THE ROAD TO CALVARY

The road to calvary is simply reminding us the experience Jesus Christ went through until He was nailed to the cross and on the cross.

His experience was not palatable, that was why at a point in time Jesus was asking God, if the cup can be taken away from him, but although He  quickly surrendered to the will  of God for Him.  It has been predestined by God for Jesus to die for us.

Jesus came to die on the cross – the things He suffered are prophesied in Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53.  These prophecies are explicit in stating the Messiah’s suffering.  Remember, He suffered and died so that you and I can be blessed with the forgiveness that comes to all who place their faith in Jesus as their Saviour (Matthew 1: 21).  Jesus had to go through the process.  He was brought to the cross so that it can be explicit the relationship of Christ to the whole world, the enormous hatred man had for God or the art of selfishness of humanity show-casing the antagonistic way of the devil.

Jesus came to die…

To destroy hostility between races

The suspicion, prejudice, and demeaning attitudes between Jews and non-Jews in Bible times.  Jesus died to create a whole new way for races to be reconciled; he “has broken down… the dividing wall of hostility … making peace … through the cross” (Eph. 2: 14-16)

To absorb the wrath of God, God’s law demanded, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deut. 6: 5).  The seriousness of an insult rises with the dignity of the one insulted.  Since our sins are against the Ruler of the Universe, “the wages of (our) sins is death” (Romans 6: 23).  Failure to punish it would be unjust.  So God sent His own Son, Jesus, to divert sin’s punishment from us to himself.  God “loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation” – the wrath-absorbing substitute ‘  ‘for our sins’ (I John 4: 10).

To give marriage its deepest meaning:  God’s desire was never for marriages to be miserable, yet many are.  That’s what sin does… it makes us treat each other badly.  Jesus died to change that.  He knew that his suffering would make the deepest meaning of marriage plain.  That’s why the Bible says, “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her”  (Eph. 5: 25).  God’s design for marriage is for a husband to love his wife the way Christ loves his people, and for the wife to respond the way Christ’s people should, so that we would escape the curse of the law.

There was no escape from the curse of God’s law.  It was just; we were guilty.  There was only one way to be free; someone must pay the penalty.  “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us”  (Galatians 3: 13).

To reconcile us to God:  The reconciliation that needs to happen between man and God goes both ways.  God’s first act in reconciling us to himself was to remove the obstacle that separated him from us – the guilt  of our sin.

To show God’s love for sinners:  The measure of God’s love is shown by the degree of his sacrifice in saving us from the penalty of our sins: ‘he gave his only Son’ (John 3: 16).  “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us:  (Romans 5: 8)

To show Jesus’ own love for us:  The death of Christ is also the supreme expression that he “loved me and gave himself for me”  (Gal. 2: 20).  It is my sin that cuts me off from God.  I see Christ suffering and dying “to give his life as a ransom for many”  (Matt. 20: 28).  And I ask, am I among the “many”?  And I hear the answer. “Whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life”  (John 3: 16).  Jesus paid the highest price possible to give me – personally – the greatest gift possible.

To take away our condemnation:  The great conclusion to the road to calvary is this:  “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8: 1).  The death of Christ secures freedom from condemnation for those who believe that Christ has served their death sentence.  It is as sure that they cannot be condemned as it is sure that Christ died!

To bring us to God:  “Gospel” means “good news”, and it all ends in one thing:  God himself.  The gospel is the good news that at the cost of his Son’s life, God has done everything necessary to captivate us with what will make us eternally and ever-increasingly happy – namely:  himself, “Christ … suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God”  (I Peter 3: 18).

To give eternal life to all who believe on Him.  Jesus made it plain that rejecting the eternal life he offered would result in the misery of eternity in hell: “Whoever does not believe is condemned already … the wrath of God remains on him”  (John 3: 18, 36).

The Road to Calvary was the way He suffered for us, before He was finally brought down from the cross to be buried