Grace Bible Church
Pastor Teacher
Robert R. McLaughlin
090420
Because Christ died for all, “whosoever believes in Him” will be saved.
- His spiritual and physical death.
- His burial.
- His victorious proclamation.
- His resurrection.
- His ascension,
- His session.
His spiritual death on the cross is the basic principle that all believers
must learn and apply is His spiritual death, where He was separated
from God the Father in the spiritual realm as He was being judged for
the sin, not sins, but for the sin of all mankind; Joh 1:29.
- He would die spiritually for the sins and the human good that the old sin nature would produce.
- He would also die spiritually for all the good that the sin nature would produce which is nothing more than the human good.
As our Lord said in MAT 5:48 Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
The question is do you think that anyone in the human race or in the
angelic realm, could ever fulfill “MAT 5:48?
Remember the old sin nature has areas of strength and areas of weakness, and our Lord not only died for man’s sins, but He also
rejected any human good that the old sin nature produces.
The death that is mentioned here is spiritual death and not physical death.
This principle can be understood simply by the fact that if the Lord died physically for us then why do we still die physically?
Secondly, because He died a spiritual death “for us” we will never have to die spiritually, and we will never be separated from God or
rejected by God.
It’s interesting that after our Lord’s spiritual death was complete while He was still alive physically and therefore He prayed in Luk 23:46 And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, Father, into Thy hands I commit My spirit. And having said this, He breathed His last.
The physical death of our Lord did not happen until He fulfilled the plan of God and finished the work that He was assigned to by God the Father.
The death that He died for us had to be a spiritual death because we all still die physically but we will never die spiritually or we will never be separated from God because Christ died for all and therefore, “whosoever believes in Him” can be saved.
Physical death still exists among the human race but for believers they will still die physically with the exception of those alive at the Rapture of the Church.
It was our Lord’s spiritual death which was being separated from God The Father on the cross which our Lord died for us and allows us to accept our “new position,” because of being in union with the death and burial of our Lord Jesus Christ.
When He died we died with Him
When He was buried, we were buried with Him.
When He was resurrected, we were resurrected.
When He was seated at the right hand of God, we were seated with Him, positionally.
So, this passage talks about our Lord’s burial and our union with Him, and His resurrection and our union with Him.
So, we have two deaths, spiritual and physical, and we have been buried and resurrected with Him, all having to do with our positional
truth which He accomplished and our union with the Lord.
This was all involved by the Baptism of the Holy Spirit with the word Baptisma being defined as identification.
And because of doctrines like these, we will never have to be fearful or worried because He’s got the whole world in His hands, and that
includes you and it includes me.
So, this means that when He was buried, we were buried or identified with Him as well. Col 2:12.
As Paul wrote in Col 2:12 having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.
This is one of the many results of spiritual death, not only that our Lord died for us spiritually and because of that, He was willing to go to the cross and be separated from His Father for the first time ever.
Now, I really don’t know how to put into words what it must have been like for our Lord, who had never sinned and had never been separated from God before, to have to go through spiritual death and being forsaken by His Father.
How could I explain what it must have been like for someone who had never sinned, always had been holy, just and righteous, as well as the God of truth, mercy, and love…..and then to come into contact with the filthiness of sin for the first time as He fulfilled the plan of God for His life.
As the Lord spoke to the prophet Isaiah in ISA 1:5 Where will you be stricken again, {As} you continue in {your} rebellion? The whole head is sick, And the whole heart is faint. [weary or warned out.
ISA 1:6 From the sole of the foot even to the head There is nothing sound in it, {Only} bruises, welts, and raw wounds, Not pressed out or bandaged, Nor softened with oil. = ministry of the Holy Spirit.
As the prophet Jeremiah said, JER 17:5 Thus says the Lord, Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind And makes flesh his strength, And whose heart turns away from the Lord.
Whether or not, it was our Lord’s spiritual death or His physical death, both were taught by the apostle Paul to be identified with our Lord’s spiritual death and physical death.
So, first, the physical death is the reason why all of us still die physically and why we need to be born-again spiritually.
Also, having “the new thoughts that come from having a new life” through the divine thoughts our Lord possessed is having a life changing attitude.
The attitude that our Lord had as Paul stated in Phi 2:3 begins to describe to us when the apostle meant Paul when he gave to us these doctrinal principles.
These doctrinal principles are revealed to us by our Lord in Phi 2:3 when the Apostle Paul said this: Do nothing motivated by contentiousness or ambitious pride, but with humility of mind [or by
means of grace orientation] let each of you keep on considering one another as more important than himself;
PHI 2:4 do not merely be regarding your own personal interests, but also for the personal interests of others.
An Amplified translation says, “Don try to push your way to the front; sweettalk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead.”
Don't be so obsessed with getting what you want for your own advantage while you ignore the biblical responsibility you have to others.
Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand to others or those in need of help no matter what.
As Paul said in Phi 2:6, our Lord had equal status with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit but didn think so much of himself that He wanted to take advantages for His sake. no matter what.
As MAT 4:10 says You shall worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only.
As our Lord said in MAT 20:28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.
He tells us why He came directly from the words of the Throne as He stated in LUK 19:10 For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.
When the time came, He set aside the privileges of His deity and took on the status of humanity as a slave and became a member of the human race.
MB Phi 2:8 Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process.
He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient deathand the worst kind of death at that: a crucifixion.
MB (Phi 2:9) Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever,
MB Phi 2:10 so that all created beings in heaven and on earth even those long ago dead and buried will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ,
MB Phi 2:11 and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.
PHI 2:5 Keep on thinking this [doctrine] within yourselves which was also resident in Christ Jesus, According to ancient sources, one of the cruelest and most
humiliating forms of punishment in the ancient world was, crucifixion.
The Jewish historian Josephus best described it following the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans in AD 70 as The most wretched of deaths. And stated that suicide is preferable to the cruel fate of
being put on the cross.
Interestingly, no other time in history could or would have allowed for Our Lord to go through this form of humiliation.
Think of the fact that the Jewish people did not use a cross or a tree for capital punishment, therefore consider the odds of the Lord Jesus
Christ having to die on a cross by the hands of the Jews.
The crucifixion allowed our Lord to fulfill such prophecies as the brazen serpent being lifted up on a pole as predicted in Num 21:9.
Num 21:9 And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he
looked to the bronze serpent, he lived.
He finished the work that the Father demanded as prophesied by the fact that people would watch Him as He was suffering publicly, Psa 22:7-8.
It has been shocking how many unbelievers changed their attitude
toward our Lord because of prophecies that he had fulfilled such as
The fact that His hands and feet would be pierced, Psa 22:16.
What were the odds that a person who would die physically without a bone being broken; Psa 34:20.
What were the odds that a person would offer the Lord Jesus Christ gall and vinegar, to relieve His pain? Psa 69:21.
Even such small details are given to identify the piercing of Jesus side as it is mentioned, Zec 12:10.
Notice the phrase, they will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will
weep bitterly over Him, like the bitter weeping over a firstborn.
Look at what happens in REV 1:7 Behold, He is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and
all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him. Even so. Amen.
Now, the Old Testament talks about hanging people on the cross, but it was after they were dead as a form of humiliation.
So, our Lord’s physical death was not death on the cross but a public form of humiliation after someone was killed because of capital
punishment.
The Roman cross consisted of wooden timbers and iron spikes. Death by crucifixion was invented by the Persians which is now Iran.
Later it was adopted by the Phoenicians (Canaanites, a perverted people) and the Carthaginians (North Africa).
Under the Romans however, crucifixion degenerated into a cruel means of torture and death.
One phrase really describe death by crucifixion: and that is agony and embarrassment.
Among other things, it was humiliating, tormenting, slow, and public.
History records the words of a slave who was pardoned by the On the cross there are only two things, pain and eternity. They tell me I was only on the cross twenty-four hours, but I was on the cross longer than the world existed. If there is no time, then every moment is forever.
Death on the cross was a form of capital punishment which lasted for around 800 years and hundreds of thousands of individuals were subject to this cruel and humiliating death.
Alexander the Great had 2,000 survivors from the siege of Tyre
crucified on the shores of the Mediterranean.
In addition, during the times of Caligula, AD 374, Jews were tortured and crucified in the amphitheater to entertain the inhabitants of Alexandria.
Many researchers have believed that death occurred as the result of a ruptured heart due to the Joh 19:34 passage of the water and blood flowing out of the wound.
So, many researchers have believed that death occurred as the result of a ruptured heart due to this passage.
Other scholars have regarded suffocation as being the cause of death.
One Roman writer wrote that, Whenever we crucify the guilty, the most crowded roads are chosen, where most people can see and be
moved by this fear.
Giving the victim a proper burial following death on the cross, during the Roman period was rare and in most cases simply not permitted in
order to continue the humiliation.
The victims in many cases were simply thrown on the garbage dump of the city or left on the cross as food for wild beasts and birds of prey.
It was also common in those days for there to be a procession through the streets of Jerusalem where the criminal, along with a statement of his crime, could be publicly displayed.
Evidence shows that He carried what the Roman called the crossbeam which would have weighed up to 150 pounds alone.
And this was done partially to further humiliate the criminal, but also as a means of further controlling the criminal.
In Jesus case, He was carrying the crossbeam on His already raw back and raw shoulders.
And, as He carried the beam, the damaged muscles in His back and shoulders were further damaged under the weight of the crossbeam.
Around our Lord's neck hung a wooden sign bearing the condemned man's name and crime they attached to the top of the cross to
embarrass the guilty and their family.
Historians also agree that to add further humiliation to the process the victim was stripped completely naked.
Once stripped, the victim would be thrown on his back and then nailed upon the crossbeam of the cross.
The long, square-headed spikes used for this purpose would inevitably pass through or close enough to the median nerve of the hands or in most cases the wrists so that the nerve was severely
damaged.
Eventually, this would cause the victim to sense a burning pain from hand to shoulder that is indescribable.
Eventually, the person whole world was one sheet of burning pain after another.
Once the person was fastened to the cross, a soldier would climb a small ladder and nail above the criminal the charges.
The Latin abbreviation INRI which was hung on the top of the cross can be traced back to the sign that Pilate had nailed to the cross of Jesus.