The transcript of a sermon on John 19:28-37 has been lightly edited for ease of reading.
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If you have your Bible, please take it and turn with me to the Gospel of John. John chapter 19. We will consider verses 28 through 37.
This is one of four accounts of the crucifixion of Jesus. We find one in each gospel. And then, of course, Paul applies it, and the other letter writers of the New Testament apply the death of Jesus to the life of the Christian.
So please follow along as I read from John chapter 19, beginning in verse 28.
“Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so that the scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, I am thirsty. A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips.
When he had received the drink, Jesus said, It is finished. With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. Now it was the day of preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath.
Because the Jews did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath, they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. The soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other. But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs.
Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. These things happen so that the scriptures would be fulfilled. Not one of his bones will be broken, and as another scripture says, they will look on the one they have pierced.”
Let us pray.
Holy, holy, holy God, you have made it possible for us to approach your word to seek true understanding and to seek healing. You have done this through your son and his work on our behalf. May your life-giving spirit open our eyes and our hearts so that we might be remade in the image of your son.
It is in his name that we pray. Amen.
INTRODUCTION
So, if you decided today to leave and to go out and to start your own new religion, there are a number of things that you would need to do, and one of those things that you would have to do in order to start that religion is to choose a logo or a symbol.
That logo, that symbol would be an identifier for those who believe what you teach and a rallying point for those people to gather as they come into the fold of your new religion. It should be something that inspires a sense of purpose and embodies much of what you believe. So if you were going to identify a symbol for your new religion, what would you look for? You’d probably look for something that that portrayed power, that communicated a glory and the majesty of your new religion.
You might even want a symbol that tells people that you are preaching peace. Now one thing you don’t want to do if you’re going to choose this new logo and this new religion is to choose something that most of the culture sees as a symbol of shame and dehumanizing rejection.
But that, brothers and sisters, is exactly what the early church did. In the equivalent of choosing the guillotine or the hangman’s noose, the early church chose an emblem of suffering and shame to be the world-recognized identifier of the church.
Today we wear the cross as jewelry. We encrust the cross with gold or silver or diamonds and we put crosses on our rings, on our necklaces, on our brooches.
But this was shocking to the first century Roman world. In Rome, only the worst of the worst criminals were hung upon the cross. It was a dehumanizing and shameful experience as you were lifted up, hung naked and exposed upon a plank of wood. Rotten food and, well, other stuff would have been thrown at you as you hung upon that cross.
And when, after two to three days on average, you finally suffocated in your own blood and in your own fluids, your body would have been thrown in the local trash heap. This is what the hymn, The Old Rugged Cross, means when it says that the cross at which we gather around is an emblem of suffering and shame.
So why would the church choose a symbol of cursing, rejection and shame as its rallying point? That’s something we’ll look at today as we seek to look into the next phrase, he was crucified, dead and was buried, he descended into hell. And as we study this phrase, we will see that the crucifixion is crucial to our salvation. We will also consider some objections to the cross and we will see that the cross has daily importance in the life of the Christian.
THE CROSS IS CRUCIAL TO OUR SALVATION
So first, the cross is crucial. If you still have your Bible open to Galatians five, please turn a couple of chapters over to Galatians three. And listen, as I read from Galatians chapter three, beginning in verse 13:
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith, we may might receive the promise of the Spirit.”
Jesus hung on the cross because he was going to be cursed by the law of God.
When we think of curse, we typically think of, I don’t know, maybe witches or practitioners of voodoo who who cast spells upon people. Michelle’s grandfather used to tell the story that when he was born in the house that he was born in, a lady walked by and this lady in the community was considered to be a witch. And so they passed Melvin through the window of the house in an attempted ritual to keep this witch from cursing him at his birth.
That’s not what the scripture is talking about when it talks about curse. Cursing is related to the covenant relationship between God and Israel. In the book of Deuteronomy, we are given the second law.
God repeats his law. He repeats how he wants the Israelites to live once they are established in the nation of Israel. And he says there will be blessings for those who lovingly obey. The prosperity of the land, the possession of the land, the closeness to God represented by the temple in the city of Jerusalem were all blessings that the people would enjoy when they lovingly obeyed God.
The cursing would come for disobedience. They would lose the prosperity of the land. They would lose the possession of the land, and ultimately they would lose the closeness to God that they experienced in the land of Israel.
And so when Deuteronomy chapter 21, verse 23, which is quoted by Paul in Galatians 3:13, said, cursed is he who hangs upon the tree. What it is saying is there is a stark and a vivid separation between the people of God and God if they disobey his commands. What does the separation look like?
Well, you and I believe we profess that God is omnipresent, that he is fully and truly and completely present in every square millimeter of the created world and beyond.
But here on this earth, he is present with all people with a measure of love and grace. How do I know that he is present with all people in a measure of love and grace? Well, it’s because he has said that death will follow sin. And yet you and I and every human being still sins.
And yet we are allowed to live for a time. But there will come a time where being in the presence of God will also mean being separated from that love and grace.
For the people of God, they will have an eternal taste of that love and grace. But for those who reject God, for those who live by the song, I did it my way, they will find themselves in the presence of God’s holiness and his justice without the mediation of his love and grace. And that is what is meant by the cursing that God brings down upon those who are disobedient.
The reason that the cross is crucial to the salvation of the Christian is this. On that cross in those three hours, Jesus experienced the separation from the love and the grace of God for those who believe. Your sins, my sins, the full punishment, the full weight of God’s wrath fell upon him at on the cross so that you and I might have forgiveness so that you and I might have grace.
If you have ever gone your own way, despite God’s commands, you deserve the curse and separation from God’s love and grace. And yet and yet. God said, I will pay the price for your sins so that you might forever live in the fullness of my glory, my love and my grace. When we see the cross, it is a reminder to you and I that Jesus has hung in our place.
He has taken the punishment for us. Without the cross, there is no salvation. Without the cross, you and I are without hope before God.
OBJECTIONS TO THE CROSS
So the cross is crucial to our salvation. This also leads us to some objections that the world has to the cross. And today I want to briefly consider three objections that come up to the cross.
The first is centered on the idea of the repugnance of sacrifice. The argument goes along these lines. Blood sacrifice, especially sacrifice that includes the loss of life, is a barbaric practice that has no place in a religion of love and peace.
This objection is rooted in an underestimation of God’s holiness. And an overestimation of our own personal righteousness.
God is a holy God. We have recently looked a couple of months ago, we looked at Isaiah 6 and Revelation 5 and considering that God is God, the father almighty. And in both of those passages, it says, “holy, holy, holy is the Lord God almighty.” What the authors are saying there is holy, holier, holiest is God.
He is more holy than any other being in all of creation. He is completely other, but he is also completely and gloriously righteous in all that he says and all that he does. This holy, holy, holy God hates sin and cannot be in its presence.
And the problem with that is we humans are not holy. James chapter 2, verse 10 says that you can keep the entirety of the law and fail at the smallest of points of the law and still be liable for the whole curse of the law. You ever caught yourself saying, it’s just a little white lie?
It’s a violation of the ninth commandment, which is also a violation of the first commandment because we put ourselves in the place of God. And because of that, just that little white lie, we deserve the wrath of God. God is a holy God.
He says that he must punish sin in order for his holiness to be preserved. And so for the Christian, the cross is not repugnant. The cross is glorious because it is our hope. It is our, the foundation of our joy.
The second objection says that the cross is God’s engagement in cosmic child abuse. This is rooted in the view that the God of the Old Testament is full of anger and petty rage, so he must make an example out of someone. And well, you know, Jesus was there, so we’ll take it out on him.
This objection denies the description in places like Matthew 3:17 of the loving relationship between the father and the son. And it also denies places like John 10:11, where Jesus says, I willingly lay down my life so that I might take it up again for the salvation of the sheep.
Under the scrutiny of scripture, this objection falls as well.
And the third objection, and this one kind of baffles me the most, but the third objection says that the cross is merely a moral object lesson.
Here’s what this objection looks like. Look, let’s throw out all of the miraculous stuff. Let’s throw out all of the claims of Jesus to actually be God. And let’s look at what he taught.
He taught us to be people of love and peace and to just hang out with sinners and tax collectors. And he was so dedicated to this message of love and peace that, you know what? He didn’t squawk whenever people falsely accused him and then willingly gave up his life as an example to those of us who follow that we should be willing to give up everything to be loving and peaceful people.
What did John say in the passage we read earlier? The man who saw it has given testimony and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth and testifies so that you also may believe. The gospel writers claimed to be writing eyewitness testimony. Everything that Jesus did, everything that he taught, they claim was eyewitness testimony.
If a word of it is not true, all of it is worthless. It’s Paul’s argument in 1 Corinthians 15 as he deals specifically with the resurrection. If Jesus is not telling the truth about being God, well why should we listen to him about loving people? If Jesus is not telling, if the gospel authors are not telling the truth about the miracles that Jesus did, how can we trust their account of his teaching to be people of peace? It’s either all true or it’s all worthless.
I realize that’s a harsh line in the sand in our world today, but he is not a good teacher if he constantly lied about who he was. And his words cannot be trusted if they were made up by men to exert power, authority, and control over people they thought were beneath them. It’s either true or we are without hope.
THE DAILY IMPORTANCE OF THE CROSS
So the cross is crucial. We considered a few objections to the cross and now let’s think about the daily importance of the cross to the life of the Christian.
One of the misunderstandings that I know I had to have corrected throughout my life, and I’m sure some of you do too, is the misunderstanding that the cross is only important to get us the entry ticket to the Christian life. It’s only important to get us over the line, so to speak, into the family of God and then we are responsible for everything else.
We are responsible to be holy. We’re responsible to put sin to death. We are responsible for all of the effort necessary to continue in our Christian walk.
Our passage earlier from Galatians chapter 5 points out to us two different ways to live. We can either live by the flesh or we can live by the spirit.
What does Paul mean when he says to live by the flesh? Well, he’s basically saying that you live in your own power according to your own wants and to your own desires. Living by the flesh is living a life marked by wanting to do things your way, regardless of what God has revealed in the scripture. And Paul summarizes the life of the flesh in verses 19 and following.
He talks about the acts of the sinful nature being “sexual morality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy, drunkenness, and orgies,” and the like.
And brothers and sisters, the temptation is to look at this list and we look at the beginning of the list and we look at the end of the list and we say, hey, you know what? I don’t struggle with those things. You know, I’ve got my sexual life under control.
I’m not a drunkard. I’ve never murdered anybody. So the life of the flesh doesn’t apply to me.
Have you ever been selfish? Have you ever gossiped? Have you ever been in a group of friends that excludes other people just because they might think or act differently than you? Paul tells us here that even anger and divisiveness and selfishness mark the life of the flesh. Brothers and sisters, what Paul is saying is that when I use my sarcasm to hurt, I am living the fleshly life. And he contrasts that with the life of the spirit.
He says, “but the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things, there is no law.”
And I’m tempted right here to look at this list and say, okay, I’m an angry, passive, aggressive person. You know what? I’m going to do everything I can today. I will love today. I will be a person of peace. I will be a person of joy. Come heck or high water. I will do whatever it takes.
And that’s the wrong attitude, brothers and sisters, because the life of the spirit, the life of the cross is a fleshly life that has been crucified with Christ. What does he say in verse 24? “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and its desires.”
What do you struggle with in your life? Where do those words and actions and desires bump up against what God calls you to do? The truth is that as if you are a believer, that part of you that rebels against God has been put to death and you are a new creature created with love, with joy, with peace.
Yes, we still live under the horrible influence of those fleshly desires, but that part of you has been put to death. Do you struggle with sexual sin? The power to fight that comes from the cross. Do you struggle with gossip? The fleshly desire that wants to exclude and build yourself up, that desire that fuels gossip has been put to death at the cross.
Have you ever taken a personality type thinking, hey, I’m going to come out as a peacemaker, I’m going to come out as you know, a strong, good personality? And the answer comes out, your personality type is angry? Your anger has died with Jesus at the cross. The sin that comes from your anger has died with Jesus at the cross.
Brothers and sisters, the cross means that you are marked by the fruit of the spirit. By the power of that same spirit, yes, you and I need to develop that fruit. But it is yours in its fullness. The cross is the symbol of victory in your day-to-day fight against sin, your day-to-day pursuit of the fruit of the spirit.
Fight your sin from a position of victory, for your sinful nature has been put to death with Jesus.
CONCLUSION
The crucifixion is crucial to our salvation. We’ve seen some common objections and attempted to give an answer, and we’ve seen how the cross is the power in the daily fight against sin.
Next week, we’ll look a little deeper into the statements that he was buried and descended into hell, but those statements are reminders that he was dead, dead, fully dead, both in body and spirit. We’ll flesh that out a little bit more next week.
I want to leave you today with this.
I understand that the fight with sin in your life is difficult. There is a sweetness when we are successful in turning down temptation, but there’s also a weight of guilt and shame that can overwhelm us in the face of repeatedly giving in to the same temptation over and over again.
Isaiah chapter 35 describes a road, and this road leads from the homes of the people of God to his glorious, magnificent end-times city.
And this road has a very specific description of it, and that description is that the lion no longer prowls, seeking to devour the people of God. Commentators look at this, and they see it as a reminder that when Jesus returns and those final glorious prophecies are made real and manifest in our lives as we travel to God’s glorious presence, sin and temptation, which the Bible describes as prowling and roaring like a lion seeking to devour the people of God. Sin and temptation will no longer have any power over the people of God.
Hallelujah, brothers and sisters. Because of the cross, that is true of you right now. Your flesh has been put to death with Christ, and sin no longer has dominion over you.
Yes, until he returns, it has great influence, but you are no longer a slave to the power of sin. You are no longer a servant to your wants, your passions, and your desires. Walk in the victory of the cross.
Flee to the throne because the cross has given you entrance to God’s presence. Take great comfort in the glory of that emblem of suffering and shame.
Let’s pray.
Gracious God and Father, I thank you for the strength that works through my weakness, and I thank you that your grace is sufficient for me. I thank you that your that that grace was secured at the cross. And so, Lord, help us to live in the light of the glory of the grace that pours out.
We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
As you leave this place seeking to live in the power of the cross, take this blessing upon you.
May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and every good word.
He who testifies to these things says, yes, I am coming soon.
Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.
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