unfinished."

Today, many Christians are also powerless to explain or to put into words the meaning of the Cross. But no preacher can leave the matter unfinished as John Milton did. There is something haunting about it which will not let us put it aside.

When Walker Railey was pastor of First United Methodist Church in Dallas, they had a…