by Dave Wilkinson

Hebrews 9:22, John 19:16-42

February 3, 2002

What happens here at the Lord’s Table?

The Catholic church teaches transubstantiation. They believe that in the mass, through a miracle, the bread and wine actually become the body and blood of Jesus. Other priests say that it’s not that Jesus is actually crucified anew at each mass – once daily, Saturday night and four times Sunday morning – but that somehow Jesus’ death is brought forward in a physical way from the past into the present. If you don’t understand that, it’s okay. It’s a mystery.

This belief in transubstantiation is why the Catholic Church has something we don’t have. A Catholic Church has an altar. It has an altar because an altar is a place of sacrifice. It’s a place of death. It’s a chopping block.

Do you remember the story of Cain and Abel – the first sibling rivals? Cain and Abel each brought their sacrifices to the Lord. They apparently knew what the Lord required -- the key biblical principle stated in Hebrews 9:22 that "without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness for sins." Abel did it the way God told him to do it. He brought a lamb and offered it to the Lord. Cain, however, had what he thought was a better idea. He substituted his idea of religion for what God required. He rejected the sacrifice of blood and brought a sacrifice of fruit.

In this way, Cain was the first New Ager. He substituted his own sweet idea of what was needed for what God required. As a result, his sacrifice was rejected. Later, of course, the same guy who was too gentle to kill a sheep killed his own brother.

"Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness for sin." We may not like that. It may sound bloody and primitive. We may decide to follow the way of Cain and become more spiritual than God. But blood’s the way God said it has to be. "Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness for sin." Sin requires an altar.

So why don’t we have an altar? Why do we have a table?

Because the altar has already been used. The perfect sacrifice has already been given for all time. It happened on a Friday afternoon in the spring of 28 A.D. outside the walls of Jerusalem.

"They took Jesus and He went out, bearing His own cross, to the place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha. There they crucified him."

John is very restrained in describing the physical facts of the crucifixion. After all, crucifixion, and the suffering it caused, was common enough knowledge in all of the provinces of the Roman empire. Crucifixion was described by one ancient writer as the "most wretched of deaths" and called by a modern writer "the acme of the torturer’s art." The purpose of the cross was to bring physical death, but only after inflicting emotional death.

Crucifixion was ultimately shameful and degrading. Roman citizens could not suffer this penalty. Even freedmen were exempt. Only the worst of criminals, traitors and slaves died upon the cross. And, as Paul reminds us in Philippians 2:8, Jesus "humbled Himself and became obedient to death -- even death on a cross!"

The victim was fastened to the cross with either cords or nails. The cross beam was fixed so that the victim’s feet were off the ground, but not necessarily very high off the ground. There was a projection from the cross called the "sedile" which the crucified man straddled. This took some of the weight of the body and prevented the nails from ripping apart the flesh. Crucifixion involved atrocious physical suffering. In fact, our word "excruciating" used to describe extreme pain literally means "from the cross" -- ex-cruce.

Nothing could be more horrible to those who stood by a cross than the sight of a living body, breathing, seeing, hearing, able to feel, and yet reduced to the state of corpse by forced immobility and absolute helplessness. We cannot even say that the crucified writhed in agony, for it was impossible for him to move. Stripped of his clothing, unable to brush away the flies, which fell upon his wounded flesh -- already lacerated by the preliminary whipping.

In the ancient Apostle’s Creed it says of Jesus that He was "crucified, dead and buried." This morning let us look at a portrait painted by John from the first of these three words.

John stood at the foot of the cross with Mary watching the death of his friend and Lord. He heard the comments of the soldiers as they gambled over His clothes. And he heard Jesus speak.

First Jesus said, "I am thirsty." These were terrible words to come from the lips of the One who had said: "If anyone thirst, come to me and drink" and had called Himself the "fountain of living water." They speak of all that Jesus had given of Himself to come to the cross.

Then, after Jesus had been given sour wine to drink, He said: "It is finished!" And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.

John does not speak of the tone in which Jesus uttered the words, but Matthew, Mark and Luke tell us that Jesus uttered a loud cry after receiving the wine and before His death. It is John who gives us the words of this cry: "It is finished" -- not spoken in resignation or defeat but in triumph -- like a racer breaking the tape at the end of the track. "It is finished." It is the triumphant recognition that Jesus has accomplished all that He came to do.

But look at what it cost. It cost more than mere death. For the cross was the sign of separation from God. The Old Testament Law, Deuteronomy 21:23, declared that anyone who hangs upon a tree is under the curse of God. Paul quotes this in Galatians 3:10 where he writes that Christ hung upon the tree to take our curse upon Himself; and in this way, to set us free. In 2 Corinthians 5:21 it declares that on the cross God made Jesus, who was sinless, to become sin for us so that we could share God’s righteousness.

Men and women, in their sin, are under a terrible curse. Romans 6:23: "For the wages of sin is death." When Jesus humbled Himself to death on a cross He paid the penalty of the curse by taking it upon Himself. He became a sacrifice -- the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Because He, who had committed no sin and so was not under the curse, bore the penalty of the curse, He has brought salvation to all who believe in Him and receive that gift of salvation from Him. "For the wages of sin is death -- but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Hanging between Heaven and Earth, Jesus was forsaken by God, for He had made Himself sin. So He cried from the cross, "My God why have you forsaken me?" He was rejected by humanity.

Why did He let it happen? Why did He choose this? Because the cross tell us that God takes sin seriously. He doesn’t wink at sin and He doesn’t grade on the curve. Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness for sin. Someone had to die. God said, "Let it be Me."

There is a moving story of a Roumanian painter named Steinberg and a gypsy girl. Struck with her beauty, Steinberg took her to his studio and frequently had her pose for him. At that time he was at work on his masterpiece "Christ on the Cross." The girl used to watch him work on this painting. One day she said to him, "He must have been a very wicked man to be nailed to a cross like that." "No," said the painter. "On the contrary, he was a very good man. The best man that ever lived. He died for others." The girl looked up at him and asked, "Did he die for you?" Steinberg was not a Christian, but the gypsy girl’s question touched his heart and awakened his conscience. He became a believer in Him whose dying passion he had painted.

Did Jesus die for you?

If you know that He did, come to His table.