The Death That Gave Me Life

Where God’s justice met His mercy — and grace rewrote my story.

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Introduction — Justice on the Playground

When I was a kid, my teacher kept a jar of candy on her desk. Every Friday she’d give each of us one piece. One day, I got there first, and a classmate took two pieces. The rest of us gasped like someone had broken one of the Ten Commandments.

“Hey! That’s not fair!” we cried.

Funny, isn’t it? Nobody had to teach us justice. From the cradle, we know when something’s wrong. If someone cuts in line, if a friend borrows five dollars and never pays back, if somebody lies to our face—we don’t have to take a theology class to feel that heat rise inside.

We are hard-wired for justice. But if we care that much about fairness, imagine the God whose justice is perfect.

And that’s where our story begins—because the same God who is perfectly just also happens to love you more than life itself.

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1. The Problem No One Can Ignore

Romans 3:10 says, “There is none righteous, no, not one.”

Sin isn’t just something bad people do; it’s the condition of every heart born on this planet. The Bible uses three words for it—sin, transgression, and iniquity.

Sin means “to miss the mark.”

Transgression means “to cross the line.”

Iniquity means “to twist or bend what’s straight.”

We haven’t just missed the bullseye once or twice; we’ve fired the arrows in the wrong direction our whole lives.

Now, let’s be honest. Most of us like to think, “Well, I’m not perfect, but I’m not that bad.” So here’s a thought experiment:

If you only sinned three times a day—one thought, one word, one action—by the time you’re seventy you’d have committed over seventy-five thousand sins. Imagine standing before a judge with that kind of record.

Sin isn’t a smudge on your record; it’s a sentence on your soul. The wages of sin is death—not just physical, but separation from God.

And here’s the catch: God can’t overlook it, because then He wouldn’t be just.

The problem is clear—we are guilty, and He is holy.

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2. The Holy God Who Won’t Compromise

Isaiah 6 paints the scene: “I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and the train of His robe filled the temple.” Angels cry, “Holy, Holy, Holy!” The whole building shakes, smoke fills the room, and Isaiah, the most righteous man in the country, falls flat on his face: “Woe is me! I am undone.”

That’s the right reaction when holiness shows up. Holiness is not God’s niceness squared; it’s His blazing moral beauty—so pure it consumes evil the way fire consumes dry grass.

Our sin isn’t just an imperfection—it’s an incompatibility. Sin and holiness cannot occupy the same space. If sin walked into heaven, heaven would cease to be heaven.

So Isaiah cries, “I am a man of unclean lips,” and the angel takes a burning coal from the altar to cleanse him. God always purges before He commissions. But how can a burning coal touch sin without destroying the sinner? That question echoes through Scripture.

And it finds its answer on a hill outside Jerusalem.

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3. The Gap We Could Never Cross

People say, “I’ll make it up to God. I’ll do more good than bad.”

But good deeds don’t erase crimes. Imagine telling a traffic judge, “Yes, I was speeding, but I helped an old lady cross the street.” He’ll smile and say, “That’s nice—now pay the fine.”

Good deeds are what you were supposed to do anyway. They don’t pay for what you did wrong.

No matter how many ladders of morality we build, they fall short of heaven’s balcony. There’s a canyon between us and God, and every time we sin, the canyon widens.

Either justice must fall on us—or someone else must bear it.

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4. The Substitute Foretold

Seven hundred years before Christ, Isaiah saw Him coming:

> “Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;

yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

But He was wounded for our transgressions,

He was bruised for our iniquities;

the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him,

and by His stripes we are healed.” — Isaiah 53:4-5

Did you hear the exchange?

He takes—We receive.

He takes our griefs—we receive His peace.

He takes our wounds—we receive His healing.

He takes our guilt—we receive His righteousness.

Theologians call it substitutionary atonement.

Revival hearts call it mercy.

Isaiah said, “All we like sheep have gone astray... and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”

All we. All sin. All laid on Him. That’s the gospel in one verse.

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5. The Substitute Fulfilled

Fast-forward seven centuries to Pilate’s courtyard.