There Is Power In the Blood – Part 3
Unusual Signs of the Crucifixion
I. Introduction
For the past few weeks we have been doing a Bible study entitled There Is Power in the Blood. The purpose of this study has been to learn why God puts such a great importance on this red stuff flowing through our veins called blood. I’ve taken a different approach in this study than is usually taken when teachers speak about the blood of the Lamb and the cross of Calvary. I’m hoping to give you some information and details that are not normally taught so that you can have a bigger, more in-depth picture of everything that has occurred and why. God has given us more than just the basics of understanding. He has provided His children with knowledge and details to encourage and strengthen our faith. That is what, I hope, this series of Bible studies will give to you.
A. Review
In the first teaching we went all the way back to the beginning, in heaven. We learned that the first sin ever committed occurred in heaven in the very temple of God. Lucifer or Satan was an anointed cherub who committed the sin of pride and defiled the heavenly temple.
Looking at Hebrews 9:22 and Leviticus 17:11 we learned that the only way for anything to be cleansed from sin and made right is through the shedding of blood. But not just any blood will do. Last week we saw that all of mankind has blood, but that it is tainted by sin. Therefore, our blood, no matter how good we are, is unacceptable as a sacrifice for sin.
Only one man in all of history had perfect, sinless, untouched blood. And that was Jesus Christ. He made the perfect sacrifice, because He didn’t inherit the sin-corrupted blood of Adam. Instead, Jesus was born of a virgin and received His blood from His Heavenly Father. Jesus, likewise, lived a sinless life, so only His blood was acceptable as a replacement for ours. Only He could legitimately take our place and pay our penalty, and restore our souls.
B. Everyone Agrees on Jesus’ Death
“Historical records could swim in the blood of past victims of crucifixion. Yet, no single death carries more historical weight than the day a tall, suntanned Nazarene hung between heaven and earth. All history revolves around the day that God, man, and the devil were in agreement…and that was the day Christ was crucified.
“Man said [Jesus] must die. His fiery proclamations and common teachings were drawing mass crowds throughout the region. He was a political threat to Rome and a religious threat to the Pharisees and Sadduccees. Man said, “Kill Him.”
“(Satan) said He had to die. Pigs were drowning by the thousands in a Galilean lake. Dead, religious church members were (being) given eternal life…Screaming maniacs were putting on new clothes and going to church. Jesus was bad for the devil’s business and the devil wanted Him dead.
“And God (also) said He must die. But not for the same reasons. God said, ‘I want man back. He is my beloved creation. I want the power of sin destroyed.’ God said, ‘Jesus, You have to die.’ And Jesus accepted the Father’s will in the garden of Gethsemane when He said, “…not My will but Thine be done,” (Matthew 26:39). And the Lamb went to the slaughter.”
Today, we are going to switch gears a little bit. We’re still going to talk about the blood of Jesus, but I want to show you some fascinating events that occurred at the crucifixion or death of our Savior and how they help fill out the complete picture of everything that was going on at the time.
At the time that the ultimate sacrifice was being made at Calvary some unusual signs were occurring. They were, I believe, signs aimed at the Jewish people – showing them that their long awaited Messiah had come. But even though these signs were given to the Jews, very few actually heeded them.
II. The Sign of the Inscription
So, let’s take a look at the first sign, the sign of the inscription on the cross.
“One seemingly unimportant (and therefore often overlooked) item which was reported in the gospel of John made the religious leaders very angry at the crucifixion of Jesus. It was the inscription written by Pilate and nailed to the cross. That inscription caused a great deal of anxiety within the ranks of the Scribes and Pharisees. There is an astonishing discovery to be found in the inscription on the cross, which will reveal the reason for their anger.”
As you may know Jesus was crucified on a very important day in the Jewish calendar. He was crucified on their holy day of Passover. This means that their holy city of Jerusalem, where Jesus died, would have been packed with Jews who had come to celebrate Passover.
“When a Jewish family arrived in Jerusalem for the Passover, they would either purchase or bring with them a special bronze name tag. This nametag would have the family name written on it. They would tie a rope or thread to the tag and hang it around the neck of a lamb they were going to sacrifice. Each father desired that God would know their family was observing the Passover, and that the lamb that bore the family name was being sacrificed for them.
Now all of the events of the Passover feast deal deeply in types and foreshadows that point directly to Jesus as being the Passover Lamb for the world. It’s a fascinating topic to study, but we want to look specifically at those bronze nametags and ask what could those nametags possibly have to do with Jesus and His crucifixion?
Part of the answer is found in the gospel of John, but we must also understand Jewish procedure in order to piece the whole picture together.
So, first, let’s read the passage in John 19:19-22, “And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS. [20] This title then read by many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin. [21] Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am the King of the Jews. [22] Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.”
Pilate wrote an inscription and placed it on the cross above the head of Jesus. The Bible says it was written in three languages. Latin – the native tongue of the Romans, Hebrew for the Jews, and for anyone else, Greek, the common everyday language of the time.
There was an interesting literary custom of the scribes of those days that helps us to understand the verses we just read. The scribes would take the first letters of the words in a phrase and put them together to see if there would be a hidden meaning from the arrangement of these letters. It worked kind of like a simple code. This custom dates back at least to the time of the Babylonian captivity of the Jewish nation.
When we translate the inscription which Pilate wrote to the original Hebrew language, which is the language that the scribes would have been reading, we can soon learn why they almost passed out and their blood pressure went up at the crucifixion sight. Remember, many Jews from around the country were in Jerusalem at this time and would have viewed that same sign above the crucified Jesus.
A. Translating the Hebrew Inscription
So, let’s take a look at what the Jewish people, reading the Hebrew translation of this sign, saw.
I’ve included in your handouts the translation of the inscription in English and in Hebrew.
English: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews”
Hebrew: “Yehoshua Hanatzri Vemelech Hayhoodem”
Now the custom as we said, was to take the first letter of each word and put them together to see if they had a deeper meaning. In the Hebrew translation, that would the Y, the H, the V, and the H. Or in the Hebrew those letters are the Yod, the He, the Vav, and the He.
Now this may mean absolutely nothing to you, but to the Jewish people seeing those four letters together in that order was ground shaking. In the Old Testament, the letters “YHVH” represent the holy, unspeakable name of God. In English, we would add the vowels and pronounce it Yahweh or Jehovah. These four letters spell out the sacred name of God over 6,000 times in the Old Testament scriptures. This is God’s personal name. By writing this inscription the way that he did, Pilate was writing the holy name of God upon God’s Lamb.
When religious leaders read the inscription, they came to Pilate demanding that he change the wording. “Make it say ‘He said He was the King of the Jews.’ That way the name of God can not be found on the cross. This man was crucified for the sin of blasphemy. He made Himself equal with God. If you leave the inscription like it is you are telling everyone that this man is God, which is the very reason for His crucifixion!”
However, this was the one item during the whole trial of Jesus about which Pilate stood his ground against the crowd. His reply was, “What I have written I have written” (John 19:22).
B. God’s Nametag
God used Pilate to put His name on His lamb for the entire world to see! Pilate’s inscription, became God’s nametag. The Jews had been bringing Passover lambs to the Temple with their bronze nametags and saying, “God see our name. This lamb is for our family.”
God hung His Son on the highest hill in Jerusalem to tell all mankind, “See My name. This is My Lamb. It is Passover. You are taking your lambs to the Temple. When the blood is flowing in the Temple from the Passover lambs of the people, My Son’s sinless blood will be flowing for the redemption of mankind so that you can once again have direct fellowship with Me.”
III. The Three Red Threads
Another interesting sign given to the Jewish people to show them that Jesus really was their long awaited Messiah deals with three red threads.
When the Temple existed a special time called Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement was observed each year. It was another one of the Jews’ holy feast days. During this important occasion, the high priest would offer special animal sacrifices for himself, the other priests and Levites, as well as for the entire population of Israel.
And on this day God would decide if He would forgive the sins of the nation. So, the entire day was spent in fasting and in reverence to God.
According to Jewish history as outlined in the Mishna (which is the Jewish religious law) the high priest would bring two goats before him. Each goat had to be identical in age, size, color, etc. The priest would cast lots to see which goat would be burned on the altar and which goat would be the “scapegoat.”
Reaching his hand into a small wooden box, he would lift out a gold engraved marker which said, “For The Lord.” The goat designated as “for the Lord” was then marked with a long piece of scarlet thread around its right horn. This was the goat that would be sacrificed on the altar.
The other goat was then marked for “Azazel,” which is actually another name for Satan. This goat was the scapegoat, and a scarlet thread was tied around its neck. The high priest would then lay his hands on this scapegoat for Azazel. The purpose of which was to transfer the sins of all Israel onto the goat.
A man would then lead the scapegoat outside the east gate, across a ramp and toward the Judean wilderness. According to some commentaries, the goat was taken to the wilderness where it was pushed off the cliff and it died. The thought behind this was that they didn’t want the sins coming back into Jerusalem, so the goat was destroyed so it couldn’t wander back into the city.
A third scarlet thread was attached to the door of the Temple gate. When the scapegoat died in the wilderness, the red thread on the Temple door was said to miraculously turn white. Upon seeing this, Israel knew that God had accepted their sacrifices and their sins were forgiven.
So, there were three red threads used on the Day of Atonement. The first was tied on the horn of the goat marked “for the Lord.” The second was tied around the throat of the goat for Azazel, and the third would turn white on the Temple doors when God saw the sacrifice was completed.
Now, what does all that have to do with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ? Well, it actually has two things to do with it.
A. White No Longer
First, let’s read Isaiah 1:18, “Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be wool.”
You see, the Jews understood these words as to be referring to the scarlet thread that was hung on the Temple gate door on Yom Kippur, and they fully expected that thread to turn white, in terms with this promise. And indeed, it is recorded that the thread did turn white as expected. A sign that God had accepted the sacrifice and the nation’s sins had been forgiven for that year.
But something interesting happened somewhere around the year 30 A.D. Around this time the scarlet thread nailed to the door stopped turning white. Instead, from about 30 A.D. until the time the Temple was destroyed 40 years later, the thread remained red. It never again turned white, probably leading many to believe that God was no longer forgiving the Jewish nation of their sins.
But about 30 A.D. is also the time of Jesus’ ministry and death. So you see, in reality, the thread remaining red wasn’t a sign that God no longer forgave sin. It was a sign to the Jews that the sacrifices were no longer necessary, because the Lamb of God, Jesus, would now make sins white as snow through His own blood.
B. The Three Crosses
The second thing those three threads pointed to were the three crosses of Calvary and the people that were hanging on them that day.
One man, Jesus, was dying as an offering “for the Lord” like the first goat with the red thread ties around its horn. Another man died rejecting Christ, and he was given over to Azazel or Satan, like the second goat. The third man accepted Christ’s sacrifice and was changed while on the cross and his scarlet sins became white as snow like the red thread nailed on the Temple gate.
God’s plan for our salvation was so interwoven in the feasts, the sacrifices, and the hidden typology of the law and the prophets, that once someone begins to see the pattern develop, it becomes undeniable that Christ was and is the true Savior of the world.
He was the perfect sacrifice, the only legitimate replacement for us. His blood saved all of mankind, from Adam onward. No other sacrifice is needed. But just as forgiveness and redemption are a done deal because of Calvary, we must also remember that God gives us the choice as to whether or not we accept them.
Forgiveness requires a choice. It is freely offered, but it is not forced upon us. We must choose to accept the gift. There are many things in this life that we cannot choose. – The way we look, what the weather is going to do, how people will respond to us. But the really big decision, the only one that really matters, where we are going to spend our eternity – that choice is left up to us.
Next week we are going to finish this study by taking a closer look at what was happening in the unseen spirit world during the three days and three nights between Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection.
