This article is based on Pastor Adrian Rogers' message, The Cross.
Why is Jesus King?
Because He has risen from the dead. When Jesus walked out of that empty tomb on Easter Sunday, He did more than survive death: Jesus’ resurrection destroyed death. Jesus our Redeemer is the first fruits of the resurrection. When He comes again, we will have the full harvest.
But how did this story of redemption come to be? What does it mean to be redeemed? Why did Jesus have to die in order to redeem us?
What happened on the cross was substitutionary atonement. “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18a).
Jesus the Messiah, the virgin-born, spotless Son of God, died for the unjust—that’s me and you. He became our substitute.
Jesus was “in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15b).
But in order for Him to redeem us, our sin had to be placed upon Christ.
For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Jesus did not just bear sin; He became sin. He never sinned. But He was made sin for us, so that He could carry that sin to the cross.
Jesus knew that the punishment of all the sin of all God’s people of all time would be upon Him. One Man, the God-Man, would bear it all. God the Father would have to treat Jesus as if He had committed every one of our sins—past, present, and future.
Jesus knew He was going to suffer the very fires of Hell.
The eternal Son who had been in the bosom of the Father from eternity was going to be now separated from God. He was going to cry out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46b)
The answer to the cost of sin is that God is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. The Father had to turn His back on the Son.
At the cross, the sins of the world were distilled, the eternities were compressed, and Jesus, being infinite, bore in a finite period of time what we, being finite, would bear in an infinite period of time. Jesus Christ suffered an eternity of Hell on that cross. Even the damned in Hell cannot know what He suffered, because they are only paying for their own sin.
If you do not understand why Jesus shrank back from that cup in Gethsemane, you do not understand sin.
In His humanity and in His holiness, Jesus said, “O God, if there be some other way...”
The silence from Heaven said, “There is no other way.”
So, in Jesus’ divine love, He chose to die.
Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father (John 10:17-18).
Satan once said to God the Father, “Not Your will, but mine be done.”
Adam, following Satan in the Garden of Eden, said, “Not Your will, but mine,” and ruined the human race.
But Jesus, the last Adam, in the Garden of Gethsemane, said, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done” (Matthew 26:42b)—and redeemed His people.
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 6:23).
When Jesus said, “It is finished” (see John 19:30), He meant that the debt had been paid, absolutely. He had satisfied the demands of God’s holy law concerning sin. There is nothing you can do, and nothing you need do to pay for your sin. You must accept Jesus’ substitutionary sacrifice.
Sin separates us from a holy God. Christ’s sacrifice on the cross reconciles us to that holy God. Jesus has taken us by the hand to present us to God the Father. He says, Father, these are mine. I purchased them with my blood.
When Adam sinned against God, he died immediately in his spirit, progressively in his soul, and ultimately in his body. When our Lord redeems us, He reverses it: we are justified immediately in the spirit, sanctified progressively in the soul, and glorified ultimately in the body. Jesus’ resurrection on the third day allows us to be raised to eternal life with Him.
As the Apostle Paul said to King Agrippa, “Why should it be thought incredible by you that God raises the dead?” (Acts 26:8)
So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?” The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:54-57).
Jesus’ death has conquered Death. Knowing this should not only make us better theologians, but better Christians.
As Paul continues with the word, “Therefore…”
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord (1 Corinthians 15:58).
Christ gives us a steadfast, sure hope so that we can mock death. Christ fulfilled the law for us; therefore, death holds no terrors for us. Death cannot hurt you. Remember: at the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, the living saints will be transported, and the dead saints will be raised—all to eternal life in the presence of God. And in the meantime, He has sent us His Holy Spirit to sanctify us in new life. This is the grace of God to us.
1 Peter 3:18; Hebrews 4:15; 1 Corinthians 15:21,54-58; Matthew 27:46; John 10:17-18; Matthew 26:42; Romans 6:23; Acts 26:8
But this Man [Jesus], after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified (Hebrews 10:12-14; word in brackets added).
For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross (Colossians 1:19-20).
