Submitted by Peter Kujala
He carried his cross up to Calvary, embraced it. Already flogged by the Romans, he allowed himself to be nailed, hung on this cross. His loved ones fled, abandoned him in the hour of trial, the enemies mocked where he bleeding, suffering looked down on them and said “Father, forgive them!”.
What is this, how is such sacrificial love possible? This Jesus, who became the world’s most famous name, and whose birth marks the beginning of our calendar era and whose book, the Bible became the most read. The answer can only be found in that very book, where it says “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”. So it was love for each of us with the purpose of saving us to eternal life.
Death is one hundred percent guaranteed for everyone, no one escapes. But, this Jesus who also died on the cross is said to have conquered death and rose from the dead on the third day. I think we need an explanation here, how is this possible? We find the answer in that Bible again. It says that “the wages of sin is death”, and that Jesus as the Son of God lived a sinless life, and therefore death could not keep him.
Now we know that we ordinary people sin every day. We slander, lie, exploit, hate and treat each other unlovingly, etc. The list is as endless as this Jesus’ love for us when he takes on all our billions of sins on the cross, like a giant magnet. And before God the Father, he therefore says “Forgive them!”, and what could God then do other than just forgive us when our sins have been removed on the cross. Through this forgiveness and freedom from sin, the way has suddenly been opened to eternal life, when death lost its right to keep us.
The greatest question and fear of every human heart, is it probably “death”? Should we just cease to exist as if we never existed, a dot that fades, vanish into nothingness? The one who defeated death responds in a sacrificial and love-filled “No, believe in Me and you will live”, because as the Bible finally says: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ”. Love on the cross has spoken, can we ignore and rush on to the meaningless, emptiness of the grave and death, or do we choose to believe and rejoice in a wonderful eternal future with the prince of Life, Jesus Christ?
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