‘WERE YOU THERE?’
The records of those hours prior to our Lord’s crucifixion carry in them an inexhaustible source of information which is of vital importance to every Christian.
Confronted by the Cross, the great central event of all history, we are compelled to bow and worship.
The nature, magnitude, and implications of the death of the Son of God are such that two things stand out in clearest focus—the sinfulness of man and the love of God.
If my sins required the death of the Son of God for their remission, then how great are those sins!
This side of eternity none of us will ever know all that was involved in Christ’s death on the Cross. We speak of various “theories” of the atonement but all of these explanations, if proven to be valid, are summed up in one simple sentence which any man can understand and accept: “Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.”
Take any translation of the New Testament and the meaning is the same: “Christ died for our sins.”
Before this statement which Paul gives as one of the two essential elements in the Gospel, man stands stripped of every pretense while God is revealed in the majesty of his love, mercy, and grace combined with his holiness, power, and justice.
What a tragedy that this great central truth of the Gospel is so often ignored, perverted, denied, bypassed, minimized, or made so complicated that men become lost in a maze of words.
To complete the simplicity of this message, let us remember the rest of Paul’s outline of the Gospel he preached: “and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.”
We live in a time when truths such as these, which are vital to man’s eternal welfare, become lost to men’s view in the quagmire of supposed theological profundities having their source in the minds of men and not divine revelation.
Christ’s death on the cross, this “dying for our sins” was not only the central drama of all time, but during those hours in human history when the Son of God was confronted by the physical event, there were other actors on the stage in whom we may discern our own likeness.
There is, of course, the central Person, without which nothing else could have had meaning—Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. In him we find eternal life, but from others around him we may take warning, reproof, or comfort.
Standing in the spotlight we see Judas. Even his name carries with it loathing as we think of betrayal, hypocrisy, avarice, double-dealing, remorse without repentance, and finally suicide.
But Judas was no outsider. He had been one of the twelve. He was a disciple and had lived with our Lord for three years. He had eaten with him and slept many nights not far from his presence. He had seen his miracles, heard him preach and teach, listened to him as he explained the Old Testament Scriptures. He had gone forth with the other disciples to preach in Christ’s name and to cast out devils. His had been an intimate, personal relationship with our Lord.… But he betrayed him.
How clearly this shows that the outward trappings of religious privilege save no one. The same fire which melts the wax hardens the clay.
What a warning to us churchmen, and church women! Religion can never save us and the more frantic we are in going about in Church activities the further we may be from the Lord.
It is the inward renewing, the new birth in which the Holy Spirit enables us through simple faith to accept the finished work of Christ, that makes us Christians. Otherwise we too may be potential Judases.
What about the disciples in that dark hour? They had shared the same privileges with Judas, but they were in a very real sense “babes in Christ.” Fearful, deserting, scattered, questioning, dismayed, and distressed, they had the capability to believe and only a few weeks later would go out, filled with the Holy Spirit, to turn the world upside down and give their lives as martyrs in the name of the risen Christ.
The spotlight shines brightly on one disciple, impulsive, warm-hearted, vacillating but lovable Peter. What a comfort to know that this disciple who followed afar off, who denied his Lord with curses on his lips, was brought to tears of true repentance through the crowing of a cock and the look of loving compassion from Christ!
How different were Judas and Peter! In them we see the great chasm of which Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 7:10: “For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.”
Mingling through the crowd and loudly demanding our Lord’s death were the religious leaders of the day. They had a form of godliness but were far removed from its reality. They were moved by envy and hatred. They refused to believe our Lord’s miracles, or his divine origin. They were zealous for the letter of the law but ignorant of the Spirit. They were “wolves in sheep’s clothing,” “whited sepulchers.” They were concerned lest they be defiled for the Passover feast by entering the judgment hall of Pilate but were oblivious to the defilement of their own crime.
Do not we all need to take warning lest our religiosity be something far removed from Christ and Christianity?
What of Pilate? He knew but one kingdom, Rome, and one ambition, to succeed in his office. Cynical, vacillating, and yet capable of decision; vaguely uneasy but more concerned with expediency than truth or right, he is typical of all world leaders who leave God out of account. He too failed to realize that God and his Truth are the eternal Stone on which the ambitions of an indifferent world will one day be broken.
Then there were the Roman soldiers—hardened, callous, indifferent to the point of gambling for the seamless robe of Christ while he died for their sins.
What warning for all of us! Judas obsessed with the love of money, men plotting the death of the Messiah whom they should have welcomed—and in the midst of it all our Lord voluntarily fulfilling his destiny.
When men sought to force him to take a crown and make him a king, he withdrew and hid himself.
Now, when men would force on him a cross he offered himself, submitting to all that man might do to him, even to death itself, and all for us!
On the Cross his work was finished, once for all. There salvation awaits for all who will believe. There the portals of heaven are opened for repentant sinners who, amazingly, become righteous in God’s sight.
“Were you there when they crucified my Lord?” Yes!
L. NELSON BELL
