Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Understanding Jesus's Death | Learning to Follow Jesus | Luke 23.26-43

Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life and the time it takes to get to work. I'm Patrick Miller. And I'm Keith Simon. Right now, we're learning what it looks like to follow Jesus by working our way through the gospel of Luke. Today we come to the most tragic and solemn moment in Luke's gospel, Jesus' crucifixion. In our next episode, we'll read the part where Luke actually describes his death. But today, we're going to see him be crucified and read along his exorcification. agony on the cross. In this scene, it's a scene laced with irony. Jesus is mocked, and yet every

Starting point is 00:00:41 mocking word is truer than its speaker could ever understand. He's mocked as a false king, and yet little do they know that they are witnessing his actual enthronement. He's mocked as a powerless savior, and yet little do they know that by his death, they are saved. They laugh at him. Why can't you save yourself? But they don't understand that coming down from the cross, what they think of is him saving himself, that would actually mean losing himself, because it would mean disobeying the vocation given to him by his heavenly father. No, this, this cross, this is the only way to Jesus' vindication, to Jesus' salvation, to the world's salvation through him. The only way is ultimately through death, because that's how God is going to forgive sins and renew his people.

Starting point is 00:01:26 strangely, the only person who actually gets it, who sees what's happening with Jesus on the cross, the only person who gets it is a criminal. It's not a disciple. It's not an expert in God's word. No, it's an uneducated criminal who somehow sees that through death Jesus is going to bring life and forgiveness. And even as that criminal dies, he begs to partake. So let's read this story together. Luke 2332. Two others who were criminals were led away to be put to death with him. And when they came to the place that is called the skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. Let's pause again. We need to talk about crucifixion. You see, we can roll past crucifixion, that word, he was crucified,

Starting point is 00:02:14 without feeling the horror. But crucifixion was the worst imaginable way to die, at least to a Roman mind. And that was the case on two different levels. First, the physical level. The physical pain of dying on a was tremendous. Aside from being nailed to splintery wood while your back has been ripped apart by whips, crucifixion and actually killed you by a combination of exhaustion and suffocation. To be able to breathe on a cross, the victim had to use their legs to push themselves up. And pushing themselves up caused terrible pain. As time passed and exhaustion set in, it became more and more difficult for the crucified person to lift himself up and breathe. And so breaths, they become shorter, the lifts, they become shorter and more frantic until completely exhausted. The victim

Starting point is 00:02:59 can't lift himself up and he dies of suffocation. So crucifixion was terrible physically, but it was terrible for a second reason. Shame. Victims were crucified, stripped, completely naked in public. They were put in public thoroughfare so that everybody would see them and so that they could be mocked, spit on, stoned, and worse. Many modern interpreters have pointed out that this isn't just a form of physical abuse. It's a form of sexual assault. It's a form of awful social humiliation. In fact, being crucified was so shameful and awful that Rome made it illegal. They made it illegal to crucify a Roman citizen. To say that Jesus bore our wounds, our hurts, and our shame, and our sin, it's really no exaggeration. So Luke tells us,

Starting point is 00:03:46 they crucified Jesus between two criminals. And Jesus said, Father, forgive them. for they know not what they do. If you were a first century Jew listening to Luke's gospel, this probably wouldn't be the first time that you've read the story of a Jewish martyr. But it would be the first time that you ever heard a Jewish martyr cry out, forgive them. You see, innocent martyrs and Jewish stories, when they were martyred, they were often calling down curses and pleased for God's justice on the people who were harming them. No one ever said, forgive them.

Starting point is 00:04:19 They always said, God, vindicate me and destroy them. him. But here's Jesus, stripped, naked, physically abused, physically wrecked, and perfectly innocent of any real crime except loving his enemies. And he doesn't call down curses. He cries out forgiveness, forgiveness to the very people who are crucifying him. This is how God's new reality, God's kingdom breaks into the present. This is how the kingdom always comes by laying down your life for those who persecute you. Luke continues. And they cast life. And they cast love. lots to divide his garments. And the people stood by watching, but the rulers scoffed at him, saying, he saved others. Let him save himself. If he's the Christ of God, he's the chosen one.

Starting point is 00:05:04 The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine and saying, if you're the king of the Jews, save yourself. There was also an inscription over him. This is the king of the Jews. In this section, Luke is alluding in multiple places to Psalm 22, where a king is undefripped. justly persecuted by his enemies. They divide up his clothes. They mock him. And yet, he's not forsaken by God. And somehow, because God doesn't forsake him, the king is vindicated. And it ultimately leads to this king becoming the ruler of all the nations, not just Israel. It brings about all people knowing God as their king. And so you can see the irony. It's precisely because Jesus is the savior that he can't come down. It's because he's this king, this king who's being

Starting point is 00:05:52 unjustly persecuted that he can't come down. The only way to save people and to bring the nations into God's kingdom, the only way to do it isn't by spilling the blood of his enemies, but instead by spilling his own. Nonetheless, the Bible excerpts, the people who know Psalm 22 by memory, the religious leaders, the Roman soldiers, not one of them sees the truth. They can only see a crucified, would-be revolutionary, who's failed miserably, and now he's paying the laughable, ultimate cost. They can't see that he's the king on his throne, forgiving and renewing the people of God. No one can see it except one person. Luke continues in verse 39.

Starting point is 00:06:32 One of the criminals who was hanged, railed against him, saying, Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us. But the other criminal rebuked him, saying, do you not fear God? Since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds, but this man's done nothing wrong. And he said to Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. The criminal, like many Jews in his day, must have believed in some sort of resurrection. But also like most Jews, he probably imagined one great resurrection at the end of time of all people,

Starting point is 00:07:13 not the resurrection of one person in the middle of history, which is what ends up happening to Jesus. So this is what he's saying to Jesus. When God resurrects all of us, you and me included, you're obviously going to be king. Remember me then. Little does he know that Jesus himself will be resurrected in three days in the kingdom that he's hoping for someday in the future will actually begin. Luke continues in verse 43. And he, Jesus said to him, the criminal, truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise. This cryptic little phrase, honestly, isn't perfectly clear.

Starting point is 00:07:51 Paradise is the word Jesus used here. Paradisees were gardens built by Persian kings and dignitaries. The idea and the word, it caught on in Greece, and eventually it actually became a part of the Greek language. And this explains why the word paradise was used in the Bible's Greek translations whenever the authors were trying to talk about the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden was called Paradise. In the book of Revelation and elsewhere in the New Testament, this word,

Starting point is 00:08:16 word paradise describes our ultimate resurrection hope and embodied life in a renewed Eden-like creation. Paradise is never anywhere used to describe a disembodied heavenly existence. Moreover, so far as we can tell, Jesus says you'll be with me today, but that's a problem because Jesus is in the tomb until his resurrection. He's not somewhere else. It's clear that he doesn't actually ascend to heaven and take the throne until after he's resurrected. So he's not going to hang out in heaven and then come back a little bit later. So whatever Jesus is saying to him, he can't be saying, you're going to be with me in heaven today. That might be true enough, but that's not what he's telling him. No, according to Psalm 96, a thousand years is like a day

Starting point is 00:09:00 for God. And here Jesus is speaking in that way. The thief's future hope is totally secure. And maybe thousands of years away, but it's like today. He will be resurrected with Jesus in the future, just as he hopes. He will enjoy life and a new creation. The thief was asking about his resurrection and Jesus here gives him a resurrection answer. He says, in the blink of an eye, you will be there. You are secure. And here's the bigger picture. That same offer, it's made to all of us. To anyone who puts their faith in this crucified, stripped, shamed, abused, tortured, suffocating king, to anyone who puts their faith in him, he cries out, forgive them rather than curse them. God's kingdom comes to. God's kingdom comes

Starting point is 00:09:44 through death, not through the death of God's enemies, but through his death for his enemies. This is the good news for all who have become enemies of God because of their sin. We're forgiven by faith. We receive resurrection life by faith. We enter God's kingdom by faith. So today, thank Jesus. Know that the king on the throne of the universe bore all of this so that you could be resurrected and live with him forever. Thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed this content, please subscribe and give us a rating. That helps other people find this podcast more easily.

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Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Understanding Jesus's Death | Learning to Follow Jesus | Luke 23.26-43

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