Chapter 10

Four Spans in the Bridge of Salvation - Crucifixion

INCARNATION brought God to man but it could not bring man to God. The first span in the bridge of salvation demands a second.

In the incarnation God had not yet dealt with the sin question. He could go no further through the revelation of His own sinless, perfect life than to show men what they ought to be. Sin, the insuperable barrier between God and man, remained, and Satan, the archenemy of God, the tempter and deceiver of men, still held the human race in his control. Men did not even know how sinful they were; their darkened minds had no conception of God's real attitude toward sin, nor did they apprehend the awful certainty of its inexorable consequences.

The life and teaching of Christ Jesus had stirred the heart of a very few to desire something better and to seek Him as the Giver but the majority of those who saw and heard Him were indifferent to Him, and not a few even hated Him had lie only lived His pure, holy life and died a natural death He would have been enshrined in the memory of but few of the choice, rare souls who appreciated His worth.

That something more than the life even of the holy Lord Jesus was needed to save men's souls is patent, something that would deal adequately with sin and all its consequences, something with power in it to defeat and to destroy the devil, something with the germinating seed of a holy, heavenly life. The world is full of leaders and reformers. Its fundamental need is a God-sent Saviour, One who can deal with sin in such a way as to bring satisfaction to God and salvation to man.

DEATH THE GOAL OF INCARNATION

The incarnation was not an end but a means to an end. In itself it had no redemptive value but it paved the way for His death which alone has redemptive value. It could never make an end of sin but it did give to the world a Saviour. Our Lord Himself and every New Testament writer set forth the death of Christ as the goal of the incarnation. He was born not merely a Man but a Saviour. He came not alone to live but to save, and to save He must die.

Matthew 1:21, "And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins."

Luke 2:11, "For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord."

The eternal Son became the incarnate Son that He might lay down His life as the crucified Son. He became the Son of Man that He might (lie for the race of men.

Matthew 20:28, "Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many."

He took a body in incarnation that He might lay it down in crucifixion. lIe entered into a body supernaturally prepared for Him, which no sin had tainted and upon which death had no claim that lie might offer it as a voluntary sacrifice unto God, that through death lie might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil. "The body was prepared not so much for the birth as for the bruising" (Genesis 3:15).

Hebrews 10:5, "Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me.

Hebrews 10:10, "By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."

Hebrews 2:14, "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil."

Christ Jesus not only came into the world to die but He knew that He came for that purpose. From the very beginning of His public ministry the Son of Man had a brooding anticipation of "an hour" that was to come - an hour which in some eventful way would be the culmination of His ministry. "The sense of something tragic in His destiny was present in the mind of Jesus."

Let us trace His anticipation of this hour through John's gospel. John 2:4, "Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come."

This word was spoken on a joyous occasion at the beginning of His public ministry when He was popular, when the people were receiving and following Him.

John 7:6, "My time is not yet come: but your time is aiway ready."

A large multitude of those who had been fed with the loaves and fishes had followed Him as He went from Capernaum across the sea. He used the occasion to give the wonderful discourse recorded in John 6 where He claims to be the Bread of Life sent by the Father to give His life for the life of the world. Life out of death was possible for all but only actual in the life of the one who "ate his flesh and drank his blood." The message of the cross was foreshadowed in these words. It was a hard saying even for His own disciples and many of them went back and walked no more with llim. The claim of Messiahship and Saviourhood angered the Jews beyond measure and instilled such bitter hatred into theft hearts that they sought to kill Him. But Jesus was unperturbed, simply saying, "My time is not yet come." lie knew full well the time would come when theft hate would expend itself on Him in cruel malignity.

Three times in John 7 this expression is used. The Jews' Feast of Taber nacles was at hand and the Lord Jesus was conscious of the plot on the part of the Jews to kill Him, so He says to the disciples,

John 7:8, "Go ye up to the feast: I go not up yet unto this feast; for my tune is not yet full come."

How significant are those words "full come." The shadow of the cross had already fallen over His life. From that time on He would walk in its ever deepening darkness.

At this feast the Lord Jesus was brought into open conflict with the Jews over the question of the authoritative origin of His doctrine. Again He made claims for Himself which so incensed them that we read,

John 7:30, "Then they sought to take him: but no man laid hands on him, because his hour was not yet come."

The same thing was repeated as the Lord Jesus taught in the Temple (John 8:20). Jesus grew in popularity with the people. He makes even more daring claims to Deity and Messiahship and proved the truth of His words by the wonder of His works. The man born blind is given sight. Lazarus is raised from the dead. The religious leaders of the day are compelled to acknowledge the uniqueness of llis power and they fear its influence upon the people. They frankly confess that "the world is gone after him" and openly declare that the thing must be stopped immediately. The hour draws nearer.

Just at this time when the Jews are most fiercely censuring and opposing Him a very significant thing happens. A deputation of Greeks (Gentiles) came to worship Him. Everything converges to show Christ that "the hour" He has so long anticipated is now near at hand. So when Andrew and Philip bring the message of the Greeks to Him, with majestic calmness and kingly control He replies, "The hour is come."

Up to this time He has not explained what He means by the often re peated words "my hour." Several times He has foretold His death and resurrection but the disciples did not grasp His meaning. On this occasion, however, He speaks more explicitly.

John 12:23-24, "And Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is come, that the Son of man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if It die, it bringeth forth much fruit."

John 12:27, 31-33, "Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. This he said, signifijing what death he should die."

The interval now was very short. Not a single event of that last week takes the Lord Jesus by surprise. He knows that His hour has come. In His last conversation and prayer with His disciples He anticipates His exodus from this world and His return to His Father in heaven.

John 16:28, "I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father."

John 17:1, "These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee."

When the Lord had spoken these words He went forth with His disciples unto a place called Gethsemane. There His soul began to be very sorrow ful and oppressed, so much so that He left the companionship of the disciples and went alone with His Father to pray. Falling upon His face He cried,

Matthew 28:39, "0 my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt."

Returning unto His disciples and finding them asleep, He, still overborne with sorrow, went away a second time and prayed,

Matthew 28:42, "0 my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me, except I drink it, thy will be done."

Again He came to the disciples and found them sleeping and again He left them to pray. Then He returned to them for the last time and said,

Matthew 26:45, "Sleep on now, and take your rest: behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of man is betrayed into the hands of sinners."

Never in the history of man was such anguish of spirit and agony of soul endured as that of the Son of Man as He went to Calvary by way of the Carden of Gethsemane. Heaven mercifully veiled the Sufferer from the gaze of men and left us only the thrice repeated pleadings of His prayer to indicate the nature and the depth of the suffering.

Two utterances in His prayer take us to the very heart of His anguish. "Let this cup pass from mc" and, "Behold the hour is at hand." Surely the two bear some intimate relationship to each other. But what is the dreaded "cup" that must be drunk? What is the inevitable "hour" so long anticipated and now at hand? Did He not interpret the meaning of this often used expression when He said "The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners"? From this and the events that follow in quick succession "the hour" could be none other than the hour of His death.

But why should He dread that or shrink from its approach? But an hour or two before He had said "Now I go my way to him that sent me." Would not death be to Him an hour of glorious release from a life environed by sin, suffering and sorrow? Would it not be the hour of reinvestment with all His kingly majesty and glory? Above all would it not be a return to the blessedness of immediate, intimate fellowship with His father? Had He died a death such as other men die then it would indeed have been just such a glorious release. Had death for Him been merely the culminating event in a life of unsullied perfection then it would have been such a gracious coronation. Some adequate explanation must be found for His dread of the approach of that "hour" that meant the drinldng of a bitter "cup."

But another question must surely press in upon one who has beheld the Son as He is mirrored in the pages of the four gospels and who has entered into a study of His matchless, pure life with any degree of spiritual appreciation and apprehension. The question is "Why need Jesus Christ die?" Scripture is very clear in its statement of what death is and who dies.

Romans 6:23, "For the wages of sin is death."

Romans 5:12, "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men.

Ezekiel 18:20, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die."

Death is the consequence of sin: it is the sinner who dies. And Jesus Christ died! The irresistible logic of these facts places before one two alternatives. Either Jesus was a sinner as all other men are and His death like theirs was the wages of His own sin, or else He died a death different from the death of all other men and for a reason entirely outside of His own life.

Was Jesus Christ a sinner? Did death come to Him as the penalty of His own sin? Even His bitterest enemies in the time in which He lived and in all succeeding ages have never accused Him of sin. He said once to a group who were opposing and denying Him, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" But not one word of accusation did they bring against Him. Even Pilate said he could find no fault in Him. God testified to the absolute sinlessness and holiness of His life even before His birth in saying through the angel to Mary, "that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." After Jesus had lived in a world where He was continuously environed by sin and defilement Cod again testified through those who knew his character and conduct under all circumstances that He "did no sin" (1 Peter 2:22); "In him is no sin" (1 John 3:5); He "knew no sin" (2 Corinthians 5:21). In His character, conversation and conduct He was the holy One of God "without blemish and without spot." If then death is the wages of sin, it had no claim upon Jesus Christ.

Why then did Jesus Christ die? How foolish and futile to look any where else for an answer to such a question but to God's divine revelation. There an absolutely sufficient and altogether satisfying answer is given.

1 Corinthians 15:3, "For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures."

Isaiah 53:6, "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all."

Isaiah 53:4-5, "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniqui ties: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed."

1 Peter 2:24, "Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed."

In every one of these passages "death" and "sin" are shown to have an inextricable relationship to each other but it is invariably the death of Christ and the sin of men.

Words could not make it clear that Jesus Christ died not because of anything in Himself but because of something in us; that it was not the wages of His sin but of ours that He paid on the cross. It was our sin He put away; our sins that He bore; our iniquities which were laid upon Him. Death had no claim on Him; then the death He died was for the sake of others and to accomplish something for them which they were unable to accomplish for themselves. The death of Christ was obviously for the purpose of taking up the sin question and dealing with it in such a way as to bring salvation to man.

But would it also deal with it in such a way as to bring satisfaction to God? God has an unalterable, irrevocable attitude toward sin which is most clearly revealed in His judgment upon it. "The wages of sin is death." Death is the expression of God's implacable condemnation of sin. "Death is the man's liability in relation to sin." Did the death of Christ deal with this divine judgment upon sin in a way that was satisfactory to God? God says it did.

2 Corinthians 5:14-15, R. V., "For the love of Christ constraineth us; be cause we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; And he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again."

The sinner's twofold relationship to God, the divine Judge and God, the gracious Saviour, may be stated as follows,

The wages of sin is death,

All have sinned,

So death passed upon all men.

BUT

One died for all,

Therefore all died.

Death is the racial doom. In Adam all die because in Adam all sinned. Death is God's judgment upon sin and it rests equally upon all men. From the execution of this divine judgment there is no escape because it is the decree of a holy God and is therefore unalterable. Sin and death are in extricably interwoven: the sinner must die.

But the holy God is also a loving God. While He cannot change His attitude toward sin and His judgment upon it without denying His own nature yet His love with perfect consistency can make some escape for the sinner, providing whatever He does maintains unity in His own divine being. This necessitates meeting in full the requirement of His holy Law. What, then, would that requirement be? That an adequate Substitute able to meet the full penalty of the Law should voluntarily offer to take the sinner's place and die the sinner's death.

But where could such an adequate substitute be found? Only "a lamb without spot and blemish" could be accepted as an offering for sin. Only an absolutely sinless one could be the sinner's Substitute. It would require one who himself had fulfilled every demand of God's holy Law to pay the sinner's penalty for a broken Law. There was but one who had ever lived such a life on earth and He was the incarnate Son of God.

\Vould He voluntarily offer Himself as the sinner's Substitute and there by assume all responsibility for the removal of the penalty, the power and the presence of sin in man, knowing as He did that the penalty of sin was death, that the power of sin meant anguish of suffering consummating in crucifixion, and that the presence of sin involved even separation from God? Would He who never knew sin willingly be made sin on the sinner's behalf knowing full well that all the wrath of a holy Cod against sin would be spent on Him? (A very helpful treatment of this to which I am in debted is found in Armour, Atonement and Law).

Yes, He would do it. For the very purpose of becoming the sinner's Sub stitute the eternal Son had become the incarnate Son. But have we not discovered in this truth the secret of His dread of that "hour," His shrink ing from the "cup"? It was not death He dreaded but the death of the cross which was "the wages of sin." What else could the thrice repeated pleading to the Father to remove "the cup" mean but that, in the death He was about to die as the sinner's Substitute, all the sin of the whole race of sinners with all its stain and stench would be upon Him? It is no wonder that the soul of the sinless Son of Cod cried out in an agony of suffering at the thought!

But the weight and wickedness of the world's sin was not all the "cup." Sin separates from God. God cannot stay in the presence of sin even when that sin is upon His own beloved Son. The Son of Man in the garden faces this awful consequence of Saviourhood. Could He assume this consequence of sin for the sinner's sake? Could He, who through all eternity in glory had rested in the intimate fellowship of the Father's bosom and who in His life on earth had enjoyed the vivid consciousness of His Father's abiding presence, consent to the inevitable even though momentary separation from His Father which the presence of the world's sin on Him would cause? Death is separation from God and separation from God is hell (2 Thessalonians 1:7-9).

This, then, is "the cup" He could not drink were there any other possible way for the Father's will in man's salvation to be accomplished. This is "the cup" that caused the agony of soul in GethsemaneÄan agony so terrible that His sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling to the ground; an agony so awful it took Him back three times to the Father to cry out for release; an agony so intense that a heaven-sent angel appeared to strengthen Him. This is "the cup" that caused the intolerable anguish of spirit, which wrung from the Sufferer upon Calvary that heartbreaking cry, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Could He drink that "cup"? Yes, even that if it were the Father's will and there were no other way in which sin could be dealt with to God's satisfaction and man's salvalion. He who had been obedient to the will of His Father every moment of His earthly life would he "obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." There evidently was no other way for "while he yet spake, lo, Judas, one of the twelve, came, and with him a great multitude with sword and staves." In quick succession follow the betrayal, arrest and trial of the Lord Jesus and thenÄthe crucifixion of the Lord of glory.

The "hour" had come. The event foretold and foreshadowed for centuries had taken place; "the most stupendous event in the history of man, the only event in the history of God." The noon hour not only of time but of eternity had come; indeed it was the pivotal hour in the life both of heaven and of earth. "The Son of Cod has died by the hands of men. This astounding fact is the moral center of all things. A bygone eternity knew no other future; an eternity to come shall know no other past. That death was this world's crisis" (Sir Robert Anderson, The Gospel and Its Ministry, p. 12).

The death of Jesus Christ is the pivotal fact in Christianity. It is its very heartbeat; its life's blood. Without it Christianity would not be. His worth lay not in the life He lived but in the death He died. His death was not so much the culmination of the victorious, obedient, holy life as its coronation. His incarnation was but paving the way for death; His death was the goal of incarnation.

It is not merely the fact that Christ died that is vital but that He died the death of the cross. The prophecy of Genesis 3:15 foretold a bruising and it was in the bruising of the heel of the woman's seed that the promise of the sinner's salvation was to be found. The Old Testament sacrifices made for the sake of sins year by year required the blood of goats and calves. These sacrifices and this blood-shedding were the foreshadowing of the one perfect sacrifice of the Son of God as He poured out His life's blood on Calvary for the salvation of sinners. While the prophets of old did tell us something of the circumstances that would attend the birth of Jesus Christ yet the burden of their message was of One who would be "wounded," "bruised," "scourged," "oppressed," "afflicted." By the mouth of all the prophets God foretold that Christ should suffer. Over and over again the Lord Jesus told the disciples that He "must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and the chief priests and scribes, and he killed, and be raised again." On the way to Emmaus as He walked and talked with the two disciples who were recounting to Him the tragedy of His crucifixion He said unto them,

Luke 24:26, "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?"

The theme of the entire Bible is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. "Cut the Bible anywhere and it bleeds; it is red with redemp tion truth." A suffering, crucified Christ was the Christ preached by the apostles and to them His sufferings were a vital factor in the sinner's salvation because of their expiatory nature. Paul testifying before King Agrippa preached a suffering Christ.

Acts 26: 22-23, "Having therefore obtained help of God, I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small and great, saying none other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come: That Christ should suffer, and that he should be the first that should rise from the dead."

Peter told us that it was through the victorious atoning sufferings of Christ that men were brought back to God.

1 Peter 3:18, "For Christ aLso hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit."

John taught that there was no cleansing power except in the blood of Christ shed on Calvary.

1 John 1:7, "The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin."

Respectable sinners will flock to the church today to hear ministers preach on the life of Jesus; many are even not averse to listening to an occasional sermon of the death of Christ, providing that death is preached only as the greatest example of sacrificial love, or as the culminating event in a life of obedience, or as an act of martyrdom in a good cause. But in this age there is a widespread refusal on the part of the man in the pew, and on the part of the man in the pulpit a conspicuous rejection of the biblical, evangelical teaching regarding the death of the cross. The reason for this will grow more apparent as we proceed with our studies.

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - THE GREAT DIVIDE

The cross of Christ makes a clean-cut cleavage between the two spheres, the sphere of death, darkness and disorder, and the sphere of life, light and liberty, and it challenges sinners to decide in which they purpose to live. The cross of Christ is the battlefield on which the conflict between Satan and God over the sovereignty of human lives is being waged and it compels men to take sides either for or against God. The cross of Christ marks the boundary line between the kingdom of Satan and the Kingdom of God and it calls subjects in the one to come out and to become subjects in the other. The cross of Christ finds men living on the plane of the natural and it opens a way for them to live on the plane of the spiritual and then appeals to them to enter the open door. The cross of Christ is the great divide: it separates men into two classes, the unsaved and the saved.

1 Corinthians 1:18, "For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God."

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - A DOUBLE EXPOSUURE

The cross of Christ is the place of exposure. There as nowhere else is revealed the hatred of man for God and the love of God for man. Sin is seen at its worst and love is seen at its best in the cross. Man's sin and God's love both reach a climax on Calvary. There the hideousness of the one and the glory of the other are brought out into the sharpest relief.

Acts 2:23, "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and fore knowledge of Cod, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain."

The desperate, despicable wickedness of the human heart is uncovered at Calvary. All the rebellion, self-will and enmity of the natural man found vent in this one act. In the crucifixion of the Holy One sin came out into the open and disclosed its inwardness.

"Him - ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." Sin nailed the Saviour to a cross and by doing so exposed to the world its ugly hideousness. Sinners stained their hands with the blood of their Saviour and thereby revealed the length and breadth, the height and depth of the infamy of sin.

However, the sin of man could not outstrip the love of God. Nor could sin defeat God by taking Him unawares. Before that hydra-headed mon ster had raised its head in rebellion against Cod He had accomplished its defeat. "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowl edge of God." In the eternal counsels of the Godhead the cross of Christ was set up in love before man was made or the world created. In the atoning death of the well-beloved Son on the cross of Calvary, God was fully prepared to assume responsibility for sin and all its consequences. God, the Father, spelled out in capital letters on the cross His unquench able love for sinners.

The cross of Christ reveals not only the love of the Father but the love of the Son as well. In the lament over Jerusalem, in the parable of the father's love for the prodigal, in the tender look at the denying Peter, and in the pathetic question to Judas the betrayer, Jesus Christ showed His sorrow for sin and the outreaching of His loving heart to the sinner. But only in the laying down of His sinless life in death as the sinner's Substitute do we see the perfect outshining of His infinite, limitless love. With the most perfect apprehension of what the sin of man was on the one hand, and of what the mind of God toward sin was on the other and of sin's due from God, there went up from the depths of Christ's sinless humanity a perfect amen to the righteous judgment of God against sin, and a willingness to bear that judgment.

The cross of Christ is the heart of God broken by sin. It tells you and me that God who must judge and punish sin will save and forgive the sinner. It discovers to us unfathomable depths of God's love.

Romans 5:8, "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son."

Galatians 1:3-4, "Our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father."

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - THE PLACE OF VICTORY

God has but one problem in His universeÄit is sin. All other problems of whatever nature emanate from this one. The sweat of grinding toil, the suffering of broken hearts, the sorrow of the world's crushing maladjust ments, all have their beginning in sin. Cod has but one enemy in the uni verseÄit is Satan. All other enmities, whether among angels or men, have their ultimate source in him. To regain His rightful sovereignty over the world and in the human race Cod had a double victory to win. This two fold victory was won through the Saviourhood of Jesus Christ. Salvation from sin and all its consequences, deliverance from Satan and his allies, were gained for the sinner at the cross.

The Old Testament classic which reveals Jesus Christ as the Sin-bearer is Isaiah 53.

Isaiah 53:4, 6, 10-12, "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows. And the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin. For he shall bear their iniquities. He bare the sin of many."

The New Testament is full of the same truth.

John 1:29, "The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."

Hebrews 9:28, "So Christ was once offered to bear the sin of many; and unto them which look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation."

Jesus Christ faced the problem which sin had created and solved it by taking upon Himself the whole responsibility for it. When He entered into human life and as the Son of Man became the connecting link between Cod and the ruined race, He pledged Himself to become responsible for sin and its effects.

Sin had brought upon man four terrible consequences for which Christ as Sin-bearer assumed responsibility. The first is guilt. The whole world is guilty before God (Romans 3:19). The whole of man is defiled and depraved. That this guilt might be removed God made Christ sin and then treated Him as sin.

2 Corinthians 5:21, R. V., "Him who knew no sin he made to be sin on out behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in him."

The second is death. "The wages of sin is death." The sentence of death rested upon the whole human race. As the last Adam, Jesus Christ assumed all responsibility for the first Adam's sin and its consequences. Therefore He executed the death sentence upon sinners by Himself dying.

Romans 5:6, "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly."

The third consequence of sin is the curse. Sin is lawlessness and the penalty for broken law is the curse. Jesus Christ acknowledged the justice in Cod's judgment upon sin and voluntarily offered to assume even this responsibility on the sinner's behalf.

Galatians 3:13, "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree."

The fourth consequence of sin is the wrath of God. God hates sin. God's holiness demanded that He take some action against it. So God was com pelled to decree that sin would bar sinners from His presence through time and eternity. Here again Jesus Christ assumed responsibility for the presence of sin in men and on the cross of Calvary bore the full force of God's wrath against it even to the point of conscious separation from His Father's presence.

Romans 5:9, "Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him."

In becoming the Sin-bearer Jesus Christ fully met and solved the prob lem of sin. "In His death everything was made His that sin had made ours everything in sin except it sinfulness" (James Denney, The Death of Christ).

The cross of Christ is God's starting point of victory over Satan and all his allies. God is the One who has been hurt most by sin. "Satan was putting the knife into God's heart through Adam's hand." So any effectual dealing with sin must go back to its first cause and any permanent victory for God must be a crushing defeat for Satan.

The first curse pronounced after the Fall was upon the serpent. The serpent's curse and the Saviour's cross are inextricably interwoven. The prophecy containing the curse foretells a double bruising. "It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

Men and women are being taught that the record of the Fall in Genesis 3 is just a myth and that no scholarly person believes it today. This is indeed the devil's lie and he has a very good reason for telling it. By the death of Christ his head was bruised, his doom was sealed. The cross of Christ robbed that satanic usurper of every vestige of rightful claim to the world and of all dominion over any man or woman who fully trusts in the atoning blood of the Saviour and who yields to the Lordship of Jesus. Christ's cry of victory from Calvary's cross "It is finished" was Satan's death knell. The victory over the devil commenced in the wilderness, continued in Gethsemane, culminated on Calvary. The hour of Christ's death was the hour of Satan's defeat.

John 12:31, "Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out."

The death of the cross deprived him of his power and rendered him in operative.

Hebrews 2:14, R. V., "Since then the children are sharers in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same; that through death he might bring to nought him that had the power of death, that is, the devil."

The death of Jesus Christ meant an open and decisive victory for God over all the principalities and powers in rebellion against Him. It severs the believer from the powers of darkness.

Colossians 2:14-15, "Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross; And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it."

The devil has two active, aggressive allies in his diabolical work of keeping sinners living in self-will and rebellion toward God. They are the "world" and the "flesh." For the defeat of both of these God has made ample provision in the cross of Christ.

Galatians 6:14, But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."

Galatians 5:24, "And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts."

In the cross of Christ the sinncr who truly desires it may find complete deliverance from the evil one and all his entanglements. Satan's reign over him may end there if he seeks release through the cross.

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - A DIVINELY PROVIDED MEETING PLACE

Sin made every man unrighteous in God's sight, (Romans 3:10-12) and by so doing it created an impassable chasm between a righteous God and an unrighteous sinner. It did more than that, it totally disqualified man for doing anything to bridge this chasm thus placing upon Cod the whole responsibility of making a way of access into His presence and of providing a meeting place between Himself and the sinner.

But how could a righteous God be just and the justifier of sinners (Romans 3:26)? How could God maintain His holiness in His dealing with sin and at the same time manifest His graciousness in mercy toward the sinner? How could God provide such a meeting place and not deny Him self through compromise?

Before God was a Law which was holy and right. It was the expression of His own character; the essence of His own nature. To ignore or condone man's rebellion and disobedience as evidenced in that Law broken would be to deny Himself. God could not do that; He must be true to Himself so He must treat sin as sin and deal with it as such. It must be condemned and its merited punishment meted out. "Even God cannot change the character of righteousness by altering, or lessening to the slightest degree, its holy demands. What is done for the satisfaction of His love in saving any one whom His righteousness condemns must be done in full view of all that His righteousness could ever require" (L. S. Chafer, Salvation, p. 27).

Before Cod was not only a broken Law but a broken relationship, a broken bond of love which had united Him to the human race. Before Him, too, was the desperate need of those whom He loved with an ever lasting love, the undone condition of those who were precious in His sight. Before Him was His own broken heart made desolate by the prodigal's departure into the far country.

Viewing the sinner in his relationship to God his fundamental need is a way of access and acceptance with God despite his guilt. Viewing God in His relationship to the sinner His fundamental necessity is a way of granting favor and fellowship to the sinner despite His holiness. A meeting place between a righteous God and an unrighteous sinner is the demand macic upon the righteousness of God. But it is equal to even this necessity for in His death upon Calvary's cross Jesus Christ became the propitiation for the sins of the world.

1 John 2:2, R. V., "And he is the propitiation for our Sins; and not for ours only, but also for the whole world."

Romans 3:25-26, R. V., "Whom God set forth to be a propitiation, through faith, in his blood, to show his righteousness because of the passing over of the sins done aforetime, in the forbearance of God; for the showing, I say, of his righteousness at this present season: that he might himself be just, and the justifier of hint that hath faith in Jesus."

To the spiritually minded Christian who has a realization of the awful chasm sin had made between him and his God the truth that centers on the word "propitiation" is inexpressibly precious. But to the natural man living still in pride, rebellion and self-satisfaction, it is insufferably offensive.

"Propitiation" means a mercy seat or covering, a divinely provided meeting place. In Old Testament times on the Day of Atonement the great high priest took the blood of the sacrificial lamb into the Holy of Holies and with it sprinkled the Mercy Seat. Within the ark under the cover of the blood was the broken Law. The blood-sprinkled Mercy Seat provided a meeting place between God and the sinner where the guilty one could come to God without remembrance of his past offenses and without fear of judgment and where the Holy One could receive the sinner without compromise and yet without condemnation. "A holy God could right eously meet a sinful man and a sinful man could fearlessly meet a holy God." God set forth His well-beloved Son to be such a propitiation for all the guilty sinners in all the world. Through the shedding of the precious blood of the Lamb of God on the cross of Calvary such a covering for sin and for broken Law was provided. In His death Jesus Christ honors God's holy Law by bearing in full the punishment meted out to the sinner for breaking it. Thus in the crucified Lord the sinner has found a meeting place with God and a way of access into His favor and fellowship.

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - A DIVINELY PREPARED TURNING POINT

A double barrier separates God and the sinner. Sin has caused man to be offended toward God as truly as it has caused God to be offended toward man. The cross of Christ shall have failed to deal adequately with sin if it only removes the cause of offense in its Godward aspect and does not equally remove it in its manward aspect.

And this is exactly what the cross of Christ does. "We love him because He first loved us" (1 John 4:19). "By grace are ye saved through faith." The grace of God built the bridge of salvation before ever a single sinner made a start toward crossing it. Grace took God into the garden in the cool of the day to seek the first two sinners and to offer them the gracious promise of salvation through a Saviour even before He dealt righteously with their sin in pronouncing upon them the judgment of the curse. Even in the prophecy-promise given in Eden, God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself. God took the initiative in effecting reconciliation by giving His Son to die.

Romans 5:10, "For if, wheit we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life."

Colossians 1:21-22, "And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight."

2 Corinthians 5:18, "And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ."

The Son of God endured the suffering and the shame of the cross that thereby He might tell a world of sinners who have turned their backs on God that God loves them with an everlasting love. When the sinner sees the Saviour suffering, the just for the unjust, when he sees Christ crucified by his sin, dying his death, enduring his punishment, then his heart is melted, his rebellion is removed, his whole attitude toward God is changed from enmity to love, from estrangement to fellowship, from indifference to devotion, from fear to faith, from shame to peace.

In Christ crucified, God has provided such propitiation and reconciliation as has made possible the removal of the barrier of separation between God and man, and has opened a merciful yet righteous way of access and acceptance; thus giving to every man who will avail himself of God's grace the opportunity for full restoration to God's favor and fellowship.

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - THE END OF THE OLD CREATION

AND THE BEGINNING OF THE NEW

Through propitiation and reconciliation, accomplished in the death of Christ, adequate provision has been made for a change of relationship be tween the sinner and God which effects a radical change in the sinner's position before God. But is there provision for a change in his condition also? The natural man is a slave, "sold under sin" (Romans 7:14).

Where sin abounded grace did much more abound. God's boundless grace was undaunted by the sinner's helpless, hopeless condition. God's right to proprietorship through creation still remained but it had been lost to Him through man's surrender of himself to the sovereignty of an other. But God would Himself go down to the slave market of sin and buy back that which was His own. He would then take the sinner out of the sphere of Satan, out of the slave market of sin, and set him free in the glorious liberty of a new life in Christ.

Such redemption demanded a ransom. It required a life for a life. "The life is in the blood." To redeem the race from the bondage of sin involved the paying of a price which was nothing less than the precious blood of the spotless Lamb of God. To buy back His own for a possession God paid the costly price of His own blood.

Acts 20:28, "Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he halt purchased with his own blood."

1 Peter 1: 18-19, "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot."

Revelation 5:9, "And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation."

But God did not go into the slave market of sin only to buy the captive sinner but also to bring him out from that old sphere of bondage and set him free in a new sphere of liberty. Not alone would He lead him out of Egypt but He would bring him into Canaan. Christ Jesus would become not only the sinner's Saviour but He would be the believer's Lord and Life. In the cross of Christ, God rejected the old order of fallen, sinful humanity "sold under sin" through the first Adam's disobedience that He might raise up a new order of holy, heavenly beings redeemed from sin through the last Adam's obedience.

The death of Christ upon the cross not only redeems but it recreates; it not only provides complete emancipation from the old life but abundant entrance into the new.

Exodus 13:3, "And Moses said unto the people, Remember this day, in which ye came out of Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand the Lord brought you out from this place."

Exodus 13:11, "And it shall be when the Lord shall bring thee into the land of the Canaanites, as he sware unto thee and to thy fathers, and shall give it thee."

Titus 2:14, "Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works."

THE CROSS OF CHRIST - THE PLACE OF DECISION THAT DETERMINES DESTINY

"The Cross of Christ has measured out the moral distance between God and man and has left them as far asunder as the throne of heaven and the gates of hell" (Sir Robert Anderson, The Gospel and Its Ministry, p. 25). Scripture bears ample testimony to the solemn truthfulness of these words. But praise God it is equally true that the cross of Christ has measured out the length and breadth and height and depth of the love of God in the gift of a Redeemer who closed the gates of hell and opened the gates of heaven for all who will believe.

As sin through Adam had been universal, so salvation through Christ must be made potential to all. Where sin abounded grace did much more abound and opened a way hack to God for every sinner. The bridge of salvation provided a way out of the old sphere into the new for all who will acknowledge themselves sinners needing a Saviour.

Titus 2:11, "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men." 1 Timothy 2:5-6, "One mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all."

Isaiah 53:6, "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of US all."

Hebrews 2:9, "But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man."

In tenderest compassion God broods over every sinner and bleeds for his sin. I-his great yearning heart of love reaches to the uttermost corner of His universe and seeks to draw each heart unto Himself through His Son.

1 Timothy 2:3-4, R. V., "This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; who would have all men to be saved, and come to the knowledge of the truth."

1 Timothy 4:10, "For therefore we both labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe."

2 Peter 3:9, R. V. "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness; but is longsuffering to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance."

That all men might have an adequate opportunity to know God's way of salvation He commanded the disciples to carry the Gospel to the ends of the earth preaching it to every creature.

Acts 1:8, "But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth."

Mark 18:15, "And he said unto them, Co ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature."

God. commands every sinner who hears the Gospel to repent and turn to Him.

Acts 17:30, "And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent."

God invites all sinners to come to Him and promises eternal life to all who truly believe and receive His Son.

John 8:37, "All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out."

John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have ever lasting life."

Countless sinners throughout the ages have refused the grace of God manifested in His salvation and have rejected Christ, the Saviour, but the death of Christ on the cross of Calvary opened a way back to God for all men everywhere. "No man is lost for want of an atonement, or because there is any other banier in the way of his salvation than his owii most free and wicked will."

Dear reader, on which side of the cross of Christ are you living? Your relationship to the crucified Christ will determine your destiny. (See Diagram 6.)