The Story of Reality: The Cross
Notes
Transcript
The Cross
The Cross
We have just about finished our study through this book, the Story of Reality. Hopefully you have been encouraged and strengthened in your faith as you have seen how this Story, the biblical Story makes so much sense especially in comparison to all the other storylines.
I am hoping by now that we all know these and that would be awesome if so. So we have four questions every world view has to answer. They are:
Where did we come from/how did it start/origins?
What went wrong/what is broken in the world?
How can it be fixed/what’s the solution?
How does it all end/what happens to everything?
And we have gone on to study the four answers that the bible presents to these questions, very clearly.
Creation
Fall
Redemption
Restoration
We have seen God as creator of everything including man. Man is higher than creation but below God. We saw that man is beautiful but they are broken. And because of the events of Genesis 3 man is lost there is evil and wrath must come to account for the evil, the sin that has now entered the world.
Remember two weeks ago I talked about the patient that goes in with a broken finger but what is actually wrong is cancer ravaging his body. And without the proper diagnosis you can’t have a solution or plan of attack. If they treat the broken finger only he is going to die just with all of his working fingers. We saw that true problem in Genesis of man’s sinfulness and brokenness, hopefully you have seen how far man has fallen and how we are unable to save ourselves.
There was no hope, man in his natural state has no hope of ever changing their condition on their own.
Last week we continued on our journey and we moved to redemption. Enter stage left the hero, the hope, which is who?
Jesus.
We have seen as we moved along this plot line, slowly different groups or religions have come along with us. How the world started we kept most of the groups, we got to went wrong and a lot dropped off but Judaism, Roman Catholics and others would agree there is something called sin or at least that man has failed to live up to expectations or the standard.
We got to Jesus and even the fact he exists and he came and we still have groups coming along with us. I would argue today that with what we are talking about today we will narrow it down to just “us”, the biblical storyline really stands out and proves to be the right and most logical storyline when you really examine the cross and what it means.
Today we are really going to wrestle the question how can it be fixed. We already assume because of the first two questions that there is a God (how did we get here) and that we (his creation) have done something wrong (fall). And so the question how can it be fixed can really be said as how are we made right before God? How is sinful man made right before a holy God?
Jesus lived his life in a manner worthy of the calling by which he was called. The manner in which he lived was important! He didn’t just swoop down for a weekend, die, rise and go back up and call it good. Jesus lived like us—he had family, he had work, he had temptations, he had friends, he had backstabbing friends, he had conflict, he had blood, sweat and tears. And he was without sin.
Jesus came in a miraculous way, but we should have expected that right—besides the fact all the Old Testament hinted or even expressly said what would happen, this was God entering the world, you didn’t expect it to be a boring old storyline did you?
What were some ways that Jesus birth was so amazing and so unique?
Born of a virgin
Born in Bethlehem “little among the clans of Judah”
Had a crib that was a feeding trough filled with straw, he was among the animals, couldn’t even get a house or a room
His parents had no money, no status and no significance
The first people who came to see him were lowly shepherds, the lowest or most boring professions
This is how the promised redeemed, the messiah, the savior made his entrance to humanity.
And he grows up. It says he grows in wisdom and stature. He wasn’t going around playing tricks on the kids in card games or multiplying his food so he could have extra or healing his neighbors of their problems. He lived a normal childhood. And this added to the power of his ministry once it began because his neighbors are looking around saying wait a second, wasn’t that Mary’s boy? Didn’t he help Joseph build our kitchen table—he wasn’t anything special and now he’s making lame men walk!
Jesus begins his ministry and is baptized by John the Baptist, he goes into the wilderness and is tempted and he defeats it.
And all of a sudden Jesus takes off—he is a phenomenon. People are amazed, they flock to see him and hear him. He challenges and even attacks this religious establishment which has stood for generations. The common folk are excited about this—yes, you high and mighty priests and pharisees and leaders who think your all that, listen to him. Those in power are offended and they want to shut this Jesus up. They try and trick him or convince him or try and silence him but it doesn’t work. He continues, he speaks the truth and he does it boldly and with great authority.
But Jesus didn’t just condemn the elite, he went after the crowds as wicked and sinful people. He used parables and teachings and miracles to show everyone they were lost, broken and wicked in need of a Savior.
And in the last year of his life Jesus ramps it up, going after the religious leaders with everything, leaving nothing untouched. You punks—you think your something special but your nothing but white-washed tombs! Consider with me---is this you? You zealots who externally are prestine with no blemish, painted over every other week, washed daily, looking immaculate. And yet on the inside is dirty, rotten, decaying corpses. Nothing but deadness on the inside, but on the outside you look great. You seem to check all the boxes but really your just dead, worthless, a vessel for destruction.
Jesus spends his final hours instructing his disciples. We have seen this in John 15. Jesus raises Lazarus which is the final nail in the coffin for the elite, they are going to kill him. And in just days the crowd will join them going from “Hosanna” to Crucify Him”
Jesus will soon we handed over to his enemies. The clock is ticking. And this—this is the reason he was born. This storyline, this entire worldview is centered around this event. It was the fulfillment of thousands of prophecy, promise and expectation. This was it—this is how it all had to play out.
And this is how the Father wanted it. This is the Father’s plan, this wasn’t evil or Jews or Romans suddenly “winning”. This is how God the Father ordained for God to Son to willfully and purposefully go through this for our God and God’s glory.
And for Jesus it meant shame, humiliation, pain, betrayal, agony and death.
We come to the cross. This is where the biblical storyline separates itself. Something happened at that cross and answers the question how are we made right before a Holy God. And see without the cross and the fullest extent of the cross you cannot answer that question.
The cross was a brutal way to die. It was common, ordinary, for the worst criminals to be killed in this way. You were beaten, then laid on two pieces of wood. They used square nails that Mike showed you at camp—they drove them through your wrists, incredibly painful in itself. Then they stacked your feet on top of each other and drove another nail through it and through your arches. And now you hang there. Many times naked or with little clothes. No food or water. You hang for all to see. The rain the wind the sun beating down on you. The birds and the bugs attacking your flesh. your exposed back which is ripped open from the beating rubs against the wood. To breathe you have to push yourself up through your broken feet. To get relief you hang from your wrists which cuts off your airways and makes it hard to breathe. And your in intense agony until you die.
But for Jesus, he had all of this and more.
I am quoting here from the book, “For Jesus, there is more. It is more excruciating than the nails pinning Jesus’ body to the timbers, more dreadful than the lashes that ripped his flesh from his frame. It is a dark, terrible, incalculable agony—a infinite misery—as God the Father unleashes his fury upon his sinless Son as if Jesus were guilty of an immeasurable evil.”
Jesus, king of the Jews, as they mocked. Hung on that cross and endured the pain that all crucified on a cross did. But he also endured the wrath of God on our account. The wrath that we talked about we needed and was necessary for redemption. Jesus, the perfect, spotless lamb took on that wrath.
We think we are whitewashed tombs. We think we are worth something. These other religions they think they have done something or achieved something because of their actions. But God has come in the form of Jesus and he is shining a great spotlight in every nook and cranny of our souls and the evil is exposed. Every man will be shown to be guilty and a punishment is deserved. God is justified in his judgement and there is no room for negotiation—you are guilty. There is no plea deal, there is no buyout.
On the cross Jesus made a trade with the Father. From the book, “Punishment adequate for all the crimes of all of humanity—every murder, every theft, every lustful glance, every hidden act of vice, every modest moment of price, every monstrous deed of evil—punishment adequate for every crimes of every man or woman who ever lived, Jesus takes upon himself as if he is guilty of all.”
It is finished. Its done, its not over but its done. It’s not just that his torment was done and the pain was gone. His divine task was accomplished. The divine transfer was complete. He took our guilt, we take his goodness.
Justification, substitution, redemption, propitiation---all have deep rich meanings worthy of looking into. Its simply this—God the just was satisfied to look at Him and pardon me.
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,
We sing about this great truth.
Come behold the wondrous mystery
Christ the Lord upon the tree
In the stead of ruined sinners
Hangs the Lamb in victory
See the price of our redemption
See the Father’s plan unfold
Bringing many sons to glory
Grace unmeasured, love untold
What riches of kindness He lavished on us
His blood was the payment, His life was the cost
We stood 'neath a debt we could never afford
Our sins they are many, His mercy is more
No fate I dread, I know I am forgiven
The future sure, the price it has been paid
For Jesus bled and suffered for my pardon
And He was raised to overthrow the grave
O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer
Gracious Savior of my ruined life
My guilt and cross laid on Your shoulders
In my place You suffered bled and died
Surely he took up our pain, and bore our suffering. The punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.
This trade explains why Jesus is the only way of salvation. There is only one way to make this right. The cross was enough. We are made right before a Holy God because of the cross. Not because of anything we have done. Our works do not save us. Being good and viritous does nothing to remedy our standing. The cross was enough.
“Mankind faces a singular problem. People are broken and the world is broken because our friendship with God has been broken, ruined by human rebellion. Humans, you and I—are guilty, enslaved, lose, dead. All of us. Everyone. Everywhere. The guilt must be punished, the debt must be paid, the slave must be purchased. This is why Jesus of Nazareth is the only way to God, the only possible source of rescue. No other person could. Not Mohammed. Not the Buddha. Nor Krishna. Not anyone else. Only Jesus of Nazareth could save the world…Jesus alone, the perfect Son of God, paid the debt for those who trust in him so they would not perish under God’s punishment, but have life with him fully and forever.”
Because of the cross we can now have faith in Jesus. But faith isn’t a strong enough word. It can be defined as “a nonrational belief in some propostion.” This isn’t a blind faith or chance.
First of all Jesus proved he was God by doing what?
Signs, miracles, wonders—he authenticated himself.
There is a difference between “believing that” (“belief”) and “believing in” (“faith”)
We may believe that something is true but never rely on it for a single moment. We may be very convinced that insulin injections will manage our diabetes, yet if we do not take our daily doses, our belief no matter how true it is, does us no good. There is another step.
There is more than just believing in. The demons believed in Jesus, they were not saved. Judas knew about Jesus and even assented to Jesus, but he never trusted him.
Believing in is not enough. You have to also trust.
Faith is not enough either. You can have faith that an airplane can take you to another place. You can have all the faith that airplanes are safe and efficent and worth it. But is faith enough? Does it get you anywhere? No, if you don’t get on the plane that is operating and has a capable pilot your not going anywhere!
Consider this example from the book.
“Pretend for a moment you are a diabetic on the verge of a diabetic coma. Pretend also that I present you with a hypodermic syringe and a small vial that I tell you is insulin. Would you trust me to give you an injection to save your life? The illustration shows a clear contrast between mere belief and active trust. You already believe that insulin can give you relief. But you remain in danager until you take a step of faith and actively entrust yourself to my care. So I supsent you might take me up on the offer. If you did, however, you would be dead. Here’s why: All the sincerity of your childlike trust could not change the fact that the vial in my illustration does not really contain insulin, only saline. You had both belief and faith, to be sure, but you would be dead, nonetheless.”
Can a person be saved by faith? No. Faith cannot save anyone by itself. Muslim suicide bombers overflow with authentic faith but it does them no good.
If you have unshakeable faith in something that turns out to be false then you have an unshakable dilusion.
Faith does not save, Jesus saves through faith. He is the rescuer. This is why we care so much about reason and evidence. Reason assess, faith trusts. Reason helps us know what is actually true, leading to accurate belief. Faith is our step of trust to rely on what we have good reason to believe is so. Christianity is all about the person we put our faith in.
If you have all the faith in the world that Jesus rose from the dead and yet he really did not, your faith is useless.
This is why truth matters. Jesus talked more about truth then trust. Truth tells us what to trust.
We are saved by faith in Jesus, trusting that this book is true. You can have all the belief and faith in the world but if it’s not in King Jesus it’s useless.
What does that faith and trust look like—repentance. Turning away from our sin. Obeying what we are commanded to do.
We are made right by the blood of the cross. That is how this is fixed. We trust and believe in Jesus because of what he has done and him alone and we do so through repentance and obedience.