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The story we find ourselves in
Christ:
If God creates a real universe, and if the people of this universe really
do have freedom to make choices, and if they make some bad choices, then
we really do have a problem.
The crisis is that we are disconnected from God, and from each other, and instead of helping the world become the world of God's dreams, we're turning it into a nightmare on all levels.
There's no sugar-coating, no watering down what we have done wrong; no
pretending that we never did it. Yet God provides an answer. All our guilt
and regret and shame, all the guilt, regret and shame of humanity, are
absorbed into God's pain, the pain Jesus made visible on the cross.
God forgives us, so none of our wrongs count for anything anymore. He actually forgets them, because he has made them worthless.
That's what the cross is all about. It was Jesus absorbing the punishment that all of us deserve. He became the substitute for all of us. As he suffered and died all our wrongs were paid for, so all of us can be forgiven.
The only way we can be rescued is by God's grace. God graciously rescues us, forgives us; we don't earn forgiveness at all, but we receive the gift, by grace, through faith.
The death of Jesus gives us a window into God's heart.
This is the story we find ourselves in.