BORN TO DIE THAT WE MIGHT LIVE
John 6:38-40
Jesus came down from heaven with a mission to accomplish! He had an assignment which He took upon Himself in coming to earth to do the Father’s will: that you will have eternal life and will be raised up at the last day.
We all know that there is nothing in this life that happens by accident. The Bible says that God created everything for His purpose. None of what is going on today, right here, right this very minute that God is not aware of.
There are so many reasons that we can enumerate from the Bible just as John Piper wrote a book “The Passion of Christ” listing down 50 reasons why Jesus came to die. I should say there is only one main reason: that we may have eternal life. This reason encompasses all the reasons or benefits that you can imagine beyond your wildest dreams. For as long as you are in this world you will not be able to understand nor fathom eternity. And yet that is what Jesus came here for: so we can be with Him forever and ever and ever and ever . . . .
We know now that Jesus came down to earth to die to pay the penalty for our sins which is death. But there are questions that we always ask ourselves, i.e.
• Why did He choose to die by crucifixion?
• Why did He not choose to come down in our time and then choose to die of an electric chair?
• Why did He not just lived a perfect, beautiful life and healed people of their physical ailment then everyone could have lived a wonderful, healthy life?
Couldn’t he accomplished more by living the perfect life that every man would love to have?
• Imagine the thousands of people He could have healed had He stayed and lived until our present generation.
• Imagine the many problems He could have solved.
• Like the war in Iraq - Pres. Bush would probably sitting in the white house enjoying his tea or coffee
• Like the problems of aids - no person would have been living with this illness
• Like cancer - if He would have been here nobody would suffer from it
• Everybody will have no eye problem. There will be no blind people begging on the street.
• Imagine the teaching, preaching that He could have done.
And yet God had a different plan. God is God. His mind works differently than ours. His thoughts are not our thoughts. God’s purpose is eternal. For God is not bound by space and time.
WAS JESUS THE ONLY ONE WHO DIED BY CRUCIFIXION?
Aside from the two criminals who were crucified together with Jesus, history records that thousands have died by this kind of death. In Jesus’ day, the Jews did not normally crucify people as the Romans did. One exception took place in 76 BC when the Jewish ruler Alexander Jannaeus crucified 800 rebels, an action criticized by other Jews. While the origins of crucifixion are obscured in antiquity, it is clear that this form of capital punishment lasted for around 800 years and hundreds or thousands of individuals were subject to this cruel and humiliating death.
Jesus’ crucifixion is the most famous in history. But what made CHRIST’S CRUCIFIXION different from the 100s of thousands who were also crucified?
• The reason behind it. On the cross, Christ died in our place. He died the death all of us should have died, taking the punishment we all deserved.
• Unlike the rest of the individuals who died of crucifixion, Jesus was the only one who was SINLESS! Jesus who did not commit any sin and yet He took upon Himself to die this kind of cruel, humiliating death. Because of Christ’s death, his followers have the chance to be reconciled back to God. Thus, Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection are the most important events recorded in the Bible.
DID JESUS KNOW THAT HE WAS GOING TO DIE BY CRUCIFIXION?
At least three different times, Jesus told his disciples plainly that he would be killed: (Mark 8:31; 9:31)
• One, was while they were on their way to Jerusalem, Jesus said to His disciples:
“We are going to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and teachers of the law. They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles (Romans), who will mock Him and spit on Him, flog Him and kill Him. Three days later He will rise.” (Mark 10:33-34)
But the apostles did not understand what He meant and were afraid to ask Him about it. (Mark 9:32)
Similarly, the gospel of John has three sayings about the Son of Man (Jesus) being "lifted up" (John 3:14; 8:28; 12:32-33)-a reference to crucifixion.
“Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life.” (John 3:14,15)
• He hinted about his death in his references to the murder of the prophets (Matthew 23:29-30; Luke 13:33), in some of his parables (Matthew 22:1-14; Mark 12:1-10), that no prophets die outside Jerusalem; and in
• His teachings about the coming sufferings of his disciples (Matthew 10:24-28; Mark 8:34-35; John 15:18-25).
Clearly, Jesus’ death was an important part of his overall message, and he wanted people to understand its meaning. There was one instance when Jesus was explaining to His apostles about His suffering and death, Peter took Jesus aside and rebuked Jesus “Never Lord. This shall never happen to you.” (Matt 16:22) and Jesus turned to Peter and said:
“Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.” (Mat 16:23)
To man: Seeing Jesus being severely whipped, mocked, scorned, spat at and be killed was outrageously evil. It was something that should not happen to a good man like Jesus. That was how Peter understood it. But Jesus said : Peter you are understanding it or seeing it as a man does and not the way as God wants us to understand it.
Even before His death, Jesus used the word "cross" in a symbolic way. He used it to describe the kind of sacrifice that his followers must be willing to make.
“If anyone would come after, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 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?” (Matthew 16:24-26)
Jesus dying violently was inexplicable to many. It just blows our mind away. Jesus’ death by crucifixion was difficult for people in that time and even people in our generation to understand the idea: that the One who claimed to be God was crucified, died of the capital punishment that was reserved for slaves, had core criminals, political agitators, religious agitators, pirates and those committing high treason. It is like imagining if Jesus would have lived in our time today that He was sentenced to die of an electric chair or lethal injection, the capital punishment known to us today.
WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM THE CRUCIFIXION?
We can learn at least four things from the Gospels’ presentation of Jesus’ death by crucifixion.
• First, Christ’s "Passion"-his suffering and death-was a key part of God’s plan for saving sinners.
• Second, both Jews and Romans bore responsibility for Jesus’ death. Jesus allowed the Romans to kill him because it fulfilled God’s plan, bringing salvation to sinners.
• Third, his death would be followed by his Resurrection, which would prove that all he had said was true.
• Fourth, his death was the way he entered into eternal glory.
WHY IS THE CROSS VERY OFFENSIVE?
Some people see the cross as a terrible instrument of death that some fail to see there is so much beauty in the cross. But to others they find it so offensive that they fail to see its value.
There is a book entitled “Not Ashamed” written by Ruth A. Tucker about a Christian mission called the ‘Jews for Jesus.’ This is a group that has accepted Jesus as the true Messiah. But in this book, one Rabbi says regarding Jesus’ sacrificial death: “It is an abhorrent, unforgivable act to God. The gospel idea God would sacrifice his son is antithetical to Jewish teaching from that day to this.”
For a Jew to accept Jesus’ claim that He was the Messiah was impossible. And that the Messiah died on the cross was to them unimaginable! Especially when in the Old Testament that anyone who
died hanging on a tree (Deut 21:23) was cursed by God. To the Jews it was offensive because it does not line up with their Old Testament law. To the Gentiles, it was foolishness because it does not line up with their logical reasoning.
“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.” (ICor 1:18)
WHAT DID THE CROSS RESOLVE?
All our problems began when our first parents willfully disobeyed God by eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God said that Adam and Eve would die if they ate the fruit and they did. From that time on, although physically alive, Adam and Eve died spiritually and were separated from the presence of God and so was the garden paradise lost.
God proclaimed the first Gospel as He said to the serpent:
“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; He will crush your head, and you will strike His heel” (Genesis 3:15)
This predicts a perpetual hostility between Satan and mankind. Satan’s seeds and her seed. The woman’s seed, the Messiah, would crush the Devil’s head, a mortal wound of utter defeat. This happened on the cross at Calvary, a big blow on the enemy, a decisive triumphed over the Devil!
Satan in turn would bruise the Messiah’s heel which speaks of suffering and even of physical death but not ultimate defeat. So Christ suffered and died on the cross but the final blow, the ultimate defeat against Satan was the RESURRECTION! He arose victorious over sin, hell and death!
“The time of judgment for the world has come, when the prince of this world will be cast out.” (John 12:31)
WHAT WAS THE MEANING OF THE CROSS?
• JESUS met the demand of God for a perfect sacrifice sufficient to pay for the sins of all mankind. The animal deaths of OT days fell short of God’s standard for they did not actually take away sin. (Heb 9:22; 10:4, 12)
His death on the cross was a once-for-all sacrifice for all our sins. He was the complete, perfect sacrifice. It satisfied the demand of a Holy God and it brings salvation to all who trust in Christ.
- His death was sufficient because He was sinless, the God-man.
• JESUS substituted His life for ours. He died that we might live. (Isa 53:5-6; Rom 5:8; 1Cor 15:3; 2Cor 5:21; 1Pet 2:24; 3:18) He gave His life a ransom for many (Mk 10:45) On the cross, Jesus died in our place. He died the death all of us should have died, taking the beatings, the whipping, the mockery, the humiliation — the punishment that we deserved. He was crucified as if He had sinned although He had not sinned at all. The Father made Jesus who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. (2Cor 5:21)
ILLUSTRATION:
There was a story from American history about a tribe of Indians. They discovered that someone was stealing chickens. The chief declared that, if caught, the offender would receive 10 lashes. When the stealing continued, the chief raised it to 20 lashes. Still the chickens methodically disappeared. In anger the chief raised the sentence to 100 lashes—a sure sentence of death. The thief was finally caught. But the chief faced a terrible dilemma. The thief was his own mother!
When the day of penalty came, the whole tribe gathered. Would the chief’s love override his justice? The crowd gasped when he ordered his mother to be tied to the whipping post. The chief removed his shirt, revealing his powerful stature, and took the whip in hand. But instead of raising it to strike the first blow, he handed it to a strong, young brave at his side. Slowly the chief walked over to his mother and wrapped his massive arms around her in an engulfing embrace. Then he ordered the brave to give him the 100 lashes.
THAT’S WHAT JESUS did for us. He embraced us with His love by substituting Himself to die in our place. Just as the mother’s life was spared by the substitutionary love of the son; for us, everlasting
life was brought through the substitutionary death of Christ.
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF BELIEVERS FROM CHRIST’S CRUCIFIXION?
• We are RECONCILED back to God. Our relationship with Him which severed by sin is restored. Our fellowship with our Father in heaven is restored by faith in Christ. We become His children, heir to His kingdom promises. (Rom 5:1, 10; 2Cor 5:18-20; Eph 2:16; Col. 1:20-22)
• We are declared RIGHTEOUS before God. When Jesus died on the cross, He absorbed the punishment that was for us, therefore as we put our faith in Him, we are no longer destined to go to hell. (Rom 3:24; 4:5; 5:1, 9; 8:30, 31; Ti 3:4-7)
• We are REDEEMED from the bondage of sin and Satan. His death paid in full the ransom price for our sin. We’re no longer slaved to sin but freed from sin. (Mat 20:28; Rom 3:24; 1Cor 1:30; Gal 3:13; Gal 4:4-5; Eph 1:7; Col 1:14; Ti 2:14; Heb 9:12; 1Pet 1:18-19)
• We are FREED from God’s wrath. The doctrine of PROPITIATION. Because a perfect sacrifice satisfying the demand of a Holy God has been made on our behalf, the sufficience sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God has been made to appease God and turn His wrath from us. (Rom 3:25; Heb 2:17; 1Jn 2:2; 4:10)
CONCLUSION:
Christ’s death had ultimately come to destroy the works of Satan—his lies, deception, accusation, etc. Jesus spoke about his death in terms of being lifted up (see 3:14; 8:28), a clear expression signifying how he was going to die—by way of the cross onto which He would be nailed. Jesus knew that he would not die by stoning, something the Jews had already tried to do (8:59), but by crucifixion. This is Jesus’ offer of salvation that extends to all people, not just to the Jews—sufficient for all mankind but efficient for those who would put their faith in His finished work on the cross.
