Part 3
perhaps temper that concept with a fuller understanding of God's love – that God always loves us as his children despite our sins – which means that God still loved his Son at that terrible time of his shouldering of our sins. Jesus himself told his disciples shortly before his crucifixion: "A time is coming and in fact has come when you will be scattered, each to your own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me" (John 16: 3233). In fact, the very psalm that Jesus quoted contains, near its end, not words of his rejection as he suffered, but words that Jesus knew he could trust completely: "He has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help" (Psalm 22:24).
So, if we consistently apply all of Psalm 22 to Jesus' crucifixion, we can realize that as he hung on the cross, his Father did not reject his beloved Son and had not "hidden his face from him." The Father loved Jesus till his last breath. As a result, the words spoken by Jesus as his end neared – "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" – were words addressed doubtless not to God, but quoted for our benefit as a summary of the prophecies Jesus was fulfilling in laying down his life for us.
30. THREE TRIUMPHANT WORDS
Most of us know what it feels like to finally accomplish something we have worked toward for a long time: a goal, a dream, a project to which we have dedicated time and energy. Even with relatively small-scale things, it can be a triumphant feeling. The larger the accomplishment, the greater are the emotions of triumph, thankfulness and deep happiness that come with accomplished plans and goals.
This feeling ties in to the story given in all of the four gospels of the supreme sacrifice of the Son of God on behalf of humanity. That had surely been a project a long time in the planning – from before the world was even formed (1 Peter 1:20). It had been over thirty years of the physical life of Jesus in the actual making: growing, building, preparing, patiently working toward the eventual goal of the sacrifice itself.
The sacrificial death of Christ is a somber and heart-wrenching thing to ponder, yet it seems more than likely that even as he perished in excruciating pain, there was for the Son of God a feeling of triumph and thankfulness at the very end. We know that even beyond the physical pain Jesus bore, he endured the terrible weight of the human sin he had taken upon himself. But the Son of God was not crushed by that weight – as we see in his final words.
Putting the gospel accounts together, we find that the last recorded words of Jesus – three small words in English translation, spoken directly before he died – show a supremely positive ending to the story of the physical life of the Messiah. Those words, according to John, were simply: "It is finished!" (John 19:30). In the original Greek of the New Testament the expression is a single word (tetelestai), but the sense is certainly that of the three English words – "It is finished!" The positive nature of the expression becomes clear if we look at it closely.
The Greek word tetelestai carries a number of related meanings. In the English New Testament it is translated as "finished" (as with a job), "fulfilled" (as with a purpose), "accomplished" (as with a task), "performed" (as with a command), "completed" (as with a goal), and in other similar ways. But the central idea in each case is a positive one. While it is natural for us, as we come to the end of the crucifixion story, to think of "it is finished" as a negative
expression – we see it as a supremely sad ending, almost like an admission of defeat – nothing could be further from the truth. When we translate the word tetelestai in any of the other ways it could be rendered, the meaning is much clearer. "It is fulfilled!" "It is accomplished!" "It is performed!" "It is completed!" These are not three words of defeat, but three words of triumph!
Despite the pain, the humiliation, and the anguish of his own impending death, the Son of God knew that he had succeeded – he had accomplished the very reason for his human life in a victory that would touch all human lives throughout all time. To that point in history no single event had accomplished so much good or incorporated such a victory. The last words of Jesus – "it is finished" – were surely the three most triumphant words ever spoken. They were equaled only by another three triumphant words spoken a few days later: "He has risen" (Matthew 28:6). The Triumph of Trust Ultimately, the lesson we can draw from the story of the last words of Jesus is one of trust. Jesus trusted God throughout his life and ministry and even throughout a slow and terrible death. He trusted that God was fulfilling his purpose when he was in pain, when he felt cut off from God, even as he felt his very life ebbing away. Far from being an expression of defeat, his words "it is finished" were the final and complete expression of his trust. The last words of Jesus were, in that sense, the fulfillment of a prophecy contained in the book of Isaiah: "The Lord Almighty has sworn, 'Surely, as I have planned, so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will happen'" (Isaiah 14:24).
When we see the final words of Jesus in context, with the sense they really convey, we can rejoice that they can – and will – apply to our lives also. Just as Job wrote of God "Though he slay me, yet will I trust him" (Job 13:15), the last words of Jesus remind us that we too can trust that despite any and all appearances, whatever may happen in our lives, if we continue to trust God he will complete his purpose in us. That is a tremendous truth that can underlie our desire to follow in the steps of Jesus and to strive to learn lessons from his sonship, signs, sermons, service and sacrifice.
ABOUT OUR BOOKS This book is distributed freely and without charge. Its material is copyright, but sections may be reproduced in fair-use quotation, and the book may be freely distributed as long as it is given without charge. "Freely you have received; freely give" (Matthew 10:8).
You can look for more free Christian e-books on the publisher's websites at FreeChristianEBooks.org, LivingWithFaith.org, and TacticalChristianity.org. New books are added periodically.
If you do not have access to a Bible to read the additional verses given in each chapter of this book, to continue your study of this topic, or for Bible study at any time, we recommend a Bible website such as BibleHub.com or BibleGateway.com which give free access to many translations of the Bible in over 70 languages. Or you can download a free Bible from FreeChristianEBooks.org.