When we view the tremendous suffering of the cross, we may be tempted to ask, “Why doesn’t Jesus stop this miscarriage of justice?” After all, he is the one who calmed the raging sea and raised the dead. Only hours before in Gethsemane, he sent a whole group of soldiers sprawling backwards to the ground with just a simple reply. He could ask for legions of angels to come to his aid. But he doesn’t. The hammer falls, the nail pierces his flesh, and the blood begins to flow. Why? Why would God allow this? Why did Jesus surrender to this?
The hand that was nailed to the cross was God’s hand.
The same fingers that formed Adam out of clay
The same hand that toppled Babel
The same hand that split the Red Sea
The Psalmist declared, You drove out the nations with your hand…It was your right hand, your arm, and the light of your countenance. (Psalm 44:2) Isaiah said, When the LORD stretches out his hand, both he who helps will fall, and he who is helped will fall down.
(Isaiah 31:3) The hands of Jesus were the hands of God.
When he touched, God touched.
When the hands of Jesus stretched themselves on the cross, those were the hands of heaven stretching themselves.
What was the purpose of the nails?
To hold Jesus to the cross?
Something else was nailed to cross.
Colossians 2:14, He canceled the record that contained the charges against us. He took it and destroyed it by nailing it to Christ’s cross. (NLT)
God nailed our debt to the cross.
The soldier thought he was swinging the hammer, but he was mistaken. Heaven was.
Isaiah 53:4-6, It was our pain he carried—our disfigurement, all of the things wrong with us…It was our sins that did that to him, that ripped and tore and crushed him—our sins! He took the punishment and that made us whole. Through his bruises we get healed…God has piled all our sins, everything we’ve done wrong, on him. (Message) When the hand of Jesus opened for the nail, the doors of heaven opened for the sinner.
The followers of Christ can say with absolute certainty, “I’m forgiven!”
We may be burdened about many things, but sin does not have to be one of them.