God’s Passion for You 12th April 09
John 20:1 – 18
About five years ago Mel Gibson released a movie called “The Passion of Christ” which received a tremendous amount of media attention; it was featured on the cover of ‘News Week’ and ‘Time’ magazine.
The word ‘Passion’ is used at Easter in the old English sense, which literally means ‘suffering’ – it was never used as a sensual word.
The Passion of Christ relates specifically to the last 12 hours of Jesus life; the trial of Jesus, the death of Jesus and what followed on the third day his glorious resurrection.
Now what do these three events tell us about God’s Passion for us?
1. Jesus Trial Reveals God’s Purpose for the World
Paul wrote that, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.”
2 Cor. 5:19
Jesus came into the world – intentionally to die for the sin of the world.
People have argued throughout the ages about who killed Jesus; was it the Roman guards or the Jewish leaders?
Let’s be very clear, it was my and sin and your sin that put Jesus on the cross; if it wasn’t for our sin Jesus would not have been crucified.
Above all Jesus the Christ died of his own volition; it was his own decision, listen to Jesus words.
“No one can take my life from me. I lay down my life voluntarily. For I have the right to lay it down when I want to and also the power to take it again. For my Father has given me this command.” John 10:18 (NLT)
Mel Gibson’s film begins in the Garden of Gethsemane with Jesus struggling with the mental anguish and agony over what he was about to go through.
“Now my soul is troubled and distressed, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour of trial and agony? But it was for this very purpose that I have come to this hour!” John 12:27 (Amp)
Q. Now how did Jesus come to this conclusion given his humanity?
Jesus was, after all, fully human – so how did he come to understand his God given purpose so clearly?
Jesus understanding came from three sources;
i. From his knowledge of the OT scriptures
ii. From listening to his Heavenly Father – through prayer
iii. From his Father’s affirmation e.g. at his baptism and on the Mount of Transfiguration.
Q. So what was Jesus life purpose which, he so clearly understood?
Jesus said, “For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it.” John 12:47 (NIV)
We live in the age of grace; we should never forget that!
When the soldiers came to the garden to arrest Jesus, Peter pulled out his sword and lashed out – but Jesus responded;
“Put away your sword,” Those who use the sword will die by the sword.
Don’t you realize that I could ask my Father for thousands of angels to protect us, and he would send them instantly? But if I did, how would the Scriptures be fulfilled that describe what must happen now?”
In the following eight hours Jesus went through six different trials, three Jewish and three Roman trials, all of them illegal, because under Jewish and Roman law you were not allowed to hold a trial at night.
Each trial was a sham, there was no evidence to convict Jesus, except finally they made one accusation stick and this is why they killed him.
After not being able to get any credible witnesses to testify against Jesus they asked him; “Tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of the living God?”
To which Jesus replied, “Yes, it is as you say.” Matt. 26: 63 & 64
Then Matthew records that they spat on him and struck him with their fists and they took him out and killed him.
But there is something we should understand;
I. Jesus never claimed to be a religious leader.
II. He never claimed to be a religious prophet.
III. He never claimed to be a good moral teacher
IV. And he never claimed to be a ‘man of God.’
V. What he said was, “I am God.”
This changes things and begs an answer, from us all, to the question:
Q. How should we respond to a claim like this?
C.S. Lewis said a person who makes such a claim for himself can only be one of three things; mad, bad or God.
There are no other options available to us.
i. Was he mad in which case how do we explain his teaching, which has profoundly changed the way we think?
ii. Was he bad, a deceiver of others in which case how do we explain his character?
I’m sure all of us, would agree that Jesus is the person whom we would most like to be in our best moments?
iii. Or was he telling the truth? In which case we should take him very seriously!
There really are no other options and the first generation of Christians had absolutely no doubt about the truth of Jesus claims.
“Christ was truly God. But … he gave up everything and became a slave, when he became like one of us. Christ was humble. He obeyed God and even died on a cross.
Then God gave Christ the highest place and honoured his name above all others. So at the name of Jesus everyone will bow down, those in heaven, on earth, and under the earth.” Phil 2:2 -6 CEV
One day everyone will acknowledge Jesus for who he is – the Lord of all.
Tragically many of those forced to bow the knee to him will not know him as their saviour. He must be both Saviour and Lord.
The trial of Jesus was a mockery, because he was without sin, but it reminds us that one day we and everyone else will face the justice of God and none of us will be innocent as charged.
Of course we won’t have to fear the justice of God if we have already received the mercy of God.
So Jesus trial reveals the purpose of God to atone for the sin of the world and help us to recognize our sin and need of a Saviour.
2. The Death of Jesus Shows Us God’s Passion (intensity)
The cross of Christ, which was so offensive to God, demonstrates the length to which God is willing to go in order to deal with the offensiveness of our sin.
After his trial Jesus was handed over to be crucified.
In the history of the world there never has been a more brutal form of capital punishment. Eventually even the Roman’s outlawed it because of its brutality.
Well before Jesus reached Golgotha, he was subject to the most horrific beating and humiliation.
The soldiers spat on him, slapped and taunted him.
“Who slapped you Jesus? If you really are the Son of God tell us who did this?
Of course if Jesus had chosen to he could not only have named them all, and given them their whole pedigree or lack of it, but he remained silent.
“If you are the king of the Jews, you need a crown” they jeered and one was produced a crown made of vicious thorns which they jammed down on his head into his scalp and skull.
The Bible also says that in their torment they plucked his beard, slapped and scourged him with a whip made of nine leather strips to which they would tie bits of bone or lead.
Every stroke would leave nine whip marks, a total of 39 x 9 = 351 bruises and tears all over his body.
He hadn’t even begun the long journey to the top of the hill where they crucified him.
The object of crucifixion was a slow unbearable death, ultimately by suffocation through exhaustion;
The victim would have to push himself up on his nailed feet to breathe and them when the pain in his feet was too great he would transfer his weight one again to his nailed hands.
Up and down up and down in this fashion until he was no longer able to lift himself and he was suffocated; a horrific way to die.
The victims would also be left to the elements; the birds would come and peck at them and the dogs would rip at their feet.
But you know Jesus greatest torment was not Jesus physical torment but the spiritual torment of being separated for his Heavenly Father – “My God my God why have you forsaken me.”
When Jesus was crucified the Jewish leaders were keen to get it over with before the start of the Sabbath and the soldiers were told to break the prisoner’s legs.
When they came to Jesus they found him already dead and so the Roman Centurion took his spear and thrust Jesus side to make sure.
Out of the wound flowed a mixture of blood and water.
The medical significance of this escaped people for generations until a cardiologists report in the Journal of American Medicine said that this was poof of death; the separation of the clot and the serum, in the chest cavity – when a heart was torn.
Jesus heart had literally exploded on the cross; he died of a broken heart.
Q. Why would God allow that?
The Bible helps us here;
“When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us.” Romans 5: 6 & 8 NLT
So the death of Jesus shows us the extent of God’s love for us and we must never forget that.
Which is why before he died Jesus gave us the sacrament we call the Last Supper.
The short answer as to why Jesus had to die is because our Creator God; Father, Son and Spirit, deemed it necessary to settle the accumulated debt of our sin. Someone had to pay.
Five months ago a young lady, who was a Buddhist, contacted me because she was feeling overwhelmed by her debt (bad karma) and she felt she had no way to offset it.
She knew that someone had to pay and she was right about that. She also knew she could never do it and she was right about that.
She had heard that Christians had a way of settling their debt of sin.
“Christ sacrificed his life’s blood to set us free, which means that our sins are now forgiven. Christ did this because of God’s amazing grace towards us.” Eph. 1: 7 CEV
Think about this – if there had been any other way, for our debt of sin to be atoned for, don’t you think God would have chosen it; to spare Christ and Himself such suffering?
The fact remains; there is no other way.
One more verse on this from Hebrews 2:10 CEV
“Everything belongs to God, and all things were created by his power. So God did the right thing when he made Jesus perfect by suffering, as Jesus led many of God’s children to be saved and to share in his glory.”
The right thing is not always the easy thing!
In a moment when we take the elements of Communion and repeat Jesus words;
‘Do this in remembrance of me” – we do well to remember that it was for our sins that he died.
Prayer: “Thank you Lord for dying for my sin and enabling me to share in your glorious life.”
So, the trial of Jesus reveals God’s purpose in Christ to atone for the sin of the world and in the process, remind us that we all live under the justice of God unless we accept the mercy of God.
The death of Jesus reminds us of God’s passion for the world; in love He paid the price of our sin.
3. The Resurrection of Jesus Shows Us God’s Power
Today we celebrate the Resurrection; Jesus is the only human story that did not end ultimately in death, if it had we wouldn’t be here.
“If Christ wasn’t raised to life, our message is worthless, and so is your faith. But the truth is Christ has been raised”.1 Cor. 15:14 CEV
After Jesus died a wealthy man, Joseph of Aramathea – a member of the Jewish Council did a very brave thing, he went and asked Pilate for Jesus body, which he wrapped in linen cloth and laid in his own tomb.
This tomb was not that unusual – most people were buried in caves but it was unusual not to have to share a tomb with many others.
A large millstone was place in from of the Tomb.
Discovering Jesus place of burial his opponents went to Pilate and said;
“This man claimed that after three days he would rise again.
We are afraid that his followers will steal the body and tell people that he is resurrected.”
Pilate gave instructions for Jesus tomb to be permanently sealed and he posted a guard.
I think it’s ironic that Jesus Christ was the only person in history whose grave was guarded to keep him from coming out.
But no grave could hold him and on the third day Jesus rose again just as he said he would.
“After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.” Acts 1:3 NIV
This wasn’t just a one off appearance, which could be explained away as a dream or vision;
Jesus appeared to hundreds of people on many different occasions – on one occasion to over 500 people at once.
That’s pretty convincing proof, which is why within a few years about half the City became believers.
Archaeologists and historians tell us that within twenty years of the resurrection of Christ; Jerusalem a City of 250,000 people had between 100 and 125 thousand Christians.
While on the cross one of the Jewish leaders had taunted to Jesus;
“If you are the Son of God why don’t you save yourself and come down from the cross.”
Jesus didn’t come to save himself but everyone else and on the third day we see that God had something far more spectacular in mind.
Paul, “And he was shown to be the Son of God when he was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Rom. 1:4 NLT
When Jesus died he became the Saviour of the world when he was raised to life again – the power that raised Jesus from the dead became available to us through the Holy Spirit.
We don’t just share in Christ’s death we also share in his resurrection life.
Paul said, “I also pray that you will understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for us who believe him. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead.” Eph 1:19 – 20 NLB
If we have a problem with powerlessness – the simple solution is that we need more of the presence and power of the Christ in our lives.
One last thing; in view of what God has done for me, how should I respond to his death for me?
i. I ought to love Christ above everything else. Even if he doesn’t do anything else for me he has given me a new life now and forever.
ii. I ought to hate sin – because it was my sin that put Jesus on the cross.
iii. I ought to tell others the good news – the Bible says:
“For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. This was the wonderful message he gave us to tell others.” 2 Cor. 5:19
Q. If someone died for you wouldn’t you want to know about it? Of course you would.
And similarly if someone has left you a legacy of life, wouldn’t you feel grieved if no one said anything to you – we ought to speak out.
Jesus is alive and we can know him!