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Jesus’ conflict with the people, especially the religious leadership, intensifies. He attacks their doctrine, conduct, dress–anything indicative of shallow religious piety that hides the spiritual poverty within each of us. He leaves nothing untouched, rebuking religious self-righteousness more than anything else. He has patience with repentant sinners and those with weak faith, but He has none for religious hypocrisy. Spiritual pride hardens the heart, preventing a humble admission of guilt. It is the most pernicious obstacle to restoring an authentic relationship with the Father. Jesus’ unrelenting assault calcifies His opposition who now actively plot His death.
The circumstances ripen for disaster as Jesus' hour of decision rapidly approaches. Calvary looms before Him; Jerusalem is now Jesus' only objective. He knows what awaits Him. The raising of Lazarus hardens the resolve of His enemies. The Triumphal Entry creates a surge of attention, but the celebration rings hollow. In a matter of days the same people will demand His death, trading "Hosanna" for "Crucify Him." In spite of the imminent danger to His life, Jesus stands boldly against religious hypocrisy and its root cause, unbelief.
Passion week is not only the end of Jesus' journey, it is the final resolution of thousands of years of prophecy, promise, and expectation. The die is cast; the final act of the drama is about to be played out. Jesus' life will soon be in the hands of those who hate Him, but it is the Father, not Jesus’ enemies, who is in control.
In a matter of hours the Messiah will be dead, but those hours tick by slowly. Some of the time Jesus spends with the ones He loves the most, those to whom He has given every waking moment for the last three years. He gathers them close to prepare them for the dark days ahead. The rest of His time is spent in agony, humiliation, and suffering.
Crucifixion is a cruel form of execution, generally reserved for slaves and rebels. Death is agonizing and slow, the result of shock, exposure and, eventually, asphyxiation. Hanging from a cross constricts the diaphragm, inhibiting breathing. The only way to get air is to release pressure on the arms by pushing up against the nails that pierce the feet, requiring continual effort that could go on for days. Exhaustion eventually overtakes the victim and he suffocates.
For Jesus, though, the pain of the cross pales in the face of a greater anguish. There is a deeper torment that cannot be seen, one no camera can capture and no words can express, more excruciating than nails pinning Jesus’ body to the timbers, more dreadful than lashes ripping flesh from His frame. It is a dark, terrible, incalculable agony, an infinite misery, as God the Father unleashes his fury upon His sinless Son as if guilty of an immeasurable evil.
Why punish the innocent One? Nailed to the top of the cross is an official notice, a certificate of debt to Caesar, a public display of Jesus’ crime: "The King of the Jews." The cross is payment for this crime. When punishment is complete, Caesar’s court will cancel the debt with a single Greek word stamped upon the parchment’s face: tetelestai. Finished. Paid in full.
Being king of the Jews is not the crime Jesus pays for, however. Hidden to all but the Father is another certificate nailed to that cross. In the darkness that shrouds Calvary from the sixth to the ninth hour, a divine transaction is taking place; Jesus makes a trade with the Father. The crimes of all of humanity–every murder, every theft, every lustful glance; every hidden act of vice, every modest moment of pride, and every monstrous deed of evil; every crime of every man who ever lived–these Jesus takes upon Himself as if guilty of all.
At the last, it is not the cross that takes Jesus’ life. He does not die of exposure, or loss of blood, or asphyxiation. When the full payment is made, when the last of the debt melts away and the justice of God is fully satisfied, Jesus simply dismisses His spirit with a single Greek word that falls from His lips: "Tetelestai." It is finished. The divine transaction is complete.
You see, there are actually three passions in "The Passion of the Christ." The passionate intensity of God’s anger at us for our sins collides with the passionate intensity of God’s love for us, causing the passionate intensity of the agony of the cross to be shouldered by God Himself in human form.
The story is told of a king who, having discovered a theft in the royal treasury, decrees that the criminal be publicly flogged for this affront to the crown. When soldiers haul the thief before the king as he sits in his judgment seat, there in chains stands the frail form of the king’s own mother.
Without flinching, he orders the old woman to be bound to the whipping post in front of him. When she is secured, he stands up, lays down his imperial scepter, sets aside his jeweled crown, removes his royal robes, and enfolds the tiny old woman with his own body. Baring his back to the whip, he orders that the punishment commence. Every blow meant for the criminal lands with full force upon the bare back of the king until the last lash falls.
In like manner, in those dark hours the Father wrapped us in His Son who shields us, taking the justice we deserve. This is not an accident. It was planned. The prophet Isaiah described it 700 years earlier:
Surely our griefs He Himself bore….He was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray. Each of us has turned to his own way. But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him.
No other man did this. No other man could. Jesus alone, the perfect Son of God, He paid the debt so that whoever trusts in Him will not perish under God’s punishment, but have life with Him fully and forever. Jesus is the Savior of the world. Without Him the world could not be saved from its overwhelming debt.
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