Think about this statement as you study through the last time Jesus ate a meal and had an intimate discussion with his disciples:
“Until you see the cross as that which is done BY you, you will never
appreciate that it was done FOR you.” -John Stott
At the end of the day, we can't play the blame game about who put
Jesus on the cross. It's not Judas' fault for betraying him. It's
not the crowd's fault that was yelling "Crucify Him!" It's not
Pilate's fault for handing him over to the people. It's not the Roman
Centurions' fault for hanging him on the cross and watching him die.
It's YOUR sin that put Jesus on the cross. Its' MY sin that put him
on the cross. Jesus did that for US.
But before his body was broken literally and his blood actually
spilled onto the ground, he used this meal to foreshadow the gruesome
event.
“The Lord’s Supper”
Matthew 26:17-30
Key Theme...Sacrifice.
Key Truth...Jesus died our death.
KeyTexts...1 Corinthians 11:23-26, Exodus 12, Exodus 24, Leviticus 16
-We deserve to die for our sin.
And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.” Genesis 2:16-17
For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23
-On the cross, Jesus sacrificed Himself and died in our place.
...just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. Ephesians 5:2
But now [ Jesus] has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. Hebrews 9:26
2 comments:
Thanks for putting this together for us! It is so encouraging to know the whole team is reading through the same passages of scripture. Excited about this! We should do it more!!
It is so humbling to remind myself that it is MY sin that put Jesus on the cross. It is easy for me to be like "oh look at what Sally is doing... I am not doing that so yay for me." But that is so wrong. The pride in my heart makes me think I am better but that is no not true. My pride put Jesus on the cross. I put him there! I have been reading Greg Groeschel's, Christian Athiest, and it is so cool to see how it is paralleling with what we are reading. I think it is easy for people to live in their sins, like think oh because I lied I am a liar and that is who I am. But the awesome part is even though we put Christ on the cross with ALL our sins, "we are not our sins." We don't have to be defined by them. We are who God says we are: we are his children, we are forgiveable, we are changable. MAN!! How awesome! We deserve to die for our sins, but instead Jesus sacrificed himself and died in our place!!!
Hey the quote by John Stott is really good. After I read through some of the passages and prayed a little I looked back at the quote. It really reminds me of how we forget what Christ has done for us. We don't realize how much we are forgiven.
Luke 7:39-50 is about the woman washing Jesus' feet with her hair... the pharisees are upset by this... Jesus reminds them that "those who are forgiven much, will love much."
To often we forget how much we have been forgiven, as we compare
ourselves to other humans. We all were in such debt to Jesus and he
wiped the slate clean... This should make us excited!
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