This week is what we know as Holy Week where we especially focus on the history of the death of Jesus Christ, His burial, and His resurrection from the dead.
Not only does the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ stand at the very center of Christianity, but it stands at the center of world history, as well.
Every time you write the date you are writing about Jesus Christ. History is divided into B.C. Before Christ and AD which stands for Anno Domini, which is Latin for, “in the year of the Lord”.
If Jesus Christ is co-equally God with the Father and with the Holy Spirit, what in the world was He doing on the Cross?
That is the last place you would expect to see Him.
If you have a Bible, please open to 1 Corinthians 1.
Again, the crucifixion and resurrection are at the very center of the Christian Faith.
Without the history of Good Friday and Easter, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:19, If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. NKJV
Imagine for a moment that you just landed on planet Earth from some other place, and you have never heard the Gospel before.
You are told the Creator God of the entire Universe loved His creation so much that He sent His Son to reveal to us who God is and He allowed His creation to brutalize and kill His Son.
You are told, Jesus took the beating and the cross so that sinful, rebellious men, might be saved from the penalty of their sin.
This sounds way out there…doesn’t it?
And before that happened, as we read in John 13:3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands and that He had come from God and was going to God,
John 13:4 rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel, and girded Himself.
John 13:5 After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. NKJV
Max Lucado said, “Jesus touched the stinky, ugly parts of His disciples. Knowing He came from God and He was going to God.
Knowing He could arch an eyebrow or clear His throat and every angel in the universe would snap to attention.
Knowing that all authority was His, He exchanged his robe for the servant’s wrap, lowered Himself to knee level, and began to rub away the grime, and the grunge from their feet.” (Lucado)
? How can some archaic story, of a Jewish carpenter getting killed on a Roman cross, save my soul from eternal damnation?
? Why do we call this Good Friday when our Savior was killed?
Read 1 Corinthians 1:18-25
Man’s wisdom says that there is no way the blood of Jesus Christ can remove another person’s sins.
Those who reject Jesus Christ think the idea of being saved through the work of a crucified man, is pure foolishness.
The Bible is full of accounts, where the Lord uses foolish things to confound people who are wise in their own eyes.
It may seem foolish that the Lord used the Apostle Paul to write 1 Corinthians and preach the Gospel since he was a former persecutor of Christians before he came to Christ.
As Christ followers, the Lord tells us to surrender to win, die to live, be born again to inherit eternal life, suffer for Christ’s sake, and give it all away to keep it.
Isaiah 55:8 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways," says the LORD.
Isaiah 55:9 "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. NKJV
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:18, “To us who are being saved the Cross is the power of God.”
Even though the Cross may seem foolish to nonbelievers, to those who trust what Jesus did on Calvary, the Cross actually demonstrates, and becomes the power of God for salvation.
1 Corinthians 15:54 "Death is swallowed up in victory."
1 Corinthians 15:55 "O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?" NKJV
Jesus defeated death by dying on the Cross!
And when Jesus rose from the dead it not only proved all of Jesus' claims that He was who He said He was, but it also proved the Father accepted Jesus' payment for our sins.
1 John 4:10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
When a person by faith, believes the Gospel, it has the power to raise a dead man to life, make them born again, and save them from the penalty of their sin, which seems foolish to people.
But there is only one way of escaping sin’s punishment.
Acts 4:12 Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved." NKJV
John 14:6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. NKJV
Notice the first three questions in 1 Corinthians 1:20: "Where is the wise man?, the scribe?, the debater of this age?"
D.A. Carson has said, “Wisdom was a public philosophy, a well-articulated worldview that made sense of life and ordered the choices, values, and priorities of those who adopted it.
• The 'wise man,' then, was someone who adopted and defended one of the many competing public worldviews”.
Vine’s Dictionary, a scribe is a man learned in the Mosaic Law and in the sacred writings, an interpreter, or a teacher.
• Scribes examined the more difficult and subtle questions of the Law… Harold Mare said,
• “The disputer of this age “was the man who wanted to dispute every issue and solve it by human reason.”
NLT 1 Corinthians 1:21 Since God in His wisdom saw to it that the world would never find Him through human wisdom, He has used our foolish preaching to save all who believe.
Just because the world wants to make up a truth that fits their worldview, Christians have the real Truth, the Word of God!
Worldly people who believe they are wise will be shown as foolish once they see Jesus when He returns in all of His Glory.
It is not that the preaching of the Gospel is foolish, but rather, it seems foolish to those who are perishing!
God’s ways seem unbelievable and that is why Hebrews 11:6 says, that without faith, it is impossible to please God.
What Paul is saying, is that the wisdom of man cannot compare to, or understand God, nor how His salvation works.
Ephesians 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, NKJV
You can look for the fountain of youth to try and live forever, but human understanding will never give you eternal life.
Romans 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,
Romans 1:21 because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
Romans 1:22 Professing to be wise, they became fools. NKJV
A crucified Messiah was "a stumbling block" to the Jews, because how could God allow His anointed One, to be cursed?
Galatians 3:13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree"), NKJV
And the Greeks were known for philosophies and new thoughts with all the wisdom man could offer.
Notice Paul said, “For Jews request a sign”.
This is ironic because Paul was probably one of the religious leaders who demanded a sign from Jesus before him believing that Jesus was God the Son, in the flesh.
There are also times when people have seen too many signs and wonders so it causes them to become lethargic, hinder their faith, and they become desensitized to miracles.
John 12:37 Although He had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in Him, NKJV
The religious leaders knew all 305 prophecies about Jesus’ first coming, and yet they refused to believe in Him.
The Pharisees had seen so much evidence, yet they refused to believe. Their agenda got in the way of believing what was right there in front of their faces.
In Matthew 16 Jesus clearly explained the sign of Jonah was a prophecy about His upcoming resurrection and that was the only sign He would show the Jews.
But the Pharisees continued in their unbelief even after seeing the miracles of Jesus so, they were guilty for unbelief, especially since the people of Nineveh repented once they heard the truth.
The message of the Cross of Christ seems weak to unsaved men.
Crucifixion was one of the most brutal and shameful modes of death during the Roman Empire and it was done mainly to slaves, disgraced soldiers, foreigners, and later to Christians.
Both Jews and Gentiles rejected Christ because He did not fit into their narrow opinion of who God is.
Guzik said, “Instead of giving the Jews and Greeks what they demanded in deliverance and wisdom, God gave them something unexpected: a crucified Messiah.
Christ (Messiah) meant power, splendor, and triumph. Crucified meant weakness, defeat, and humiliation.
Christ crucified was the ultimate oxymoron and this was what Paul preached!” (David Guzik)
The divine power of God was unleashed by the death of Christ.
Universal Law says sin causes death and there is no getting around that truth.
Ezekiel 18:4 The soul who sins shall die.
Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. NKJV
God's Word being true, does not depend on anyone believing it or any external evidence.
God's Word is true simply because it comes from God, the creator of truth. So, there is a penalty for sin, whether men want to reason it away or not. But that is not the end of the story.
God put the punishment for our sins on Jesus so that He could make us co-heirs with Christ as we become Children of God.
The plain simple message of the Gospel is that Jesus paid sin's penalty by sacrificing Himself on Calvary’s Cross. Jesus died, was buried, and rose again, proving who He was.
God the Father accepted Jesus’ payment for the sins of mankind.
Gordon Fee said, "We simply cannot abide the scandal of God's doing things his way, without our help. And to do it by means of such weakness and folly!
“God will not be so easily tamed and freed from its shackles, the preaching of the cross alone has the power to set people free."
Without the Cross of Christ, there is no salvation from spiritual death. And without the Resurrection, we would have no proof that Jesus’ atonement on the Cross was actually effective.
This Holy Week, may we know it's all about the cross, it's all about Jesus Christ, all about a resurrection. Jesus alone gives us the power for a new life, provided by the cross and resurrection.
In our weakness and frailty, we can be reconciled to God and have a relationship, communion, and fellowship with Him.
1 Corinthians 1:18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. NKJV
