What "The Cross Is Drawing Near" means
Keith Getty and Stuart Townend write liturgical songs for the church calendar with the kind of precision that only comes from believing the calendar matters. This song is a Lenten piece, and the title is both temporal and theological. As Lent progresses, the cross draws near. Not in time alone, but in the congregation's attention, in their awareness, in the weight they are being asked to carry with Christ in these forty days. The phrase "drawing near" implies movement, approach, a closing of the distance between the present moment and the event being remembered. Lenten worship is not primarily historical recreation. It is participation: the congregation entering into the movement of Jesus toward Jerusalem, toward betrayal, toward the cross. Getty and Townend write that movement into the song. The redemption and cross tags locate the song's theological center, and the lent and church-calendar tags mark its liturgical home. At 75 BPM in G, the song has the gravity of Lenten reflection without becoming penitential to the point of crushing the congregation. There is sorrow here, but there is also purpose, and the song holds both.
What this song does in a room
In a Lenten service, this song does the work of orienting the congregation toward Jerusalem. It does not allow the season to stay abstract or devotional in a private sense. It places the cross in the road ahead and asks the congregation to keep walking toward it. That is theologically important and emotionally complex. Most congregations are more comfortable lingering in Christmas or Easter than sitting with Lent. A song that names the cross drawing near is giving the congregation permission to feel the weight of the season without skipping ahead to resurrection. Rooms that have been through the Lenten disciplines and arrived at this song in a mid-Lent service often receive it as an acknowledgment of something they were already feeling but did not have language for. That is what a well-placed liturgical song does.
What this song is saying about God
The theological vision in this song is of a God who did not avoid the cross but moved toward it deliberately. The cross is drawing near not because it overtook Jesus but because he walked toward it with his eyes open. That agency matters enormously for the congregation's understanding of what the cross means. This was not tragedy. It was intention. The redemption tag confirms the purpose: the cross is drawing near because that is where redemption lives. Getty and Townend's Christology is consistently high, and this song continues that pattern. The Jesus approaching the cross in this song is fully in command of what is happening to him and why.
Scriptural backbone
Luke 9:51 is foundational: "As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem." The word "resolutely" in Greek suggests a setting of the face, a deliberate forward movement. Isaiah 53:3-5 provides the prophetic grounding: "He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed." John 12:27 gives the interior life of the movement: "Now my soul is troubled, and what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour."
How to use it in a service
This song belongs in the mid-to-late Lenten season, particularly on the Sundays approaching Holy Week. Palm Sunday and Holy Week services are natural homes. It can also serve as a thematic song during a sermon series on the passion narrative or on the theology of suffering. If your congregation does not observe Lent formally, this song still works as a response to any sermon that engages the cross seriously, not as a decoration but as the pivot point of human history. Position it after a scripture reading from the passion narrative to allow the textual weight to precede the musical response. The liturgical and lent tags indicate that this song knows its season. Let it inhabit that season fully.
Things to watch for as the worship leader
Lenten worship requires a different emotional key from you as a leader. The posture is not sadness for its own sake, but it is sober and attentive. If you are used to leading with energy and uplift, Lent calls for a different gear: stillness, weight, presence. This song rewards that posture. Lead it with your feet on the ground and your attention fully on what the words are saying. The congregation will follow your lead. If you treat this as just another worship song with no particular gravity, that is what they will feel. If you treat it as a song about the cross drawing near, and the cross actually means something to you, the room will receive it differently.
A note for the team behind you (techs, vocalists, band)
The Getty and Townend sonic environment applies here: piano-led, restrained, harmonically precise. Keys: a slightly darker piano voicing than you might use for an Easter song. The lower register can be used with more authority in a Lenten piece. Organ: optional but effective for the processional quality of the song. Drums: very restrained. Brushes on snare, minimal cymbal. If the room and tradition support it, no drums at all. The bare, unadorned sound suits the Lenten season. Guitar: acoustic, perhaps fingerpicked, not strummed. Strings or a string pad will add appropriate weight without drama. Background vocalists: blend and precision. No runs or expressive individuality. The song is moving toward the cross; the vocals should reflect that gravity. FOH engineer: a somewhat dry, intimate mix. The reflective quality of Lent is served by a mix that feels close, not cavernous.