Episode 199: Crucified | Tim Henderson+ | Good Friday

Introduction

Hello friends. It's good to be with you this evening. A little while ago I did a very quick read through the New Testament and made note of every time the apostles reflect on Jesus' death. I captured a document of every instance, and it's this right here. I actually have several copies of it in case you'd like one. Last week I read through it just for my own reconsideration during Holy Week because I wanted to fill my mind with this body of the implications of Jesus' death. I brought several copies of it. They're down here on the front row, and if you'd like one just to read through yourself, you can grab one when we come down to nail our sins on the cross. You'll find them on that front pew if you'd like to grab one.

The Centrality of Jesus’ Death

As you might imagine, Jesus' death undergirds everything throughout the New Testament. Luke, Paul, Peter, John, whoever wrote Hebrews, they just pepper their writings with allusions to Jesus' death. In fact, once you get outside the gospels and into the book of Acts, it’s all of three verses before his death comes up. Luke wrote this in Acts 1:3:

After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive.

And that phrase just captures me: after his suffering, how deep it was, how brutally agonizing it was. As I flipped through this just the other day, so many arrests me. It says in Acts 20 that we are to be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.

First Corinthians 1 says that Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. For it is written:

I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate. — 1 Corinthians 1

There are so many more worth highlighting here. Revelation 1:5, to him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood.

If you want to grab one of these copies, feel free. There are many in here. But there is one passage in particular I want to focus on tonight: Galatians 2:20 and 21. If you have that, feel free to flip there. It’s short, it’s brief. Here's what it says:

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing.

The Personal and Participatory Nature of the Cross

I'm on a very short leash tonight, so this has to be tight. But the crucifixion is very personal and it proves something you might not have considered in light of it—it's participatory. Take another look at verse 20. Paul says:

The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Now, there are countless places in the New Testament that say things like God so loved the world, or that God demonstrated his love for us—while we were sinners, Christ died for us. Or that the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. Or that this is a trustworthy saying that we put our hope in the living God who is the savior of all men.

And as great as they are, they're broad, they're general, they're not specific, they're not personal. But in Galatians 2:20 it’s very particular. Essentially, what Paul is saying is that God loves you, but I’m his favorite, right? Can you say that? That God loves you? That he gave himself for you?

The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I believe that when Jesus moves from being an example to being an experience, from being famous to being a friend, from loving the crowd to loving you, everything changes.

I have a friend named Robert who just read The Lion, The Witch, The Wardrobe for the very first time. It’s a famous children’s story by CS Lewis, and you should read it too. The climactic moment in the story is when this wretched little kid named Edmund, whom you just dislike so much, has betrayed his entire family for some food and power to this evil witch. Edmund is rescued from that witch by a lion. The lion surrenders himself to be killed so that Edmund can go free. Robert doesn’t like Edmund because the kid is just the worst. And you wouldn’t like him either if you choose to read the book. But Edmund changes, and sometime later, in a sequel called The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Edmund is talking to another loathsome little kid named Eustace Scrub. And Eustace is learning for the first time about this lion. Here’s their dialogue:

Aslan, says Eustace, I’ve heard that name mentioned several times since we joined the Dawn Treader. And I felt, I don’t know what, I just hated it. But then again, I was hating everything then. And by the way, I’d like to apologize. I’m afraid I’ve been pretty beastly.

That’s alright, said Edmund. Between ourselves, you haven't been as bad as I was on my first trip to Narnia. You were only an ass, but I was a traitor.

Well, don’t tell me about it then, said Eustace. But who is Aslan? Do you know him?

Well, he knows me, said Edmund. He is the great lion, the Son of the emperor across the sea, who saved Narnia and saved me.

That’s spot on. You guys, Jesus’ work is not merely corporate; it’s individual and personal. He saved me. He gave himself for me.

The second thing this passage provides is proof. Follow the reasoning. There’s a tight little argument here, but it might not be obvious at first glance. Verse 21 says:

I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing.

Now, to grasp the impact of what Paul is saying, come with me to the garden. I know that now Friday is no longer Thursday, but go back a day—Thursday. Jesus is in the garden, in agony. He’s sweating blood. He’s dreading tomorrow’s torture because it will be so unspeakably awful. It’s like bone on iron agony. It’s as if someone is pressing a high heel shoe into the crown of your foot until it presses through. It’s like bearing all your weight directly on your radius until you finally suffocate in exhaustion.

And anticipating that, Jesus asks, is there any other way? If this is the only way—if mankind can be restored, redeemed, brought into communion with God without this excruciating death—then okay, I'll go through it. But he asks, could we do that instead? Is there any other way that this cup could pass from me? Can mankind be redeemed without the cross?

But there is no other way. So to the cross he goes. I think the most compelling evidence for the uniqueness of Christ, the exclusivity of the gospel, and the desperate need for everyone to hear and believe is the crucifixion. What Paul is saying is that if people could be made righteous apart from Christ, if the cross wasn’t absolutely necessary—if it wasn’t the only way, the unique solution—then Jesus died for nothing. It’s absurd. It’s pointless.

Whatever you depend on that isn't the cross makes a mockery of the necessity of his suffering. The cross is personal; it’s proof that he is the only way we can be saved; and it’s participatory.

The Participatory Aspect: Union with Christ

Look at what he says. Paul says, I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. We all know, perhaps, that Good Friday today remembers the crucifixion of Jesus. But I hope you won't think me heretic to say that it’s also about your crucifixion. If you are in Christ, if you have been united to him, then his death is your death.

Here’s how Paul puts it in Romans 6:

Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

And if we've been united with him in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. Good Friday is his, but it is also yours. Easter is his, but it is also yours.

Because his death is your death, you are crucified with him, united to him. Therefore, you are no longer slaves to sin. Dead people don’t sin, and in Christ, you are free. You are free to live a new life. Now, you may go back and choose to sin, but you don’t have to. You’ve been freed from it. You can live in the freedom purchased for you on the cross, reckoning yourself dead to sin by uniting yourself to him. And that’s huge news.

Here it is all again, together:

Galatians 2:20 — I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing.

Conclusion

The cross is personal. It’s proof. And it’s participatory. That’s why we give him praise. Let’s do that.

Lord Jesus, today and on all days, on the highest and holiest day of the year, on the day that we remember particularly that you chose to exalt yourself. You were lifted up before all men. You were seen in the fullness of your glory. Blood dripping down your face, gasping for breath, drinking wrath, and loving me. Lord, we adore you, we praise you, we lift you up. Amen.