Lent 24 post 2

 Luke 23.32-43

‘Save yourself!’

Three times, as he hung on the cross, Jesus heard those words shouted at him with jeering mockery. Three times those shouts must have tested his resolve, for he knew that he could have saved himself, with legions of angels at his command(Matthew 26.53). Yet three times he resisted, just as he had done in the wilderness at the very start of his earthly ministry. Luke probably means us to make that connection(Luke 4.1-13).

The tactics were the same, ‘If you are the Son of God. . .’ ‘If you are the Messiah. . .’ ‘If you are the king of the Jews.’ Back then, the devil had tried three times to tempt Jesus to avoid the path of suffering and death, and choose some alternative way to glory. And even now, at the cross itself, the devil makes three last desperate attempts. If only he could get Jesus to save himself, then Jesus’s whole mission to save the world would be lost. So he speaks through three different people, who all make the same taunt, but mean it in different ways.

But there is massive irony between what they think they are saying and the actual truth of the situation. Take a look at each of them in turn.

The religious rulers. (.35)

Their mockery was a rejection of the claim of Jesus to be God’s Messiah, God’s chosen One, the Saviour king. How could he save anybody else if he couldn’t save himself? Yet, of course, their words state exactly who Jesus was. So they both state the truth and reject the truth in the same breath.

The Roman soldiers (.36-38)

Their mockery was a rejection of the charge against Jesus, that he was supposed to be the ‘king of the Jews'. But that’s ridiculous! ‘What kind of king are you up there, with thorns for your crown and a cross for your throne?’ And yet those words above his head, the butt of their laughter, were a bald statement of the truth.

The resistance fighter (.39)

His mockery was a rejection of Jesus' failure to be the kind of messianic leader that he and his band of brigands wanted, to lead them in rebellion against Rome. ‘You should have joined us if you’d been a real messiah. Well, here’s your last chance. Save yourself and us and we’ll slaughter these Romans together! Ha, ha! As if. . .’

But Jesus refused to save himself. Not because he couldn’t (as all three voices seemingly thought), but because he chose not to. Jesus resisted these three last temptations, and, as he did so, we see two astonishing paradoxes.

The paradox of power 

Can you detect the different kinds of human power alluded to in those three voices? Look at the religious establishment in its crushing self-righteousness, imperial military force in its callous brutality and nationalistic fanaticism with it’s raw violence. Horrid human power in all its cruelty. But who was exercising real power at that very moment? The powerless one on the middle cross. The paradox is that, in choosing to surrender his life in utter powerlessness, Jesus was exercising the loving power of God through which, alone, all the powers of human and satanic evil would be defeated and ultimately destroyed.

Rejoice today that the ‘weakness’ of the cross was the power of God!

The paradox of salvation 

‘Save yourself and us' was the third mocking insult. But, of course, that was precisely what Jesus could not do. Can you see? He could not both save himself and save us.

Either he could save himself, and he knew it, with that army of angels at the ready. But, if he had saved himself, he could not have saved us through his atoning death for our sin.

Or he could choose to save us (which was the very purpose of his coming), but in that case he could not save himself. So Jesus chose to die, chose to stay on the cross and endure the agony, the shame and the outer darkness of separation between Father and Son, so that we might be saved.