Jesus’ death on the cross wasn’t His greatest sacrifice.
I know that sentence comes with the air of many trending
articles and blog posts. I’ll write something like “Why I still go on dates
even though I’m married!” to lure you with indignation and confusion before
telling you why my statement isn’t actually false even though it doesn’t mean
what you think it means…
My line means exactly what it means. It had not luring motives or hidden
agendas. Continue on in your indignation
if you wish. But I maintain what I first
stated:
Jesus’ death on the cross wasn’t His greatest sacrifice.
The season of Lent always serves a very intense and profound
purpose: to make me reflective. To leave
me in wonder and awe. To be left utterly
amazed by the love of the Father. The
love of God to watch the people He created to love Him, fall and fail. And to watch the fall of man and to create a
plan “he will crush your head and you will strike his heel” (Genesis 3:15)…a
plan to bring those created in love and by love and for love…to bring them back
to Love. I’m left baffled by the
patience. The patience of God to
wait. To watch His people ebb and flow
back and forth between obedience and insolence.
Knowing that His plan was ready but his people were not. But, when the time was right, God sent his
son, born of a woman…(Galatians 4:4).
God, on earth, with us, Emmanuel!
Those facts alone drop me to my knees…
And then comes Lent, the preparation for Easter, and somehow
– despite all we know – there is more.
As is always. God is always more
than the limitations we place on Him.
God is always more than the finite limitations of human understanding… The immediate “more” comes easily into full
focus. Jesus came to die. Christmas and Easter are indubitably
connected. Easter cannot exist without
Christmas (obvious you might say!) but nor does or can Christmas exist without
Easter. It’s been said by those much
wiser, smarter, and closer to Jesus than I am that the manger existed in the
shadow of the cross.
Jesus came to die.
And He HAD to die.
For a hundred reason which serve separately than the current scope of
this post. Jesus was always part of
God’s plan for redemption and reconciliation.
Sin, which entangles and separates humankind from God (spoiler! This is
important in a bit!) had to be atoned for.
A lamb without blemish needed to have blood spilled in sacrifice to a
perfect God. Prophesy was fulfilled. Jesus, Son of God and son of man, was slain
as an atonement for sin. For my sin.
He was obedient, even obedient to death on a cross (Philippians 2).
Jesus died for me.
Any strength left in those dropped knees has shattered.
And they should.
But it’s not enough.
Too often those finite limitations of human understanding
end there. Our scientific minds end at
the end of our understanding. And though
we are still restricted, we understand death.
We can comprehend the magnitude and finality of death. There is nothing worse than death.
Jesus, who was without sin, was handed over to sinful men to
take on the weight of sin. The weight of the sin of the whole world. And the penalty for sin is death. Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice for us in
death on the cross.
But He didn’t. Jesus’
ultimate sacrifice wasn’t in His death.
Because death is easy.
“Very rarely will anyone die for a righteousness man, though
for a good man someone might possibly dare to die…” Paul tells us in Romans 5. He then proceeds with the same knee jello-ing
truth of the reality… Christ not only died for the righteous but the
unrighteous.
And yet…people who can in no way compare to Christ have died
for others. Have sacrificed their lives
for another. It’s not unheard of… In
fact, anything newsworthy to hit one right in the feels often has to do with
sacrifice. A soldier who not only died
protecting a comrade but committed to service believing his life would mean
life for an entire country. The teacher
who protected against an attacker. The mother who stands in the way of a
bullet. The stranger who pushes another
out of the way of a moving car. People
willingly put their lives on the line for others.
For even just one other person, we find people willing to
die.
Though their intentions and motives be strewn across any
sphere of reasoning and rationale, if you were to announce that one life could
be sacrificed to save every other life in the known world (completely
disregarding any life to come)…I believe the applications would be
endless. I don’t consider myself noble,
sacrificial, or especially good. But I
do believe if I was given that option, I would take it. I would gladly take on the punishment of
death if it meant those I knew and those I didn’t could live. It would be a sacrifice I would willingly
make. No, it wouldn’t take away the fear
or the trepidation or the uncertainty.
But I would go…
And Jesus would greet me as I took my dying breath…
It is in this sentence I find my truest reality. The love I was created for and to Know would
be my eternity of reality. It’s the
story maker, the story shaper, and the story changer.
The reality of Christ frees me from the punishment of sin
and death (Romans 6:22-23). See the punishment of sin is death…and the
punishment of death is eternity. An
eternity without God.
Sin separates us from God (Isaiah 59:2). Habakkuk 1:13 tells us God can’t look at
evil. And the rote Romans 3:23 reminds
us that all have fallen short of the glory of God. [Although I’m of personal opinion that while
God’s holiness is incompatible with sin, is us that creates the separation, not
God. God came for the ungodly – He
bridged the gap. Our sin, however, pulls
us further away from the heart of God and therefore drives a deeper wedge between
where we are and where God calls us to be.]
We sin. So we know separation
from God.
Jesus didn’t. Jesus,
without sin, was handed over to sinful men to bear the consequence of sin. Death.
Eternal separation from God.
Jesus, who was God and who was with God and who was part of the plan
from the beginning only knew the extreme presence and incarnation of the Father
within Him. We see the Holy Spirit rest
upon Jesus at His baptism where God’s voice from heaven says “this is My Son,
whom I love; with you I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22) but God’s presence wasn’t
waiting for this moment. Jesus never had
a case of confused identity. Even as a
boy when He stayed behind at the temple He questioned why His parents would
come looking for Him “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49) Jesus knew intimately the presences of the
One who called Himself “I AM.”
And Jesus’ dying breath wasn’t going to me met with “I
AM”. It was to be met with a complete
absence of God. When Jesus cries out
with His dying breaths “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”… “My God, my God, why
have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46) Jesus met death
with the consequence of death…the absence of God.
In so lies Jesus’ greatest sacrifice. He was willing to not only sacrifice His
earthly life but His relationship with God that we might be in relationship
with God.
He endured Hell that we might never have to experience
Hell.
He bore a separation from God which never was a part of His
being that we might never have to know a day, a moment, without His
presence.
And then He conquered it.
He conquered death and He conquered Hell. And He rose.
And He lives. He lives that we
may know Him. Lives that we be in relationship with Him. Lives that we may serve Him. Lives that others may be drawn to know and to
serve Him. Lives so that, as the song
says, we can face tomorrow.
He made the greatest sacrifice.
Can I but respond to faithfully give Him my life…
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