Why did Jesus really die on the cross?
This week, millions of people throughout the world will remember the death of Jesus on the cross. After all, it is an historical event attested to by the witness of Scripture as well as non-Christian historians like Josephus, Tacitus, and Pliny. Yet, why did Jesus really die on the cross? If you say that he died because he was betrayed and crucified, you would only be scratching the surface with such an answer. The real reason Jesus died wasn’t because of man’s plans, it was due to God’s plans. In the first post-crucifixion and post-resurrection sermon, Peter told the religious leaders of his day that Jesus, “was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross” (Acts 2:23). Why did Jesus really die? It wasn’t a tragic accident. It was part of God’s rescue plan for the world.
Both as individuals and as a human race, we need to be rescued from something: sin and death. Since our first parents sinned in the garden, we have followed suit, and have sinned too. Sin means breaking God’s law. James 2:10 says that if we keep some of God’s commands, and yet “stumble at just one point” we are “guilty of breaking all of it.” Picture this. Imagine you are dangling over the edge of a cliff holding on to a ten-link metal chain. If it breaks, it doesn’t matter which link of the ten breaks, you will fall to your death no matter what! In the same way, breaking just one of God’s laws (like The Ten Commandments) makes us law-breakers and guilty before God who is perfect.
When we got into this mess, what did God do? The Bible says, “God demonstrated his own love for us in his: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). So, the punishment that our sins deserve—death—was paid by Jesus, out of love. The prophet Isaiah put it like this: “The punishment that brought us peace was upon him” (Isaiah 53:5).
Some people object and say, “How could God punish Jesus, an innocent third party? That doesn’t seem fair?” But in actual fact, Jesus isn’t a third party. When Jesus died, the Bible says, “God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them” (2 Corinthians 5:17). God was paying for our sins Himself, “in Christ.” Since Jesus is God, in human flesh, God was therefore the one paying the debt that our sins had accumulated. This is why the day that Jesus died is called by Christians as “Good” Friday. The day that Christ died was indeed very good for us because it was the culmination of God’s rescue plan to deal with our sins.
We often say that Christ died for our sins. And that’s true. But how do we actually know that his death accomplished that? How can we be sure that when Jesus cried out on the cross, “It is finished,” that the work of paying for our sins really was accomplished? The proof is the resurrection. Romans 4:25 says that Jesus was “delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” The resurrection authenticates the work of Jesus on the cross.
Though God’s good salvation plans were achieved at the cross and by the resurrection, the saving benefits of Christ’s death don’t apply to you automatically. You have to receive them personally. Like a gift, they must be received in order to benefit from it. If you’re never done that, please click here to learn more about how you can do that.
