NO OTHER WAY
One of the questions that gets asked is why did Jesus have to die? Couldn't there have been some other way to accomplish salvation for mankind? Couldn't God just forgive us without Jesus having to come to earth and be crucified? God can do anything, right? So why would he have Jesus go through all that? It doesn't make sense; why not make it easier on him?
1) Jesus asked for another way.
Mark 14:35-36, "Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. “Abba, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”
Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane just moments before his arrest. It was so intense for Jesus that in Luke's gospel it says that he was actually sweating drops of blood. This is an extremely rare condition known as hematidrosis and it occurs when someone is dealing with extreme physical or emotional stress.
Jesus is agonizing over what he knows is going to happen to him so he cries out, asking the Father to provide another way for salvation to happen. In Luke's version Jesus said, "Father if you are willing, take this cup from me". So apparently God was not willing to spare his son from agony, torture and death because as we all know, the cup of suffering was not taken from Jesus.
If anything is possible for God then why didn't he provide another way? Why didn't he spare his son? Before getting into the reasons why it had to be this way, we need to understand how painful it must have been for the Father to deny his Son this request. If there were another way, God would've provided it.
One of the most painful things to go through as a parent is to watch your child suffer and be powerless to do anything about it. They’re crying out to you and all you want is to take the pain away. You wish God would put it on you instead of them. So you hold them, pray and wait in agony for their pain to subside.
Knowing the pain I’ve gone through in these situations, I can only imagine God’s pain as he watched his son go through his torture and crucifixion. Then to hear Jesus cry out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus is saying, “Father, why have you left me, why have you abandoned me, why have you deserted me?”
I can’t imagine how excruciating each step must have been as the Father turned his back on his son and walked away when Jesus became our sin. And one of the most remarkable things about the Father is that he had the power to end his son’s suffering. It's hard enough to watch our kids suffer and not be able to stop it, how much more unbearable would it be to allow it to continue knowing I could stop it?
Sometimes parents go through this when the child needs to be taught a lesson about something; whether it's figuring something out on their own or suffering the consequences of their poor choices. Even though you know it's what's best it's still painful to endure.
They ask you to help, they ask you to reconsider but you stand firm, knowing that what they're going through is necessary. You're willing to be thought of as a bad parent; you're willing to have your child be upset with you in order to do what's best for them, regardless of whether they can understand that right now or not.
Not that Jesus felt that way toward the Father but his despairing cry would still have been painfully difficult to hear. It would pain the Father deeply to have to watch his son go through everything that was necessary for mankind's salvation. Forsaking his son would be the hardest thing for the Father to do.
So we need to understand that when God denied Jesus' request it wasn't because he didn't care. If all that pain could've been avoided the Father would've made another way. But why did it have to be this way? Why did Jesus have to suffer? Why did he have to die?
2) Why was death the only way?
It was needed to show the extent of our sin.
Paul said in Rom. 3:23 that all have sinned. He said later in Rom. 6:23 that the wages of sin is death. A wage is something you earn for something you do. What did we do? We sinned. What did we earn from that? Death; specifically spiritual death. God told Adam to not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil or he would die.
So when Adam and Eve disobeyed God they died spiritually. Their purity was shattered and now they knew sin through disobedience. And because of that, their relationship with God completely changed.
We too, because of our sin, don't have a relationship with God; we are separated from him. Isaiah 59:2 says our sins have separated us from God. And we, like Adam and Eve, are spiritually dead because of sin. Eph. 2:1 says that we are dead in our sins. Sin results in separation from God and being separated from God is being spiritually dead.
And that means we live our lives as a slave to sin. Jesus said in John 8:34 that everyone who sins is a slave to sin. And, being a slave to sin leads to only one thing-death. Paul said in Rom. 6:16 that being a slave to sin leads to death. We're all sinners and that means we're a slave to sin and sin leads to death.
Too often we hear the terrible news that a person has been kidnapped and held for ransom. Spiritually that has happened to all of us. God is our original owner but we were captured and held for ransom. Most kidnappers ask for money. But what about in our case? Could money redeem me? No; money couldn’t ransom me. What about my good deeds? No, they won’t pay the price either. No offering is good enough.
Psalm 49:7-9, "No man can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for him—the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough—that he should live on forever and not see decay."
There is no way I or anyone else could ransom me because everyone is in the same boat I'm in-they're a sinner like me. Your life is just as blemished as mine. In the OT animal sacrifices, the animal could not be blemished or defected-it had to be spotless; without any defect.
So, when it comes to paying the ransom for the soul, nothing short of perfection will do. There is no price tag for the soul. The cost is too high; it's too valuable. Jesus said in Matt. 16:26, "What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul?"
The answer is 'nothing'. If I owned the world and all its resources it wouldn't be worth losing my soul over. And likewise, If I could offer the total sum of the world's money and resources to try to buy freedom for my soul it wouldn't be enough. The value of the whole world isn't enough to remove the stain of sin.
My sin brought upon myself the greatest penalty-death. Since the wages of sin is death, the ransom price had to be the same-death. God couldn't just cancel the debt, it had to be paid in full. Therefore the only way I could be redeemed was for someone who was without sin, someone who was not under the same curse, to pay the ransom.
That's where Jesus comes in. Jesus said in Matt. 20:28 that he gave himself as a ransom for us. And Jesus is the only one who could do that. He's the only unblemished one; the only one with no sin. Jesus is our only hope to escape the curse of spiritual death.
Hosea prophetically spoke about Jesus in Hosea 13:14, “I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. Where, O death, are your plagues? Where, O grave, is your destruction?"
Jesus sacrificed his life in order to save mine. Through Jesus I am set free. Heb. 9:15 says that Jesus died as a ransom to set us free from sin. That's the only way I could be ransomed, redeemed, set free from the penalty and power of sin. Jesus had to die to show the severity of sin and to show what the only remedy was for removing it. You can't go to any greater length than death.
Sin is extreme-it separates us from God and it kills us. Therefore, the remedy for sin has to be just as extreme. And Jesus didn't go to this length simply to save our soul; his death was to set us free from the slavery of sin so that we would put sin to death in our lives.
1st Peter 2:24, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.” Jesus bore our sins on the cross so that as Jesus died for sin, we would in turn die to sin and therefore live for God.
God in his holiness will not tolerate sin, it must die. It's not enough to just minimize it; the only acceptable remedy for sin is to remove it. That's why we're told in Col. 3:5 to put to death anything that belongs to our old nature. Paul didn't say to 'injure' your sin; he didn't say dial it down a notch or two-he said put it to death.
Sin is serious-serious enough that the only way Jesus could remove our penalty for it was to die. If we take that extreme payment to heart then it will cause us to see the seriousness of sin and perform the same treatment to it. Jesus needed to die so that we would see how severe sin is. We need to know that sin kills us so we'll take it seriously enough to put it to death.
It was needed to show the extent of God's love.
1st John 4:9-10, "This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins."
How does this define what love is? The fullest extent of God's love for us was to let go of his only Son. And we have two ways he did that. First, he let him go to come to earth. "He sent his one and only Son into the world". It was an act of love just to release Jesus from heaven to come to earth.
There would be sacrifice just in the event of Jesus taking on humanity and the conditions of life on earth. It would be a stark contrast from Jesus' glorified state in the perfection of heaven. You have two factors that are sacrificial in Jesus coming to earth-leaving the perfection of heaven for the imperfection of earth and laying aside his glorified state and taking on human form.
In the first part Jesus would be dealing with the elements of things like harsh weather conditions. He would be enduring the sights, sounds and smells of our imperfect world. He would have to deal with being surrounded by imperfect people; some of whom would mistreat him.
Secondly, he would be laying aside his supremacy and worship. In heaven Jesus was worshipped and adored by the angels. But in coming to earth that adoration and worship would be laid aside and replaced with being looked at as just another human being. Instead of being adored by all he would be hated by many. Jesus' status in heaven didn't change-he was still preeminent but he wouldn't be treated as such on earth by most people.
And in taking on human form he would have to deal with physical limitations. He would have to deal with physical pain and suffer weakness through things like hunger and thirst. He would deal with raw emotion and endure strong temptation. So just in Jesus coming to our world we can see the love and sacrifice of both the father and the son.
"This is love: not that we loved God but that he loved us." True love is expressive; true love is sacrificial. 1st Cor. 13:5 says that love is not self-seeking. God's love for us is not reciprocal; it's not based in us loving him first or even in us loving him back. God loving me is not contingent on me loving him; it's not altered by how much love I show him.
God's love is at its fullest-even for those who hate him. Therefore, God's love for us is not self-serving; it's not selfish-it's not dependent on getting something in return. What God wants in return is our salvation. So the motive for God's love is our benefit. That's what sacrificial love is all about-not seeking anything for oneself.
That was Jesus' life. He said in Matt. 20:28 that he did not come to be served but to serve. He laid down his life for us. 1st John 3:16, "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers."
In John 3:16 we see the love of the Father-'For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son'. And here in 1st John 3:16 we see the love of Jesus. I don't think it was a coincidence to have these things stated in John 3:16 and in 1st John 3:16. How do we know what love is? The father sacrificed the son and the son sacrificed his life.
Jesus gave his all every day for the benefit of others. He came to serve and die for sinners. Rom. 5:8, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
God didn't send Jesus to those who loved him-he sent him to those who were his enemies. Jesus didn't die for those who were pure; he died for those who were impure. He died for those who didn't care about him, didn't love him, didn't serve him. He died for those who were against him, who hated him, who wanted him dead. This is the full extent of love-to die for your enemy.
"God sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins". What does atoning sacrifice mean? Some translations use the term propitiation. Jesus died for his enemies. In reality-because of our sin, that's what we all are. Col. 1:21, "Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior."
Because God is holy, he must separate himself from what is unholy. That's why we are separated from him. Alienated means separated. We are not connected to God; we cannot please God. Even though God loves us he hates sin; sin is his enemy. Therefore we're his enemy because of our sin and the evil behavior that stems from it.
In our sinful nature we oppose God. Because God hates evil he treats it with divine contempt. So, because we're sinners, God's wrath toward sin is upon us and consequentially so is his judgment. That's where Jesus comes in. The wrath God has toward our sin got projected onto Jesus. In a minimized way, it's kind of like if you did something wrong and your Dad got upset but your brother stepped in and took the punishment for you. You broke the window with the ball but he got the spanking.
Jesus being our atoning sacrifice means he took upon himself God's wrath toward sin. That's why Jesus cried out to his Father when he was on the cross, "Why have you forsaken me". That's the moment when Jesus took our sin upon himself and in so doing, incurred the wrath of the Father.
2nd Cor. 5:21, "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God". When Jesus took our sin upon himself God had to look at Jesus differently. As God is repulsed by sin he had to be repulsed by his son. As God would separate himself from sin he separated himself from his only son. Although Jesus knew this moment was coming, he did not know how it was going to feel until it actually happened.
God loved us enough to separate himself from his son physically when he came to earth and he loved us enough to separate himself from his son spiritually when Jesus became sin for us. There's no greater sacrifice to make.
Jesus' love for us brought him to earth and it brought him to the cross. The religious leaders may have handed him over to be crucified and Pilate may have pronounced the sentence but it was Jesus' love for us that brought him to the cross. And it was love kept Jesus on the cross when he was challenged to come down off it to prove himself. Jesus endured through the pain and suffering so he could be our atoning sacrifice and appease the wrath of God toward our sin.
"So that in him we might become the righteousness of God". When we trust in Christ for salvation God looks at us as if there is no sin there; only righteousness. Now, because of Jesus, there is reconciliation; there is peace between us and God. Now, we can have a relationship with him.
Sadly, most people will not get to experience this wonderful transformation. Jesus said in Matt. 7:13-14 that the road leading to destruction is broad and many travel it while the road leading to eternal life is narrow and only a few find it. Yet Jesus still went through with it. Why endure such trauma knowing the extreme sacrifice would not be largely successful? Love.
It was important that everyone had the opportunity to be saved; even if most weren't going to accept what he did to save them. The Father let Jesus go because there would be many who would turn to him for salvation and be set free. It's for those who would spend forever with him that Jesus went to the cross.
In fact, it's been said that if you were the only one who would ever be saved Jesus still would've went to the cross. I believe that because I believe that's how much love the Father and the Son has for each and every one of us.
Why did Jesus need to die? To show how extreme our sin is and to show how extreme his love is. If we really take these two factors to heart it will greatly change our lives.
