Image is “View from the Cross” by James Tissot
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Maundy Thursday Correction
- That’s Passover and that’s Communion, for the Passover, like the Lord’s Supper, is a meal of forgiveness and life as we’re living in a land of sin and death.
- For the Passover, like the Lord’s Supper, is a meal for the Lord’s People who are living in a land of slavery and death—Israel enslaved to Pharaoh and dying in Egypt; we enslaved by sin and dying. Israel’s meal sealed to them the Lord’s passing over by the flesh of the lamb. The Lord’s Supper seals forgiveness and life to you by the Lord’s flesh and blood. The Passover was not for the forgiveness of sins, but the Lord’s Supper is.
There they crucified Him, and with Him two others, here and there, and in between Jesus.
᛭ INI ᛭
Everything’s crashing in on Jesus at Calvary. “The hopes and fears of all the years are met” at Jesus cross! Everything centers on Him. He’s not only the center of attention, but He’s literally at the center of it all! “There they crucified Him, and with Him two others,” (John’s eyewitness perspective takes over) “here and there, and in between Jesus.”
But it’s not just where Jesus is crucified. The constant refrain throughout John’s account of Jesus’ Passion is this: “…to fulfill the Scripture.” All that Jesus does fulfills the Scripture, that He suffers and dies the way He suffers and dies “fulfills the Scriptures.” And so we can confess: “that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, ‘[and] the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures.’” (1 Cor 15; Nicene Creed)
It’s also what Christ ultimately cries out: τετέλεσται, “It’s finished!” What’s finished? IT is! Salvation? The Scriptures? History itself? Yes! “When the fulness of all time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, to redeem those who were under the Law.” (Gal 4) “He redeemed us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse for us, for it’s written, ‘Cursed is everyone who’s hanged on a tree.’” (Gal 3) “God made Jesus to be sin, though He didn’t know sin, for our sake, so that we would become God’s righteousness in Him.” (2 Cor 5)
JESUS CRUCIFIED IS AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING!
All the Bible hinges on Jesus. The Old Testament points forward to Him, gearing His people up for His arrival, but not just any arrival—His arrest, arraignment, and eventual death. The New Testament preaches this, points back to or flows out from Him and His death. The Bible only makes sense with Jesus crucified at the middle. Missing Jesus in the middle makes a mess of God’s message in the Bible.
Jesus is King of kings, Lord of lords, Caesar of caesars. He’s the second David, promised by Ezekiel, the better Solomon, the better Absalom who dies hanging from a tree. He’s King of the Jews and also “Lord of the nations, Son of God and Son of Man!” He’s the Second Adam, the Priest of priests, High Priest of high priests, not after the order of Aaron but Melchizedek. He’s the promised Prophet like Moses, a better Moses! “Moses was faithful in all God’s house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, but Christ is faithful over God’s house as a son.” He’s the better Jonah, who would spend three days in the heart of the earth instead of a fish.
Jesus does all that He does because what all the Old Testament figures did wasn’t enough, was never enough, was never meant to be enough to save them or “all the nations of the earth.” And so
JESUS CRUCIFIED IS AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING!
All your sin hangs on Him. There isn’t a sin you’ve got that He didn’t carry. Unless of course you take it back to continue to live in it willfully to your own destruction. All sins crash in on Him. The ancient pagan gods that people made up, really just demons, never did was the True God does. Same with the new “god” the unaffiliated 26% of Americans believe in. The eternal, all-holy, almighty, transcendent God suffers and dies to save His dirt creatures that rebel against Him!
He claims their sin—your sin!—as His own. What’s sin? Dicey topic these days. He defines that, too. He’s God. We’re not! We cannot truly change what we are: sinner according to His all holy standard. We often weaken, ignore, or just plain reject His standard!
How bad are the sins you’ve got? God had to die! That’s how sinful you are. “No good dwells within you, that is, in your flesh.” God would be fickle, unfair, and not really that all that good if He just said, “Well, do XYZ to be saved.” Which is how most worldly people interpret what Biblical Christians say about sin…
No matter the sinful desire or behavior, whether it’s the sins you’ve got, or the sins you know the person next to you, behind you, in front of you did, whether that sin’s got a fancy name to it from the Bible or not, even if it’s a catchy acronym that’s becoming more and more alphabet soup every day… The only alphabet soup that matters in a dying world isn’t LGTBQIA but INRI. The world says we’re wrong, that everything in life centers on how we bow the knee to former. But here we are with John, telling what saw: There they crucified Him, and with Him two others, here and there, and in between Jesus. He tells us what he heard: “He said, ‘It is finished!’”
For you and your sin and the sin of the whole world:
JESUS CRUCIFIED IS AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING!
“The propitiation, the payoff, for our sins, and not ours only, but the sins of the whole world.”
Yes, JESUS CRUCIFIED IS AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING!
Even here at church. It’s why—He’s why!—we do what we do. He should be. Christ-crucified for sin at the center. It’s why our forefathers built churches like ours. Big altar, from which Christ’s body and blood are delivered to you to eat and to drink, at the center is either crucifix (Bethlehem) or the resurrected Jesus with scars (Immanuel). Baptism and Absolution and Communion are also front and center because they deliver Christ crucified to you. Christ and Him crucified the focus of our services, our hymns, our sermons, and everything we do because these are the ways we deliver Him into our ears, hearts, minds, and mouths! Many churches, many attractive and growing ones focus on the Bible as principles from Jesus or His example to follow, but Jesus crucified is NOT at the center. He’s not really the it’s finished of everything! You’re to pick up where He left off… No!
JESUS CRUCIFIED IS AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING!
Everything’s crashing in on Jesus. He’s at the heart and center of it all. All of the Bible hinges on Him and all your sins are in Him, hanging on the tree—earning forgiveness. Everything we do at church does, too—delivering forgiveness. Everything in your daily life flows out from JESUS CRUCIFIED BEING AT THE CENTER, THE IT’S FINISHED, OF EVERYTHING—living out forgiveness! For “we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” For “if any one’s in Christ,” baptized into Him, “He’s a new creation.” from Christ comes all that you need for such godliness (2 Pet 1), for only the person who’s in Jesus will bear fruit (Jn 15), for “apart from Me you can’t do anything,” (Jn 15) Jesus says. And you’re in Christ crucified, Him at the center, Him the it’s finished of everything, gathered around His table: “for whoever eats My flesh remains in Me and I in Him.” The same blessing of His preaching and Word (Jn 8).
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