Jesus: The Crucified One (Palm Sunday)

Who was responsible for Jesus’ death? There are many ways to analyze this question:

• JUDAS. He was the disciple who betrayed him. But it is hard to figure all of his motives. Some suggest he was a Zealot – freedom fighter – focused on Jesus as an earthly leader, and disappointed that Jesus was a Prince of Peace instead.

• RELIGIOUS AUTHORITIES. There was a clear clash between Jesus and the religious authorities, as Jesus threatened their positions of power.

• ROME. Jesus not only appeared before the high priest – he was taken before Pontius Pilate, the representative of the political authority of Rome, and they were certainly threatened by this talk of a "King of the Jews."
  

• HUMANKIND. Our faith challenges us – to see how Jesus’ death could not be pinned upon any one individual or any one group. Our faith language expresses the truth that the death of Jesus is the result of our sin and disobedience.

A verse of the hymn Ah, Holy Jesus expresses this thought in a profound way:

Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone thee!
'Twas I, Lord Jesus, I it was denied thee;
I crucified thee.

(Hymn written by Johann Heermann, 1630, English translation by Robert S. Bridges)

The power of remembering the death of Jesus is that rather than being a defeat, it became the ultimate victory. This truth is described in the word "ATONEMENT" - reminding us that Jesus’ suffering and death overcomes the separation between God and humankind.

John Wesley once suggested that what we believe about the atonement – the death of Jesus – is the thing that distinguishes a Christian from someone who simply believes that there is a God.


Read this article describing the meaning of atonement, and various "theories" of the atonement.


BIBLE PASSAGES THAT DESCRIBE THE MEANING OF THE CROSS:

JOHN 1:29. (John the Baptist identifies Jesus as...) “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

In this way, Jesus is the fulfillment of the sacrifices that had been offered for generations as a way to remove the consequences of sin. Jesus fulfills this sacrifice is an ultimate way through his life and death. He is “a full and sufficient sacrifice." Look at Jesus' own words that describe the meaning of his death:

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.

JOHN 3:14-15. So must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

This passage from Hebrews gives us the powerful phrase "once for all," describing the powerful impact of Christ's sacrifice:

HEBREWS 9:27. He has appeared once for all at the end of the age to remove sin by the sacrifice of himself.


Someone once said, “If we can save ourselves, then we have no need of a savior.” Not everybody likes this idea – that it takes a death to give us life. Even in NewTestament times there were those who just could not accept this way of thinking:

1 CORINTHIANS 1:23-25. When we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense. But to those called by God to salvation, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God. This foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and God’s weakness is stronger than the greatest of human strength.

When he died, the Bible tells us that the curtain in the sanctuary of the Temple was torn completely in two – from top to bottom – that curtain represented the separation between God and humanity that was overcome through his "once for all" sacrifice. Because of that sacrifice, you and I can say, “He died for me.”


Some of the finest expressions of the meaning of Jesus' death are found in the language of hymns and songs of faith. These are songs you would think would be morbid and sad, speaking of defeat and loss. Instead they speak to us of a victory beyond compare.

HYMNS THAT DESCRIBE THE MEANING OF THE CROSS:

In the cross of Christ I glory, towering o'er the wrecks of time;
All the light of sacred story gathers round its head sublime.
- John Bowring, 1825

‘Tis finished! The Messiah dies, cut off for sins, but not his own.
Accomplished is the sacrifice; the great redeeming work is done.
The veil is rent in Christ alone; the living way to heaven is seen;
The middle wall is broken down, and all mankind may enter in.
The reign of sin and death is over, and all may live from sin set free;
Satan hath lost his mortal power; ‘tis swallowed up in victory.
- Charles Wesley, 1762

What thou, my Lord, hast suffered was all for sinners' gain;
Mine, mine was the transgression, but thine the deadly pain.
Lo, here I fall, my Savior! 'Tis I deserve thy place;
Look on me with thy favor, vouchsafe to me thy grace.
- Anonymous. English translation by Paul Gerhardt, 1656

O Love divine, what hast thou done! The immortal God hath died for me!
The Father's co-eternal Son bore all my sins upon the tree.
The immortal God for me hath died: My Lord, My Love, is crucified!
- Charles Wesley, 1742

Above all powers, above all kings, above all nature and all created things,
Above all wisdom and all the ways of man, you were here before the world began.
Above all kingdoms, above all thrones, above all wonders the world has ever known,
Above all wealth and treasures of the earth, there's no way to measure what you're worth.
Crucified, laid behind a stone, you lived to die, rejected and alone,
Like a rose trampled on the ground, you took the fall and thought of me above all.
- Michael W. Smith