Good Friday April 2, 2010
Luke 23:46 A Good Way to Die
Dear fellow redeemed,
For
many watching the crucifixion of our Lord, I’m quite sure I know what the
thinking was.
“This
is no way to die!”
* As we picture the scene, it may also bring to mind the
ongoing debate between pro-lifers and pro-choicers. As you know, people have very different
beliefs about death, and very different ways of dying; especially when one’s
suffering becomes quite intense.
* But have you ever thought about what makes Christ’s
death so different?
After
exclaiming: “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” we’re told,
“he breathed his last.” What shall
we make of this?
* Simply
put, the death of our Savior was not your ordinary death.
He didn’t die because he had no other choice but to die.
* He
died because it was his choice to die!
Really!
But hold on a second! Jesus isn’t the
only one who dies by choice, these days, is he?
* Not in today’s world of modern thought.
I speak specifically of this world’s mercy-killing promoters;
what some will refer to as pro-deathers, and I mean no disrespect – using the
term myself.
* In any event, such people believe it’s a person’s choice to
die when he desires to die, if in his
opinion his life is no longer worth living.
* In other words, pro-deathers do not believe God alone should
decide the timing of one’s death. That
would make our God inhumane; lacking understanding and compassion.
* Okay. But now why did
Jesus choose to die?
It wasn’t because he was tired of waiting for his Father to
make the choice for him, or because his Father had some warped inhumane sense
of justice.
* He chose to die, rather, so that as the world’s substitute
he might deliver us from of our sins. He
wasn’t trying to get out of something, that is. His choice was to save us.
Well,
today’s pro-deathers may say that we’re all entitled to our religious
beliefs.
Still,
they don’t believe Christ’s death offers much relevance when it comes to our
own death.
* Speaking of normal people, such as you or me, we die because
we have no power.
We grow weak and old, and lose control what happens to our ailing
and failing body.
* And that’s just not right in the opinion of today’s
pro-deathers.
But there is a way in their opinion where we can make a
meaningless death a good death.
* The problem is, pro-deathers choose to assert a power that
doesn’t belong to them.
To
make more sense of just how far off they are in their thinking, we give
consideration to Christ’s power, which is none other than God’s power.
* The truth is, Christ has power not simply to give
life, where he raises the dead to life.
He also has power over life. Being God himself, the timing of one’s death
is in his hands.
* And so, Jesus demonstrated that he was
the Lord over life in his own death.
Consider
the opening words of our text: “Jesus called out with a loud voice.”
Dying, he still cried out loudly, “Father, into
your hands I commit my spirit.”
* Now,
that was astonishingly unusual.
Ordinarily, a dying person gives up his tired soul with a
weak, soft groan.
He
has no more power to speak and cry aloud.
His
strength fails. The powers of his life
fades away.
And
eventually his pulse stops and his heart quits beating.
But
Christ’s death could not be described in this way.
* He did not die from exhaustion.
Nor did he die because of his countless pains or his
unimaginable agony.
* No, even as he died, he still
gave evidence of his power.
By uttering his last words with a shout, he revealed to the
world that he indeed was God’s Son and had power over life and death.
He was the Lord of Life, and could have stopped his death had
he chosen to.
* Therefore,
he didn’t die because he had to die.
He died because he wanted to die and had the power to
die.
* Jesus
had said earlier about his life: “I have power to lay it down, and I have
power to take it again.” As the Lord
of life he had the prerogative to lay down his life any time he hose, and to
raise it again.
Well,
if some pro-deathers claim to believe in God, as I imagine they do, they may
very well agree that only God has the final say about death.
* They may also agree in most cases that suicide is
wrong.
“We should not encourage people under normal circumstances to
seek an exit from this life, but in every case possible remind our loved ones
that their life has value.”
* But then they’ll go on and say that the time may come when
one’s life has no value to any one; not to their family, not to their
community, and least of all to themselves.
They are simply suffering needlessly and may have even become
a burden to those trying to care for them.
* In such cases pro-deathers believe we may assist a
loved one in their desire to die.
In fact this makes death is beautiful in their view; having a
chance to die with dignity.
This
problem, to tell you the truth, extends far beyond our culture’s pro-death
movement.
Many
people today try to take the edge off death by hiding the reality or effects of
death.
* We see this, for example, in many of
the traditions surrounding the funeral.
What
would you say is the main responsibility of the mortician?
* Some might think that it’s to beautify death. We
glance at the body lying in the casket and comment “Doesn’t she or he look
nice?”
* And if the makeup job is at is usual best, we may even have
a difficult time believing that the body we see before us is really dead.
* But
what’s the real purpose of an open casket; to help the loved ones accept their
loss; to give them chance to say “good-bye?”
* We’d
be better served to regard the open casket as our chance to come to grips with
our own sin. We recognize that death is
the result of our sinful nature.
* The open casket should be sobering reminder not only that we
shall all die someday, but also that we need to be delivered from
death.
A
lot may cross people’s minds when they see the face of an acquaintance who now
lies dead before them.
* When
the disciples saw the corpse of Jesus taken from the cross, they might have
lost all hope of seeing him again.
* But
they should have known better than to regard his death as we regard other
deaths.
For while it is true that your typical death can only remind
us of our sin, our frailties, our imperfections and, yes, our own death,
Christ’s death reminds us that such dying is not the end.
* And that’s why we can truly speak of a beautiful death.
It happens to be the death of our Lord Jesus who died in
order to save us.
* And so does his death make our death beautiful. Every death is beautiful when a sinner dies
trusting in the blood of his Savior and looking forward to his new life with
Christ.
And
so are we alerted to yet one more difference between pro-deathers and
believers.
* Those trusting in their own means of death die with no hope,
whereas those trusting in Christ’s death, have every reason to hope.
* Very
simply, Christ’s death means that our own death can no longer separate us from
God.
Our
sin, you see, which had caused our separation was heaped upon the body of
Christ.
So
that our sin might no longer be our problem or concern, Christ made it his
problem and concern – up until the moment he died on the cross.
* This
was the death he chose. By dying our death, he wanted us to know that we were
truly forgiven by the Father and without sin in his sight.
* As
Paul writes to the Colossians: “But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s
physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish
and free from accusation.”
Reconciled
to God! . . . Holy in his sight! . . . Free from accusation!
* When
all is said and done, God’s death makes your death and my death very different
than the typical death.
* Unlike
nonbelievers who die like cattle with no thoughts or hopes concerning tomorrow,
the Christian can die with the certain hope of eternal life.
Everyone
of us can die knowing that the sting of death has been removed.
* “Yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil;
for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me.”
* What a comfort: to have our fear of
death taken away!
Meanwhile,
we don’t concern ourselves with those who try to hide or decorate death.
* Instead,
we commend our souls each day to our faithful creator and Father saying, “If
we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord.
So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.”
* And
when we see our final day approaching we permit God’s Word to be heard
from our lips, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” Amen.
May
the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in
Christ Jesus. Amen.
