Well, let's go back to this portion
of scripture this morning. Here we have three men dying
on three crosses. The thieves were ungodly men,
murderers, rapists, thieves, just lousy, sorry, people in
the kingdom of Rome. They were suffering and they
would die as punishment for their crimes. The other one who died was the
Lord of Glory. He had to suffer. He had to die. Not for his own sins, for he
had no sin. He did no sin. But all the sins of God's people
throughout all of the ages, Isaiah says, were made to meet on him. And therefore, God punished him.
He had to die. For the scripture says, the soul
that sinneth that soul shall die. And our Lord Jesus, though
he personally did no evil, all of the evil of all of the people
of God, of all of the ages, met upon him. Therefore, he must
die. Divine justice charged him as
being guilty. and divine justice exacted from
the Savior, that just punishment for the sins of the elect of
God. I find it noteworthy that the
Jews insisted, and Rome carried this out, that our Savior die
in between two noteworthy malefactors. One writer suggested that they
selected the vilest of the felons in prison. They said, let's crucify
them and let's put in between those men Jesus of Nazareth for
he is That is, He was to them the greatest of the malefactors.
They considered Him worthy of death because of His blasphemy. He said He was the Son of God. He said God was His Father. We
know His Father and Mother. We know Joseph and Mary. Who does he think he is? And they crucified him for blasphemy
and for sedition. They said, he's leading a revolt
against Caesar. And so they carried out the death
sentence against Jesus of Nazareth. But know this. that death which
our Savior died was appointed for Him before the world ever
began. Why, the Scripture says He was
the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world. He was born to die. He was born
to be the substitute of His guilty people. He was born to be God's
perfect sacrifice for sin. You say, well, how could one
man's death atone the millions of people for whom he died? Because
of who died? That's the Son of Man. That's
the Son of God. That's the God-man dying on the
cross. The reason his death was so wonderful,
so priceless, was because that's God in the flesh laying down
His life voluntarily to save His people from our sin. Are you a believer? Do you trust in the Lord Jesus
Christ? And I ask this of those of you
who are watching by live stream this morning as well. Well, then
let me tell you, He was dying for you. He laid down His life
for you. You were guilty and deserved
to be put to death by God in His justice and in His wrath. But the Lord Jesus took your
place. He died your death. He suffered the wrath of God
that you deserve to suffer. and you get off scot-free. That's the beauty of the gospel
of grace. I heard a preacher not long ago,
he said, if you come to Jesus and you promise him, you'll make
him Lord, you'll serve him the rest of the days of your life.
He said, he will save you. Hang on a minute, make no promises. Enter into no vows with God. He doesn't make bargains. He
saves sinners absolutely freely. Nothing is dependent upon you,
not even your faith. Because faith is a gift of God. Oh, may the Lord grant this faith
to believe, to embrace, to hug up, to lean on. The only Savior
of sinners, may He grant that to all of us, that we be found
in Him. And being found in Him, and since
He has removed our sins from us as far as the East is from
the West, we're made the very righteousness of God. in him. It's very significant to think
about the hour in which this was, and not specifically that
hour on the clock, though he was nailed to the cross at 9
a.m. and he died about 3. But he referred
to all of his experience upon the cross of Calvary as that
hour, that hour. You remember back in the second
chapter of John, our Lord's first miracle, you remember what it
was, turning of water into wine. And Mary, his mother, said they
need more wine. And our Savior said to her, mine
hour is not yet come. He didn't come just Perform some
miracles though. He did perform lots of miracles
But he came to perform the greatest miracle that there ever was To
save us from our sins, but he said my hour is not yet come When our Lord made these final
statements from the cross of Calvary, it was getting toward
three, three o'clock in the afternoon. That should kind of ring a bell
to you if you have knowledge of the Old Testament, because
Moses gave the commandment of God to the children of Israel.
The Lord had said to Moses, now every morning at 9 a.m. you'll kill a lamb. And every
afternoon at 3 p.m., you'll kill another lamb. And the Jews were in a great
rush to have our Savior, one whom they considered to be their
enemy, they were in a hurry to have him die so that they could get their
lambs. killed not only for the Passover,
but also that 3 p.m. lambs got to die in accordance
with the law of God. And little did they know, they
had no idea, they had no confidence in the purpose of God regarding
the death of Jesus of Nazareth. They had no idea that God's lamb
was right then dying. which would cancel out the need
for another lamb to die anymore as a sacrifice to God. I used to believe that when the
Lord came back the second time that Israel would be gathered
back together and they'd rebuild the temple and they'd resume
offering sacrifices to God. And then God taught me that,
wait a minute, they're not going to resume offering sacrifices. They might resume killing animals,
but the sacrifice God demanded has already been offered. And
it was offered to God. You see, it was to God that Christ
offered himself. There was no payment necessary
to the devil or to Rome or to anybody else. The payment price
of redemption was offered to God the Father. We were in debt
to God because of our sins which are against God. That's why David
said in Psalm 51, against thee, thee only have I sinned and done
this evil in thy sight. I've sinned against God. Well,
then God has to be repaid. That's why Christ died. Can you possibly imagine your debt of sin to God? without a redemption, without
atonement? You have no idea how many times
you've sinned. And I don't have any idea how
many times I've sinned. I'd hate to have to count my
sins since I woke up this morning at 5.30. Would you want to count yours?
Would you want to be liable for your sins just today? and then
go back ever how many years you've lived in this world. And yet, for the people of God,
we have to give no account. I'm not going to answer for my
sins. My Savior has already answered for me. He's already paid my
debt. I don't owe anything to my God, except I'll say, I owe him a
debt of gratitude. That's it. Christ paid my debt. At this hour, that's when he
did it. This hour. This is the hour he talked to
his disciples about. He told them he was going to
his death. They said, no, no, far be it
from thee, Lord. We don't want you to die. That's
what Simon Peter said. And the Lord Jesus said, you
don't savor the things of God. All the disciples tried to talk
him out of going to Jerusalem, He said, I'm going to Jerusalem.
They said, wait. Don't you have any idea about
the fate that awaits you if you go to Jerusalem? Don't go. Don't
go. I'm glad they didn't have their
say. I'm glad that the Lord didn't listen to them and said, well,
I won't go then. He had to go. He set his face
like a, Isaiah says, like a flint toward Jerusalem. This was what
was marked out for him from before the foundation of the world.
He must die to make atonement for our sins. He must die to
make things right with God. He must die to save us from our
iniquities. He must die to justify us and
make us righteous. There was no other way. You say,
well, how could his death avail to put sins away? Because he's
the infinite God, that's why. If anybody else had said, I'm
dying for the sins of people, we'd say, well, sorry, you can't
do that. Your death's not gonna do any
good for me. But his death did me infinite
good. And I am the recipient and you
who believe in here, out there, all over the world, in many congregations
this morning, people are meeting, honoring Christ. When he died, he sealed our pardon with his
blood. The disciple said, don't go. He said to him, shall I ask the
father to deliver me from this hour? But this is the hour appointed
for me. That's why he said in John 17,
father, the hour is come, glorify thy son. In Luke 12, 50, he said,
I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straightened
till it be accomplished? I yearn to die this death. I
desire to die this death. I desire to redeem my people. I desire to honor my God. This
is my great heart's desire and my purpose in living and in going
to the cross is to honor my God and save the people that I have
love from all eternity. See, three men died at Calvary. One man died in his sins, the
unbelieving thief. He died in his sins. The Savior
said, if you die in your sins, he said, where I am, you cannot
come. You cannot come. One man died to his sins. That's the thief who was brought
to faith in Christ. He died to his sins because Christ
bore his sins in his own body on the tree. And one man, the God-man, He died four sins. Four sins. Sins that belonged
to his people. We sing that song, he took my
sins and my sorrows. And you know what he did with
them? He made them his very own. And he bore the burden all the
way to Calvary and he suffered and he died alone. As you think about our Savior
dying upon the cross of Calvary, there are a lot of ironies at
the cross. Here we know that our Savior
was mocked. They said, because he can't save
himself. But he saved a sinner by not
saving himself. If he had saved himself, nobody
else is going to be saved. He's accused of claiming to be
a king, a threat to the power of Rome, a threat to Caesar,
a threat to Roman authority. He therefore must be executed
before he can lead a revolt against the kingdom. And yet the same
people who claimed to be protecting Rome from him, they mocked him
and they scorned him and they ridiculed him as being helpless
and powerless. He's treated like a king, sort
of. They shoved a reed in his hand. They bowed and mocked him and
said, hail, king of the Jews. They took the reed and hit him
over the head. They put a purple robe on him.
They put a crown on his brow, the crown of thorns, and they
did it in mocking and in jest, and yet he is God's true king. In Psalm 2, I have set my holy,
the holy son of God, I've set my king upon his holy hill of
Zion. He's accused of blasphemy. by
those who blasphemed him. Because he's truly God. So the
blasphemers accused the one being blasphemed of blasphemy. Justice is turned on its head. That is the justice of men. And it's somewhat ironic that
men cursed him. But that was nothing compared
to the curse of God. He appears unable to save himself
or to save anybody else as far as that goes. But he saved a thief. We have
no comprehension of what it takes to save a sinner. You see, our
Savior had said back in Matthew 11, the Son quickeneth whom He
will, or in John chapter 5. The Son quickeneth whom He will.
Here is our Lord Jesus with bloody gore, crucified on the cross,
nailed to the cross. He couldn't come down from the
cross. He's been beaten. His back is like furrows that
have been plowed. He's just a gory, bloody mess. And yet this thief recognizes
him to be the Lord and the King who's coming into his kingdom. I'll tell you another ironic
thing. You know, they wanted him to
be taken down from the cross by the Roman soldiers because
Passover was drawing nigh. Let me just kind of put it in
our language today. Get him off the cross because
we got to go to church. We've got to make our attendance
at the synagogue and at the temple, at the temple. What was the Passover all about? We got to celebrate Passover. Well, it was remembering how
the Lord had liberated Israel from Egyptian bondage. And so they offered Passover
lambs without spot, without blemish, a male of the first year. You
remember all the requirements that are laid out there in Exodus
chapter 12. But they missed a very important
point, and so many people today still miss this vital point in
the exodus of Israel from Egyptian bondage. When Moses gave the
instructions, kill a lamb, a male of the first year in its strength,
nothing wrong with it. Go outside and put the blood
on the doorposts outside and over the top of the door? That wasn't for Pharaoh. That
wasn't to free them from Pharaoh. You know who that blood was for?
It was for God and to save them, save the firstborn from the wrath
of God. That's what it's for. And as far as the Egyptians and
the Israelites, whoever offered the sacrifice, whoever killed
the lamb and spread the blood out there, the firstborn in that
house could not die because the substitute had died. But if there was within Israel
a family that said, you know, I don't believe that, If they didn't give God what
He demanded, their firstborn's gonna die. Remember that. That blood was for God. And I'm telling you, the death
of our Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross of Calvary, it was
for God to pacify, to appease His wrath. His justice has to be honored. You say, well, he died for sinners.
Yes, he did. He died to save us. Absolutely,
he did. But God couldn't do anything
for us unless the Lord Jesus Christ did something for him. He took my place. He died the death that I deserved. He bore my sins in his own body
on the tree in a manner that I cannot begin to comprehend
at all. I can't wrap my mind around that. There's no way, only God knows
what he suffered. Only God knows what happened
during those three hours of darkness. But I do know this, that's when
he saved me. So I got saved 30 years ago. Now, I beg your pardon. Gotta
go back further than that. When were you saved, Jim? Well,
if you want me to start, I was saved before the foundation of
the world. I was saved in the eternal purpose of God. Well,
what about in time? I was saved when Jesus Christ
took my place. And he died. And I go free. That's the gospel. It's not complicated. You say,
well, I'm gonna try to read my Bible and pray. Hang on now. Salvation, it's good to read
the Bible. That's not how God saves sinners. I'm going to start praying every
day. Good for you. That's not what God looks for.
He's looking for the blood. Looking for the blood. When I see the blood, God said,
sometimes I don't see it too clearly. Just being honest. Brother Barnard said honest people
don't wind up in hell. I don't know why people can't
be honest. I know why they can't, because they're kind of religious
by nature and think, well, there's really something to us. There's
nothing to you, let me just tell you. I'll be the first to tell
you. There ain't nothing to you. It's as much to you as it is
to me. I'm nothing. But my Savior's everything. He's my all. and everything a
holy God demands for this sinner, my Savior has made it right. That old thief had a work of
grace done in his heart, and he said, Lord, remember me. That's all, if he'll remember
me. Lord, remember me. In the Lord's
Supper, we take the Lord's Supper and we, this doing remembrance
of me, Christ said, I remember him. But my memory is, it's getting
worse and worse. Is your memory getting, I find
my memory is getting kind of feeble sometimes. But his memory won't grow feeble. Lord, remember me when you come
into your kingdom. And the Savior answered him,
and he answered him with a word that when the Savior was gonna
say something real weighty, he used the word verily. Verily I say unto thee, today
shalt thou be with me in paradise. Where is paradise? Well, the
Apostle Paul said that He went to the third heaven. He called
it paradise. Paradise. Last Wednesday night
late, Bill went to an enclosed garden that the Bible calls paradise. I'll be in paradise soon. Years, I don't know. I have no idea how many years. But I know this, those for whom
Christ lived and died and arose, those he represents in heaven,
at his bidding, will go home. And then we'll see and experience
joys forever in the presence of the King. Lord, remember me. And he said, you'll be with me
in paradise today. I'm not going to forget you. He said, your names are engraved
upon my hands. I'm not going to forget you. My dear mother got Alzheimer's
disease. Couldn't remember any of us. Couldn't remember the Savior.
But her salvation wasn't dependent upon her remembering him. He said, I won't forget you.
I won't forget you. Well, let's sing the closing
song here. Let's sing 118 when I survey
the wondrous cross. 118. Anybody troubled over your sins
look to Christ And if you do God enables you to do it