Lessons From Calvary

    “And there were also two other, malefactors, led with him to be put to death. And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the malefactors, one on the right hand, and the other on the left. Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. And they parted his raiment, and cast lots. And the people stood beholding. And the rulers also with them derided him, saying, he saved others; let him save himself, if he be Christ, the chosen of God. And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, and offering him vinegar, And saying, If thou be the king of the Jews, save thyself. And a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek, and Latin, and Hebrew, THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS. And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:32-43).

    Let us go again with our blessed Saviour to that horrible scene of sin and woe, that blessed, glorious scene of mercy, love, and grace, just outside the city of Jerusalem. I have before my mind’s eye the scene of three crosses, three criminals, soldiers, priests, a religious crowd, all gathered to slaughter the Son of God. Scattered among the others, I see a few weeping women, and in the distance, one or two heart-broken men. There is much to be seen here on the very surface. But there are other things hidden beneath the surface and unobserved by men. I see before me something of the character of God, much about the character of man, a great display of substitution, God’s great salvation, a tremendous picture of sin pardoned, a sad picture of sin unpardoned, a Saviour despised, a Saviour embraced, a sinner forever lost, and a sinner forever saved. I have found a few lessons in this passage that I pray the Spirit of God may be pleased to graciously apply to our hearts.

    How deep, bitter, universal, and vile is the hatred of the human heart for God!

    “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7).

    Oh, how fallen man hates God! We see it in the priests and the scribes. We see in the soldiers and the people. Hatred echoed through Pilate’s judgment hall. Malice rang in Herod’s court. Envy was the motive behind every word and deed performed on that infamous night by wicked men. The arrest, the scourging, the mockery, the spitting, the smiting, the cries of “Crucify him! Crucify him”!, the wagging of heads, the drunken songs, the nailing, the thieves’ railing, everything was but the outpouring of man’s utter hatred for God.

    Here we see what is in every human heart by nature. The heart of man is enmity against God. Man declared his heart in the crucifixion of God’s darling Son. Here is fallen man showing himself openly, making an unconscious confession of his hatred of God.

    It was man who erected the cross and nailed the Son of God to it. God gave the wild ass’s colt his reins and seems to have said, “Vent the feelings of your heart.” And he did, taking God by the throat, as it were; man snatched the only begotten Son of God from his Father’s heart, and crucified him with hellish delight.

    Reckoning the death of the cross the worst of all deaths, man says, “This is the best way to show my contempt for God. This is exactly what I think of the Son of God.” Thus, the enmity of the natural heart speaks out, and man not only confesses publicly that he is a hater of God, but he takes pains to show the intensity of his hatred. He glories in his shame, crying aloud, “Crucify him! Crucify him”!

    The cross interprets what is in man’s heart. The cross rips the mask of pretended religion off of the face of our race. The cross of Christ exhibits man’s heart as a cesspool, overflowing with the malignity of hell.

    Most would say, “I don’t hate God. I may be indifferent to him. He may not be in all my thoughts; but I don’t hate him”! If that is so, let men explain their daily crucifixion of the Son of God. What is man’s wilful unbelief, but the crucifying of the Son of God afresh? What is rebellion to Christ, but the crucifying of the Son of God afresh? What is blasphemy, but the crucifying of the Son of God afresh? What is man’s mockery of Christ, but the crucifying of the Son of God afresh?

    Will you dare look at your hands? They are red, dripping with blood! Whose blood is that? It is the blood of God’s own Son! Blood you shed continually in your heart, because you hate God, because you really want to be God yourself!

    Reading these lines, you may think I am being harsh. You may retort, “How dare you judge me”! I am not judging you. It is the cross that judges you. I am asking you to judge yourself by it. It is the cross that interprets your purposes and reveals the thoughts and intents of your heart.

    Oh, what a revelation of man the cross is! Man hating God, and hating him most, when God displayed his love most fully. Man acting like the devil, taking Satan’s side against God. Yes, the cross was a public declaration of man’s hatred for God and his Son. The cross is proud man spitting in God’s face and saying, “I am holy. I need no Saviour. To hell with God and his Son”! Our Saviour asked, “What think ye of Christ?” Man’s answer was, “Crucify him”! Man’s heart, his hands, his tongue all combine to scream out hatred for God and his Son. Everything I see in man on Calvary’s hill is hatred, utter hatred for God, the hatred of the human race toward the triune God. That is what your unbelief is: hatred for God and his Son (1 John 1:7-10; 5:10).

    What a horribly evil thing sin must be, if it takes the blood of God’s own Son, the death of heaven’s Darling to put it away!

    What must sin be when, in order to expiate it, the Lord of Glory must die upon the cursed tree as an outcast, a criminal, a curse? What a horribly evil thing sin must be! It is rebellion against God, treason against his throne, man’s attempt to rape and defile the holy Lord God, to drive the Almighty from his throne, to murder the Eternal Son.

    Sin is the expression of fallen man’s enmity against God, the display of our natural heart hatred of God. Sin is that which makes us obnoxious to the holy Lord God. Sin is the defilement of our race. Sin has brought us under the curse of God’s holy law. Sin has put us under the sentence of death, eternal death. Sin shuts the door of hope upon all the human race.

    It is no easy thing for sin to be put away. No carnal sacrifice can put away sin (Hebrews 10:1-7). Isaac Watts wrote:

    Not all the blood of beasts

    On Jewish altars slain

    Could give the guilty conscience peace,

    Or wash away the stain.”

    No work of man can put away one sin. No amount of repentance can put away sin. Not even our faith can put away sin. Toplady said in Rock of Ages:

    Not the labours of my hands

    Can fulfil Thy law’s demands;

    Could my zeal no respite know,

    Could my tears for ever flow,

    All for sin could not atone;

    Thou must save, and Thou alone!

    Even God himself cannot, in his pure, absolute character as God, put away sin. If sin is to be put away, it must be put away by the sin-atoning death and substitutionary sacrifice of the incarnate God, the God-man Mediator, the Lord Jesus Christ.

    But his sacrifice was enough. He died but once; and once was enough. That is the meaning of these words. “Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” Christ’s sufferings and death for sin are of infinite value, merit, and efficacy. Therefore, he suffered for sin only once. He appeared once in the end of the world to put away sin; and he has done it.

    Our Lord Jesus Christ put away the guilt of sin by his atoning sacrifice. He put away the punishment of it by his sufferings and death as our Substitute. The incarnate Son of God put away the penalty of the law by his satisfaction of Divine justice. He put away the consequences of sin by his obedience unto death. He puts away the dominion of sin in his people by the power of his grace in the new birth. He puts away the filth of sin by his sanctifying grace. And he shall put away the very being of sin in resurrection glory.

    This work of putting away sin was accomplished by him bearing our sin in his own body upon the cursed tree. He carried it and took it away. This is what was pictured in the Old Testament type of the scapegoat.

    The Lord Jesus has removed sin from us as far as the east is from the west, by finishing and making an end of it. He disannulled and abolished it, insofar as the law and justice of God is concerned. When he paid our debt, he cancelled it in one day, by his one sacrifice. In one great day, the whole work was done (Zechariah 3:9). Our sins, being forever, effectually put away by the sacrifice of Christ, shall never be found and can never be charged to us again (Jeremiah 50:20; Romans 4:8).

    My sin, (O the bliss of this glorious thought!)

    My sin, not in part, but the whole,

    Is nailed to his cross, and I bear it no more.

    Praise the Lord! It is well with my soul!

    Horatio Gates Spafford

    How immeasurable and infinite the love of God in Christ is. I see in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ love to the uttermost, unquenched and unquenchable (John 3:16; Romans 5:8; 1 John 3:16; 1 John 4:9, 10). Man pours floods upon this love to quench it, but it grows more intense. What patience with man’s utmost malice; what forbearance with his sin! “Father forgive them; for they know not what they do.” Was ever love like this? So vast, so free, so overflowing. Sin abounding, grace did much more abound (John 13:1; Ephesians 3:14-19. O how he loves!

    The purpose of our great God and Saviour is unalterably fixed, relentlessly pursued, and perfectly executed.

    Our Saviour came here to do a work (Matthew 1:21), a work appointed to him and purposed by him from everlasting (Psalm 40; Hebrews 10); and he was determined to accomplish it, “straightened”, as he put it, until it was accomplished. It shall be accomplished. It shall be finished. He had come here to accomplish death; and it shall be accomplished (Luke 9:30, 31).

    How will he do it? By what means shall the holy Lamb of God be sacrificed? The altar shall be built, built by man’s enmity. The sacrifice shall be slain, slain by man’s hatred. The work shall be done, done by man’s will. It shall be done exactly according to the purpose of God (Psalm 76:10; Acts 2:23).

    How willing, how anxious the Lord Jesus Christ is to save poor, lost sinners!

    The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is a vivid declaration that “where sin abounded grace did much more abound”! What is the meaning of the cross? Why was our Lord Jesus nailed to the cursed tree? Behold the dying thief and hear the answer. The Son of God came into the world to save sinners! Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost!

    The dying thief is a true specimen of God’s elect. This man appears to have done nothing but evil all his life. We know nothing about him, except that he was a thief, a thief who had executed his crimes with violence, a thief who continued to blaspheme, even as he was being executed, a thief who was loved and chosen of God (1 Corinthians 1:26-31).

    Why was Immanuel’s blood poured out at Calvary? Christ Jesus poured out his life’s blood upon the cursed tree to wash away sin. Here I see it washing away the sins of one like myself, whose heart and life were as black as hell. Why did Christ suffer and die? It was to pardon the most guilty. It was not merely to save us from hell, but to open Paradise to the chief of sinners, to open it at once; not after years of torment, but “today”. Today “shalt thou be with me”. Yes, the Lord Jesus went back to heaven with this saved thief in his hands. What an efficacy there is in the cross! What grace! What glory! What cleansing! What healing! What justice! What blessedness!

    By his death upon the cursed tree, the Son of God delivers and saves his people from their sins! Satisfying the justice of God, he plucked us as brands from the burning, conquered hell, and defeated the devil and cast him down to hell. The first sinner saved by the cross, after it had been erected upon Calvary’s hill, was a wretched, justly condemned thief; and the Son of God went up to heaven with him to join in that joy that is in heaven over one sinner who repents.

    See how near a person may be to hell and yet be saved! That thief was, as it were, upon the very brink of hell. He had one foot in the pit. Hell was in his heart. Hell had been his life. Soon, hell must be his portion forever! He had done nothing but evil continually all the days of his life. In the very last hour of his life, he is heard blaspheming and railing against the Lord Jesus. Yet, he was plucked from the fire by omnipotent mercy! Saved by the Son of God! He was just about to step into everlasting damnation, when the omnipotent hand of the Son of God seized him and lifted him up to Paradise!

    Oh, what grace is here! What boundless love! What power to save! Who after this need despair? Truly our Lord Jesus Christ is mighty to save!

    See how near you may be to Christ and yet be lost forever! The other thief was as near the Saviour as the one who was saved. Yet, he perished. He went to hell from the very side of the Son of God, from the very presence of Immanuel!

    There are two men. Both are thieves. Both are damned. Both are lost. Both are without God, without Christ, without hope. Both are in the immediate presence of the crucified Christ. One is taken up to glory. One is taken up to heaven. The other is cast down to hell. What made the difference?

    “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23). Throughout the Word of God we are constantly assured of these two facts. First, if anyone goes to hell, it is his own fault alone, his own responsibility, altogether the result of what he has done, and that for which he alone must bear the blame forever. Second, if anyone is saved, if anyone goes to heaven, it is God’s work alone, altogether the result of that which God has done, and that for which God alone must have the praise forever.

    “The wages of sin is death”! Sin is what we all are by nature; and sin is all that we do in a state of rebellion against God. It is as impossible for a sinner to do good as it is for water to be dry. Our corrupt nature corrupts all our thoughts, feelings, words, and deeds. As a corrupt fountain only brings forth corrupt water, so a corrupt heart only brings forth corruption. That means that the very ploughing of the wicked is an abomination to God, and even our righteousnesses are filthy rags in his sight (Proverbs 21:4; Isaiah 64:6). Sin is also our choice. We all drink iniquity like water (Job 15:16). And that which sin deserves is death, eternal death, which is eternal separation from God and the eternal vengeance of his holy wrath. Death is the debt God owes to sin. And God always pays his debts. The one thief went to hell because he ate the fruit of his own way.

    “But the gift of God is eternal life”! Eternal life comes to guilty sinners not as a debt, or a reward for something we have done, but as the free-grace gift of God. The new birth, which is the beginning of eternal life in the soul, is the gift of God. Faith in Christ is the gift of God. Heavenly glory, which is the consummation of eternal life, is also the gift of God. Death, hell, and judgment are things we earn by sin. But grace, life, and heaven are things freely given to sinners “through Jesus Christ our Lord”!

    Christ, having paid the debt of sin for his people by his death upon the cross, has made it right and just for the holy Lord God, who must punish sin, to give eternal life to all for whom he died. Through the merits of Christ, through his blood and righteousness, God gives eternal life to everyone who believes on him. Even the faith by which we receive this gift is the gift of God and the result of his operation of grace (Ephesians 2:8; Colossians 1:12). Faith in Christ is not the cause of God’s gift, but the result of it. If you now believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, God has given you eternal life. It is altogether his work. “Salvation is of the Lord”!

    Can anyone be nearer to Christ than that thief was? Looking at him, hearing him, speaking to him, he was lost after all! Be warned. Outward nearness, religious duties, familiarity with the Word of God, baptism, eating and drinking the symbols of the Saviour’s body and blood, none of these things can save. You may be very near Christ, and yet not be in Christ. Salvation is not being near Christ. Salvation is being found in Christ.

    Hear the taunts of the crowd, “He saved others; himself he cannot save” (Matthew 27:42; Mark 15:31). That is the very essence of the gospel. The Son of God died as our Substitute. In order to save us he had to sacrifice himself (Hebrews 10:9-14; 1 Peter 3:18; 1:18-21; 2:24). In the light of all these things, my heart cries, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.” Because he saved others, the Lord Jesus Christ could not save himself.