Lasting significance?

 

Monica Lewinsky, O.J. Simpson, Anita Cobby.  They were big names in the news in the 1990’s.

 

However, if I asked my children today to tell me about Monica Lewinsky, O.J. Simpson or Anita Cobby they would stare at me blankly.

 

My kids, aged 13, 11 and 9, aren’t much interested that an intern had an affair with the President, an American footballer shot his wife or that a nurse was murdered by a western Sydney hoodlum gang.

 

Despite the fact that these events in the 1990’s dominated our news agenda for months (someone described the OJ Simpson case as ‘the news event of the decade’) my kids see those incidents as happening ‘out there’ and ‘back then’ with no real relevance to them.

 

They don’t have lasting significance.  Indeed, in 100 years I don’t think anyone will remember any of their names.

 

The murder and subsequent resurrection of Jesus - that we point to at Easter - is different to any other event.   

 

There are some similarities:  Jesus was an innocent person, brutally abused and killed by a gang on rampage. 

 

However, Easter is different in that it has lasting personal impact for each of us.

 

The reason Easter is different has to do with the answers to these questions:

 

1. Who is Jesus?;

2. What actually happened between Jesus and his father when he died ?; and

3. What benefit does Jesus’ death have for me? 

 

In looking at these questions in greater detail, we will come to see that Jesus is in fact God’s King on the planet; that at the cross, in the death of Jesus, God the Father abandoned his Son, with a purpose; and that through Jesus’ death, I can have direct access to God.

  

1. Who is Jesus?

Jesus was born a Jew 2000 years ago.  All through his life there had been allusions to the fact that he might be the longed for Jewish King (Messiah).

At the time of his execution the local Roman Governor (who in our terms would have the same status as the Mayor of Parkes), ordered that above Jesus’ head be placed a written notice of the charge against him: 

  

  THE KING OF THE JEWS. (Mark 15:25)

I think the governor was being sarcastic, meaning something like: ‘this (a brutal, humiliating death) is what happens to people who set themselves up as rival kings, against the great king Cesura (my boss) in Rome.’ 

 

Yet in fact, Pilot was speaking with pin point accuracy. Jesus fulfilled all the Jewish expectations (written years before his time in the Old Testament ) about the promised King or Ruler (Messiah), to the letter.

 

Jesus is the only person who has ever been able to effectively rule God’s planet. He is God’s King of this world.

 

2. What happened at Jesus’ death between Jesus and his father?

At the moment of the death of Jesus he was abandoned - not just by his mates and the soldiers (who stripped him naked, flogged, whipped him, spat at him and struck his face) but more significantly, he was abandoned, and forsaken, by his Father.

 

Here’s how the Bible writer Mark describes what happens to the relationship between the Father and the Son at the moment of Jesus’ death:

 

At the sixth hour darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani ?"--which means,  "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"  (Mark 15:33-34)

 

Why would God the Father abandon the Son who he loves, to such a death?

 

To get a better understanding of this, it helps to know that centuries earlier, God gave the his people, the Israelites, instructions on how they (a sinful people) could approach Him (their Holy God).

 

They were to take a pure goat and send it out from the Israelite camp into the desert to die. The most important part of this ceremony was that before the goat was abandoned, the people would symbolically transfer their sins onto the head of the goat. This ceremony meant that the people were forgiven, because the rightful anger of God at their sin had been borne by the goat – the goat’s blood had been shed in their place.

 

Just as the goat was abandoned and then died in place of the Jews of Moses’ time, so we are to see that Jesus was abandoned by his Father and died instead of us.

 

I find this very hard to get my head around.  I love my dad and my dad loves me.  I enjoy spending time with him and have no trouble honoring him.  But he’s not the perfect dad and I have not been the perfect son.  And yet here is the perfect father (God the Father) who has been in perfect relationship with his son Jesus for all eternity, abandoning his only son.  I can’t imagine my dad not stepping in to rescue his son.  But here is the perfect father holding back as his son was executed.  Such was God’s love for me, that he would abandon his own Son for my sake

 

Jesus’ willingness to go to the cross doesn’t lessen the horror of the pain of this awful moment. The pain here is primarily relational pain as the father heaps on his son all the punishment for all the wrong ever done.

 

Significantly, this is not divine child abuse (as some have blasphemously described it). Jesus is not a child, or an unwilling participant. Jesus willingly went to his death - in fact the Father, Son and Spirit were acting in unity in this ultimate act of selfless love for me (and you).

 

3. What benefit does Jesus death have for me?

Jesus’ death has an immediate benefit for me. In his death, Jesus deals with my sin and opens up direct access to God.

 

Consider for a moment this line which seems out of place in the middle of Mark’s graphic account of Jesus’ crucifixion:

 

When some of those standing near heard this, they said, "Listen, he's calling Elijah."  One man ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a stick, and offered it to Jesus to drink. "Now leave him alone. Let's see if Elijah comes to take him down," he said. With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last. The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. (Mark 15:36-38)

 

When I first read this report, about the tearing of the Jerusalem temple curtain, I thought that reporter Mark (sitting at his laptop writing down the account of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection) had accidentally pressed paste at the wrong moment - and had carelessly inserted a line about the tearing of the temple curtain (15 kilometres away).

 

But in Mark’s case it wasn’t sloppy editing.  It was theological gold!

 

For the Jews the temple was the place where the people could approach the Holy God; but because of their sin, the Jews’ access to the inner parts of the temple was generally barred. The inner most part of the temple, the ‘Holy of Holies,’ was only accessed once a year - by the high priest.

 

So Mark is making the crucial point that at Easter - when the Father applied the punishment for sin to Jesus - he tore down the curtain which divided humans from God’s presence - spectacularly making it possible for our free access to God.

 

What now?  What response? What will I do?

We have learnt that Jesus is the King of this world. When Jesus died - abandoned by his father - to open up the way for us to God - there were all sorts of reactions by the people at the time.

 

Some mocked.

 

The professional thug soldiers, playing a cruel game of blind man’s buff with Jesus as the victim, put a crown of thorns in his head, a mock purple robe and hitting him, taunting him.

 

In the same way the chief priests and the teachers of the law mocked him among themselves. "He saved others," they said, "but he can't save himself!  Let this Christ, this King of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe." Those crucified with him also heaped insults on him. (Mark 15:29-32)

 

The irony here is amazing.  Of course Jesus could have saved himself! Jesus was God’s king on the planet.  But he chose to save others instead (opening the access way for us to God, taking God’s wrath on himself). 

Today there are many people who like the soldiers, crowd and religious leaders poke fun at the death of Jesus and miss its importance and the benefits.

 

Significantly, there was another reaction to Jesus death, that of a Roman Centurion:

 

And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, heard his cry and saw how he died, he said, "Surely this man was the Son of God!" (Mark 15:39)


 

The Jewish passersby and religious leaders misjudged the importance of Jesus death, yet a Roman Centurion analysed correctly what was happening.

 

The key to right standing before God is not religious pedigree, but having a right grasp of who Jesus is (God’s king on the planet); of what happened at Jesus’ death between Jesus and his Father (God the father abandoned his son to pay for my sin); and realizing the benefit that Jesus death has for me (direct access to God).

 

The challenge this Easter is not to be a mocker and miss out on the benefits of Jesus death.  Rather, be someone who understands the significance of what Jesus was doing and personally put your trust in Christ.

 

I’d recommend saying something like this to God:

 

Dear God,

         I’m sorry - I’ve been a mocker like the crowds and the religious leaders.

         Thanks that Jesus didn’t save himself - but saved me instead.

         Thanks that he died to take the punishment that I deserved.

         Please help me from now on not to underestimate or mock but to treat

         Jesus properly as who he really is - my Lord

        

        Amen.