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March 28, 2009Why Jesus Died
"Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him."
- Acts 2:22-24
Since Jesus had no sin either in his nature or in his conduct, he need never have died either physically or spiritually. ... Then why did he do it? What was the rationale of his death? There is only one possible, logical, biblical answer. It is that he died for our sins, not his own. The death he died was our death, the penalty which our sins had richly deserved.
- John Stott, Our Guilty Silence
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Comments
Amen! Shout it from the roof tops now, for the time is approaching that we will be muzzled.
Posted By: Ralph Gaily | March 30, 2009 5:24 PM
A Jesus died for the likes of this crowd--which includes the likes of me.
What wondrous love is this!
Posted By: SallyB | April 2, 2009 2:41 PM
The picture s is speaks more than thousand words. It is well painted. The only deficit is no Asian faces is included.
Richard Teo
Posted By: Richard Teo | April 3, 2009 10:23 PM
Jesus's death and resurrection had two dimensions: the vertical and the horizontal. He died for our sins so that we could be reconciled to God and he died for our sins so that Jews and Gentiles could be reconciled through him. There is a vertical and horizontal purpose for Christ's death. Ephesians 2:11-18 puts it this way:
11Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called "uncircumcised" by those who call themselves "the circumcision" (that done in the body by the hands of men)— 12remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.
14For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility, 15by abolishing in his flesh the law with its commandments and regulations. His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, 16and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. 17He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. 18For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.
Christ "purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two. . . ." This is the horizontal dimension of the Gospel.
Why is this important? Because history has borne the result of emphasizing only the vertical dimension: personal piety divorce from Christian ethics.
Personal piety that focuses only on the vertical dimension of the gospel allows for only a shallow gospel that preaches personal salvation without the recognition of the spiritual fruits of communinal and social accountability. Horizontal texts like Galatians 3:26-29, 1 John 4:7 ff., John 17:2-23, and Revelations 5:9-10; 7:9-10 and their implications and applications for today can be ignored. Consequently, the results have been that Christians are saved, but still practice, preach and propagate sexism, classism, ethnocentrism, racism, and "negative" nationalism.
One must preach the two-fold purposes of God, the Vertical and Horizontal, in order to have a Biblical Gospel. To do less is heresy! We must preach the Ephesian text along side of the other Gospel texts.
Posted By: Floyd Knight | April 4, 2009 2:04 PM
Christians know that when reconciled to God, they are also to be reconciled with their "neighbor". I do not care for some preaching that seems to be one-sided. I do think we need to learn LOVE. NO one has that down, Christian or other. Christians do believe that Jesus IS the Way, Truth, and Life.
They need to grow in what that means and follow Him. Sexism, classism, ethnocentrism, racism and Negative Nationalism is not a Christian sin...it is a human sin and occurs all over the World. It is horrible in most of the religions of the World...just look at it! Then realize that a REAL personal relationship, a real sincere seeking of the Will of God moment to moment, is what Christ did and what we are to follow. We stand alone in our relationship with the Living Spirit of God.
Posted By: susan | April 7, 2009 9:17 AM
Can anyone please provide the title and artist of this painting? It's fascinating.
Posted By: unlikelymoose | October 26, 2009 4:16 PM