The Big Picture of the Bible: Chapter 10 Jesus Paid the Price Owed by the Sinner

10 JESUS PAID THE PRICE OWED BY THE SINNER. Mel Gibson’s famous movie, “The Passion of the Christ”, very graphically depicts the arrest, scourging, and crucifixion of Christ. But what that movie does not explain is “why”. Why did Jesus have to go through that horrific ordeal? Why did Jesus have to have nails driven through his hands and a spear thrust through his side? Why did Jesus have to die in the first place? Based on our study to this point, the answer is now clear. Jesus went through this ordeal; Jesus was willing to die on behalf of the sinner. Jesus, “…was cut off out of the land of the living, for the transgression of my people, to whom the stroke was due”. Isaiah 53:8. Jesus, the Son of God, representatively took my place. He paid the price of suffering and death that was owed by each one of us as sinners. Jesus in fulfillment of God’s plan, died for our sins. “Your will be done,” Matthew 26:42. And he did so by choice. He died out of love for his father and an intentionally focused desire to do His Will. Jesus was willing to suffer as The Lamb of God for the sins of all the world. By living a sinless life, Jesus qualified himself as an innocent stand-in to die in the place of the truly guilty – you and me. When Jesus died on the cross, he took our sins upon himself and paid the price of death owed by the sinner. In the language of 1 Peter 2:24, “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross,t hat we might die to sin.”. Jesus died on the cross so that I might die to sin and be made righteous. His death represents the Judicial death that I deserve. Continued by book author Kenneth W. Craig