Jesus Died to Bring Us to God

ME: Intro (Relentlessness/reckless love)

On June 11, 1997, the Chicago Bulls and the Utah Jazz were tied at 2 games each for the NBA Finals.

Game 5 was that night in Utah.

And the most valuable player, Michael Jordan was questionable with flu-like symptoms right up to the pregame.

But he muscled through to play the game.

After the first quarter, his illness was clearly affecting him,

He looked lost,

And the Utah Jazz had built a commanding lead.

Cameras captured Jordan with wobbly knees,

Frequently being helped by teammates,

Hunched over on the court between plays,

And chugging fluids while being covered with bags of ice when he had a chance to rest on the bench.

If you are a basketball fan,

You likely know how the story goes.

Jordan went on in the final three quarters to score a total of 38 points, seven rebounds, five assists, and three steals.

Included in those 38 points, was the game-clinching three pointer,

That gave the Bulls the lead with less than 30 seconds left in the game.

Immediately after hitting this shot,

Jordan nearly collapsed into the arms of his teammate,

Scottie Pippen,

In this now famous photo from that game.

The Bulls went on to beat the Jazz in Utah 90-88 in what now is called the infamous Flu Game.

The Bulls went on to win the championship in game 6.

There are many ways to describe that performance specifically,

And Michael Jordan in a general sense.

One word used to describe both Jordan and his performance in that game is relentless.

In fact, one of the people closest to Michael Jordan has been his personal trainer,

Tim Grover.

Grover describes Jordan this way:

“Michael wasn’t the best because he could fly through the air and make impossible shots; he was the best because he was relentless about winning, relentless in his belief that there’s no such thing as ‘good enough.’”

Grover gave this description in his appropriately titled book;

Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable.

In this book,

Grover shares about his experiences and what he has learned from working with some of the most relentless professionals,

Like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant.

And I agree,

These two men especially,

Are some of the most relentless people I have ever seen.

But I can only think of one Man who was relentless to the point of being unstoppable,

As Grover claims in the subtitle of his book.

Jordan is long retired from the NBA,

His career has stopped.

Kobe Bryant tragically passed away from an unexpected helicopter crash last year.

I do not say this to make light of his passing,

But when it comes to death,

None of us are unstoppable,

Even the most relentless among us.

But there is One.

One Man who demonstrated an unstoppable relentlessness,

Even when it came to His death.

That Man is Jesus Christ.

Jesus could have stopped His friend, Judas, from betraying Him,

Instead, He dismissed Judas from dinner,

Sending Judas to bring back those who would capture Him.

Jesus could have made a way to have this cup pass from Him,

Instead, He prayed to the Father for His will to be done.

Jesus could have allowed Peter and the other disciples to fend off the captors while Jesus snuck away.

Instead, He told Peter to put His sword away and healed the wound of one of His captors.

Jesus could have denied the claims about Him being the Son of Man during His trial before the Sanhedrin or Pilate,

Instead, He stated the truth, that He was the Messiah,

Knowing it would be used to crucify Him.

Jesus could have overpowered the soldiers who whipped and beat and mocked Him,

Instead, He endured the shame and the suffering as an innocent Man.

When it came down to Him being nailed to the cross where He would hang to die,

He could have called down a legion of angels to wipe out all His enemies and put an end to His suffering,

Instead, He opened His mouth and said,

“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Jesus was relentless.

He was relentless with mercy,

He was relentless with grace,

He was relentless with love,

And He was relentless when it came to being crucified.

Then, from the cross, the last thing He said was,

“It is finished.”

And He died.

Pastor Michael Lawrence comments;

“From [Christ’s] first prayer in the garden to his last cry on the cross, it is clear that Jesus understood not just that he might but that he must die…Why this relentless movement to the cross? Why this unimaginable suffering? Why did Jesus have to die?”

Pastor Lawrence asks some great questions.

Questions that Peter addresses in our passage this morning, 1 Peter 3:18.

Which, as you can see by our outline is the final passage in our It Is Well series,

And Lord willing, next week,

We will begin our Naturally Supernatural series through the book of 2 Peter,

Beginning with 2 Peter 1:1-15.

But our outline for this morning will focus on Peter’s answer to three important questions in 1 Peter 3:18:

Why Did Jesus Die?

Why Should Jesus Die?

Why Would Jesus Die?

Christ relentlessly died for sins, for sinners, for God, and now death cannot stop us.

As Pastor Lawrence recognized,

Jesus relentlessly moved to the cross.

But if Jesus’ relentlessness ended at the cross,

How is His relentlessness unstoppable?

How is He truly different than any other relentless person like Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant?

Because after Jesus died,

He was taken off the cross and buried in a tomb.

But Jesus was truly relentless because days later He showed that not even death could stop Him,

When He rose from the grave!

Last week, we talked about how really the entire letter of 1 Peter,

Was an exhortation that we are to do good in the face of evil.

The foundation for our salvation and vindication for the evil we face is the relentlessness of Christ.

The foundation is the suffering and death of Christ,

Followed by His resurrection and exaltation.

Before we seek to answer the first question in our outline,

Why did Jesus Die?

WE: Context

Let us look at the context around our passage.

Vs. 18 begins with the word “for.”

I highlight this because this means it is connected to vs. 17.

So, our passage is a continuation of Peter’s argument from vs. 17.

What is Peter’s argument in 1 Peter 3:17?

He says;

1 Peter 3:17 ESV

For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.

It is essentially the same argument we focused on last week,

The same argument that makes up almost the entire letter of 1 Peter,

The argument that we are to do good in the face of evil.

Peter is saying that is we do this,

We earn an audience from the world around us.

An audience that wants to know,

How are you able to do good when suffering?

To which Peter answers elsewhere,

We are able to do good when suffering because of the hope that is in us.

Peter knows this answer will likely not be all that satisfying to this audience,

So, he acknowledges that we will still have to give a reason for this hope that is in us,

We have to be able to not only answer the “how” question,

But also the “why” question.

Why do you do good in the face of evil?

What is the reason for this hope that is in you?

The answer is our passage this morning.

Christ suffered and died once for all to bring us to God.

This is the reason for the hope that is in us.

This is the strategy Peter is communicating to us.

Do good in the face of evil to gain an audience that asks, why?

Then point to the Gospel as the reason for this hope that is in you.

It is believed that vs. 18-20 were some type of early creed or confession,

Kinda like the statement of faith we hold to as a church.

A creed consists of the fundamental beliefs we all agree on,

That have little to know interpretive difficulties.

What we might refer to as the milk of the Scripture.

The most historically known creed is referred to as the Apostle’s Creed, dating back to the first few hundred years after the death of Christ;

“We believe in God the Father, we believe in Jesus Christ, we believe in the Holy Spirit,

Our God is three in one.”

Ironically, vs. 19-22 include two subjects that have been very difficult to interpret.

The question of whether or not Jesus descended to hell after His death,

And whether baptism by water is required for salvation.

We would reject these two beliefs based off our understanding of Scripture as a whole.

But when we read vs. 19-22 in isolation,

We can understand how some Christians have concluded that Jesus descended to hell,

And that Peter is saying water baptism is required for salvation.

But we do not affirm these beliefs.

Without being able to go into much detail for time’s sake,

The reference to a prison in vs. 19 is what many belief is a reference to hell,

And it seems that Peter is saying Jesus descended to hell to proclaim the Gospel to the spirits in hell after His death.

It would make no sense for Christ to do that,

Because Scripture teaches that hell is an eternal prison,

So, the preaching of the Gospel to souls in hell would not produce any fruit.

What seems more likely based off Peter’s grammar,

Is that he is referring to the Spirit of Christ,

Which is the Holy Spirit,

Proclaiming the Gospel to the people in the days of Noah,

And during those days,

All but the eight people who were on the ark rejected God,

Resulting in their spirits being in prison.

History indicates that sometime in the 600s,

A few hundred years after the Apostle’s Creed was first formed,

The understanding that Jesus was descended into hell began to be included.

Which we should take issue with,

Even if we agreed with this theory,

It is not something that is widely held enough,

Nor would be considered milk,

That it should be included in a creed.

But this is the first challenging subject in these verses.

Second, Peter is making a comparison in vs. 21-22 regarding the symbolism water baptism presents regarding salvation.

He is not specifically saying that a person needs to be baptized in water to be saved.

If that were the case,

The thief on the cross,

Whom Jesus said would be with Him in paradise,

Is not actually saved,

And that would mean Jesus lied to him,

Which we can be certain is not the case.

There is much more that could be said about these verses,

But our focus this morning is specifically on vs. 18,

Which once again,

We see Peter alludes to the prophecy of the suffering servant in Isaiah 53:11-12;

Isaiah 53:11–12 ESV

Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

GOD: Why Did Jesus Die?

This allusion to Isaiah begins to answer our first question,

Why Did Jesus Die?

Our passage in the ESV says that Christ also suffered.

This suffering speaks of a severe pain that is acted upon Him by others.

During His life on earth, Jesus repeatedly predicted this suffering awaited Him.

Peter, the author of this letter,

Was one of Jesus’ closest friends,

He saw the extent of this suffering.

He was the one who drew his sword for battle to prevent this suffering.

But after he was corrected by Jesus and put his sword away.

He knew the end of this suffering came when Jesus breathed His last breath,

And died on the cross.

Here, Peter says Jesus did this to bring us to God.

Needing to be brought to God implies a separation between us and God exists.

What is the cause of this separation?

Our sins.

That is why vs. 18 begins by saying Christ suffered,

He suffered, as Peter saw, to the point of death,

For sins.

His death was a judicial execution,

It was the payment required for the penalty of our sins.

“For sins” is the same phrase used in the OT when speaking of the sacrifice required by the law.

This is difficult for us to understand.

That this one Man would die for our sins.

The difficulty starts with our unwillingness to call sin, sin.

But from there, we doubt the punishment our sin deserves.

Despite our unwillingness or our doubts,

Peter is showing us that God has created us to know Him.

So, our sin is more than merely breaking God’s law.

It is a personal offense against God.

It is a rejection both of God’s rule by breaking His law,

But it is a rejection of the person, of God Himself.

The language Peter uses here is not positional language,

As if there is a physical gap between us and God,

And Jesus walked over to us,

Picked us up,

And carried us back to set us down in front of God.

The language here is relational language.

Our sin has created relational distance between us and God.

We all have experienced this with our human relationships.

When you offend or hurt your spouse,

For example,

Positionally, you can be sitting right next to them in the car, on the couch, or in the bed.

But relationally, there is an unseen gap that is now present.

You are not feeling love pull you toward them emotionally,

You do not want to listen to their words to you,

You do not want to share you thoughts, feelings, or emotions with them in that moment.

Similarly, children, you may have been offended by a parent.

Positionally, you may still be in the same room as them,

But relationally, you feel that same distance.

You do not want to share any accomplishments with them,

You do not want to hear what they may have to say to you,

You have no desire to play with them.

This feeling we have when others offend us,

Gives us at least a vague understanding of what our sin feels like to God.

We offend God when we sin,

We create the relational distance between us and God.

So, how does God, Who is both fair and gracious, punish these offenses against Him?

It goes back to the first command He gave to mankind,

In Gen. 2:17, God said;

Genesis 2:17 ESV

but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

He warns that the punishment for sin is death.

Elsewhere in the Bible we learn that death is more than physical death,

It is eternal spiritual death,

It is constant torment and suffering for our offenses against God.

Because God is infinite,

The penalty for offending Him is also infinite.

The OT is filled with terrible images that warn us of this judgment.

As terrible as they are,

They are still merely images.

So, they pale in comparison to the day when an innocent Man was whipped beyond recognition,

Stripped of His clothing, being publicly shamed,

Beaten to a pulp,

Mocked incessantly,

Then nailed to a wooden cross through His flesh.

You see, on the cross,

Jesus suffered the wrath of God,

He felt that relational distance when there is an offense between two people.

He could not taste the love of the Father,

Where there used to be warm communion with the Father,

All Jesus could see was cold abandonment.

And this is what hell feels like.

If you want to best understand in this world what hell looks like,

Picture what it would feel like to be Jesus when He was crucified.

That is what it means to pay the penalty,

To suffer the consequences for offending God.

And the Bible says, God demonstrates His love for us,

In that while we were still sinners,

While we were actively offending,

Actively creating relational distance between us and God,

Christ traversed all that distance and died in our place on the cross.

Christ suffered and died for sins.

That is why Jesus died.

YOU: Why Should Jesus Die?

But this leads into our second question,

Why Should Jesus Die For sins?

Jesus had not sins of His own.

Christ is wholly righteous,

As Peter points out here.

His relationship with the Father was good.

There were no offenses between the Father and Son.

He deserved to be with God,

Not cut off from God.

He deserved to be blessed, not cursed.

Why did Jesus, the righteous, have to die?

Peter says, for the unrighteous.

He died as the substitute for you, and for me.

This concept of a substitute for sinners is central to the entire Bible.

It is hard to think about a major event or instruction in the OT that doesn’t teach about our need for a substitute to do what we cannot do.

The seemingly never ending number of sacrifices offered in the temple,

Day after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year.

Countless animals offered as these sacrificial substitutes for the sins of God’s people.

When Abraham was about to sacrifice his only son, Isaac,

God provided a ram as a substitute instead.

A spotless lamb was sacrificed during Passover so that the firstborn son of Israel would not die.

And going back to the moment immediately after sin entered into the world,

God killed an animal to clothe Adam and Eve,

Covering the shame of their nakedness.

Then we get to the NT,

And the author of our passage,

Peter, may not have fully understood what he was witnessing as he watched Jesus die on the cross.

But after Jesus rose from the dead,

Restored and commissioned Peter,

Peter came to understand what he is desperately trying to communicate to us in his letter,

That on the cross,

Jesus died as the substitute for sinners,

For unrighteous people like you and me.

All the examples that came before in the OT;

All the animals, Isaac, the spotless Passover lamb,

All of them were meant to prepare us to recognize the only righteous substitute when He was finally offered.

Jesus Christ is that righteous substitute.

And His substitutionary death for the unrighteous is sufficient.

That is why Peter said Jesus died once for all.

This means no further sacrifices are needed.

Heb. 9:12; 10:10 explain this in detail;

Hebrews 9:12 ESV

he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

Hebrews 10:10 ESV

And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

The fact that each of these NT references uses the word “once,”

Means that Jesus’ death was once and for all.

Unlike the OT sacrifices

His sacrificial death happened on an single occasion,

Only that one time,

For all His people.

Romans 6:10 explains this;

Romans 6:10 ESV

For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God.

At last, a sacrifice that would not need to be repeated!

At last, a substitute whose death accomplished what no other sacrifice could!

No animal could bear the full responsibility for our sin.

Our sin is a human problem,

So, it takes a human to deal with it.

But what person should be a substitute for you and your sin problem?

No matter how good of a person you try to think up,

That person has their own sin problem to deal with.

There is only one who does not have His own sin problem,

Jesus Christ, the righteous one.

At last, a person who perfectly obeys the Father’s will,

A person, who unlike all other people going back to Adam, said no to Satan’s temptations.

At last, a person who is the righteous Lamb without spot or blemish.

His death saves us from death.

Jesus endured and exhausted the entire wrath of God on the cross,

Leaving no wrath left for all who trust in Christ.

By satisfying God’s wrath,

Jesus shows He is the true King and Judge who conquers our greatest enemy,

Sin and death.

So, Jesus died for all the unrighteous.

Does that mean Jesus died for you?

If your answer is yes,

Then you must confess that you are unrighteous.

We do not tend to think of ourselves this way.

But if you are truly honest with yourself,

I am certain you would confess that your life is oriented around yourself.

You keep yourself central to your universe.

Or, at the very least,

You realize you do not disobey God,

You may even completely disregard God.

Do you understand all of this is sin and it leaves us unrighteous.

And our unrighteous state earns us the eternal wrath from God because He is just.

Dear friends, if you understand that you are in an unrighteous state,

You must also know that Jesus Christ is your substitute,

He is your Savior,

He delivers you from death.

He calls you to confess your sin,

Knowing that your sin puts you to death,

But Jesus’ death in your place is sufficient.

So, turn away from trusting in your self-sufficiency,

Trust in Christ,

Depend fully on His substitutionary death as the righteous one to deliver you from sin and death.

Today you can stop pretending to yourself that you are good enough to get to God on your own,

Humble yourself, forsake self-centeredness,

And confess that Jesus died for the unrighteous,

Including you.

This is the atonement.

Brothers and sisters, the strategy to do good in the face of evil,

And the reason for this hope that is in us,

Comes from the atonement.

Comes from this exchange of the righteous for the unrighteous.

Everything comes from this.

One problem believers struggle with,

Is this belief that we are righteous,

And the people who do evil to us,

They are the unrighteous.

We are highly unlikely to verbalize this,

But our way of thinking, our behavior, and our actions reveals this belief in our heart.

And to a certain degree, that is understandable.

It is true, God, by His grace, and through His Holy Spirit,

Is producing righteousness in His people.

But brothers and sisters, we are suppose to follow Christ.

This means,

Even if one of you were the most righteous person in your life,

For you to follow Christ,

Means you would have to suffer for all the unrighteous people in your life.

So, why should Jesus die?

Because He is the only One righteous,

Therefore, the righteous died for the unrighteous,

Jesus died for sin and for sinners.

WE: Why Would Jesus Die?

This brings us to our final question this morning,

Why Would Jesus Die?

This is an extraordinary thing Jesus did.

I am sure we could imagine ourselves being willing to die some heroic death for someone we love,

Or someone we deem good or worthy.

But this says Christ died for the unrighteous,

For the people who said unspeakably vicious things to Him,

The people who mock God and Jesus.

The arrogant people who thought they were better than Jesus,

These are the people Jesus died for,

Why?

Why would Jesus die for these people?

Peter tells us right in the middle of this verse,

Jesus died for the unrighteous,

To bring us unrighteous people to God.

This is an incredible statement.

It is foreign to the way we think.

This almost sounds like some sort of religious platitude,

Pastor Michael Lawrence gives an example of thinking this way;

“Isn’t that nice. We get to be with God. I wonder what heaven will be like. I hope my friends will be there. I wonder what we’ll do. I hope I don’t get bored.”

When we think about being brought to God this way,

We fail to grasp the weight of what Peter is saying.

This statement is God-centric.

And when we understand it rightly,

This is a breath-taking revelation!

When we go all the way back to the fall of mankind in Gen. 3,

All the way up to the cross of Christ,

The relational separation we talked about earlier was glaringly present between humanity and God because of our sin.

Throughout that time,

Some people tried to run to God in their own strength,

Others tried to run and hide from God,

Some did their best to avoid God,

While others simply pretended He was not there in the pursuit of their own man-made agendas.

For example, the first people,

Adam and Eve,

They tried to hide from God in the Garden,

But when their sin exposed them before the eyes of God Almighty,

One of the most tragic consequences of their sin was being expelled from the Garden,

Where they fellowshipped with God in His presence.

Then the development of the temple included a curtain to separate the Most Holy Place,

Where God’s presence was in it’s most concentrated state on this earth.

Outside of the Most Holy Place were a series of courtyards and tabernacle walls which kept people an even greater distance from God’s presence.

If you picture it like a series of concentric circles,

Similar to a bullseye,

With God’s presence at the very center.

But why did God make so many layers of separation?

He tells Moses in Ex. 33:20;

Exodus 33:20 ESV

But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.”

God’s unfiltered holiness would overwhelm us to the point of death.

So, God separated His people from His presence.

Going back to Adam and Eve,

The Bible says He placed a warrior angel to guard the door,

Preventing people from getting back in.

Now, because we are unrighteous, if we are to get back to God,

It requires the righteous to bring us to God on the basis of His righteousness.

And that is what Christ offers us.

Friends, the Bible assures us that on the cross,

Christ, the righteous One,

Marched into the presence of God,

Bearing our sin upon His shoulders,

Suffering the punishment of God’s wrath for us.

Jesus died not just to free us from our sin and death.

He died to bring us to God.

When we enter into God’s presence,

We are living testimonies of the amazing grace and unimaginable love of God.

Because God have His own righteous Son to bring us to Him.

This makes God the focus of Christ’s death on the cross.

The righteous died to bring the unrighteous to God.

So, the unrighteous become banners of God’s glory.

When Christ brings us to God,

He is bringing us back into a relationship with God.

It is rightly reorienting the universe back to having God as the center,

Where we again have nearness,

We find joy and purpose in our relationship with God.

The goal of the atonement was to bring us to God.

So, why would Jesus die?

Jesus would die to bring you to God as a banner of God’s glory.

Meaning Jesus would die for sins, for sinners, and for God’s glory.

This is the path of the Christian life.

Everything leads you to God.

His death leads us forward into everlasting life in the presence of God.

For God’s glory.

Romans 5:2 says it this way;

Romans 5:2 ESV

Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Jesus was able to do this because as our passage ends by saying,

Though He was put to death in the flesh,

He was made alive by the Spirit.

Christ was put to death in the flesh,

Means Christ literally died on the cross.

He experienced physical death.

An innocent man,

Was executed in cold blood on a cross.

But not only did Jesus experience physical death,

Immediately after,

Peter says that Jesus was made alive.

This is worded in such a way that it communicates Jesus was caused to have life,

Specifically, life again.

Jesus did not stay dead.

He satisfied the wrath of God,

Opening the way for the unrighteous to be brought to God.

So, that death cannot stop us.

Now the number that follow Christ is a multitude that cannot be numbered,

Made up of men and women from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.

Peter wrote this letter to believers suffering for their faith in Christ.

Last week we talked a lot more about Peter’s specific exhortation to persevere in suffering by following Christ’s example.

Our text this morning is a little different.

He is reminding us that Christ’s suffering was unique,

It atoned for our sin,

It redeemed us unrighteous sinners,

And now because Christ was made alive in the Spirit,

His suffering is over.

He has risen from the dead,

Exalted in the heavens,

Seated at the right hand of the Father.

We build our lives upon the truth of our text this morning.

Just like Christ was made alive in the Spirit

Paul described how you can be made alive in the Spirit in 1 Co. 15:22 and Rom. 8:11;

1 Corinthians 15:22 ESV

For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

Romans 8:11 ESV

If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

Brothers and sisters, your sins have been paid for,

Your righteous substitute was sufficient,

He has brought you to God.

He is made alive in the Spirit,

He is done with your sin,

So you should be too.

Your life is certain to have trials,

But Christ is teaching us that they are small in comparison to the future He has secured for you.

So, do not grow to fond of this world’s love and comforts,

Likewise, do not grow weary from this world’s trials and struggles.

The core message of our text is focused on the relentless work of Christ in this world.

He died and rose from the dead,

Then He ascended to the right hand of God.

Christ relentlessly died for sins, for sinners, for God, and now death cannot stop us.