Friday, April 12, 2019
Because God’s children are human beings—made of flesh and blood—the Son also became flesh and blood. For only as a human being could he die, and only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death. Only in this way could he set free all who have lived their lives as slaves to the fear of dying. We also know that the Son did not come to help angels; he came to help the descendants of Abraham. Therefore, it was necessary for him to be made in every respect like us, his brothers and sisters, so that he could be our merciful and faithful High Priest before God. Then he could offer a sacrifice that would take away the sins of the people. Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we are being tested. Hebrews 2:14-18
In yesterday’s
devotion I asked the question how it could be God’s good
plan for His Son, Jesus to be “crushed”. In this morning’s reading the answer is rolled-out
so very plainly it shouts here I am; here’s the answer. So, let’s dig in with the writer of Hebrews
this morning and rest in Lent’s unchanging Good News for all humanity, that we’ve
sinned, but there is a Savior!
Let’s
explore three important facts about being crushed for us as a good plan:
1. God is Eternal; He never dies
This
is the most easily-accepted of the three; God’s eternality makes sense if you hold
Scripture as true at all. The creator of
everything must have been there before everything else existed. We see this naturally; God having placed it
in our DNA that He is before all. Even
as children we understand this; we expect our parents will never die. As God always existed, so he always exists!
2. Humans, slaves to Sin can’t live
Again,
faith in Scripture’s authenticity (and accuracy) opens this fact to us. In the opening chapters of Genesis, as soon
as humans are created they rebel.
Humans, therefore, introduce death to an otherwise perfect environment. And, as we pass-along in our DNA
characteristics of body, defects, hair and eye color, we also pass along Adam’s
sin nature; we pass along the ungodlike ability to fear and die.
3. God came to exchange our Death for His LIFE
As God in
Heaven cannot die, the good plan of God to redeem
his fallen, but beloved creation (us), is for God to enter humanity, to accept the
ability to die. In short, in the manger
and the 33 years that followed, God incarnate took on, in every way possible, our
death:
This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. Hebrews 4:15
But Jesus
didn’t just passively take-on, or accept death, He defeated, and
will ultimately destroy death. Hear
those familiar words you’ve heard at funerals so often…but hear them now as what
began as a newborn in a borrowed birthing-suite rank with barnyard smells, and
ultimately culminated in smashing the fear-filled chains of death that were trying
to keep eternal God in a borrowed tomb.
This was the other half of God’s good plan
– that which he accomplished (defeating death) He gives to all who turn to Him
in faith:
Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” For sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power. But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:54-57
For You Today
Lent is a
time for looking at the big picture – life, death, meaning; this is it, God’s good plan the best gift in the universe –
life, eternal!
