Everyone enjoys a good scandal. It makes for great headlines, website views, and magazine sales. The famous last words of Jesus that we’ll focus on this weekend are the most scandalous last words in history. His 13 words to a dying criminal confronts all religions, spirituality, belief systems, and religious views about who gets to go to heaven and who doesn’t, and what makes you right with God and what doesn’t. Just 13 words (with all the rest of the Bible to back it up). But that’s not all…
His last 13 words to a dying criminal brings scandalous hope to the very worst of us who have lived lives, and have pasts, or committed sin, and made mistakes that some of our family and friends will never forgive us for, and that we cannot find it within us to even forgive ourselves for. Perhaps the guilt you carry sucks the air out of your life. There’s scandalous hope, spectacular hope, for you today.
But it is scandalous. How so? Because in 13 words, Jesus reveals the only way a person can get to heaven, and how the worst person can get there apart from “religion.” Stay with me. Let’s read the text.
Luke 23:32-43
Three men were on crosses. Sinless Jesus was on the center cross. This revealed that he was considered THE WORST of the three! The other men were called “criminals,” which translated simply means “doer of evil things.” We don’t know details of exactly what these men did to deserve the cruel and unusual punishment of crucifixion. Speculation has it that they were thieves to the degree that their thievery involved murder and rape. Scholars also hold that they were mainly insurrectionists, rebels, against the Roman government, who supported themselves through thievery.
But we find they were also rebellious against God. Luke, the Historian, tells us one of the criminals “railed” or “hurled abuse” (lit. “Blasphemed”) at Jesus (vs. 39: “Are you the Christ? Save yourself and us!” ). But we learn in Matthew that BOTH thieves were guilty of railing and hurling abuse at Jesus (Matt. 27:44).
In addition, we rebel with our thinking, behaving, believing, speaking, and relationships. We want his gifts, but we don’t want Him. We don’t’ care for Him, except when the lights go out in our lives, and then we blame Him.
John Piper once said (my summary), “Thousands of airplanes fly across the globe and we don’t give God a thought. But when one crashes, all humanity cries, “WHERE WERE YOU GOD!?”
So, again, BOTH criminals were railing against God at one time (Matt. 27:44). The drumbeat refrain against Jesus: “He saved others; let him save himself, if he is the Christ of God, his Chosen One!” But then… something changed in one of the criminals….
Luke 23:40: “But the other rebuked him saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.”
What happened? Confession and repentance. Note how his words connect their crimes (and sin) to God: “Do you not fear God…”. In the midst of his sin and rebellion, he came to his senses and confessed that he was in fact a sinner against God’s holiness, truth, and love.
How do we discover repentance? Well, his words are exactly what you rarely here from American lips: “You and I are getting what we deserve. You and I are to blame. You and I are guilty.”
In the middle of his sin, rebellion, and the consequences of it, he stopped his blaming, he confessed he was getting what he deserved, he owned his guilt, and there encountered the grace of God. Who might I be talking to? You are in the middle of your sin, rebellion, secrets, guilt, or even consequences of your actions, and love and forgiveness and new life are offered to you lavishly. How so? By owning your rebellion. Stopping your blame. Owning your sin. Owning your guilt. When you have emptied yourself to the place of humility and abandonment of self and rights before the holy God, you are free now to cast yourself wholly, purely, and only upon the grace of God.
How do you cast yourself wholly and only upon God’s grace for sin and rebellion and the consequences of it all, even while in the middle of it? You cry out for Jesus as your only hope and Savior.
Luke 23:42: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Wow. In a word full of liars and speculators about God and heaven, and after a lifetime of lying and being lied to, hurting and being hurt, the criminal tore himself free from the beliefs and opinions of others (the other criminal) and shook loose from the popular belief of the population (mob), and took the step of faith. And note His words of faith: “Jesus, remember me WHEN…” Not “IF”.
But here’s the scandal. This criminal doesn’t cry out to Allah, or Buddha…. He doesn’t try to save himself with positive thinking about his cross experience. No self-help would deliver him from that moment of being nailed to wood. In fact, the lesson is this: Just as this criminal cannot physically save himself from that cross, he cannot spiritually save himself from sin. That’s the lesson. Trying to go about your own way, or views, or beliefs, to make yourself spiritually right with God apart from Jesus, will give you the same result as it would for that criminal to get himself physically off that cross—“it ain’t gonna happen.” Impossible.
You need a Savior. And not just any Savior. There is only one Savior who can save you from your sin and rebellion against the Holy God and make you right with God. And that’s why this criminal’s first word in receiving grace, forgiveness, and eternal hope was… “Jesus”.
Romans 10:9-10, 13: “…because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. … For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Again, as I said, the consequences of his sin, his suffering, and pain, awakened faith in Jesus. It was that painful place that gave him faith like a child, humility, and complete abandonment of self. Those events, painful they may be, that knock the religion out of us, spirituality out of us, the intellectual pride out of us, and bring us to our knees in child-like faith, humility, and complete abandonment of our rights and self, causing us to collapse into the arms of God. Friend, that is a gift. If you are not a believer, and FINALLY find yourself in such a place, then embrace that gift. Eternal hope is before you in this moment. Will you cry out the name of…“Jesus”?
Some might say, “Well, if I was that criminal, knowing I was going to die, and my life was over. I’d be doing the same thing!” Are you sure? How do you know you wouldn’t be like the other criminal? Don’t fool yourself to think “when you’re ready I’ll get my life right with God.” You have NO idea when you’re appointment to die and face God will be fulfilled. In the same vein, at your last moments, if you get last moments like the criminals, how do you know that you won’t be so overwhelmed with rage, or pain, or bitterness, or anger, or hardness of heart, that you rail against him instead of bow before him? You truly can not know. Stop playing games with your soul!
And now, we, with the criminal, turn our eyes upon this Jesus and His scandalous, yet glorious, response: Vs. 42: “Truly, I say to you, today, you will be with me in Paradise.”
And Jesus’ response to the criminal’s child-like, end of his rope, humble plea: “TRULY.” “TRULY” is a once and for all declaration. “Amen!” or “True dat!” or Beyond doubt,” “BANK ON THIS! Today, you will be with me in paradise.”
Jesus just said, “Pin your hope on me alone. I will not fail you. I’ve got you. I’ll see you soon.” God’s forgiveness is enough to release you from your regrets, mistakes, past, even when others and yourself won’t. Hear Jesus say to you, “Pin your hopes on me. Forgiven!” Forgiven after I’ve been miserable a while? Punished myself enough? “NO,” says Jesus. “Forgiven, TODAY!”
This saving faith came from the worst of us—a rapist, a murderer, a…sinner. Don’t ever think you or someone you love is too far gone. The criminal was forgiven and promised life forever because of his child-like faith in Jesus in his last moments. Please don’t miss the LAVISH forgiveness of God when you turn to the Only One who can grant it: Jesus. The criminal simply wanted to be remembered at some future time. In fact, this actually points to the staggering humility of the criminal in this moment. He’s saying, “Jesus, I don’t deserve you. I don’t deserve heaven and eternal joy. My sin and rebellion should make you turn your face from me. But Jesus, whenever you think of me, some time in the future, will you…” Jesus turned and looked into his eyes, and said, “TODAY...you will be with ME…”
Again, the scandal: Jesus alone is enough to save you. Faith in Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection is sufficient, more than enough, to make you right with the Holy God.
For example, the criminal had no good works to offer as a reason to be right with God. He had never been baptized, he had never taken communion, no priest gave him last rites. No sacraments. None of that makes you right with God. Jesus AND _______ does not make you right with God either. Only JESUS!
Ephesians 2:8-9: For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
If you add anything, it’s no longer grace. The blood of Jesus is sufficient to cover your sin. He suffered for you. You don’t have to add any of your suffering and regret to it to be forgiven and freed from guilt. He’s enough. His blood is sufficient. This is the scandal of grace!
That’s why purgatory is not true. Purgatory says we must pay something, somehow, for our sins. Nonsense. You could never pay enough!. Only Jesus. Jesus AND NOTHING else, only Jesus.
And still more scandal: Jesus said, “Today, YOU will be with me in paradise.” He didn’t’ say, “YOU… AND YOU, will be with me in paradise.” Some say that all people are saved in the end. All people go to heaven (Universalism). Well, that’s not what Jesus said. The only one who went to heaven was the one who cried out his Name alone in confession, repentance, and faith for his sin and rebellion.
Jesus told him, “Truly... Today you will be with me in Paradise.”
As one commentator noted, a Jewish day ended before the first star could be seen in the sky. So Jesus said, “Before the sun goes down, you will be with me in splendor and glory and eternal joy—paradise—heaven.” That morning he woke up a criminal sinner in prison facing death. That night he walked as a forgiven saint in glory rejoicing with His Savior. Scandalous: Jesus gave His best to a criminal.
This shows us that “soul-sleep”—the belief that when a person dies his soul “sleeps” until the final resurrection of all believers—is nonsense. The Apostle Paul even plainly said in 2 Cor. 5:8 that to be “absent from the body” was to be “at home with the Lord.”
But what is this Paradise? In Scripture, “Paradise” is always used of another name for heaven (2 Cor. 12:2, 4; Revelation 2:7). The word points back to the garden of Eden—Peace, joy, beauty, rest, and, best of all, the presence of and intimacy with the first-Lover God.
The Bible’s emphasis regarding heaven is our being in the presence of eternal delight and joy—Jesus Himself—for all time; and not necessarily the experiences of heaven and the loved ones we’ll see there. However, there is enough in Scripture that reveals this too. And who better to share his perspective on it from Scripture than C.S. Lewis.
Playing off of Jesus’ reference to Paradise and Isaiah 11’s depiction of all animals (the predator and prey) living together in perfect harmony, a writer records Lewis as suggesting that “heaven is a gloriously beautiful and exciting place of unlimited adventure and unlimited security where you can swim up waterfalls and play with wild animals without ever being afraid. Heaven is a place of re-union with the people you love to see and get to know, a place where good things never end and each adventure is better than the one before. Heaven is a place where every creature is in the prime of life, in the best possible physical shape, and free from the constraints of time and the bondage of sin.”
We have no idea the glory that truly awaits those born-again. Nevertheless, Jesus said to the criminal “Today.” And Jesus says that to you too. Whenever your, or my, “TODAY” is, you will be ushered into His presence with rejoicing for all time... IF He is your Lord and Savior.
Conclusion
You are in the gospel story in this moment. In that story we have the crowd, criminal #1, and criminal #2.
1) The crowd who refused to believe in Jesus unless He gave them PROOF FOR FAITH. (Matt 27:44-42: “If you are the Son of God... come down from the cross, and we will believe in Him.”)
2) The criminal who wanted Jesus to save Him from his PAIN. (Luke 23:39: Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!)
3) The criminal who wanted Jesus to save Him from his SIN. (Luke 23:40-42: “Do you not fear God....? Jesus, remember me...”.)
Which one are you? Which one will you be?
The scandal? Only one was saved. One who had never been religious, never been baptized, never participated in the sacraments, one who was void of last rites. There is no-one so low or so vile or so criminal or so sinful that Jesus would turn His face away from them and deny them Himself and eternal life and joy. The only condition is confession of sin, repentance from sin, and faith in Christ alone.
Will you embrace the scandalous grace of Jesus?
