As you know very well, today is Father’s Day, and what I wish to talk about is the great love to which we have access in our heavenly Father – a love so great that it would be willing sacrifice itself for our spiritual well-being and life. Jesus declared in John 15:13, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” – and this is the kind of love that our heavenly Father has for each of us. Allow me to begin this morning by sharing an illustration of parental love and sacrifice:
On August 16, 1987, Northwest Airlines flight 225 crashed just after taking off from the Detroit airport, killing 155 people. One survived: a four-year-old from Tempe, Arizona, named Cecelia. News accounts say when rescuers found Cecelia they did not believe she had been on the plane. Investigators first assumed Cecelia had been a passenger in one of the cars on the highway onto which the airliner crashed. But when the passenger register for the flight was checked, there was Cecelia’s name.
Cecelia survived because, even as the plane was falling, Cecelia’s mother, Paula Chican, unbuckled her own seat belt, got down on her knees in front of her daughter, wrapped her arms and body around Cecelia, and then would not let her go . . . Such is the love of our [heavenly Father and] Savior for us. He left heaven, lowered Himself to us, and covered us with the sacrifice of His own body to save us.(1)
Just as this mother was willing to die for her child, we have a heavenly Father who loves us this much. He loves us so much so that He sent His one and only Son to die in our place. I have entitled our message, “He Died in Your Place,” and this is a message that presents some basic truths that we must come to understand in order to receive Jesus Christ as our personal Savior and Lord.
A Father Mourns for His Child (2 Samuel 18:31-33)
31 Just then the Cushite came, and the Cushite said, “There is good news, my lord the king! For the Lord has avenged you this day of all those who rose against you.” 32 And the king said to the Cushite, “Is the young man Absalom safe?” So the Cushite answered, “May the enemies of my lord the king, and all who rise against you to do harm, be like that young man!” 33 Then the king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept. And as he went, he said thus: “O my son Absalom – my son, my son Absalom – if only I had died in your place! O Absalom my son, my son!”
Here we see that King David mourned for his son Absalom who was killed in battle. Absalom was killed in a battle that he fought against his own father. He rebelled against his father, David, by turning the hearts of people toward himself. He would stand in the city gate each and every day, and when someone came to settle a dispute before the king, Absalom would turn the people away and say that there was no one from the king available to hear their case. Absalom took the liberty of passing judgment on the cases by himself, and his judgment was always in favor of the people.
He would then state, “Oh, that I were made judge in the land, and everyone who has any suit or cause would come to me; then I would give him justice” (2 Samuel 15:3). We read how whenever someone would come to bow down before Absalom that he would not allow it, but he would instead embrace and kiss the individual, and the Scripture says, “In this manner Absalom acted toward all Israel who came to the king for judgment. So Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel” (2 Samuel 15:6). Absalom gained a great following in Israel, and both his and David’s men came face-to-face in a showdown, where Absalom lost the battle and was killed. Absalom was a traitor and a rebel, and yet his father still loved him and mourned for him.
We Are All Rebels against God
In the account of the prodigal son in Luke chapter 15 we read of a young man who demanded his share of the inheritance from his father, and how he went out and spent it on prodigal, or wasteful, living. Even so, his father had been diligently watching and waiting for his return and he gladly received him back into the family whenever he chose to come home. The father in this New Testament parable represents our heavenly Father who loves us enough to take us back from where we have gone astray.
You see, we are all rebels and traitors, for the Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23), and “There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10); and Isaiah 53:6 says, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way.” We have all rebelled against our heavenly Father at one time or another because of sin. Some of us have never come to the Father for salvation and eternal life; and there are others who have tasted of salvation but have gone astray and backslidden. Sin makes us distant from God (Isaiah 59:2) and makes us a traitor; and treason is worthy of death for those without Christ, for we read in Romans 6:23 that “the wages of sin is death.”
A Heavenly Father Mourns for Us
Just as David mourned for his son Absalom, God mourns for his lost sons and daughters who are without Jesus, and living in sin and destined to die. In fact, the Father pursues us, for we read in Revelation 3:20 where He says, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.” We also read in 2 Peter 3:9 that our heavenly Father “is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” Absalom may have been David’s son, nevertheless, he rebelled against the king, and this was a crime worthy of death; however, we see that the king (or the father) still loved his son.
There is nothing we have done that is so bad that our heavenly Father will refuse to love us. We are told that nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39). We may feel as though we have done things that make us unworthy of God’s love; however, the Bible teaches us otherwise. We read in Romans 5:8, “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” God does not approve of our sin, but He loves us while we are sinners, and we can come before Him just as we are and repent and ask for His forgiveness.
He Is Willing to Die in Our Place
We read in verse 33 where David cried out, “O my son Absalom – my son, my son Absalom – if only I had died in your place!” How many of us as parents feel that we would give our own life that our children might live? Parents who have lost a child to death will sometimes ask why it could not have been them who died instead. If one of us found ourselves on a hostile mission field and the natives captured our family and insisted that one family member die as punishment, and then they selected one of our children, I am sure we would strongly insist that we be allowed to take their place in death. David would have died for Absalom; however, Absalom had already perished and suffered a physical death and there was no coming back.
What I want to point out is that our heavenly Father feels the same way about us. He “would have been willing” to die that we might live, had it not been for Jesus who died in our place. The death that He wants to free us from is spiritual death; and even if we are already dead in our sins, we can be brought back to life from this type of death. In Ephesians 2:1 we read, “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins,” and then in Ephesians 2:4-5 we are informed, “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.” Therefore, if you are spiritually dead, not having salvation through Jesus Christ, you can be brought to life (Romans 6:23) – that is eternal, spiritual life – for there is someone who is willing to step in and take your place.
Our heavenly Father sent His one and only Son. Jesus paid the penalty for our sins by going to the cross. You see, we are supposed to die for our sins, but Jesus stepped in and took our place so that we don’t have to die. If we will believe in what Jesus did for us by dying on the cross over 2000 years ago, then it goes into effect for each of us today, and we gain salvation from our sins and eternal life (Romans 10:9-10).
Time of Reflection
It is not at all a coincidence, that as this earthly father David wished he could die for his child, that the heavenly Father had the same feelings of compassion toward us; and therefore, He chose a man from the lineage of David to take our place in death. In Matthew 1:20-21 an angel declared, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.”
David, a man after God’s own heart (Acts 13:22), echoed forth the heart-cry of the heavenly Father whenever he mourned for Absalom, and the Father is mourning for all who are lost and dying in their sins. Our heavenly Father sent His Son, Jesus to lay down his life for us on the cross. So, how do we receive the gift He offers? John 3:16 tells us, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” If you will just believe in Him with all your heart, believe that He died for you on the cross, and then confess Him before all men, you will be saved from your sins (Romans 10:9-10).
David cried out for Absalom, and God is crying out for you this morning. Will you listen to His voice? David longed to lay down His own life so that His son could live, and the heavenly Father feels the same way about us and He wants us to live forevermore. 1 John 4:9-10 says, “In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation [or atoning sacrifice] for our sins.”
If you wish to receive forgiveness of your sins and eternal life, then simply ask the Father and He will not deny you. Matthew 7:9-11 tells us, “What man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!” The heavenly Father wants to give you the greatest gift of all time – eternal life! Romans 6:23 begins by telling us, “The wages of sin is death,” however it goes on to say, “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Come and receive His indescribable gift today!
NOTES
(1) Bryan Chapell, In the Grip of Grace, Grand Rapids: Baker 1992.
