“Why Did Christ Suffer and Die?”
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As we enter into a time of remembering what Christ did for us on the cross, there will be many of us who have asked the question, why did Jesus have to suffer and die? For those of us who are Christians tonight we have the tendency to think of the evil and injustice that happened when Christ entered into Jerusalem, stood trial before the Jewish officials, was beaten and spit upon and then nailed to cross where He suffered shame and eventual death.
You may be here tonight and wander why does God allow this to happen and why do even now evil things happen in our current world? What is the worst evil that has happened in our world?
Was has been the worst evil in this world?
-The Jewish Holocaust is estimated that Nazi Germany and more specifically Hitler killed some 6 million Jewish people.
-Wars. In World War 1 it is estimated that 40 million people died. This was one of the deadliest conflicts in human history. In World War 2, 70-85 million people lost their lives. This is the worst conflict in human history.
-Rape. It was reported in 2022 that around 442,754 women were raped or sexually assaulted in the U.S. alone.
-Abortion. Despite bans in some states more than a million abortions were performed in the U.S. in 2023.
-In the history of the U.S. the Civil War it is estimated that around 750 to 850,000 people died. On September 11th, 2001 during the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and other parts of our country around 3,000 people lost their lives.
-Racial Injustices, Physical abuse in the homes, Child Abuse, as well as many other types of abuse and evils could be listed.
-But there has been no greater evil or sin than the innocent murder and killing of Jesus.
So why did this have to happen? Jesus suffered and died to show us that the worst evil is meant by God for good. Turn with me to our text this evening. Acts 4.
27 for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
If you go back up to verses 25-26 here these verses come to us from Psalm chapter 2. Let me read this.
25 who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit,
“ ‘Why did the Gentiles rage,
and the peoples plot in vain?
26 The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers were gathered together,
against the Lord and against his Anointed’—
These words from Luke and ultimately the Psalter are in reference to God’s anointed one who is the Messiah (Jesus) The peoples here who plotted against him are the Jews and their rulers. This prophetic language of the Psalm ultimately show us that Pilate, Herod and others, in coming against Jesus, were simply carrying out God’s plan.
As we come back o verse 28, the word predestined here comes from the Greek work (proorizo) which means to determine beforehand. You may not like this word or have a difficult time with this, but here in our text this helps us to see that God is the great historian who has written history even before it began. What Luke has in mind here as he writes Acts is that these men like Herod and Pontius Pilate have done evil things, sinful things and yet they have merely succeeded in actually fulfilling God’s eternal plan. Here is what I mean by that.
Jesus Christ stood in our place and bore our sin and God took that suffering and that evil and made it into something good. There are many times that we see things here on earth and wonder why did this have to happen or how come this happened??? Why would a loving God allow such evil to happen right? There are many times where God’s Word does not speak about certain issues or why certain evil things happen. There are secret things that only God knows about. Sometimes He chooses to reveal those to us and other times they are not revealed to us.
29 “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.
My point here is that the main focus of God’s Word is not where did evil come from, but a demonstration of God’s love for mankind as He (God) enters into evil and turns that very evil into something good.
We see a wonderful picture of this in the Old Testament with Joseph the son of Jacob. Joseph was one of 12 brothers and his brothers became jealous of Joseph and sold him off into slavery in Egypt. He was forgotten about for 17 years, but eventually through God’s good plan God made him a great ruler in Egypt. Joseph became second in command to Pharoah and so there were many people who looked up to Joseph. God gave Joseph wisdom so that when a great famine came upon the land, Joseph was wise to prepare and plan for this so that lives would be spared including his very own brothers who had sold him into slavery. This whole story is summed up in just a few words from Genesis 50 verse 20.
20 As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
The point in me sharing this story with you tonight is a foreshadowing of how Jesus himself was forsaken and betrayed in order that many might be saved.
We also see in the Old Testament that there came a time when the people of Israel became discontent with their governance. For many years the thing that made the nation of Israel different from that of other nations is that God was their king while other nations had a human ruler. But there came a time where Israel rebelled and asked for a human king.
19 But the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel. And they said, “No! But there shall be a king over us,
It was only later on that the Israelites came to their senses and realized their sinful behavior and their wicked and evil desires.
19 And all the people said to Samuel, “Pray for your servants to the Lord your God, that we may not die, for we have added to all our sins this evil, to ask for ourselves a king.”
But just like Joseph, we see that even in this God had a plan. From the long line of Israel’s kings God himself orchestrated a plan and brought Christ into the world, in order that He might be our sinless and perfect Savior. In fact, this is why Jesus came to earth.
21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
Jesus came to face evil and suffering. Everything that was done against Christ was sinful and evil and yet God was in this. How could this be so? Acts chapter 2 explains it this way to us.
23 this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.
Think about everything that Christ went through for you and I. Jesus after he was betrayed and arrested was scourged with a whip, and there was a crown of thorns places upon his head. People spit in his face and even bruised his face. Nails were placed in his hands and feet. There was a spear that was thrust into his side and just the utter humiliation that Christ endured while He hung there naked on the cross. Jesus endured the scorn of rulers, the betrayal of his friend, and the complete deserting of the disciples.
All of this was the result of sin and yet planned by God to destroy the power of sin. As our text explains to us that even Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and people of Israel did what God had planned.
Church, there was not greater sin than to kill Jesus who was and is the Son of God, and yet God was behind all of this.
10 Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him;
he has put him to grief;
when his soul makes an offering for guilt,
he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days;
the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand.
I have always had a difficult time with this verse. The first time I read this, I didn’t like it. Why was it God’s will or plan to hurt His own son? How can that be??? These are the difficult parts of the Bible that we have to wrestle with and struggle with so that we can truly see God’s good plan.
God did this so that through the death and resurrection of His Son Jesus, we could be healed, we could be saved from our sin.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
The Passion of Jesus Christ, the Cross of Christ was meant by God to show us that there is no sin and no evil too great that God, in Christ cannot bring from it everlasting righteousness and joy.
The very suffering that you and I caused because of our sin became the hope of our salvation. When Jesus went to the cross, He set millions of captives free. Jesus unmasked the Devil’s fraud and broke the chains of his power. On the night before Jesus died He said this in John chapter 12.
31 Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out.
I want to challenge you tonight. Don’t follow someone who had already been defeated. I want to urge you to fix your eyes and your heart and your mind on Christ. Follow Christ. Yes, it will be costly, there may come times of persecution, but think about what He endured for you.
(Close in a Word of Prayer as the Praise team comes to play “Jesus Paid It All.”)
-Thank you for being here tonight. This weekend we have 2 services. Our first service is at 9:00 a.m. and our second service is at 10:30. We hope to see you there.
-Easter Egg Hunt. Parents this is for you. We have several age groups for our Easter Egg Hunt. So, let me quickly explain.
-We will begin with our 4 and under group.
-Our next group is 5-8 years old.
-We will then have those who are 9-11.
-Finally, those of you who are students can grab some candy as well.
You can begin to line up here at the back door.