The Magnet of the Nations: The Burj and the Cross

It doesn’t matter how many times we pass it. At the sight of the Burj Khalifa, my six-year-old exclaims, “It’s the tallest building in the world!” One of the restaurants near the tower’s base is unashamedly called “Babel.” Even the poetic inscription on the Burj Khalifa alludes to Old Testament cities of renown: “I am the power that lifts the world’s head proudly skywards, surpassing limits and expectations. Rising gracefully from the desert and honoring the city with a new glow.” 

Dubai is indeed a wealthy city of epic proportions.It draws the nations with the promise of prosperity and happiness. The Burj Khalifa is like a signal that draws those looking for a spectacle. The Burj inscription celebrates this, “I am the magnet that attracts the wide-eyed tourist, eagerly catching their postcard moment, the center for the world’s finest shopping, dining, and entertainment, and home for the world’s elite… I am Burj Khalifa.” It is a display of human ingenuity, pride, and creativity. In a way, it is glorious. 

The Burj Khalifa’s magnetic power starkly contrasts God’s foolishness and weakness. When God drew the nations, He used the cross. His magnetism was not a spectacular demonstration of power and wealth but a scandalous and offensive display of apparent folly and weakness. 

Simply Offensive 

When I lived in Mongolia, someone came to my door and handed me a little book. On the front was a picture of a dying man. The man was dying a horrible death, bloody and painful. It was grotesque. What kind of person goes to someone’s door and hands out this material? Underneath the picture were the words “Good News.”

It was startling. Astonishing, even.  

How can it be that this death was good? This man bled out and suffocated on the cross. He was probably picked at by birds while he hung there naked. He was shamed and mocked and publically held up as a weak fool. Polite company of the time would not even speak of “the cross” or “crucifiction” because of its brutality. To disseminate pictures and literature of a crucified person would have been considered barbaric and coarse.

Yet, God enters where polite company refuses to go. In that place, He displays His power. God did not build a Burj to draw the nations; He lifted the cross. The cross, the place of folly and weakness, became the epicenter of the cosmos. 

There Are No Tourists Here

Jesus claimed his death would draw the nations, “When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself.” The nations behold the crucified one. 

Jesus was alluding to themes in Isaiah that speak of the nations beholding the Suffering Servant. God said, “Behold, my servant shall act wisely; he shall be high and lifted up, and shall be exalted. As many were astonished at you— his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance.” Isaiah speaks of the nations seeing Him lifted up and being so shocked and astonished that they come and bow before Him. 

This was no “postcard moment.” Those drawn to the Crucified are not “wide-eyed tourists.” To stand at the foot of the cross in belief is to experience the power of God. There are no tourists here. The cross and resurrection, foolishness in the eyes of the world, create new life and offer true satisfaction and forgiveness of sins.

The best the world has to offer will satisfy only momentarily. It provides a moment of excitement, and then we are off to the next spectacle. But God’s apparent foolishness and weakness will satisfy for eternity: “For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” 

Here is true glory; come and see.

Verse references from 1 Cor. 1:20–31, John 12:32, and Isaiah 52:13–14.