Christ Came Down…To Give His Life

We’re continuing our series today…looking at the WHY of Christmas…WHY Christ Came Down…

So often we focus on the WHAT of Christmas…Shepherds, Wise Men, Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus

But unless you and I understand the WHY Christ Came Down…

Our celebration is merely religious tradition…

Or even just emotional sentiment…a stroll down memory lane.

From His very own words…Christ tells us WHY He came down:

To SHOW us the Father…in every action…interaction…every conversation with people…we see God at work.

To PROCLAIM the truth…not only what He did but also what He said…how He spoke truth into our lives.

And this morning… Christ Came Down To Give His Life…for us.

Pray: Lord through your Holy Word…speak to each heart. Speak to all of us…allow us Lord to remember afresh what You have said Lord Jesus…Cause it to make a difference in our life…in our lives. Thank you dear Father. In the dear name of our Saviour…the Christ who Came Down. Amen.

Jesus said in:

Mark 10:45

“For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”

A lot in this verse about WHY Jesus came down…but today I am zeroing in on the last phrase:

In His own words Jesus said: He came down to give His life as a ransom for many.

Probably many QUESTIONS come to your mind as you think about this verse.

Why a RANSOM?

What is a RANSOM?

And why is a RANSOM necessary?

Who are the many ?

How does it tie in with Jesus and His life?

How on earth is this a Christmas verse?

These are questions we will hope to unpack and look at this morning.

SITUATION…Mark 10:32-34 Jesus is…on the road going up to Jerusalem…

There is fear & amazement in the air…everyone suspects something tremendous is going to happen.

Disciples are over-excited… Jesus tells them what He is walking into, willingly:

v.33 “See, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, and deliver Him over to the Gentiles. v.34 And they will mock Him and spit on Him, and flog Him, and kill Him. And after three days later He will rise.”

Don’t miss this…Jesus is KNOWINGLY walking into the jaws of suffering and death.

1. It Was INTENTIONAL…

Let that sink in…Christ came down INTENDING to give His life as a ransom for many.

It was not a tragic accident, it was not incidental…not coincidental…

Jesus says He literally came (intending) to do this.

Christ did not come to earth for any other reason…

NOT to be a great teacher…NOT to be a notable moralist…NOT even a great disciple maker…

NOR did He come to be a revolutionary and then incidentally got caught up in a plot that resulted in His death.

The Bible says…Jesus came to die.

Hebrews 2:14 NLT

“Because God’s children are human beings…made of flesh and blood…the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could He die, and only by dying could He break the power of the devil, who had the power of death.”

So Jesus, the Son of God came to die…to give His life as a ransom for many. Jesus is choosing to die. He is participating intentionally in His own execution.

Mark 10:45

“For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

“Son of man…” = used 82x in NT referring to Jesus…a favourite term for Himself…the OT prophets often used it…saying the Son of man would come…Jesus uses it for Himself more than any other phrase.

2. Why Does Jesus Call His Death a “RANSOM”? “…came to give His life a ransom for many."

Ransom…makes us think of a payment that is made for a hostage release

Greek = lutron it means just that…a payment to release someone from some kind of bondage: prisoners of war, slavery, debt…to release someone from captivity or punishment.

So Jesus sees His mission to earth…His death…as a ransom to release many from bondage.

He is paying a price…a price they cannot pay…so that they may go free.

He is substituting Himself for them.

And He is willingly doing it…at the cost of His life…they get their freedom.

So this ransom is describing a substitution…Jesus…in the place of…the many.

But what is the bondage/slavery/debt that many are in need of being ransomed from?

3. What Are They Ransomed From?

The Bible talks about the fact that mankind are…slaves to sin…our conscience even tells us.

This really doesn’t sound like a Christmas message Pastor David…I didn’t get up early to come to church to hear that I am a sinner…its not very Christmassy…aren’t you supposed to be the JOY giver…about His death…I came to hear about His birth…not His death!

Fact is…People don’t like being considered “a sinner”.

But if we do not understand why we need a Saviour…Christmas is just sentimental ooy gooey.

(EVIL PEOPLE Pix)…

Many think …Unless you are a really bad person…doing nothing but really bad things…you really aren’t a sinner…some even say: “I haven’t broken all the commandments.”

“…ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”

“There is no one righteous not one.”

Jesus describes us this way:

John 8:34

“Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.

He did not see us as occasionally sinning…but He sees us as under the power of sin.

We are slaves of sin and we need to be ransomed from its power.

The apostle Paul put its this way: in Romans 7:23 “I see …another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members."

But that's not the worst of it…

The Bible says that “…the soul that sins must die.” Ezekiel 18:4

Jesus taught that the penalty for sin is eternal punishment.

Matthew 25:46 says, "These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

Sin is that SERIOUS…

Sin brings God’s wrath…

Sin brings God’s judgment…

Unless there is a RESCUE…

If we don't find rescue from the guilt of sin…we’ll be punished,

And Jesus says, forever…because sin is an infinite offence against an infinitely holy God.

So the slavery and bondage we need ransoming from is the slavery of sin & eternal punishment

That’s what the Scriptures tell us for the reason Jesus came as a ransom.

Because we are sinful, we are in a sinful condition…we are sinners by nature…

Jesus had to come to RELEASE us from that captivity.

That’s why He came…because we’re sinners. He came "to give His life as a ransom for many.”

4. How Does Jesus Ransom Us?

So what then is the way Jesus rescues us?

Jesus says, "The Son of Man came . . . to give His life as a ransom for many."

Jesus dies for many.

The ransom price was His very own life. (There is no greater love)

This is why Jesus was born of a virgin…He was born Fully God and Fully Man!

This is why the Bible says again and again that Christ died to save us.

Romans 5:8–10

“But God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life.

This is how God shows His love for us…

We have been justified by His blood…our sins are forgiven (just as if I’d never sinned) declared “righteous”.

We don’t face God’s wrath for sin!

We were "justified by His blood” Romans 5:9.

“Justified" means to be declared “righteous”

We were “reconciled” to God by the death of His Son" Romans 5:10.

Jesus bore our sins in His body on the cross” 1 Peter 2:24

Christ died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust…to bring us to God” 1 Peter 3:18.

The heart of the Christian message is that Christ came to give His life as a RANSOM for many.

That is, to die for many…to save many from their sin and its guilt, power & penalty in eternal punishment.

5. Who are "the Many” Ransomed?

Now the last question is:

Who are the many?

Are you part of the “many”?

John 1:12 “But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name…He gave the right to become children of God.”

Story #1

I met a man about a month ago…interesting Tim Horton conversation…

Rode a big dark black Harley… told me about his marriages…heart aches…

Spoke for about 20 or so minutes before he found out I was a pastor.

He said: “I never go to church because it is only for good church going people…”

I was sure to tell him we don’t go to church because we are good…

I told him we “go to church because we NEED God …we are hurting people…

And we are in need of being redeemed/ransomed…a place for broken people, hurting people.

Not because we are good…or because we have it all together… we come because we have immense needs…

We need…what only God can give us.

That’s the way God works…he said he “…might pop in some Sunday”.

Paul wrote in:

1 Timothy 1:15

“The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.

Another Christmas verse!

So Paul is saying he is the worst of sinners…he is the foremost of sinners.

But that’s the very reason Christ came down.

Tell me again…Christ came down to save sinners no matter how bad they think they are.

That’s the picture Jesus gives us when he is telling the story of the prodigal son.

Story #2

Luke 15 Jesus tells the story of a son who demanded his inheritance from his father early…so he could go his own way and do his own thing.

Jesus said the young man wasted his property in reckless living.

He ends up dragging himself back to the father as his last hope… “maybe the father will accept me, feed me even make me a servant.” As he comes back to the father (like God)…

Luke 15:20 “while the young man was still a long way off…his father saw Him, felt cmpassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him.

Jesus is tyelling us about the love God the father has for each one of us…regadless of what we have done.

I need to know that too…I need to know that because sometimes I feel like I am better than a lot of people.

I know that sometimes I know and think of myself as the being the one who God could never forgive.

Tell me again WHY Christ came down?

Christ came down because we are all sinners…and we all needed what Jesus could provide.

Jesus Christ gave His life as a ransom for many to change us from being sinners who are people that were sinners, broken and hurting with no hope… to being broken, hurting people who know an eternal hope.

How do we become part of that “many”? What is it I need to do?

John 1:12

“But to all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God,

Answers the very question:

John inspired by God wrote:

Whoever receives Jesus…who believes in His name…He gave the right to be come a child of God.”

At that moment we believe in who God says Jesus is…that Jesus is our ransom for our sins…our Deliverer, who redeems us…who reconciles us to God…makes us right with Him

At the moment we believe that…God just like the father of the prodigal son runs to us even when we are a long way off…runs to us and welcomes us into His family as His children.

That is why we sing at Christmas about the story of Christ coming down.

Why did Christ come down?

So that God & sinners can be reconciled…be made one together…that’s why Christ came down

Tell me again why Christ came down…let the angel who came to Joseph explain:

Matthew 1:20-21 “…for He will save His people from their sins.”

Tell me again why did Christ come down?

Christ came down because we are sinful people who needs Someone…a Saviour who will save his people from their sins.

PERSONAL REFLECTION & ACTION…

So here’s my question…

How does that change your life?

How does it impact who you are?

Follower of Jesus…You know what it means that Christ has reconciled you so that you can now be in a relationship with God.

How does knowing that…Christ coming down to be your ransom…how does that impact my life?

Maybe you are hearing this kind for message for the very first time…I want you to know that Christ coming down…and taking your sin will be an absolutely life changing moment of your life when you believe and accept that is who Jesus is.

But Jesus is more than a baby in a manger…He is more than just wonderful Teacher…more than just our Friend…more than just a good Person…all those are true…but really the reason Jesus is those things to us is because we have entered into that relationship as His children…we know Him for who He truly is…we know He is the ransom that was paid…and now has impacted our lives…