Day 30 :: Save Yourself!
“He saved others, but he cannot save himself! He is the King of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God; let God rescue him now—if he takes pleasure in him! For he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’”
Matthew 27:39-44
In one episode of Dad’s Army the elderly Private Godfrey reveals that he had been a Conscientious Objector during the Great War. Conscientious Objectors were men exempt from fighting because they claimed to be pacifists. They were widely regarded as cowards, this was certainly Captain Mainwaring’s view. Godfrey, despite being a kind and gentle old man, is shunned. Contrary to all expectations, at the end of the episode the platoon discovers rather than being a coward he is a decorated war hero who as a medic went out into no man’s land during fierce battle and saved several lives. Our perceptions and that of society around us can so often be very wrong.
In this passage we read that as Jesus hung on the cross, he was surrounded by scoffers and mockers. Can it get much lower for Jesus? The passage says ‘even the criminals’ taunted him. Everybody from the heights of the religious establishment standing before him to lowlife criminals that hung at either side mock our Lord. Even the passers-by ridicule. The One who is worthy of all praise is subject to the mockery of man.
When BBC Sports presenter David Icke claimed to be the ‘Son of the Godhead’ in 1990 he too was met by mockery and derision. The public rightfully estimated that it was ridiculous for a football commentator to claim to be divine.
For the people of Christ’s day as they saw him dying at the hands of their oppressors, the Man who had stood before their religious leaders and condemned them harshly, claiming to do so with Divine authority, to see him humbled and cowed in this most brutal way appeared to them to eliminate the possibility that he might actually be who He claimed to be.
But Isaiah wrote that this would happen. In chapter 53, Isaiah says Christ would be ‘despised and rejected’ He would be regarded as ‘struck down by God’ and that he would be ‘like someone people turned away from.’ Christ, to the on-looking world, looked like an absolutely hopeless case. To them he was worthy of nothing more than contempt and snide remarks. But Isaiah also tells us that one day the Jews will see that rather than being an accursed blasphemer, Jesus is actually their promised Messiah.
“We…regarded Him stricken, stuck down by God, and afflicted. But He was pierced because of our rebellion, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on Him, and we are healed by His wounds.”
Isa 53:4-5
At the cross everybody thought this was a defeat, even believers like Peter were confounded. In reality, while the cross looked like a pitiful end, the cross was God’s answer to the world’s problem.
“God has chosen what is foolish in the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen what is weak in the world to shame the strong.”
1st Corinthians 1:27
David Icke’s claims to divinity were accompanied by prophecies of wide-spread natural disasters. When they inevitably failed to materialise, this demonstrated the obvious, his claims were bogus.
However, when Christ died a humiliating, horrific death that was not the end, he went onto to demonstrate beyond doubt the reality of Deity. His lifeless body was enclosed in a cold, dark tomb. On the third day, Jesus, the apparent defeated victim, rose victoriously over death. Jesus was truly dead but as the sinless Saviour death could not hold him. Everybody who had died up to this point were sinners, dying as a consequence of sin. Jesus is holy, the spotless, unblemished Lamb, only he could defeat the shackles of death and open the prison doors, leading all who trust in him, in his death and resurrection, out into eternal life. Praise God, Jesus is the Victor!
“O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
1st Corinthians 15:54-57
Passages to read: Matthew 27:39-44, Mark 15:29-32, Luke 22:35-36
A thought to remember: God's power is made perfect through weakness
A question to ask: How might our faith be misconstrued by the unbelieving world round about us?
A song to sing: Old Rugged Cross