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Romans 5:6-8
When I was eleven I got a record player for Christmas. I remember going to the store and finding a bargain bin with 45s that were 25 cents. I bought Tennessee Ernie Ford, “Were you there” In his rich baritone voice he asks the question Were you there when they crucified my Lord. I can remember thinking that was a strange question to even ask. How could anyone alive have been there other than Jesus? It was not until much later that I began to understand how accurately theologically that simple song was. I had been there, and I must go there.
We were at the cross, because our sins were there.
Pastor Harris read from the gospel of Luke the cry of Jesus directed heavenward, “My God My God why have you forsaken me!” These were words of agony. Not from his beating and the crow of thorns that had been pushed on his head. His cry of agony did not come from the nails in this hands or feet, not the pain from his back that had been ripped open by the bone tipped whip of the lector. No he cried out because the incredible weight of our sins came crushing down on him. Rom 6.23 teaches that the weight of sin is death. Jesus latterly died under the weight of your sin and mine. He who had known no sin became sin for us.
Two days ago people gathered in Oklahoma City to commemorate the great tragedy that took place there when a terrorist boom took the lives of 168 people.
Yesterday 3000 gathered to remember the Columbine High School massacre. Both were moving experiences of anguish and sorrow.
Today we have gathered to commemorate a great tragedy that took place over two thousand years ago when the innocent Son of God under went that great agony of the sin of the world and died. The difference in the memorial services of the past to days and this day is we are the ones who caused his death.
Today is a day of sorrow and grief for those who have come to admit that they were there. That we caused his death.
We grieve and sorrow today, yet this burden we can bear on Friday, because we know that Sunday is coming!
You may say well I wasn’t just me. It was all the other people that cause his death. I don’t think we can look at it that was. We know God’s heart he has revealed it to us. He is not willing that any should perish but that all would come to repentance. You are included in that any. If you were the only one Jesus would have died for you. He is not willing that any should perish. The wages of sin is death.
You were at the cross the Love of God brought you there.
The Love of God brings us there for forgiveness. We still must go to the cross to receive the redemption that this cruel instrument of death purchased for us.
The climax of the book Pilgrims Progress is when Christian finally makes it to the wicker gate and climbs a small hill and kneels before the cross. When he does this the sins that he had been carrying rolled off his back rolled down the hill and disappeared into a tomb.
Each of us must come to that place on our own. We must go to the place of the cross to receive the grace of forgiveness and the new life that is promised in Christ.
I don’t say this to obscure my meaning with figurative speech. I mean we must come to the cross, which is realizing that we are sinners, our sin; your sin put him on that cross. The cross is a humbling place. Here we must confess our sin and by repentance ask his forgiveness. So even today the cross is a place of death. It is where we die to sin that we might live in Christ.