The Death of Jesus (Isaiah 53)

This sermon was preached on 29/12/2013

Why does the Apostles Creed say that Jesus was both crucified and dead, given that virtually everyone who was crucified died? The probable answer to the question is that they were refuting a heresy that suggested it was not really the Christ who suffered on the cross, that the Christ whom the heretics said had come on the man called Jesus at his baptism had then left the man Jesus when he was crucified. That was an ancient heresy connected to Gnosticism. It is interesting to note how they counteracted the heresy – they did so by simply stating the truth and put it in a form by which Christians repeated the truth regularly.

It is very unlikely that we will meet someone today who holds that ancient heresy, although anything is possible in our confused age. Yet there are modern heresies to which the Apostles Creed speaks and one of them also suggests that although Jesus was crucified he did not die. This modern heresy suggests that Jesus merely swooned on the cross and later revived in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Strangely, the heresy does not explain how a man terribly weakened by his crucifixion would then be able to muster sufficient strength and move by himself the stone over the entrance and then be agile enough to escape through the guards watching the tomb.

Of course, the Creed was not only designed to deal with wrong teachings. It was also a summary of what Christians should believe, what they should think about and reflect on with regard to their faith. So the Creed is urging us to focus on the fact that Jesus died and on the significance of his death.

Proofs of his death

While it is the case that the Bible is not a history book in the normal use of the term, it is also the case that the Bible often refers to historical events in great detail. The four Gospels describe many of them and each of the Gospels focus on the death of Jesus. If their details were inaccurate, it would have been easy for them to have been discredited by those who knew otherwise. The first set of proofs of his death is connected to what officialdom did to ensure it happened.

First, Pilate gave Jesus, after he had been scourged, into the hands of competent executioners who knew what they were doing with regard to crucifixion and they confirmed, when asked, that Jesus had died. Second, Pilate only gave permission to Joseph of Arimathea to take down the body of Jesus after confirmation had been obtained (a soldier plunged a spear into Jesus in order to ensure that he had died). Third, Pilate gave orders that the tomb of Joseph should be guarded in case the disciples of Jesus tried to steal his dead body. It would have been easy for someone to discover if Pilate had not given these orders. But no attempt was made because even those who were opposed to Jesus knew that officialdom had done its work thoroughly.

The second set of proofs is the responses of the followers of Jesus, mainly of the women who had remained at the cross and of two Jewish rulers who came there after Jesus had died. The women witnessed what had happened and their response was to prepare burial ointments for his dead body. Their action was moved by deep affection for him, yet it is obvious that they knew he had died. The other followers who witnessed his death had more credibility outside the church than the women would have had. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were both politicians whose word would be accepted and both of them also knew that Jesus had died, which was why they placed his body in Joseph’s tomb.

Predicted

Concerning the fact of his death, it is important to recall that Jesus himself had predicted it several times. For example, he said to his disciples in Matthew 20:18-19: ‘See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day.’ The Saviour on that occasion outlined what would happen to him when they and he reached Jerusalem. He knew that he was going to die.

We can go further back than a few weeks and discover that the death of Jesus had been predicted centuries before he was born. Isaiah the prophet, in his amazing description of the sufferings of the Messiah recorded in Isaiah 53, states clearly that he would die. The prophet predicted that the Messiah would be cut off out of the land of the living and would be buried with the rich (vv. 8-9). While many down the centuries between the time of Isaiah and the time of Jesus may have wondered how the prophecy could be fulfilled literally, once they heard the details of the death of Jesus they would have realised that Isaiah’s words were fulfilled literally.

Planned

Fulfilment of prophecy is a wonderful apologetic tool than can be very effective when arguing for the truth of the Bible and its message. Yet for those who accept the Bible’s message there is an even more amazing aspect of the death of Jesus and that is that it was planned in heaven long before even the universe was created.

A few weeks after Jesus was crucified, Peter was preaching to crowds gathered in Jerusalem for the Feast of Pentecost, crowds who would have been aware that the body of Jesus had disappeared from the tomb of Joseph. In his sermon Peter explained to them what had taken place and how Jesus had been raised from the dead. Among the matters he said to them was this statement: Jesus, who was ‘delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men’ (Acts 2:23). Peter, while not absolving his listeners of their guilt in connection to the death of Jesus, affirms that his death was part of God’s eternal plan. There are many mysteries connected to God’s eternal purpose but one obvious aspect of it is that the death of Jesus was intentional and not accidental as far as God was concerned.

Peter’s words make clear that those involved in the death of Jesus had their reasons. We know that the Jewish leaders wanted Jesus punished because they were envious of him. Pilate allowed to Jesus to be punished because he was afraid that he would lose his position if things got out of hand. The mob asked for Jesus’ death because they were easily influenced by their rulers at Passover time and chose instead of Jesus someone who from their perspective was trying to deliver them from bondage to Rome after Pilate gave them the choice between Jesus and Barabbas. But why was God involved in the death of Jesus?

Purpose

The Bible reveals some details about God’s eternal plan. As far as the death of Jesus was concerned, the plan included promises, pictures and punishment. We can think of each of them in turn.

The promises are of two kinds. First, there are promises made between the persons of the Trinity and, second, there are promises made by God to humans. Within the Trinity, each divine person made promises to the other. For example, the Father promised the Son that if he would accomplish the work of redemption he would be raised from the dead and would then receive the Holy Spirit in order to build his church. The Son promised that he would become a man and fulfill what was required of him. The Spirit promised that he would glorify the Father and the Son as he applied the benefits planned by the Father and procured by the Son. It is difficult for us to imagine eternal persons making promises to one another and we may wish to use other words such as ‘decided’ instead of ‘promised’. But the meaning is the same. It was the intention of each person in the Trinity to fulfill the eternal plan.

Then there are the promises made to humans regarding the death of Jesus. Inevitably many of these promises, particularly in Old Testament times, were given in the form of prophecies and sometimes through illustrations that may not have been fully understood until the death of Jesus took place. One example of a promise that was also a prophecy is what was said in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve had disobeyed God. In the presence of the enemy (the devil), God announced: ‘I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel’ (Gen. 3:15). While many may have wondered where this conflict would take place, we can see how it was fulfilled in the death of Jesus when he was bruised and yet won a great victory over the powers of evil on behalf of those who would trust in him. Of course, the clearest prophecy, and which contains many promises, is found in Isaiah 53, a chapter which as many have said could have been written at the foot of the cross.

The second feature of the displaying of what God had in mind in his eternal plan is what I have called pictures. They refer to the methods God used to educate his people during Old Testament times, especially in Israel’s sacrificial system. Again and again, worshippers of God were instructed that he could only be approached through a perfect sacrifice. Every sacrificial victim had to be flawless, without even a mark as a defect. This emphasis was stressed in numerous ways such as the choice of animal for the daily sacrifice, or the Passover sacrifice, or by personal offerings a worshipper made. To discover from passages such as Isaiah 53 that the perfect sacrifice was not an animal but the Messiah was striking, especially as elsewhere it was stated that the Messiah would also be divine. Isaiah predicted that through death the soul of the Messiah would make a guilt offering; in other words, he would sacrifice himself on behalf of transgressors.

Some of those pictures pointed to particular lessons. The Passover pointed to the need of redemption from slavery (and we know that we needed to be redeemed from the power of sin as well as from its penalty). The necessity of a worshipper leaning on the animal that he had chosen to sacrifice illustrated the need of personal identification (and we know that we must trust in Jesus personally and continually). The burnt offering told of the necessity of wholehearted dedication to God’s will and the peace offering indicated that it was possible for sinners and God to have fellowship (we know that because of Jesus' dedication we can devote ourselves to God's service and enjoy fellowship with him). And the sin offerings highlighted that wrongdoings had to be atoned for. All those pictures pointed to the fact that in order for God and humans to live together there had to be a sacrifice that involved the death of a flawless victim.

The third detail connected to God’s purpose is that of punishment. God is holy and must punish sin wherever it is found. What is amazing about the punishment God planned was that he would bear the punishment in the person of his incarnate Son when he was on the cross. This is a reminder that the sacrifice made by Jesus was a propitiation in which he bore the wrath of God against the sins of his people. Many today are uncomfortable with the biblical claim that God is angry with sinners, yet their discomfort is unwarranted. This does not mean that God was angry with Jesus when he was on the cross. But it does mean that Jesus experienced what God's anger against our sins meant. As we saw in the previous study when considering the sayings on the cross, for Jesus bearing the penalty for our sins meant that he endured the wrath of God and discovered what it meant to be without the comfortable sense of his presence.

Yet we must always remember that Jesus was full of love as he bore this awful penalty. His love for the Father did not diminish, nor did his love for his people. We see his love for the Father in his words, 'My God, my God.' The thought did not occur to him that he should cease being his Father's Servant, the role that he had agreed to perform in the eternal purpose. And his love for his people remained strong during his hours of sacrifice unto death and despite the great distress he did not desire to abandon his task on their behalf.

Progress

When Jesus died, the veil that separated the holy place and the holy of holies in the temple was torn from the top to the bottom. This veil was very large, about sixty feet wide and thirty feet high. Moreover it would have required a great deal of effort to rend it because of the way it had been made. Yet it came apart easily without human involvement, and from the top to the bottom. The only people that could have witnessed it would be the priests serving in the temple (perhaps some of them were among the priests whose later conversions to Christ are mentioned in the Book of Acts and they could have related the details of what had taken place).

Whether they did or not, the significance of the tearing is obvious. God himself removed this symbolic barrier to his presence and indicated that, because of the atoning death of Jesus, it was possible for sinners to draw near to him. No longer would those who trusted in him have to go through detailed rituals. The privileges of the kingdom of God progressed from those connected to the state of immaturity to those connected to the state of fulfilment.

The death of Jesus meant that sinners could draw near to God in repentance and faith. They could draw near as his children, members of his family, with permanent access to him. This is why Jesus died. He did so because it was the eternal plan devised by the Trinity whereby sinners would enter into the great blessings connected to salvation from sin.