Matthew 15:33-41
The Death of Jesus
33 At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. 34 And at three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).
35 When some of those standing near heard this, they said, “Listen, he’s calling Elijah.”
36 Someone ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him down,” he said.
37 With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.
38 The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. 39 And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!”
40 Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joseph, and Salome. 41 In Galilee these women had followed him and cared for his needs. Many other women who had come up with him to Jerusalem were also there.
Jesus LOVES us...Most theologians interpret His death as the justice for our sins, our fall from grace, our rebelling morality against God...Jesus pays our debt...He pays our sin debt...Someone has to pay for the sins of this world...Someone has to pay for our fall from grace...He is the One to pay it for us...Christ says us from our sins...He is the One punished for our sins...
But His dying on the cross, also shows His love for us...He did not have to die...He is divine...He could at any time on the cross (or anytime for that matter) done a miracle...He could have changed things, with a miracle...But the difference between Him and me, is that He follows God's will completely...He does not care to be in control of His life, He wants God to be in control of His life, because the Son knows that Father knows best...It seems, we don't...It seems we would rather be in control of our lives, than to let go and let God, like Jesus does...
As He was dying, He ask His Father why has He had forsaken Him...These words are a mystery...But this also is sad...This is very sad...Jesus uses the words King David did in Psalm 22:1...I think, at that very moment He was paying our sin debt and about ready to die...Our sins were passed to Him to pay our sin debt...Our sins temporarily break the complete, perfect connection with God...He feels empty and lost with these sins...He feels lost with our sins...He at this very moment feels separated from His Father...Justice is being done...This separation is a part of justice...This is what my sins did to Him...It seems that the perfect relationship with the Father and His Son was temporarily broken, and soon would be restored...It seems Jesus may have felt like man, for this one instance, as He was taking on the sins of this world and paying each of our debts...We are freed by Christ's atonement...We are born in Adam and the wages of sin is death... Christ frees us from this death, and we now can fear no more...
This is a sign of His love...He did not have to have His relationship broken with His Father and feel this way...He could have walked off from the cross at anytime, but He didn't...With Jesus all things are possible and He prefers and remains on the cross being tortured to death, to show His love for us...Would you or I stayed on the cross, knowing we could leave that torture at anytime?...And we can only imagine how bad the feelings were of being separated from the Greatest One in the universe, and saying My Father, My Father, why are You forsaking Your Son could actually feel?...Yet, He stays on the cross, to die for us, to pay our debt...
His love, His justice, and His death allows us to be free from death and all fears if we believe in Him and the One who sent Him...