EASTER STRENGTH - HIS STRENGTH for my weakness

EASTER STRENGTH – HIS STRENGTH for MY WEAKNESS

Four Ironies of the Cross

Text: Matthew 27:27-50
Topic: How the Crucifixion was riddled with irony
Big Idea: In his weakness on the cross, Jesus Christ revealed his greatness.

Introduction

Irony has the capacity to clarify an incident and express what is important about it.
There are four ironies of the crucifixion of Christ.

The first irony of the Crucifixion is the one who is mocked as king is King.

Jesus is given a mock crown of thorns and mocked as king, but Matthew and his readers know that Jesus really is the King.
Jesus stood in the royal line of the Davidic king and told parables about kings in reference to himself.

Roman executioners had perfected the art of slow torture while keeping the victim alive. Some victims even lingered until they were eaten alive by birds of prey or wild beasts. Most hung on the cross for days before dying of exhaustion, dehydration, traumatic fever, or—most likely—suffocation. When the legs would no longer support the weight of the body, the diaphragm was constricted in a way that made breathing impossible. That is why breaking the legs would hasten death (John 19:31–33), but this was unnecessary in Jesus’ case. The hands were usually nailed through the wrists, and the feet through the instep or the Achilles tendon (sometimes using one nail for both feet). None of these wounds would be fatal, but their pain would become unbearable as the hours dragged on. The most notable feature of crucifixion was the stigma of disgrace that was attached to it (Gal. 3:13; 5:11; Heb. 12:2). One indignity was the humiliation of carrying one’s own cross, which might weigh as much as 200 pounds. Normally a quaternion, 4 soldiers, would escort the prisoner through the crowds to the place of crucifixion. A placard bearing the indictment would be hung around the person’s neck. MacArthur Study Bible

The second irony of the Crucifixion is the one who is utterly powerless is transcendently powerful.

Crucifixion was the worst means of execution, reserved for slaves and rebels.
Bystanders insulted Jesus as he hung there: “Come down from the cross if you are the son of God!”
- Matthew 27:39
While Jesus was unimaginably weak, he was powerfully bringing about the destruction and resurrection of the temple.
In an attempt to explain what he means and does, Jesus told his disciples they must take up their crosses and follow him.
- Matthew 16:24

The third irony of the Crucifixion is the one who can’t save himself saves others.

Illustration: Carson’s son had a t-shirt that depicted Jesus making a save as a soccer goalie above the message “Jesus saves.” Carson felt this was in bad taste, but it raised an interesting question: What does to save mean in our culture?
Everything Jesus does is for the purpose of saving people from sin.
The reason Jesus could not save himself is that he came to do his Father’s will.

The fourth irony of the Crucifixion is the one who cries out in despair trusts God.

Jesus’s cry reflected his deepest awareness of his abandonment and his judicial bearing of our sin.
Jesus suffered like he did so we wouldn’t have to.
- Illustration: At the end of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poem “Cowper’s Grave” about the depressive William Cowper, she quotes Christ as saying, “My God, I am forsaken!” Hereby she illustrates that Jesus died so Cowper wouldn’t have to.