Christ's death, as well as the outcome of His death, was pre-planned by God: it was not a plan B'.
Him being delivered by the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have
crucified and slain' (Acts 2:23).
Many years ago, Jonathan Edwards preached a sermon
entitled, 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.' Today, with the
widespread low view of God, many think of God in the hands of angry
sinners. God, to many, is a very little 'God' indeed, who is being
hindered and limited by the wicked hands of men. One man thinks he can
hold God off at arm's length and say to Him, 'I will not!' or that he
can, if he choose, open his heart to the Saviour and let Him in. What a
burlesque caricature of the 'Almighty God, whose power no creature is
able to resist!' Our text does not say that Christ was delivered up to
death on the cross by man's wicked hands, but by the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God. Yet we hear 'the Cross of Jesus' being spoken
of as an emergency measure on the part of God. As one writer put it:
'Emergencies change all habits of action, divine and human... The
greatest event on earth, the Cross, was an emergency action' (S. D.
Gordon, Quiet Talks on Prayer, p. 55). What a travesty of the
truth! God never gets into an emergency. He is the Creator of
circumstances; and no circumstance is or becomes any problem to Him. God
is never put into a predicament; and the Cross was no afterthought,
suddenly brought in to cope with an unforeseen difficulty. Nor was the
death of Christ a calamity which calls for man's sympathy and pity.
Neither was His death a mere experiment, uncertain in its results. It
was not a mere trial which God put into operation to see what good could
be accomplished, or what favourable response to it could be elicited
from man. It was perfectly planned in the eternal purpose and counsel of
the sovereign God. 'For of a truth against thy holy servant [same word,
v. 25] Jesus, whom thou didst anoint, both Herod and Pontius Pilate,
with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together, to
do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done' (Acts 4:27-28).
Hear the whole purpose of the Cross from the lips of incarnate Truth:
'And 1, if I be lifted up from the earth [on the cross], will draw all unto me' (John 12:32); and 'all that the Father giveth me shall come unto me' (6:37).
I delight in this truth and love to proclaim it, that the counsel of
the Lord shall stand, and He shall do all His pleasure. Therefore of all
that the Father giveth to Christ, He shall lose nothing. By His
predetermined death they are eternally saved, and they shall never
perish (John 10:28). Every part of the crucifixion was according to the eternal purpose of God which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord (Eph. 3:11).
You can see, then, that the principle cause of
Christ's death was no contingency, accident or chance, but the sovereign
counsel and eternal foreknowledge of God. It was God who planned it,
who ordered it, and who disposed all things concerning it. This in no
case implies that the murderers of Christ were forced into their evil
act. They acted freely, and did unto Him whatsoever they listed. Yet
they are accountable to God for their sin, and are not excused on the
ground that it was all the work of God's determinate counsel. Their
malice, cruelty and wicked hands God was pleased to use as instruments
to accomplish His own holy purpose. From the human side, it was (1) a
violent death. He was put to death outrageously by furious men: 'ye have
taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain.' Yet from the point
of view of God's sovereignty, no man could touch Him, except by the
will of the Almighty Lord. To the Father's will He was always obedient.
So it was (2) a voluntary death. He laid down His life of himself; no
man took it from Him. He had power to lay it down, and power to take it
again. It was (3) a painful death. 'The cross was a rack as well as a
gibbet' (John Flavel). The pains which He suffered were the pains of
death and hellish agonies. His body was wracked with pain. He endured
bitter sorrow and travail of soul. Further, it was (4) a shameful death.
Only slaves, and the basest and vilest of men were crucified. They were
made an ignominious spectacle. But Jesus 'endured the cross' and
'despised the shame.'
Now why did Jesus thus die? Not to show us how a good
man dies; not to teach us how even before the threat of death to remain
true to our convictions; nor to prove that martyrdom is better than
compromise. No, it was because in and by His death He must bear the
curse of God against sin. The curse of the Law was against all of us,
since we all fall short of that divine Law. Christ bore the curse for
His people and redeemed them from it. His was (5) a prefigured death. In
the Old Testament we have the figure of the lamb being sacrificed as a
type of Christ, Who is the Lamb of God. His was (6) a predicted death.
He himself had predicted His own death: 'For indeed the Son of Man goes
on his predestined way; but woe to the man who is betraying him!' (Luke 22:22,
Weymouth). Also, God had foreappointed His death. It was all 'according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of His
own will' (Eph. 1:11). Therefore, though He died on the cross, He did not die of
the cross. Christ was not a victim of circumstances. No, all
circumstances are in the control of God. Nor did Christ suffer a tragic
death as a result of caprice, chance, fortune or luck. Banish the
thought that the cross was a tragedy, or any sort of an emergency that
God was forced into! Yet we come across sermon titles such as 'The
Tragedy of the Cross.' Now a 'tragedy' is defined by Webster's Dictionary,
First (1828) Edition: 'A fatal, mournful event in which human life is
lost by human violence, particularly by unauthorized violence,' and so
is 'the fatal outcome of a hopeless struggle.' But that is exactly what
the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ was not! 'Known unto God are all
his works from the beginning of the world' (Acts 15:18);
and the cross is no exception to this. It was no fatal outcome of a
hopeless struggle; but it was the inevitable consequence of an
invincible purpose!
Thus it is with the precious blood of Christ.
Believers are saved by that blood while on earth, that they may live
with Christ in heaven. And the blood which is redemption to them on
earth, is confirmation to those in heaven. Because of His shed blood,
the saints in heaven have more perfect joy, but not more security, than
the saints still on earth. As the gleaning of a 'handful of purpose'
from an old forgotten field has it:
But Christ's to the end shall endure,
As sure as the earnest is given;
More happy, but not more secure,
The glorified spirits in heaven.
So it is by His blood that He has opened the kingdom
of heaven to all believers; notice, not to all men, but to all
believers! That is the extent and intent of His death: 'By him all that
believe are justified from all things, from which they could not be
justified by the law of Moses' (Acts 13:39). According to II Thessalonians 2:13, 'chosen ... through ... belief of the truth,' believers are the elect.
The world sees this mighty sacrifice held up as the
means of pardon and forgiveness for the people of God; and the world
hates every bit of it. The ungodly will have nothing of God's mercy in
the blood of Christ. With them, it is mercy despised. Yet those who
trust in that atoning blood, though they be the greatest sinners, are
certain of free, full and final pardon. The very blackest guilt can no
more stand under the cleansing power of that blood than a wicked
reprobate can stand up under God's wrath and justice. By that Divine
blood every stain is washed away. That efficacious blood blots out all
the sins of all the elect, even their most obstinate unbelief.
As a certain writer so wonderfully described His
death: (1) It was a natural death, that is, it was a real death. He did
not merely swoon on the cross, then revive in the coolness of the tomb.
The eternal Son of God 'became flesh,' condemned sin in the flesh, and
'tasted death' itself. That the naturalness of it might be the more
apparent, He was buried, and lay in the tomb for three days. (2) It was
an unnatural death, that is, it was exceptional. Death had absolutely no
claim on the Divine Saviour. Death comes by sin, and He had no sin.
Peter says, 'He did no sin' (I Peter 2:22); John says, 'in him is no sin' (I John 3:5); Paul says, 'He knew no sin' (II Cor. 5:21).
He is 'holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.' Pilate found
no fault in Him. Therefore for the Holy One of God to die, it was
unnatural. (3) His death was supernatural. It was the death of the Son
of God predetermined from all eternity. He was the Lamb slain from
before the foundation of the world. He himself had said, 'From
henceforth I tell you before it come to pass, that when it is come to
pass, ye may believe that I am he' (John 13:19).
We are redeemed with the 'precious blood of Christ as
of a lamb without blemish (in His person), and without spot (in His
conduct); who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the
world' (I Peter 1:20).
God in His determinate counsel planned from eternity that the Saviour
should die as the sacrifice for sin, that we might live. His death was
supernatural also in that it was different from any other death. It was a
voluntary death, for He 'laid down' His life of himself. He was led,
not driven, as a lamb to the slaughter. He bowed His head, and gave up
His spirit. Through all the six hours of excruciating pain on the cross,
He had held His head erect. It did not loll helplessly on His chest.
When He died, His head did not fall; He bowed His head, reverently and
voluntarily. Behold, the majestic bearing of Christ on the cross! But
there is further evidence that it was a supernatural death: 'Behold, the
veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and
the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; and the graves were opened' (Matt. 27:51-52).
The purpose and power of God are very outstanding in the death of His
Son. Everything about His death was in the hands and power of God. The
Son himself was the mighty conqueror in the battle of the ages (Rev. 6:2), for He killed death dead by His death, and put away sin by the sacrifice of himself (Heb. 9:26).
He was not a helpless victim of human violence. By His death He did
what was assigned Him to do, as He said, 'This commandment have I
received of my Father' (John 10:18). (Cf. A. W. Pink's The Seven Sayings of the Saviour on the Cross).
We insist,
therefore, that the death of our Lord Jesus Christ was definite and
certain in every respect, historically, naturally, spiritually and
effectually. There was nothing accidental, nothing precarious about it.
His foreknowledge rendered it certain, for God's foreknowledge is based
on His settled counsel and purpose. God foreknows only what He has
foreordained. He has foreordained whatsoever comes to pass. So Jesus
went to the cross with absolute determination, with His face set like a
flint to go to Jerusalem and Calvary. He went, not merely to make
possible the salvation of mankind, but to make certain and actual the
salvation of believers, 'the elect of God, holy and beloved' (Col. 3:12). He died on the cross, not simply to make sins pardonable, but to 'take away' sin (John 1:29).
Therefore, His death was not a mere 'conditional' redemption purely
incidental to the mood and inclination of man. It was an actual
redemption; He truly, in fact and reality redeems. 'He hath visited and
redeemed His people' (Luke 1:68).
Thus the Lord Jesus carried out into perfect execution the counsel and
will of God. He reveals, sets in motion and brings to its conclusion the
whole plan of God. We know that all things cooperate for good for them
that love God and are called according to His eternal purpose. Back in
eternity there was in the mind and plan of God His people whom He
foreknew and predestinated called, predestinated justified and
predestinated glorified (Rom. 8:28-30).
Now, in time, these people shall be called by Christ through His
preached Word, justified by His blood, and, ultimately, glorified at the
return of Christ in His glorious Second Advent. Thus the Cross of Jesus
is the central link in the chain that connects the entire plan of the
salvation of His Church Latent, Militant, Triumphant and Universal, from
everlasting to everlasting. The Lord Jesus died according to the
counsel of God, and we are saved according to the counsel of God. So the
child of God is led to sing, 'Thou shalt guide me with Thy counsel, and
afterward receive me to Glory' (Ps. 73:24).
The believer by God's grace is destined to glorification. Christ Jesus
has merited glory for us on His cross. Through the power of His cross
the glory of heaven can alone be realized. Through the power of His
cross He will draw His people from the depth of sin, death and hell to
the very height of everlasting glory. This He is able to do, since He
arose from the dead, 'ever liveth,' and death hath no more dominion over
Him. The living Christ has power to save. That gracious power is always
in operation, saving men through faith, which is itself the gift of
God, calling them, justifying them, sanctifying them, and ultimately
glorifying them both in soul and in body. With a true faith, believe and
trust the Christ of Calvary, and you will dwell for ever in the house
of the Christ of Glory.
Robert Harbach
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