What Did Jesus Give Up?

Luke describes Jesus before his death as being in “agony” and describes a man in a state of mental trauma.  Matthew, Mark, and Luke all show Jesus asking to avoid death, “If it be your will…take this cup from me”.  And at the very end, Jesus does not, as the Maccabean martyrs did, confidently call those present to conversion. Rather, he cries out to God that God has forsaken him. Sure, Jesus suffered a three-hour-long death by slow suffocation and blood loss. Yet, as horrible as that was, there have been far more excruciating deaths that martyrs have faced with far greater confidence and serenity.

Why was Jesus so much more overwhelmed by his death than others have been, even more than his own followers?

To understand the full depth of Christ’s suffering we must remember how he is introduced at the beginning. The gospel writer John introduces us to the mystery of God as tri-personal. The Son of God was not created but took part in creation and has lived throughout all eternity “in the bosom of the Father” (John 1:18) — that is, in a relationship of absolute intimacy and love beyond our capacity to imagine.

And at the end of his life he was cut off from the Father.

There may be no greater inner agony than the loss of a relationship we desperately want. If a mild acquaintance turns on you, condemns and criticizes you, and says he never wants to see you again, it is painful. If someone you’re dating does the same thing, it is qualitatively more painful. And if your spouse does this to you, the psychological damage is... infinitely worse.

We cannot fathom, however, what it would be like to lose not just spousal love that has lasted several years, but the infinite love of the Father that Jesus had from all eternity. Jesus’s suffering would have been eternally unbearable.

Still at the Movies

Still at the movies: Rocky is incredulous.  “You asking me to pull an act, turn yellow, so those kids will think I’m no good…. Nothing doing. You want to help those kids, you got to think about some other way.”  Father Jerry is calling Rocky to make a substitutionary sacrifice. If you hold on to your dignity, he says, those kids will eventually die in shame. If you die in shame, their lives can be salvaged. Rocky refuses. But the next morning as Rocky walks to the execution chamber, he cries out for mercy in cowardly hysterics, and dies in apparent humiliation.

The gospel, however, is not just a moving fictional story about someone else. It is a true story - about us. We are those delinquent kids.  And to save us Jesus gave up something infinitely greater than celebrity.

But just what did Jesus give up?

The gospel narratives make it clear that Jesus did not face death with the courage that was generally expected in a spiritual hero.  The well-known Maccabean martyrs, who suffered under the Syrian rule of Antiochus Epiphanes, were notable examples of courage in the face of persecution. They were renowned for being defiant and having confidence in God even as their limbs were cut off.  That stands in blunt contrast with Jesus, who is deeply disturbed by his approaching suffering and death. “…He began to be deeply distressed and troubled” saying, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death” (Mark 14:33-34).

Going to the Movies

Unlike primitive deities, who demanded blood for their wrath to be appeased - extracting their revenge -the God of the Bible becomes human and offers his own life in order to destroy all evil - without destroying us.

And yet the Cross is much more than just a lovely example of sacrificial love. Furthermore, to die needlessly is wrong. Jesus’s death is only a good example if it was more than an example, if it was something absolutely necessary to rescue us. And it was.

Why did Jesus have to die in order to forgive us? There was a debt to be paid — God himself paid it. There was a penalty to be born— God himself bore it.

To make this clearer and for a change of pace, let’s go to the movies. In the film Angels with Dirty Faces, James Cagney plays Rocky Sullivan, a celebrity criminal who is the idol of all the juvenile delinquents in the city. Rocky is now on death row. The night before his execution he is visited by his boyhood friend, played by Pat O’Brien, now a priest trying to save inner-city kids from a life of crime.

Father Jerry makes an outrageous request believing it’s the only way the kids he is working with can be turned away from the destructive path they are on.  “I want you to let them down. You see, you’ve been a hero to these kids, all your life — and now you’re gonna be a glorified heroin death. Rocky, they’ve got to despise your memory. They’ve got to be ashamed of you.”  Rocky is incredulous.

To be continued…