New Thoughts (01/05/13-01/21/13)
The Whole Point in One Word (01/05/13)
It would be nearly impossible for me to avoid starting at the end for my comments on this section. Those final three words of Jesus that John relates for us, one word really, are effectively the culmination of the entire body of Scripture. “It is finished!” Everything has been executed completely. Every last prophecy fulfilled, every promise delivered. Indeed, everything has been made perfect. It’s all wrapped up in that statement. Indeed, John had used the very same word to explain the timing of this whole thing there in John 19:28. Jesus knew it was finished. All things had been accomplished perfectly. His work here was done. Not one least item remained of God’s agenda which needed doing.
And so, He gave up His spirit. He sent it off. Notice that: He’s in control of the event. This is the thing the centurion marked so well. That man would know how these crucifixions normally went. He knew that it was intended to be a long, painful struggle with inevitable death. He knew that what he had just witnessed was not normal. Crucified criminals did not choose their final moment. Their final moment chose them. But, this one? This was unheard of, and even a hardened soldier could grasp that something significant had happened. Of course, there were all these other signs happening to drive the point home.
But, let me return to that most beautiful phrase in all of Scripture. “It is finished!” How we need to hear that repeated! How it fills the soul with the joy of knowing its truth. How it causes us to marvel at the whole scope of history, and the wonder of God having all of this in mind even from the outset – even before the outset.
Think about that! There was a time when all was void – empty chaos. God, in His perfection of wisdom, decided to create, and in that created order He determined to place man. Even as He contemplated that idea, He knew what would happen. He knew the serpent would come. He knew Adam would fail. He knew the Flood would become necessary. He knew, right then and there, that the time would come when He would have to come down Himself, become as one of these men He was going to create, and show them how it was done. He knew He would have to take the full force of His own just wrath in order to rescue His own. And, He knew down to the second the exact moment at which this act would come. He knew what He would say with that last breath. In fact, He had whispered it to His people down through the ages.
He had arranged the covenant relationship that bound His people to Him and Him to His people. He had made clear and certain promises as part of that covenant, promises so grand as to fill the hearer with wonder, promises so grand as to seem impossible! He had also given certain of His people to glimpse this ultimate moment. Some knew what they were glimpsing, or at least that they were being granted a glimpse. Others, it seems, only felt the inspiration and awe, not knowing what they, themselves were saying.
As we have been looking at these final moments of Christ on earth, it has been impossible to escape the fact that so much of what has been happening has been marked out not by the prophets, but by the psalmists! We saw it at the Last Supper. Indeed, Jesus Himself pointed out that what Judas was doing had been recorded long ago. Here at the cross, it seems the entirety of Psalm 22 has been played out. If time permits, I really ought to spend a goodly while considering that Psalm more fully.
I don’t know how much the psalmists realized what it was they were writing. I don’t really think they were conscious of seeing forward through time to this point. I suspect they were wrapped up in their own time, and wrote words that reflected their own situation, their own feelings, their own heart-cry to God. It just happens that their situation and their expressive prayers were shaped and suited by an all Powerful God so as to point beyond the lives of the one praying and take on a far greater, eternal significance.
There is something else we would do well to notice in all this, something Jesus models that we may be ignoring to our loss. What is revealed to me, and I trust I am by no means the first, just coming to what others have known all along, is that Jesus thinks in Psalms. We are used to thinking about the way Jesus would take Himself off to pray in isolation as a way to restore Himself. But, what is evident here in these moments of greatest trial is that He has known the practice of meditating on God’s Word. He has been so fully soaked in the Psalms God caused to be written that when His own most needful moments arise, the cries of God’s Word, the prayers of God’s own heart, are the natural response.
Perhaps you’ve noticed this in yourself. It is the tragic moments, the sudden shocks of life, that reveal our nature. Most of the time, we can and do manage our outward appearance, the public persona. We, particularly, who seek to live as Christians are prone to making a work of it. One doesn’t come to church and confess to weakness and problems. One comes and presents one’s Sunday best. And, it’s not just the clothes. Indeed, the clothes barely enter into it any more. It’s the everything’s great, not a problem in the world attitude we don at the door. Because, after all, God’s people can’t have problems, can they? It wouldn’t be fitting!
In the workplace, and to a greater or lesser degree in the home, the story’s much the same. We have a sense of how we ought to be, and we seek to behave in accordance with that sense. And, we do a pretty good job of it. We may suspect that we are just fooling most of the people most of the time, may feel ourselves a fraud even as we do our best. And, maybe that’s the way it really ought to be, strange as it seems. We ought not to think too much of ourselves, and apart from God, it’s hard to imagine anybody else who knows our real inward weaknesses better than ourselves. At the same time, that effort to look better actually works towards us functioning better. Practice may not make perfect, but it certainly helps!
But, it’s those system shocks that reveal whether the practice is all show, or whether it’s producing something in us. When hammer hits thumb, is the response of a godly nature, or does it more often demonstrate just how much work remains to be done in us? When there’s a terrible report from the doctor, when the pink slip comes all unexpectedly, when disaster strikes, where do our thoughts turn? In Jesus, I see where they ought to turn, but they can’t turn there except we have been in training up to that moment. They ought to turn, as His thoughts did, to God’s Word. In the Psalms we have so much material for our encouragement, for helping us work out our own confusion, upset, anguish. We have so much to remind us just how great our God is, just how forever faithful to us, how shockingly ready to forgive.
Jesus thinks in Psalms. These moments in extremis make that clear. In His time of deepest anguish, as He suffers that rift of separation in His very being, He does not cry out in anger. He does not shout epithets in His pain. He jumps straight to Scripture. “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” Look. He’s not in any condition to be running through His mental catalog looking for an appropriate way to express His agony. Agony does not permit of such exercises. Agony tends to short out our mental wiring, and what’s left is the answering service. Jesus’ answering service provides Scripture as His instant response to every shock of life. Every last bit of these final words we have from Him comes out of that stored up catalog of God’s Word. This should hardly shock us in this One Who is the Word Incarnate. But, neither should we suppose it is something uniquely His.
The Living Word came to live amongst us not so as to rub our noses in our abject failure, but to show us what is possible, to show us what is intended. Here, He would seem to demonstrate what is intended in those psalms that He caused to be written down for our benefit. They are for our benefit. It’s not there to impress us with David’s poetry. It’s not there so we can get a sense of what he was feeling at this or that moment of his life. It’s there so that when we find ourselves in such situations, our heart and soul can respond as his did, that we, too, may have a heart after God. It’s there so that we can train ourselves, train our own spiritual answering services to provide a reaction to shock that is suitable to a citizen of God’s household.
Jesus thinks in Psalms. Surely, this being the practice of our federal head, it must become our practice, too. Here is strength for the trial. Here as the way through in the face of temptation. Here is the meaning and the purpose of meditating on His Word day and night. And, here is proof of the value of that meditating.
Verifiable Evidence (01/06/13)
What the Gospels present for our consideration is often so incredible as to be thoroughly unbelievable. This is more the case for us today, given our propensity for scientific thought, and a general rejection of anything that claims to be supernatural. But, it was going to be hard enough for those who first received the testimony of the Gospels to accept some of what the authors said. As we come to the final climactic events of the Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension, things become more incredible than ever.
Think about it. You’re reading through these accounts, and even as a believer, some of this starts to sound pretty mythical in nature. The sun goes out for three hours. OK, sure. There’s an earthquake that just happens to hit just as Jesus dies. That’s perhaps the most plausible of the events recorded here. The veil of the temple? What possible reason did it have for ripping, and what sort of force would be needed to make it rip entirely? You could explain a bit of a tear given the shaking of the earthquake, I suppose, but completely shorn in two?
So far, though, everything at least has some precedent. The events are unusual, but not unheard of. The timing is curious, but not impossible. But then Matthew throws in this business about tombs opening up, and he doesn’t leave it at that. We could buy that. Earthquake, rocks splitting: sure, that’s going to disturb those graves on the hillside. Understood. But, he goes on. Many of the dead saints therein were raised! OK. Now he’s lost me. This is beyond belief. It was hard enough to deal with the story of Lazarus, but this? A bunch of graves open up, but it’s only the saints who come out and wander Jerusalem. Right.
But, note this: Matthew doesn’t just throw that out there and leave you to decide whether to believe him or not. He points out that many in the city of Jerusalem were witness to this. He doesn’t tell us whether those many were all counted amongst the disciples, or whether it was a mixed company – at least prior to these sightings. I would venture to say it was a mixed company, though. A body wandering the city streets doesn’t have a great deal of control over who they might encounter. So, understand: There are many, many witnesses, and not all of them predisposed to buy into some mythological fantasy.
Those who are so quick to discount the Scriptural record in our day would do well to recognize this point. When the word was first spreading, there were entirely too many witnesses about for any such fabrication to have taken hold. If Matthew was aware of such events in the city, then certainly, those who lived in the city were aware of them, too. If he knew that many had seen, he likely was able to supply names to the curious. If his readers had any doubts as to the veracity of his report, they could check him out, and he’d be more than happy to provide them a list of folks to go interview in this regard.
There’s that same sort of point made later by Paul, as he writes to the Corinthian church. Discussing the Resurrection of Christ, he points out that at one point Jesus appeared to more than 500 people in one place, and note well: Most of them were still alive and available for interview when he wrote. Some had died, it was true, but there were plenty still around who could confirm this first-hand experience of the risen Christ. You didn’t have to buy one man’s account of a blinding light in the desert. There were so many witnesses to this Man that any charge of fabrication could easily be refuted. There were so many hostile witnesses that any such fabrication would have quickly been set at naught.
Certainly, those hostile to Messiah, or at least to the Messiah God had provided, tried everything they could to set this fledgling sect at naught. They denounced it, called it sacrilegious, accused its members of every manner of heinous behavior. Except, the truth kept winning out. Why was that? With so many voices raised against them, what exactly allowed them to not merely persist, but to thrive, even to become the dominant religion throughout the known world? Quite simply, it was verifiable. You could go, if you had the means and the interest, and speak to those who had been changed by this One. You could go and speak to those who had seen Him, heard Him, met Him after He died. You could go talk to that centurion that gets his mention here. Clearly, Luke did as much.
Here again you see the lengths to which God went to anchor this event in verifiable, certifiable history. It can hardly be supposed that this centurion who went out to supervise the death squads was somebody inclined to accept this Jewish criminal as a god, let alone the God. It’s hardly likely that he even viewed the God of Israel as anything more than one of the gods, and probably held Him to be obviously inferior to the pantheon of victorious Rome. Seriously, if Israel’s god was so powerful, how is it that Roman forces occupied the land, Roman governors ruled them, and Roman officials even determined who would be in the offices of this god’s very temple!
Having stood witness to all these events, the Roman mind might actually have been more inclined towards accepting them as signs of some god or another being angered. They were, after all, a relatively superstitious lot. But, was it superstition, or was it the glimmer of Truth through the haze of misdirection with which they had been benighted? Even the most lost of unbelievers has yet some spark of God’s Truth within. They don’t acknowledge it as such. If they suspected it of being His Truth, they would likely try to expunge it from conscience. But, conscience is God’s to give in the first place, and no effort of man can quiet it entirely. “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness in men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them” (Ro 1:18-19).
That centurion may have had some serious misconceptions about what all these signs in earth and sky meant. He may have, almost certainly did have a pantheon of false gods to which he would naturally attribute such things. But, there is this to be said for him: He didn’t ignore what was happening. He didn’t miss what was happening. From what Luke says, neither did the bulk of the locals who were out watching Jesus die. They came for a spectacle, but what this spectacle told them was that they had made a huge mistake. I have to think Luke’s description of their departure is understated in the extreme. They went away beating their breasts? Yes, I bet they did! I would suppose they went away mourning not so much for the Man on the Cross as for themselves, panicked by the realization that the centurion’s assessment was more true even then he knew.
“Surely, this was man was innocent.” And note Luke’s point here: He began praising God. Not the gods in general, not some particular deity of the Romans. He began praising God, Yahweh, El Shaddai. And, what does that mean? It could also be said that he began to glorify God. It means that he has recognized the worth of that which he is honoring and praising. It means he has formed an opinion and is now expressing, ‘the consequential meaning from the opinion which’ he has formed. That particular aspect of praise is brought out by Zhodiates. But, that’s what’s signified here. He has, upon consideration of all that he has just witnessed, formed the opinion that this seemingly weak god of Israel’s is in fact God in the singular. The entire Roman pantheon has just suffered an extreme demotion in this man’s thinking. There is now but one God, and you can bet he is to be counted among the believers, and counted among the believers Luke would interview for his writing. And, having in this very moment been granted to know the One True God, he is also granted to testify to this, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” Again, not the son of a god. There were enough of those in the Roman mythos. No, the Son of the God.
As to his testimony to Jesus’ innocence, this can certainly be heard in terms of a legal assessment. One will note that Luke has presented any number of voices declaring the innocence of Christ. Legally, he assures us, there was absolutely no basis for what happened here. He had committed no crime, and yet here He was on the cross, dead. But, that term of innocence might very well be heard with a much higher significance, and given the centurion’s recognition of Jesus as God’s Son, it would not seem to be much of a stretch to suppose he meant it in this sense. That term innocent is dikaios, which in other settings and circumstances we would more commonly translate as righteous. It’s really a question of whose laws are in view. In terms of civil law, He was innocent. In terms of God’s Law, He was righteous. In terms of the significance of His being here on the cross, there is yet more that must be said. He was (and is) approved of and acceptable to God. As our atoning Sacrifice, this is really critical to know. Not only was this a miscarriage of earthly justice, it was simultaneously the perfect carrying out of God’s Justice, and done in the perfection of His Mercy!
The centurion, with thanks to the Holy Spirit, recognized the implications as to the Person of Christ. It would be awhile before the Apostles were ready to explain the power of what he had just concluded. Those must have been harrowing days for him, as well, as he felt a certain responsibility for having been part of killing God’s Son. But, for the Apostles? Oh, yes, this was a shock. The degree of their shock becomes clear in the coverage of their actions in the following days. But, somewhere in their heads, there is this echo of what Jesus had said. Never mind His many pronouncements of the necessity of His dying, and never mind His proclamations that He would rise again. They weren’t ready for that yet. But, there was this: “Nobody takes My life from Me. I lay it down of My own accord” (Jn 10:18). This, of course, continues with the statement that He is also authorized to take His life back. But, right now, it’s the first clause that is before their eyes.
This was quite likely the thing that really grabbed the centurion’s attention. He didn’t die like they usually do. The manner of His end demonstrated quite clearly, particularly by those most familiar with the process of crucifixion, that He was in control of events, whatever appearances there may have been to the contrary. He laid His own life down. What comfort it must have been to his ears to hear how Jesus had already specified that this was of His own accord. What relief! It’s not a complete removal of responsibility, but it’s also a great note of hope for those who would come to God seeking forgiveness for being part of this.
And thus was he become a witness for Christ. Can I say that with the certainty of Scripture? No, I don’t suppose I can. But, the circumstantial evidence in support of this being the case is, I think, pretty strong. God was making absolutely certain that the strength of the witness to this most critical moment in all of human history was so great that no amount of deception by the devil or by fallen humanity could ever succeed in destroying or discrediting that evidence.
Think about it. Think how much effort has been expended right on through to our own time to destroy God’s witness, to remove this one hope from humanity! Think of those through the years who dismissed Luke as a fraud, making up names of Roman authorities. Think of those who insisted that half of the tribes supposedly driven out as Israel came into the Promised Land were figments of a literary imagination. Except, it turns out they were real! The proofs were found of these various ‘ites’. The proofs were found of those Roman authorities. So, explain to me again which is the fraud, which the foolish? How much more foolish can one really get than to suppose that here at 2000 years’ remove, we are in a better position to assess the evidence than were those who were present as events unfolded?
I find it intriguing that all except Luke find cause to comment on that sop of sour wine that was lifted up to Jesus at the end. In general I tend to suspect a greater significance to apply when both the Synoptic Gospels and John cover the event. It just seems to place a greater emphasis on the thing given John’s propensity for bypassing what has already been written and providing what has not. So, then, we have this matter of Jesus taking that final sip of weak wine at the end. What ought we to make of it? What ought we not to make of it?
One thought that had come to mind was that there might be a coincidence of timing with that occasion when Jesus asked the Samaritan woman for a drink (Jn 4:6-7), but I think that’s stretching for connections. First, John notes the hour at the well, but not here. Second, given the testimony from Luke 23:44, it’s a different hour anyway. So, no, I don’t think that’s a direction to go in.
Another thought that comes to mind is how to seek understanding as to how this fits with the oath Jesus took at the Last Supper. Recall that just yesterday, He had told His disciples, “I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom” (Mt 26:29). Yet, here He is taking at least some small sip of wine. Now, it can be granted that the wine offered to Him on the end of that reed is not of the same sort as would be present for the Paschal meal. This stuff was nearer vinegar, and watered down to make it palatable. Yet, it was drinkable stuff, apparently. It was what the soldiers of Rome had for their own thirst, odd though that may seem to us.
I could try and find answer in John’s explanation that “all things had already been accomplished”, and therefore the kingdom was already established. There is that prophetic now / not yet tension that one might apply to the point. All is fulfilled, and the kingdom is inevitable. Their joining Him in the kingdom, while it might not happen today, is inevitable. But, there is that part of His oath that says ‘with you’. If we insist that this indicates the twelve of them gathered together once again drinking wine, this doesn’t fit. If, we try and take ‘this fruit of the vine’ as something more specific, then maybe the connection is broken. In other words, if it restricts to Jewish table wine and misses this plebian Romish stuff, then the one has nothing to do with the other. But, that seems very unlikely.
Again, the formulation of His oath would seem to preclude any attempt to restrict His meaning to the particulars of the Paschal meal, although this would be the easiest way to resolve the apparent conflict. Sure! He’s never going to celebrate Passover again in this life. But, then, He is The Passover. Why would He ever celebrate it again at all, given He has fulfilled that feast? No. That path is non-operative.
There is one way I can construe the one as not abrogating the other. That is to suggest that He has already passed beyond time. I’m not saying I’m particularly comfortable with this idea, only that I cannot see another solution at present. God help my limitations! But, I am mindful that God is an eternal being, an existence outside time, having created time. He sees the end from the beginning precisely because He is present in both simultaneously. The entire span of human history is all one to Him. Well, then, if Jesus has already in some sense returned from His earthly sojourn, having completed all He was given to do, has He then entered into that eternal now? Is the today in which He gives up His spirit the eternal today in which He will return? But, I fear that this treads dangerously close to heresy. It comes very near to suggesting that it was not Christ the Man Who died upon the cross, but Christ the God, and that is not to be accepted.
Perhaps it is best to hear His words over the Paschal cup less woodenly. In that He has fulfilled every requirement, it is understood that the last day began. The kingdom is no longer near. It is here! That final cry of, “It is finished!” signifies exactly that. Prophecy has now been fulfilled. It requires no more. Everything that was set in motion there outside the Garden has been fully realized, and nothing remains that can forestall the restoration of the Garden in the New Jerusalem come down.
Wow! Does that ever turn my thoughts in new and unplanned directions! Because, this is very clearly true with no regard to the significance of the wine. Let’s expand on this. First, to the point that nothing remains that can forestall the full presence of the Kingdom: This should be a guard against the modern intrigue with seeing the Temple restored. There’s a whole movement out there watching for red heifers, waiting to see the temple incense reformulated, and so on, as if these are things that must happen in order for Jesus to return. Never mind the wrongheadedness of expecting a restoration of the type when Christ the Antitype has already terminated the need for those types. But, the “It is finished!” of the Cross has put paid to any such requirements. No. That future day is so absolutely certain in the moment Jesus spoke that word, that it is as good as here today. Though it tarries, wait! It is God’s Word. It cannot fail! These games of seeing signs may seem in some way pious, but they are just games. They are as evil in our generation as they were when Jesus walked the hills of Israel. “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign, and no sign shall be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet” (Mt 12:39). This is it, folks! Stop looking for more. It’s not necessary, and it’s very likely counterfeit anyway!
To the second point: “Prophecy has now been fulfilled.” This, too, must be heard when Jesus says, “It is finished!” It’s done. It’s over. Nothing remains to be predicted of the future, for it has all been said and done. Interesting this. I have long struggled with that particular aspect of Reformed theology that precludes the prophetic voice in our time. Even now, I’m not exactly clear how this can be the case when prophets are so obviously present in the nascent church. But, I can certainly accept that the prophetic role has undergone a distinct transformation between that which concluded with John the Baptist and what follows. But, there is this: “It is finished!” Every promise, every prophetic utterance has been satisfied. Everything God found cause to speak to His people, every demand of covenant, it’s all been wrapped up, signed, sealed and delivered in this moment, in this Man. So, as I point out regarding the temple rituals, I might just as well advise concerning the prophetic office: If it’s all finished, if every type and foreshadowing has been satisfied in Christ, why are we looking to see the types and shadows reinstated? Where is the benefit?
This profoundly impacts what I thought I understood. This, to me, is far more telling than the usual argument hinging on Hebrews 1:1-3. If it is finished, what is there to start again? If all is done and made certain, what remains for the office of the prophet? If, indeed, perfection has come, where then is there room for the partial? Again, I cannot explain how this leaves a place for the prophets we are clearly shown in the New Testament. That there is a change is clear. That those of this new order at least retained a gift for seeing what lay ahead is clear. That they were not longer the infallible spokesmen of God seems to be suggested as well. I think of that one who prophesied to Paul, seeking (it would seem) to dissuade him from going to Jerusalem. The words were true, but the intent was false to God’s purpose. The prophet no longer called somebody to account with regard to the covenant, merely prepared the sharer in the covenant promises and demands for what lay ahead. And, it remained to that one to hear the forewarning without being turned from God’s clear purpose by that forewarning. After all, Paul had the Holy Spirit within to counsel him, just as we do. There is wisdom in counsel, but there is greater wisdom in hearing the Spirit’s judgment upon all counsel!
Father, I am as far as my small wisdom can take me on this matter, I think. It seems I am at one of those moments where things I thought I understood are suddenly subject to change. I know not where this leads, but I pray that it leads to a clearer, more accurate understanding of Your ways and Your expectations for me in my time. Oh, Lord! If I have chased after shadows when I had Your light right here, forgive me, I pray! If I have supported beliefs that are false, please! Correct me even now! And grant that I would be so bold as to pass on what You are making clear, even where it may be uncomfortable, even where it may lead to a degree of argument. But all, O Lord, according to Your will. Holy Spirit, be my guide as it seems my eyes are open, and if I be wrong in this, speak! For Your servant listens. Jesus, I am thrilled anew to hear You say, “It is finished!” I am ever thrilled by that, but today it hits again, it takes up greater significance, it sounds even more certain than ever before. Thank You! Thank You for being both Author and Finisher! Thank You that the certainty of ‘that day’ is as concrete as the certainty of this day.
New Testament Prophets – A Sidebar [Under Review] (01/08/13-01/19/13)
Coincidence? Part 2 (01/20/13-01/21/13)
One final thought on this matter of the prophets: It occurs to me this morning that when we read that pronouncement from Moses that one day a prophet like him would arise again, that was intended in the most singular of applications. We understand, of course, that he was pointing specifically to the man Jesus, The appointed Christ of God. But, it seems to me that he is also indicating a distinction of these two from all others in the more general class of prophets. There would be prophets aplenty, and several of them both legitimate and honored. Nobody, for example, is going to opine against Elijah or question his legitimacy as a prophet. But, there is a unique aspect to Moses and Jesus in their filling of the prophetic office, and that is that these two were given to pronounce new doctrine in the forms of establishing new covenants. To the best of my knowledge, neither of these activities were entrusted to any other prophet. Certainly, no other prophet came with God’s covenant in hand for delivery to His people. They came as prosecutors of the covenant once for all delivered. They came to admonish and forewarn based on the terms already set forth in the covenant. But, they did not alter one slightest term of covenant.
Only Moses and Jesus are given this task, and Moses, by his pronouncement concerning the Prophet to come, would seem to make this point. Listen to Him. He is, after all, the Final Word. He is the bearer of the New Covenant, the Author and Announcer of its terms, having fulfilled the terms of the Old Covenant. This understanding would serve well to guard our hearts and minds from abusers of the prophetic office without the need to insist on an end to all prophecy.
OK. Onward, or rather, backward to our text once more. There is a footnote to the NET that discusses the particular significance of Jesus indicating His thirst, as it fits the flow of John’s account. Recall that it is John who relates that occasion in a previous year at the great feast, when Jesus had stood and cried out, “If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. As Scripture says, Rivers of living water shall flow from the innermost being of the one who believes in Me” (Jn 7:37-38). John proceeds to explain that He was talking about the Holy Spirit which was to be given to believers. And now, we arrive at the moment of Jesus’ death, and He says, “I am thirsty.” For the editors of the NET, this is significant of His being forsaken by God. In this sense, it behooves us to look further back in John’s Gospel, to that woman by the well, who was told of water Jesus would give which, having drunk, would become ‘a well of water springing up to eternal life’ (Jn 4:14).
So, we have that water representing both Spirit and Life. Clearly, in the present context, life is about to be let go. And, given the agony of soul made clear by Matthew and Mark, it would not be wrong, I suppose, to see this as indicating a breech in eternal fellowship with the Holy Spirit as well, not to mention with the Father!
This points our attention to the critical point that Jesus was, in this agony upon the Cross, satisfying a legal requirement for the punishment of sin. He was not appeasing the Father. He was atoning for us. He was paying the penalty for every sin we have committed. And, in order to do so, it was necessary that the guilt for all our sin be laid upon Him, just as had long been symbolized by the temple practice of laying hands on the scapegoat. The thing is, with the very real guilt of our very real sins truly taken upon Himself, He had become reprehensible in the sight of God the Father. He Who is Holy, Who cannot abide even the presence of sin, could in no wise look upon this mess. He could offer no comfort. He could not, in this instance, show mercy.
So, yes, Jesus had every reason to be in agony of spirit. The Cross, as I have said before, was as nothing compared to this! For the first and only time in all eternity, the fellowship of the Trinity had been broken. It would be a temporary matter, at least as we perceive things in our temporal world. It was only for a few moments, a few days at most. And, to be sure, the persons of the triune Godhead knew this with absolute certainty. Yet, on another scale, I wonder how temporary this really is. He Who knows the end from the beginning, Who sits outside of the time He created, does He really experience this as a temporary condition? Is there an eternal pain?
This much we do know: that Jesus, having conquered death, took back to Himself His life, as He had been authorized to do. He note only rose from death, but He ascended into heaven, there seated for all eternity upon the throne of God’s right hand. So, whatever the eternal echo of this separation, we know this: It is not a permanent condition. God has not been permanently rent in spirit. Behold! The Lord our God, he is still and ever One.
At the same time, we do well to recognize that the agony of this moment when Father must turn away from Son was not agony for Son alone. No. The Father was equally torn apart, although He had known from all eternity that this must happen. Even so, the moment of its happening, the reality of its happening, was pain beyond measure to this God Who is Love. Yet, He would not strike out at those who had made it necessary. Even in this agony of His, He would show mercy! Wonder of wonders! So, rather than destroy mankind, or wreak immediate and most thorough vengeance even upon those fallen spirits who had instigated the fall (after all, it remained the fault of man for listening), He worked out His grief in other ways, in those signs and wonders that befell that day, things which, in the end, forced those present to stand up and take notice.
When we hear about the sun darkened during the hours of His Son’s torment, it is the grief of the Father we are hearing about. When we hear about the earthquakes that ensued, it is again the heart-wrenching sorrow of the Father that is being expressed. And, when we come to the veil of the temple, ripped asunder from top to bottom, is it not the case that we are seeing something more than just the opening of the way for our entrance into the Holy of holies? Here, too, is a most visceral display of what was happening in God’s own heart! He was being torn asunder. I don’t know that we can even grasp the pain of that separation. I don’t know if we can imagine the strength of will required not only by Jesus, but also by the Father – and the Holy Spirit, too – for them to see this work completed. If ever you doubted God’s love for you, think about that! Think about the fact that He watched His Boy die. Think about the fact that He had to schedule that death, condone that death, and even refuse the least comfort to His own being in that death. Think hard on the fact that it was you and I that made this necessary. And, then, recognize the immeasurable scope of a love that would take this on your account, just so that you could one day enjoy the very fellowship that was severed and suffering in that moment! Then, be very thankful that it was only the veil that ripped, only the earth that shook.
One last thought regarding this thirst, or perhaps two. Actually, the first is not so much a thought as an aside. When reading the accounts in their several translations, The Message is the next to last version that I reach. For all its popularity, I honestly don’t find it all that good. This actually comes as something of a surprise, given that I read other material by that version’s author, and it was quite informative, quite compelling. But, come to John’s mention of those bystanders raising up wine on a branch of hyssop, and this author instead suggests they lifted it up ‘on a javelin’! Now, I cannot find even the least hint of a cause for such a translation. If the goal was to make the text somehow more accessible for a modern office, how does this accomplish the goal? Is a javelin really any more familiar an object to those outside the track and field community? Is it something that, having been mentioned, the reader can imagine its heft in their hand? No.
Worse still, to my thinking, it loses something very important by making such a choice. There is a significance to hyssop which would not have been lost on the reader of John’s Gospel. It would not have been lost, either, on any reader today who has taken the time to read through the Old Testament. Hyssop was a plant with great significance in the culture, being used, as it had for long centuries, to sprinkle the blood of the sacrifice upon the altar, the clothes, or whatever it was that was to be thus sanctified. And here, it is the blood of the vine, as it were, that is being sprinkled upon the Sacrifice Himself. Don’t miss that! He was, and is, as the sacrifice for our sins, holy and acceptable to God. Here, He was being marked out as sanctified, for that same wine which was brought to His mouth must surely have sprinkled His body as it was lifted up. And none of that power of image is ever going to be seen in some guy stabbing a sponge on his javelin and poking it up at Jesus!
The CJB also offers a curious addition to this image, indicating that having soaked the sponge in the wine, the then ‘coated it with oregano leaves’. Where is that coming from? It may be a bit of cultural lore that is being brought into the scene. Perhaps there’s something here that echoes certain aspects of the Paschal meal? I could look, I suppose, but the larger point is that once again there is absolutely nothing in the text to indicate any such thing. The nearest I can arrive at is that they are taking the hyssop reference to indicate oregano instead. And, here again, it seems the power is lost, unless there is something in that oregano that would speak to a Jewish reader of similar things.
A Warning (01/21/13)
For my final thought on this passage, I return to something written as I considered the impact of these things on the people who had come to observe. Now, we have Luke’s report that at the end of it, with all these signs and dark omens, they went away mourning, beating their breasts in sorrow. Yet, it strikes me that this sorrow was not for that One Who had given up the ghost, but for themselves, for what must surely befall those who would murder God’s own Son.
But, looking at Matthew and Mark, we get a sense of how those same people had been feeling about things just a short time earlier. In spite of the darkened sun, it seems there was still a sense of, as I wrote in that other place, ‘the living nodding knowingly at the judgments meted out to the dead’. Hearing His agony, they were still in a mood to mock. They were still looking for entertainment from this One. If He died, so be it. They could amuse themselves in another hero brought down. If He really did come down from His cross, well! Wouldn’t that be something to witness! Therein would lie a tale to tell the grandkids, and that’s no lie! But, more of their thinking seems to have gone towards judging this One who was, if not dead, then on a certain course to arrive at that state, and in this, they thought they had his measure. Yes. He is about to die, and die in a manner not only heinous in the extreme, but even written of in Scripture as being a mark of one accursed! And this was the so-called holy man? This was the one who was going to overturn the orderly ways of the Pharisees? This was the one everybody was claiming was our Messiah? Our victorious warrior king come riding in state into Jerusalem a few days back? Well, what’s become of Him now? Where now the claims? Indeed, by His death they thought to have seen their judgment vindicated. But, as I also wrote in that place, “only later would the implications really sink in.”
We see the beginnings of that in Luke’s report. But, it would hardly be the end of that more sober assessment. Indeed, by what we understand from history, they had about forty years to think upon what they had done, or at least what they had not moved to stop. And then, Jerusalem fell. And let there be no doubt in any mind that this was indeed a judgment meted out by God in heaven.
And here, it is very necessary that I turn away from ancient history and face the present. There is a warning for us in what happened here. There is a lesson. You see, we can look back across that ancient history with that same knowing sense, nodding at the judgment meted out on ancient Jerusalem, and later on Rome’s vast empire, and we, too, can tend to miss the implications for ourselves. It is one thing to nod and concur with that ancient judgment. But, in concurring, with the justness of what was done then, what justice must we concur with in our own present day? If it was just that the nations were punished then, in what wise can we suppose it just that our own nation goes forward with its promotion of sin and incurs no judgment itself? And just how long do we suppose God will hold back? He is patient, it is true. He is merciful, too. But, He remains Just, and it would be unjust in the extreme were He to so thoroughly rebuke His own peculiar people for their corruption of His ways and yet leave this land that claims to be Scripture’s city on a hill, which set itself out as the land of religious liberty and acknowledged this same God as the arbiter of the rights of man unpunished in the absence of repentance.
I think back upon those woes Jesus had pronounced on the cities of His travels. If Sodom and Gomorrah had witnessed what you have seen, they would have repented, yet you have not! If the Roman Empire had the benefit of our knowledge, of our grasp of sound doctrine and theology, as well as of history and political science, one wonders what might have come about. If Great Britain had held firm to its image of being the New Jerusalem, had kept to the faith which at times fueled them, would the sun still fail to set on their lands? In an alternate, and far less happy reading, if this nation of America continues on its present course and refuses to repent of the wickedness it not only pursues but even promotes, can it really be supposed that our own period of power will be allowed to persist for so very long?
It would be easy to look upon the situation in purely political or historical terms and find the question already sufficiently disturbing. History says that these periods of political power have limited durations, and ours has already endured a few hundred years of prominence. Sufficient cause exists to ask, ‘how much longer?’ The signs of decay are there for all to see, and it doesn’t require the eyes of faith to discern. But, when the eyes of faith are brought to bear, to contemplate the evidence and its significance, then surely the situation is seen to be more dire still! Can a nation that promotes abortion, promotes sexual abominations, promotes fornication as one of its chief industries really think God will be pleased with its claims to be a Christian society? Really? You know, the religious rites continued in Israel even past 70 AD. People of real and earnest faith still dwelt in the land. But, the time of God’s patience had passed. The crisis moment had come with the Cross, and the people had been found wanting. When will our own crisis moment have come and gone? Will we fare any better? I pray we do, but I find scant cause to suppose it likely.
There is much to be done by way of evangelism and missionary work here in our own nation. We have focused on far-flung countries for a long time, but we have neglected the festering disease plaguing our own national body. Other nations have noticed. Other nations are now sending missionaries to us! And ought that not in itself to be a wake-up call? How loudly does God need to shout the warning before we will listen? How deeply are we asleep, here in the American church? How long can we hope to remain satisfied in our enclaves, thinking it sufficiently glorious that we resolve not to go outside and be part of what’s happening out there? More than repentance is needed! How shall they repent if they have not heard? And how are they going to hear if we no longer go to them, but instead draw inward, making ourselves little fortress churches?
Oh, the tide of culture is most assuredly against us, let there be no illusions about that! But, God is for us. If we have been herded out of the public square, it’s time we insistently pushed our way back in. In love, to be sure! Without God’s Love in the fore every effort we might make would be vanity and wind. But, at the same time, our willingness to retreat is most unbecoming of the ambassador of the King of kings!
I find myself echoing some themes from much nearer the start of this journey through the Gospels, echoes of that call for people to stand with faith as Caleb did, when he and Joshua alone still believed what God had promised. Indeed, as I recall from that time, there were moments when it would seem even Joshua had his doubts, but Caleb stood firm. Caleb went forth, certain of the God he served, not of his own prowess as a warrior. My! The man was pushing ninety when he went forth to take Hebron. Confidence in his own prowess? I think not! But, he knew what God had spoken, and he believed it. More: He lived it! And that made all the difference.
What shall happen when we, the church in the west, begin to not only believe God, but to live in light of His word? I’m talking stuff far and away beyond trying to live a good and righteous life. I’m talking things that are past the point of trying to shape our character in His image, when that character and that God Who shapes it impels us to action. I’m thinking of a Church that really believed the gates of hell could not prevail against it. I’m thinking of a Church that knew it had the keys of life and of death, that knew it spoke on behalf of the Creator, that knew it bore the message of Truth, even into a nation that wasn’t too sure truth exists. I’m thinking of a Church that could speak of hope made certain, and do so in the full power of the Holy Spirit indwelling. It’s time we leave the reservation, lest that moment of crisis come for our nation, and we be found as wanting as those who are yet in the darkness beyond our doors.
