Month: February 2024

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 19 ~ ~ Mark 10:45 ~ ~ “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”

Day 8 of the 50 reasons (50 days) that Christ suffered and died for us.  This is in the book “the Passion of Jesus Christ” by John Piper.

Christ Suffered and Died …..

TO BECOME A RANSOM FOR MANY

There is no thought in the Bible that Satan had to be paid off to let sinners be saved.   What happened to Satan when Christ died was not payment, but defeat.   The Son of God became human so   “that through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil.”  (Hebrews 2:14).  There was no negotiation.

When Jesus says that He came “to give His life as a ransom,” the focus is not on who gets the payment.  The focus is on His own life as the payment, and on His freedom in serving rather than being served, and on the “many” who will benefit from the payment He makes.

If we ask who received the ransom, the Biblical answer would surely be God.  The Bible says that Christ “gave Himself up for us, an…offering…to GOD”  (Ephesians 5;2).  Christ “offered Himself without blemish to GOD” (Hebrews 9:14).  

The whole need for a substitute to die on our behalf is because we have sinned against GOD and fallen short of the glory of GOD.  (Romans 3;23).  And because of our sin, “the whole world is held accountable to GOD” (Romans 3;19).  So when Christ gives Himself as a ransom for us, the Bible says that we are freed from the condemnation of God.

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 8:1). 

The ultimate captivity from which we need release is the final “judgment of GOD”  (Romans 2:2 and Revelation 14:7).

The ransom price of this release from God’s condemnation is the life of Christ.  Not just His life lived, but His life given up in death.  Jesus said repeatedly to His disciples, “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him” (Mark 9:31).  In fact, one of the reasons Jesus loved to call Himself “the Son of Man” (over sixty-five times in the gospels) was that it had the ring of  mortality about it.  Men can die.  That’s why He had to be one.  The ransom could only be paid by the Son of Man, because the ransom was a life given up in death.

The price was not coerced from Him.  That’s the point of saying, “The son of Man came not to be served but to serve.”  He needed no service from us.  He was the giver, not the receiver.  “No one takes My life from me, but I lay it down of My own accord” (John 10:18).  The price was paid freely; it was not forced.  Which brings us again to His love   He freely chose to rescue us at the cost of His life.

How many did Christ effectively ransom from sin?  He said that He came “to give His life as a ransom FOR MANY.”  Yet not everyone will be ransomed from the wrath of God.  But the OFFER is for everyone.  “there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom FOR ALL.” (1Timothy 2:5-6).

NO ONE is excluded from this salvation who embraces the treasure of the ransoming Christ.

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 18 ~ ~ Colossians 2:13 ~ ~ “And you, who were dead in your trespasses…God made alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.  This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.”

Day 18 of the Passion of Jesus Christ by John Piper:

Christ Suffered and Died……

TO CANCEL THE LEGAL DEMANDS OF THE LAW AGAINST US

What a folly it is to think that our good deeds may one day outweigh our bad deeds.  It is folly for two reasons.  First, IT IS NOT TRUE.  Even our good deeds are defective, because we don’t honor God in the way we do them.  Do we do our good deeds in joyful dependence on God with a view to making known His supreme worth?  Do we fulfill the overarching command to serve people “by the strength that God supplies – in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ.” (1Peter 4:11)

What then shall we say in response to God’s Word, “Whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.” (Romans 14:23)?  I think we shall say nothing. 
“Whatever the law says it speaks…so that every mouth may be stopped”  (Romans 3:19).  We will say nothing.  It is folly to think that our good deeds will outweigh our bad deeds before God. 

WITHOUT CHRIST-EXALTING FAITH, OUR DEEDS WILL SIGNIFY NOTHING BUT REBELLION.

The second reason it is folly to hope in good deeds is that THIS IS NOT THE WAY GOD SAVES.  If we are saved from the consequences of our bad deeds, it will not be because they weighed less than our good deeds.  It will be because the “record of our debt” in heaven has been nailed to the cross of Christ.  God has a totally different way of saving sinners than by weighing their deeds.  There is no hope in our deeds.  There is only hope in the suffering and death of Christ.

There is no salvation by balancing the records.  There is only salvation by canceling records.  The record of our bad deeds (including our defective good deeds), along with the just penalties that each deserves, must be blotted out—not balanced.  This is what Christ suffered and died to accomplish.

The cancellation happened when the record of our deeds was “nailed to the cross” (Colossians 2:13 (above).  How was this damning record nailed to the cross?  Parchment was not nailed to the cross.  Christ was.  So Christ became my damning record of bad (and good) deeds.

  He endured MY DAMNATION.  He put MY SALVATION on a totally different footing,  HE IS my only hope. 

And faith in Him is MY ONLY WAY TO GOD.

FEBRUARY 17

OUR PERSONAL PROMISE:

Psalm 61:1-4

“Hear my cry, God;

Give Your attention to my prayer.

 From the end of the earth I call to You when my heart is faint;

Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

For You have been a refuge for me,

A tower of strength against the enemy.

Let me dwell in Your tent forever;

Let me take refuge in the shelter of Your wings.”

(I can’t leave this here without giving you bits of Charles Spurgeon’s commentary on these four verses):

“David was in terrible earnest: he shouted, he lifted up his voice on high.  He is not, however, content with the expression of his need:  to give vent to his sorrows is not enough for him, he wants actual audience of heaven, and get results…….It is hard to pray when the very heart is drowning, yet gracious men plead best at such times.  Tribulation brings us to God, and brings God to us.  Faith’s greatest triumphs are achieved in her (faith’s)  heaviest trials. 

Mark how our psalmist tells the Lord…that he intended to call upon Him.  Our prayer by reason of our distress may be like a call upon a far-off friend, but our inmost faith has its quiet heart-whispers to the Lord as to one who is assuredly our very present help….

He who communes with God is always at home.  The divine omnipresence surrounds such a person consciously; his faith sees all around him the palace of the King…”

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THE WORD FOR TODAY

Ephesians 5:2

“Christ loved US and gave Himself up for US, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

Ephesians 5:25

“Christ loved THE CHURCH and gave Himself up for her.”

Galatians 2:20

“(He) loved ME and gave Himself for ME.”

Day 6  of John Piper’s 50 reasons Christ suffered and Died:

Christ Suffered and Died…….

TO SHOW HIS OWN LOVE FOR US

The death of Christ is not only the demonstration of GOD’S  love (John 3:16), it is also the supreme expression of CHRIST’S OWN love for all who receive it as their treasure.  The early witnesses who suffered most for being Christians were captured by this fact;  Christ “loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).  They took the self-giving act of Christ’s sacrifice very personally.  They said, “He loved ME.  He gave Himself for ME.

Surely this is the way we should understand the sufferings and death of Christ.  They have to do with me.  They are about Christ’s love for me personally.  It is MY sin that cuts me off from God, not sin in general.  It is MY hard-heartedness and spiritual numbness that demean the worth of Christ.  I am lost and perishing.  When it comes to salvation, I have forfeited all claim on justice.  All I can do is plead for mercy.

Then I see Christ suffering and dying.  For whom?  It says, “Christ loved THE CHURCH and gave Himself up for HER.”  (Ephesians 5:25).

and

“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life FOR HIS FRIENDS.” (1 John 15:13). 

and

“The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for MANY.” (Matthew 20:28).

And I ask, Am I among the “many”?  Can I be one of his “friends”?  May I belong to the “Church”?  And I hear the answer:

“Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.”  (Acts 16:31).

“Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” (Romans 10:13).

“Everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins through His name.” (Acts 10:43).

“To all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.” (John 1:12).

“Whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”  (John 3;16).

My heart is swayed, and I embrace the beauty and bounty of Christ as my Treasure.  And there flows into my heart this great reality – the love of Christ for me.  So I say with those early witnesses, “He loved me and gave Himself for me.”

And what do I mean?  I mean that He paid the highest price possible to give me the greatest gift possible.  And what is that?  It is the gift He prayed for at the end of His Life:

“Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, may be with Me where I am, to see My glory”  (John 17:24).  In His suffering and death “we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1;14),

We have seen enough to capture us for His cause.  But the best is yet to come.  He died to secure this for us.

That is the love of Christ.

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 16 ~ ~ ROMANS 5:7-8 ~ ~ “For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die.  But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”

John 3:16

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.”

Ephesians 1:7

“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our sins, according to the riches of His grace.”

Day 5 of the fifty reasons why Christ suffered and died for us.

Christ Suffered and Died………..

TO SHOW THE WEALTH OF GOD’S LOVE AND GRACE FOR SINNERS

The measure of God’s love for us is shown by two things.  One is the degree of His sacrifice in saving us from the penalty of our sin.  The other is the degree of unworthiness that we had when he saved us.

We can hear the measure of His sacrifice in the words, “He gave His only Son” (John 3;16).  We also hear it in the word “CHRIST”.  This is a name based on the Greek title “CHRISTOS” or “ANOINTED ONE.” Or “MESSIAH”.  It is a term of great dignity.  The Messiah was to be the King of Israel.  He would conquer the Romans and bring peace and security to Israel.  Thus the person whom God sent to save sinners was His own divine Son, His ONLY Son, and the Anointed King of Israel – indeed the king of the world (Isaiah 9:6-7).

When we add to this consideration the horrific death by crucifixion that Christ endured, it becomes clear that the sacrifice the Father and the Son made was indescribably great —infinitely great. ….. when you consider the distance between the divine and human, and that God choose to make this sacrifice to save us.

The measure of His love for us increases still more when we consider OUR unworthiness.  “Perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die – but God shows His love for us in that WHILE WE WERE STILL SINNERS, (and, I might add, by definition that means rebellious against God – the enemies of God), Christ died for us. (Romans 5:7-8).  We deserved divine punishment, not divine sacrifice.

I have heard it said, “God didn’t die for frogs.  So He was responding to our value as humans.”   This turns grace on its head.  We are WORSE THAN FROGS.  They haven’t sinned.  They have not rebelled and treated God with the contempt of being inconsequential in their lives.  God did not have to die for frogs.  They aren’t bad enough.  We are.  Our debt is so great, only a divine sacrifice could pay it.

There is only one explanation for God’s sacrifice for us.  It is not us.  It is “the riches of His grace”  (Ephesians 1:7).  It is all free.  It is not a response to our worth.  It is the overflow of His infinite worth.

In fact, that is what divine love is in the end: a passion to enthrall undeserving sinners, at great cost, with what will make us supremely happy forever, namely, his infinite beauty.

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 15 ~ ~ Hebrews 13:20-21 ~ ~” Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do His will.”

Day 4 of why Christ suffered and died for us, according to John Piper in his book, “The Passion of Jesus Christ.”

Christ Suffered and Died…………….

TO ACHIEVE HIS OWN RESURRECTION FROM THE DEAD

The death of Christ did not merely precede His resurrection —   it was the price that obtained it.  That’s why Hebrews 13:20 says that God brought Him from the dead “by the blood of the eternal covenant.”

The “blood of the eternal covenant.”  Is the blood of Jesus.  As He said in the upper room with His Apostles: “This is My blood of the Covenant.” (Matthew 26:28).  When the Bible speaks of the blood of Jesus, it refers to His death.  No salvation would be accomplished by the mere bleeding of Jesus.  His bleeding to DEATH is what makes His blood-shedding crucial. (and incidentally, it was no “coincidence” that He was crucified on the day that all the lambs were sacrificed for the annual Passover.  He is the Lamb of God———the ultimate sacrifice for sin, and the only one who can really take away sin.  The lamb sacrifices were merely symbolic of His sacrifice).

Now what is the relationship between this shedding of Jesus’ blood and the resurrection?  The Bible says He was raised not just AFTER the blood-shedding, but BY it.  This means that what the death of Christ accomplished was so full and so perfect that the resurrection was a REWARD and VINDICATION of Christ’s achievement of death.

The wrath of God was satisfied with the suffering and death of Jesus. The holy curse against sin was fully absorbed.  The obedience of Christ was completed to the fullest measure.  The price of forgiveness was totally paid.  The righteousness of God was completely vindicated.  All that was left to accomplish was the public declaration of God’s endorsement.  This He gave by raising Jesus from the dead.

When the Bible says, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins” (1Corinthians 15:17), the point is that the resurrection proves that the death of Jesus is an all-sufficient price.  If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then his death was a failure.  God did not vindicate his sin-bearing achievement, and we are still in our sins.

But in fact, “Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father (Romans 6:4).  The success of His suffering and death was vindicated.  And if we put our trust in Christ, we are NOT still in our sins.  For “BY the blood of the eternal Covenant,” the Great Shepherd has been raised and lives forever.

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 14 ~ ~ “Hebrews 5:8 ~ ~Although He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered.”

Hebrews 2:10 ~ ~ “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”

Day 3 of John Piper’s 50 reasons Christ suffered and died; in His book, “The Passion of Jesus Christ.”

Christ Suffered and Died……….

TO LEARN OBEDIENCE AND BE PERFECTED

The very book in the Bible that says Christ “learned obedience: through suffering, and that He was “made perfect” through suffering, also says that He was “without sin.”  Hebrews 4:15 tells us:

“In every respect He has been tempted as we are, YET WITHOUT SIN.”

This is the consistent teaching of the Bible.  Christ was sinless.  Although He was the divine Son of God, He was really human, with all our temptations and appetites and physical weaknesses.  There was hunger (Matthew 21:18) and anger and grief (Mark 3:5) and pain (Matthew 17:12). 

But His heart was perfectly in love with God, neither was deceit found in His mouth (1Peter 2:22).

Therefore, when the Bible says that Jesus “learned obedience through what He suffered,” it doesn’t mean that He learned to stop disobeying!  It means that with each new trial He learned in practice – and in pain – what it means for us to obey.  (We also need to see that this time of His humanity was the only time He and the Father were separated.  He prayed to His Father as we do now, instead of being one with Him in the sense they were since eternity past.   When He became a man, He subjugated Himself to the Father, and only did the Father’s will, –we see this in Gethsemane –‘but Your will be done, not Mine.’ as opposed to them being of one mind constantly since before creation.   In that sense, He had to learn what it was like to be subjugated to anyone – even the Father.  He wanted to experience everything we have to experience.) (Hebrews 4:15)—

When it says that He was “made perfect through suffering,” it doesn’t mean that He was gradually getting rid of defects.  It means that He was gradually fulfilling the perfect righteousness he had to have in order to save us. (In the Greek language, the word which is translated “perfect” mean “complete”—not “perfect” as we think of the word.  He was completing His work on earth for our salvation.  Many Greek and Hebrew words are difficult to translate into English, so we need to study and compare with other verses, as well as the original language and context, to understand what the writer was actually saying).

That’s what He said at His baptism.  He didn’t need to be baptized because He was a sinner.  Rather, He explained to John the Baptist, “Thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”  (Matthew 3:15).

The point is this:

IF THE SON OF GOD HAD GONE FROM INCARNATION TO THE CROSS WITHOUT A LIFE OF TEMPTATION AND PAIN TO TEST HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS AND HIS LOVE, HE WOULD NOT BE A SUITABLE SAVIOR FOR FALLEN MAN.  His suffering not only absorbed the wrath of God.  It also fulfilled His true humanity and made Him able to call us brothers and sisters. (Hebrews 2:17).

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 11 ~ ~ Philippians 3:10 ~ ~ “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death,”

Isaiah 41:10 ~ ~ both the NASB and Young’s Literal Translation  say this:

“‘Do not fear, for I am with you; Do not ANXIOUSLY LOOK ABOUT YOU, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”

I like that literal rendering by these two translations of “do not anxiously look about you”………isn’t that what we do?  This person, that person.  This situation, that situation.  This possibility, that possibility…these thoughts are the stuff that panic attacks are made of; thoughts which erode our faith.     Let’s not look anxiously around us.  Just focus on the fact that HE IS OUR GOD!  And He said “surely I will……….”   that’s all we need to know!!!!!

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Today we’re finishing the introduction in John Piper’s book, “The Passion of Jesus Christ”.

I am not the first to link Calvary and the concentration camps – the suffering of Jesus Christ and the suffering of Jewish people.  In his heart-wrenching, innocence-shattering, mouth-shutting book “Night”, Elie Wiesel tells us his experience as a teenager with his father in the concentration camps of Auschwitz, Buna, and Buchenwald.  There was always the threat of “the selection” – the taking away of the weak to be killed and burned in the ovens.

At one point – and only one – Wiesel links calvary and the camps.  He tells of an old rabbi, Akiba Dumer:

“Akiba Dumer left us, a victim of the selection.  Lately, he had wandered among us, his eyes glazed, telling everyone of his weakness:  “I can’t go on ….It’s all over….”  It was impossible to raise his morale.  He didn’t listen to what we told him.  He could only repeat that all was over for him, that he could no longer keep up the struggle, that he had no strength left, nor faith.  Suddenly his eyes would become blank, nothing but two open wounds, two pits of terror.”

Then Wiesel makes this provocative comment: “Poor Akiba Dumer, if he could have gone on believing in God, if he could have seen a proof of God in this Calvary, he would not have been taken by the selection.”  I will not presume to put any words in Elie Wiesel’s mouth.  I am not sure what he meant.  But is presses the question:  Why the link between Calvary and the concentration camp?

When I ask this question, I am not thinking of cause or blame.  I am thinking of meaning and hope.  Is there a way that Jewish suffering may find, not its cause, but its final meaning in the suffering of Jesus Christ?  Is it possible to think, not of Christ’s passion leading to Auschwitz, but of Auschwitz leading to an understanding of Christ’s passion?  Is the link between Calvary and the camps a link of unfathomable empathy?  Perhaps only Jesus in the end can know what happened during the “one long night” of Jewish suffering.  And perhaps a generation of Jewish people whose grandparents endured their own noxious crucifixion, will be able, as no others, to grasp what happened to the Son of God at calvary.  I leave it as a question, I do not know.

But this I know:  Those ostensible “Christians” who built the camps never knew the love that moved Jesus Christ toward Calvary.  They never knew the Christ, who instead of killing to save a culture, died to save the world.  But there are some Christians – the true Christians – who have seen the meaning of the passion of Jesus Christ, and have been broken and humbled by His suffering.  Could it be that these, perhaps better than many, might be able to see and, at least, begin to fathom the suffering of the Jewish people?

What an irony that Christians have been anti-Semitic!  Jesus and all His early followers were Jews.  People from every group in Palestine were involved in His crucifixion (not just Jews), and people from every group opposed it (including Jews).  God Himself was the chief Actor in the death of His Son, so that the main question is not ‘which humans brought about the death of Jesus?’ but, ‘what did the death of Jesus bring about for humans – including Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus and non religious secularist –and people everywhere?’

When all is said and done, the most crucial question is:  Why?   Why did Christ suffer and die?  Not why in the sense of CAUSE, but why in the sense of PURPOSE.  What did Christ achieve by His passion?  Why did He have to suffer so much?  What great thing was happening on Calvary for the world?

That’s what the rest of this book is about.  I have gathered from the New Testament fifty reasons why Christ suffered and died.  Not fifty causes, but fifty purposes. 

Infinitely more important than who killed Jesus is the question,

“WHAT DID GOT ACHIEVE FOR SINNERS LIKE US IN SENDING HIS SON TO DIE?”

To that we now turn.

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 12 ~ ~ 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”),

Romans 3:25 ~ ~  whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed,

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.

John 7:38 (AMP)

He who believes in Me [who adheres to, trusts in, and relies on Me], as the Scripture has said, ‘From his innermost being will flow continually rivers of living water.’

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We’re reading in John Piper’s book, “The Passion of Jesus Christ”   Today:

Christ Suffered and Died………….

TO ABSORB THE WRATH OF GOD

If God were not JUST, there would be no DEMAND for His Son to suffer and Die.  And if God were not LOVING, there would be no WILLINGNESS for His Son to suffer and die.  But God is both just and loving.  Therefore His love is willing to meet the demands of His justice.

God’s law demanded, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might (Deuteronomy 6:5).  But we have all loved other things more.  This is what sin is – dishonoring God by preferring other things over Him, and acting on those preferences.  Therefore, the Bible says, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”  (Romans 3:23).  We glorify what we enjoy most.  And it isn’t God.

Therefore sin is not small, because it is not against a small God.  The seriousness of an insult rises with the dignity of the one insulted.  The Creator of the universe is infinitely worthy of respect, admiration and loyalty.  Therefore, failure to love Him is not trivial – it is treason.  It defames God and destroys human happiness.

Since God is just, He does not sweep these crimes under the rug of the universe.  He feels a holy wrath against them.  They deserve to be punished, and He has made this clear: 

“For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23)

“The soul who sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4)

There is a holy curse hanging over all sin.  Not to punish would be unjust.  The demeaning of God would be endorsed.  A lie would reign at the core of reality.  Therefore, God says,

 “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them”  (Galatians 3:10 and Deuteronomy 27:26).

But the love of God does not rest with the curse that hangs over all sinful humanity.  He is not content to show wrath, no matter how holy it is.  Therefore God sends His own Son to absorb His wrath and bear the curse for all who trust Him. 

“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us” (Galatians 3:13).

This is the meaning of the word “propitiation” in the text quoted above (Romans 3:25).  It refers to the removal of God’s wrath by providing a substitute.  The substitute is provided by God Himself.  The substitute, Jesus Christ, does not cancel the wrath; He absorbs it and diverts it from us to Himself.  God’s wrath is just, and it was spent, not withdrawn.

Let us not trifle with God or trivialize His love.  We will never stand in awe of being loved by God until we deal  with the seriousness of our sin and the justice of His wrath against us.  But when, by grace, we waken to our unworthiness, then we may look at the suffering and death of Christ and say, “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the (wrath-absorbing) PROPITIATION  for our sins.”  (1 John 4:10)

GOD’S WORD FOR FEBRUARY 10 ~ ~ 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.”

YOUR PERSONAL PROMISE FOR TODAY ~ ~ “John 10:28-29 ~ ~ “And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.   My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all;  and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.”

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We are beginning John Piper’s book, “The Passion of Jesus Christ”, with “fifty reasons why He came to die.”  We’ll see a different reason every day until Resurrection Day.

INTRODUCTION:

The most important question of the twenty-first century is:  why did Jesus Christ suffer so much?  But we will never see this importance if we fail to go beyond human cause.  The ultimate answer to the question, “Who crucified Jesus? Is: “God did.”

It is a staggering thought.  Jesus was His Son.  And the suffering was unsurpassed.  But the whole message of the Bible leads to this conclusion.

GOD MEANT IT FOR GOOD.

The Hebrew prophet Isaiah said, “it was the will of the Lord to crush Him;  He has put Him to grief”  (Isaiah 53:10).  The Christian New Testament says, “God did not spare his own Son but gave Him up for us all”  (Romans 8:32).  “God put Christ forward …by His blood, to be received by faith”  (Romans 3;25).

But how does this divine act relate to the horribly sinful actions of the men who killed Jesus?  The answer given in the Bible is expressed in an early prayer:  “There were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus…..both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your plan had predestined to take place” (Acts 4:27-28).  The depth and scope of this divine sovereignty takes our breath away.  But it is also the key to our salvation.  God planned it, and by the means of wicked men, great good has come to the world.  To paraphrase a word of the Jewish Torah (Old Testament):  They meant it for evil, but God meant it for good (Genesis 50:20).

And since God meant it for good, we must move beyond the question of human cause to divine purpose.  The central issue of Jesus’ death is not the cause, but the purpose – the meaning.  Man may have his reasons for wanting Jesus out of the way.  But only God can design it for the good of the world.  In fact, God’s purposes for the world in the death of Jesus are unfathomable. 

I am scraping the surface in this little book as I introduce you to fifty of them.  My aim is to let the Bible speak.  This is where we hear the word of God.  I hope that these pointers will set you on an endless quest to know more and more of God’s great design in the death of his Son.

THE PASSION OF CHRIST AND THE PASSION OF AUSCHWITZ

It is a tragedy that the story of Christ’s passion has produced anti-Semitism against Jews.  We Christians are ashamed of many of our ancestors who did not act in the spirit of Christ.  No doubt there are traces of this plague in our own souls.  But true Christianity – which is radically different from Western culture, and may not be found in many Christian churches – renounces the advance of religion by means of violence.

“My Kingdom is not of this world,” Jesus said.  “If my Kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting.” (John 18:36).  The way of the cross is the way of suffering.  Christians are called to die, not kill, in order to show the world how they are loved by Christ.

Today this love humbly and boldly commends Christ, no matter what it costs, to all peoples as the only saving way to God.  “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through Me.’”  (John 14:6). But let it be crystal-clear:  It is not Christian to humiliate or scorn or despise or persecute with prideful putdowns, or programs, or crusades, or concentration camps.  These were and are, very simply and horribly, disobedience to Jesus Christ.  Unlike any of His followers, He prayed from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”  (Luke 23:34).

The passion of Jesus Christ is the most important event in history, and the most explosive political and personal issue of the twenty-first century.  The denial that Christ was crucified is like the denial of the Holocaust.  For some it’s simply too horrific to affirm.  For others, it’s an elaborate conspiracy to coerce religious sympathy.  But the deniers live in a historical dreamworld.  Jesus Christ suffered unspeakably and died…………….so did the Jews.