Recently, I was watching a television drama in which one of the characters - a Baptist minister - asked another character - a man who had questions about religion and God - whether he believed that Jesus died for his sins. The man responded, “I don’t even know what that means.” And unfortunately, that’s the kind of culture we live in today, where people don’t even know what it means that Jesus died for their sins. From who Jesus is, to how, why, or even if He died, to what sin is, not only do non-Christians not understand what it means that Jesus died for their sins, but sadly even many Christians don’t understand what that means either. It appears that either this message isn’t being proclaimed at all, or if it is being proclaimed, it’s not being explained.
And so, given the account of Christ’s crucifixion in the Gospel text for today, I thought it best that we go back to Christianity 101 and review just exactly what it means that Jesus died for our sins, so that we Christians might not only receive the comfort for ourselves that these words give, but also that we might be able to both proclaim and explain them to others, who ask us about the hope that we have in Jesus Christ.
Based on the Apostle Paul’s words that “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,” and because he and the other Apostles and pastors proclaimed Christ crucified (a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles), the Christian Church today is to continue to proclaim the very same thing - that Jesus died for our sins. But because we may no longer take for granted that people understand this message, we must flesh out each word in this statement. Many people have not even heard that there is such a person as Jesus, let alone that He died for our sins. They may have heard the Name Jesus, but they have no idea who He is. So, we must tell them. There are many jesuses. Just because someone mentions the Name Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean that he is referring to the Jesus of the Bible. The fact is, there’s only one Jesus who is our Savior, and that’s the Jesus of whom the Old and New Testament documents speak. He is no mythical figure or fictitious character like Santa Claus, Allah, or the Easter Bunny. He is a real human being, who, according to the eye-witness accounts of Him, walked this earth some 2,000 years ago in the days when Tiberius was Caesar over the Roman empire, Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was king of Galilee. Jesus is a real, true, and historical Man. But Jesus is not just a man. Earlier in his Gospel account St. Luke records that when the angel Gabriel announced Jesus’ birth to the virgin Mary, he said, “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.” Jesus is both the Son of Man and the Son of God, one person who is both God and Man. Jesus is God in human flesh. He was conceived by God the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary, as we confess in the Apostles’ Creed. Furthermore, as Luke writes in today’s Gospel text, Jesus is the Christ, the Jewish Messiah, of whom the O.T. Scriptures foretold, who would save His people from their sins. He was the promised Seed of Abraham and Son of David, both King of the Jews as well as King of the universe. As St. John writes, “All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.” And so St. Paul writes that at the Name of Jesus every knee will bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
Jesus Himself claimed that He was God. He used divine names and titles for Himself, accepted worship, did things that only God could do, and spoke as if He were God. On one occasion He talked about how Abraham rejoiced to see His day. The Jews then said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have you seen Abraham?” And Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” And they picked up stones to throw at Him, but He hid Himself from them and left the temple. The Jews picked up stones to stone Jesus, because with the words “I Am” He had just used the Name God had used of Himself in the O.T. - Jehovah, or YHWH, and they saw that as blasphemy. But it was not blasphemy, because that’s who the Jesus of the Bible is. In this little sermon we’ve only just barely scratched the surface of the eye-witness testimony concerning Him. But all of it attests to the fact that He is God Almighty in the flesh, the Son of God the Father and the One whom the Holy Spirit delivers us through the Word, Baptism, and the Lord’s Supper.
Now, the Apostle Paul writes that this Jesus, “though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” It was for the purpose of giving His life for us on the cross that Jesus took on human flesh. Since God by nature cannot die, the only way He could was by becoming a Man Himself, yet without ceasing to be God. This He did, in order that He might live a perfect life in obedience to God’s commandments for us and give His life as the perfect sacrifice on the cross, to atone for our sins. We’ll talk about sin and atonement in just a moment. But first we must make it clear that Jesus truly did die, and that He died by way of crucifixion. There are many, including the Muslims, who claim that Jesus did not die on a cross. But the testimony of the N.T. documents attests to the historical fact of His public execution on Calvary, which was observed by both hostile and sympathetic witnesses alike. According to Luke, who investigated all these things closely for some time, Jesus suffered under the governing authorities, who sentenced Him to death; He was rejected by His own people, the Jews, who asked for a murderer to be released instead of Jesus; He was mocked and scoffed at by the religious leaders, the crowds, the soldiers, and even the criminals who were crucified with Him; and He was publicly nailed to a cross to hang and bleed there until He died. There is, in fact, so much evidence for the crucifixion of Jesus that it would be easier to deny the assassinations of either Lincoln or JFK.
But why did He die? Why did Jesus give Himself into death at all, let alone this kind of death? The Scripture says that it was in order to atone for our sins. Now, again these words need to be explained. What are sins and what does it mean to atone for them? Sin is rebellion against God. It not only refers to certain acts of rebellion and disobedience to God’s commandments, but also to the state or condition of being an enemy of God. We sin, because we are sinners. And we’ve been sinners from our conception, having inherited the sinful condition that was passed on to us from Adam and Eve, who disobeyed God in the beginning, doing what He told them not to do. Consequently, since then “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” and “There is no one righteous, not even one.” Every one of us has broken every one of God’s commandments, whether by doing something He has commanded us not to do, or by not doing something He has commanded us to do. We have not loved God with our whole heart nor have we loved our neighbors as ourselves. And even if we haven’t actually killed anybody, Jesus says that if you’ve ever been angry at someone, you’ve killed them in your heart. And even if you haven’t actually committed adultery, Jesus says that if you’ve ever lusted after someone, you’ve committed adultery in your heart.
Some may not feel like they’re that bad of a sinner. But regardless of whether you feel like you’re a sinner or not, God says that you are and that you are as big of a sinner as anybody else. Death is the proof. No matter how big or small our sins appear to be to us, the Scripture says that the wages of sin is death. Since we all die, it’s proof that we’re all sinners; that includes the unborn as well as the newborn. Though they might not be old enough to have committed any actual sin yet, the older they get the more their sinfulness will manifest itself in their thoughts, words, and deeds.
There is only one person who is not a sinner, and that is Jesus. He alone is without sin, because He alone is God in the flesh. But He allowed Himself to become infected with your sin. St. Paul writes that the Father made Him who knew no sin to be sin for you, so that in Him you might become the righteousness of God. At His Baptism Jesus was loaded down with your sins, so that He might take them to the cross to atone for them there with His blood. To atone for sins is to remove, purge, cover up, or pay a ransom for them. In the O.T., God removed the sins of His people through animal sacrifices. On a daily basis people would come to the temple with their sheep, goats, and bulls, lay their hands on them and confess their sins over them. Then the priests would slaughter the animals, offer their bodies up in fire, and sprinkle their blood upon the altar, thus atoning for the people’s sins, so that they might stand in God’s presence cleansed of sin. Once a year on the day of Atonement the high priest would enter into the holiest place of the temple where the ark of the covenant stood, and he would sprinkle the blood of bulls and goats upon it, thus atoning for all the sins of God’s people with a single sacrifice. And yet, by having to repeat these sacrifices day in and day out, year after year, the people were brought to the realization that the blood of animals could not purge them of their sins once and for all. God had chosen a better sacrifice, the sacrifice of His Son, whose blood offered up on the cross once for all completely cleanses us from all sin. As John writes, “[Jesus] is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.” He is the Lamb of God, who takes away/atones for the sins of the world. The blood He shed on the cross, sprinkled upon you at your Baptism, cleanses you of all sin, so that you may now stand in God’s presence without fear, holy, spotless, and blameless.
This, then, is what it means that Jesus died for your sins. While you were dead in your trespasses and sins, God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, in human flesh to give His life on the cross in order to remove your sins from you once and for all, so that you who trust in Him might not perish, but have everlasting life. John writes, “This is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” Jesus died for your sins. They have all been answered for by His shed blood. His resurrection from the dead is the Father’s stamp of approval and confirmation that He accepts His Son atoning work for you. For Christ’s sake, you who believe in Him and are baptized into His Name are no longer children of wrath, but children of God. You live under His words of forgiveness and the promise that someday you too will go to be with Him in paradise. Jesus died for your sins. It’s the good of Good Friday. Amen.