Key verse: Luke 23:34a – “Jesus said, “Father, forgive them for they do not
know what they are doing.”
Good evening! How’s everybody? How’s the conference?
Today, we will be making a connection with David Wolff’s
message and talk about what Jesus did for us as our true older brother…
This
passage, which deals with the death of Jesus, contains much more significance
than reading it like a historical event.
Now
you know the story of the Prodigal son. The two sons who were loved by their father
and treated with the best luxuries the father could provide. That was the
father’s plan, in which he would provide his sons with the fullest of his
ability. His main purpose was to have a relationship with his sons; a
relationship which would bond them together and live happily. But that’s not
how the story goes does it? The younger son treats the father like crap and the
older son later shows that he was only in it for the wealth. But unlike other
fathers, their father was different; and he reacted differently. OUR father was
different.
Because
of our actions like the younger and older brother, we have been separated from
God and couldn’t be near him since we were imperfect and full of sin. But in
this story we see that this unbreakable rule is broken through an event we
can’t imagine to purposely take part in and an idea no human would have
possibly thought of. This crazy idea, the crucifixion, planned out by God was
the way and only way that we and God could be together again. But this plan was
of course, not simple. It had to weigh against all of our sins! This plan was
long and painful in which no human could volunteer or even be paid for to do
such things.
This,
in fact, could have only been done through Christ and his blood. Through this
passage, I hope we can see the true meaning and power of the crucifixion not as
pain or suffering, but as a new hope and connection with God.
Verse 26 says “As the solders
led him away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the
country, and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus.” How painful and tiring
would this have been for Jesus? We can see that he couldn’t even hold the cross.
He was so weak that someone else had to hold the cross for him.
In the previous passages, we can see just how brutal this
was. Now after Jesus was tried in court, condemned guilty of blasphemy, and
brutally beaten almost to the point of death, they put the cross on him and
took him to a hill to be crucified. At this point, Jesus could have only been
in unexplainable pain. Before this, he had been beaten and brutally whipped by
Roman soldiers. Now I don’t know about you but I’m pretty sure those soldiers
weren’t ordinary citizens. They were the leading military force in the world at
the time. Imagine the strongest kid in your school. That buff guy who always
lifts weights and drinks protein shakes. Now imagine five or more of those guys
beating you up afterschool. It’s not pretty is it? This wasn’t even the
beginning. After being beaten, Jesus was then whipped dozens of times, and this
was no ordinary whip. It had a piece of bone at the end of the rope which would
rip chunks of skin off from your body. It was so harsh that many criminals die
due to whip alone before even facing the cross.
After going through all
this, Jesus was then forced to carry the cross from where he was to the hill
called the Skull. Historians say this distance his was about 0.3 kilometers,
which is 300 meters. What’s that… a block or two? This seems like a short
distance to us but to Jesus, it would have felt like miserably long. Not only
being flogged, he was forced to carry the crossbeam which was about 100lb. (The
total weight of the cross was well over 300lb. I mean, if Jesus was forced to
carry 300lb, it would have been a little overrated. The average load of a U.S.
soldier carries was about 95lb)
Even with all this, Jesus
was not only carrying the weight of physical suffering but also the extreme
weight of everyone’s sin as well.
1.
Daughters of Jerusalem
Now that you know what Jesus went through, look at these
verses. Let’s read verses 27-28: A large
number of people followed him, including women who mourned and wailed for him.
Jesus turned and said to them, “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me;
weep for yourselves and for your children.”
Now
the women were probably in shock at this time. The person they served, loved
and shared everything with was beaten, spit on, mocked, and was now being
dragged to an execution site. When people that you know, go through hard times,
such as a friend, or a loved one, it’s hard to watch them suffer, let alone
leave them be. Normally we try to comfort them, share their grief with them,
and provide what they need in order for them to get back on their feet. But in
this situation the women couldn’t do such a thing. Instead they did what they
only could do: they followed him and mourned for him.
But Jesus tells them not to weep for him. He tells them of
the future when they will face something so great, and so devastating to the point
where they wouldn’t want to bear children.
Verse 30 says “Then “’they
will say to the mountains, “Fall on us!” and to the hills, “Cover us!”
What was Jesus talking
about? How could having offspring be so bad (other than paying for their
college tuition)? He was talking about the attack on Israel which would happen
40 years later when Romans would completely destroy Jerusalem and its temple.
The romans would wipe out everything on sight; mercilessly kill men, women, and
children, leaving Jerusalem devastated. Jesus was talking about at this point
the women would be in such great pain that they would have wished that the
mountains and hills would have covered them because of the death of their
children.
Why was Jesus saying this? Why was he saying
it now? He can barely stand on his two feet but he gives the time to comfort
the women around him. He was in so much pain and surrounded by so much evil and
darkness. Well, this was because of
Jesus’ love and compassion. Even at this dark moment, even in the darkest
moment of his life on earth where everything seemed to be going wrong and
towards the losing side, and Jesus showed compassion for them. Jesus showed
compassion for US. And through this we can see that this love was no ordinary
love.
We can face hard times; times where we feel utter
hopelessness. When it feels like nothing more can go wrong. But we can see that
through Jesus’ love, and the love he showed on the way to the cross can give us
hope that no human on earth can give.
2.
Father forgive them
Verse 32 to 33: Two other
men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. When they came
to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the
criminals- one on his right, the other on his left.
Jesus was being treated like a criminal. During the Roman
Empire, when a criminal was put on the cross, it meant that he did something
horribly wrong, such as treason or murder. Jesus was an innocent man. Pilate
knew that but let Barnabas go. The Pharisees knew this because of their jealousy.
We all know that Jesus was an innocent man. Jesus himself knew this but
continued his journey down the path of suffering, continuing his plan. The
Skull was a hill which could be seen from many directions close and far. This
was to announce the punishment to the public so that the people could see that
these men were criminals and people would know what type of crime he or she committed.
This was their way of humiliating and shaming the criminal as they died.
But here we can see Jesus didn’t feel shame, or humiliation. Let’s
read verse 34a. “Father,
forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.
Incredible don’t you think?
Jesus went through so much pain and is still suffering on the cross, but he
says “Father forgive them.” How is that possible? Even the little thingsget us
sometimes. As human beings, we have a difficult time forgiving others. Weather
they did something big or small, our anger or frustration towards them causes our
judgments to be blinded by our emotions. Of course this is a natural human
reaction but in this situation, we can clearly see that Jesus was no ordinary
human. He’s God’s son, revealing the supernatural power of God’s forgiveness. From
the beginning of his ministry to his death on the cross, Jesus never stops
showing his compassion towards us; his unending compassion which still
continues on to this day. Jesus’ compassion for us made him to pray “Father
forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” It looks like the
people doing it on purpose but Jesus said “they did not know what they are
doing.” He saw them blinded by their own sins and their ignorance. The
forgiving love of Jesus is more than a justice. It is the most powerful and
only love that covers all our sins.
But
still the people didn’t see this. They didn’t understand the situation. The
people surrounded Jesus with criminals, they continued to mock him, hurt him,
and we can see that they] killed him. Verse 35-37 says “The people stood watching, and the rulers even
sneered at him. They said, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is
God’s Messiah, the Chosen One.” The solders also came up and mocked him. They
offered him wine vinegar and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save
yourself”
Even
as the rulers and soldiers mocked him, Jesus said “Father
forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”Everyone’s still mocking him
on the cross but Jesus is still asking God to forgive them.
No human can forgive another
through natural judgment in situations like this. You and I cannot do this by
ourselves. It’s impossible. We can’t do it. But Jesus did.
Jesus
asked God to forgive them because he didn’t lookand judge them by their current
rebellious actions. He didn’t ask God to forgive them because they deserved it.
No, no. He asked God to forgive them because of his grace and love for them; his
unconditional grace, his unconditional love. Jesus knew and saw our spiritual
blindness. He knew how filled with sin we were and how desperately we needed a
true older brother.
Have
you ever been in a situation like Jesus? When people accuse you of doing a
certain thing? When people dislike what you do, what you say? When people you’re
close to, or distant from hate you when you didn’t do anything wrong? What do
you say? What do you do? Here we can see what Jesus did. He forgave them. Now,
of course it’s easier said than done. Our natural emotions fight with what’s
right and wrong. We can see that forgiveness
is costly and seeming impossible at times. But with Jesus’ love, we can choose
to forgive them.
When
Stephen was being beaten to death with stones, he asked God to forgive them. When
the disciples were hated and chased by the law, they showed compassion and
forgiveness even to the point of their deaths.Are you having a hard time
forgiving someone who hurt you?If so, what would you do? Would you confront
them? Get even with them?
In
the passage, when the people hurt Jesus, when WE hurt Jesus and offended God’s
son, he didn’t punish us, he didn’t blow us up, he didn’t show anger, he chose
to forgive us; he chose to forget our sins. I pray that God may help usto
understand this and keep it in our heart. Let’s think about the power of
forgiveness.
(The
essence of Christian faith is in forgiveness of sins. Unless we accept His
forgiveness, we don’t have relationship with Him. )
Here
we can see two things. The first is the grace of God. And the second is the love
of God.
Let’s
talk about grace first. What is grace? It’s something we can’t work for but
rather given to us as a gift. Something we definitely don’t deserve. If we were
to get what we deserved, it wouldn’t be grace, but would be eternal punishment
in hell because that’s what we deserve. The only reason we are alive and doing
what we do is because of the grace of God. Just by looking around, we can see
just how much grace God has given to us. Look at your life; your family, friends,
Christian family, heck even look at your hands. If it weren’t for God, you
wouldn’t have them. These are the things that God provided for us and something
he chose to do himself. He wasn’t forced to do so, he’s God! No one can force
God to do anything. Neither did he feel a need to. This grace, a free gift, was
given purely through his willingness.Ephesians 2:8 says: For it is by grace that you have been saved through
faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.God doesn’t limit his grace.
In the song “How He Loves”, there’s a verse saying “If grace is an ocean, we’re
all sinking.” God gives us so much grace, that we can’t even handle it. And he
won’t hesitate to give us more.
Even
while Jesus was being crucified, God’s grace can be shown. In verses 39 to 43,
a murderer who committed crime all his life, is saved at the last moment
through faith.
In
this passage, God showed grace to the people by sending his son to the world.
He showed grace to mankind. He showed grace to US, sinners. Even when we rejected
him, even when we eventually murdered his beloved son, his grace, his
unconditional grace didn’t change. Beautiful, right?
Now
let’s talk about love. Not the kind of love where you start feeling weird and
you get a tingling sensation in your chest when you see that girl or boy. No,
not that kind of human love. I’m talking about God’s love; true love; the love
defined in the Bible through the life of Jesus. What’s the difference? That’s
easy; one is perfect and one is not. Now I’m going to talk about the God’s
love, the perfect one. The other “love”, you guys can discuss it later.
Now
this true love is incredible. In the Bible, it shows just how powerful this
love can be. And this love is shown right here, in Luke 23; the most incredible
love story of all time. So incredible that it completely destroyed the power of
sin. Do you know what that means? Do you know how powerful sin is? Did you know
that it can overtake you without you even noticing it? It’s so powerful that even
influential legit Christians have sometimes overcome by Satan. It’s inevitable
because of our imperfection. No one can avoid sin. No science, no money, no good
deed will allow us to avoid sin, let alone clear it. But through God’s love, he
cleared it for us. And he cleared it ALL. The power of sin and death was
defeated by God’s unconditional love for us, and by sending his SON, his ONLY
SON, as he was praying for our forgiveness on the cross, we were saved right
then.
So
through this we can learn the grace and love of God.
But
sometimes, we forget this, we put this behind us and start to think and judge
through our own instincts. I lived most of my life alone since my father was in
Korea, My mother usually worked and my sister lived in a completely different
state. This caused me to be independent. Although I learned this passage every
year, I didn’t understand it fully and I didn’t care. Why did I need to know
this? I was living my life fine. Even today, I continue to have a hard time
going back and forth. But, a deeper study of God for the past few weeks and by
reading the passage in a deeper meaningful way, I could learn deeper about what
Jesus did for me on the cross.
So
what was the result of this significant event? Let’s look at verse 44 and 45.
It says “It was now about noon, and darkness came
over the whole land until three in the afternoon for the sun stopped shining.
And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.”
What
was the curtain of the Temple? As you guys know, it was the boundary between us
and God; the boundary where holiness and unholiness divided. On the other side
of the curtain was the presence of God. Normal people couldn’t pass this
curtain. Only the High Priest could enter this place once a year to make a
sacrifice. They had to tie a rope around his waist so that if he didn’t come
out within a certain period, his body would be dragged out from outside.
But
this curtain was torn in half and the most holy place was visible for everyone
to see. The old way was broken through the blood and body of Jesus. The place
which couldn’t be approached by man was now open through the death of Jesus.
This was no accident. It wasn’t a maintenance issue. If it was, it wouldn’t have
been recorded in the gospel. Rather, it showed the significance of our
reconnection with God. Now we can talk to him anywhere. You can talk to him in
a car, while walking, heck even when we’re in the school bathroom pooping. But
what does this mean?
It
means that we, sinners, through our true big brother, can be in the presence of
God freely without any fear of death or guilt. Thank God for Christ did for us
on the cross. I pray that we can understand this deeply and keep it in our
hearts.
What can we do with this
enormous gift given to us? What should we do with this great privilege?
Well
John’s going to tell that to us tomorrow.
Let’s
pray.
Please help us to understand your forgiveness on the cross and even
though it’s hard and sometimes seem impossible, help us to keep this in our
hearts and show you through us to others.
How
could people do such a thing to a man who had done nothing towards them? This
was because of our sinful nature. The very reason why we can’t be with God.
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