December 14

"It is Christ that died." Romans 8:34.

"Delivered Him up for us all." If any other expression were necessary to deepen our sense of the vastness of God's love, we have it here. Who delivered up Jesus to die? Not Judas, for money; not Pilate, for fear; not the Jews, for envy—but the Father, for love! "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." In this great transaction we lose sight of His betrayers, and His accusers, and His murderers, and we see only the Father travailing in the greatness of His love to His family. And to what was He delivered? To the hands of wicked men—God's "darling to the power of the dogs." To poverty and want, to contempt and infamy, to grief and sorrow, to unparalleled suffering, and a most ignominious death. "It pleased the Lord to bruise Him, He has put Him to grief." And for whom was He thus delivered up? "For us all;" for the church purchased with His own blood. For all in that church He has an equal love, and for all He paid an equal price. Deem not yourself—poor, unlettered, and afflicted as you may be—less an object of the Father's love, or less the purchase of the Savior's merits. Oh, blessed, comforting truth! For us all! For you, who are tempted to interpret your afflictions as signals of wrath, and your sins as seals of condemnation; your poverty as the mark of neglect, your seasons of darkness as tokens of desertion, and your doubts and fears as evidences of a false hope and of self-deception; for you, dear saint of God, Jesus was delivered up.

The death of Christ formed the first of all the subsequent steps, in the working out of the great plan of the church's redemption. To this, as its center, every line of truth converged. It was as a suffering Messiah, as an atoning High Priest, as a crucified Savior, as a Conqueror, returning from the battle-field with garments rolled in blood, that the Son of God was revealed to the eye of the Old Testament saints. They were taught by every type, and by every prophecy, to look to the "Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." Christ must die. Death had entered our world, and death—the death of the Prince of Life—only could expel it. This event formed the deepest valley of our Lord's humiliation. It was the dark background—the somber shading of the picture of His life, around which gathered the light and glory of all the subsequent parts of His history.

But in what character did Christ die? Not as a martyr, nor as a model, but as a substitute. His death was substitutionary. "God has not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us." This great truth the apostle, in another place, appropriates to Himself. "The Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." Here was the personal application of a general truth. And this is the privilege of faith. There breathes not a babe in Christ, who may not lay his hand upon this glorious truth—"Christ gave Himself for me." Since Christ bore our sins, and was condemned in our place; since by His expiatory death the claims of Divine justice are answered, and the holiness of the Divine law is maintained, who can condemn those for whom He died? Oh, what security is this for the believer in Jesus? Standing beneath the shadow of the cross, the weakest saint can confront his deadliest foe; and every accusation alleged, and every sentence of condemnation uttered, he can meet, by pointing to Him who died. In that one fact he sees the great debt cancelled, the entire curse removed, the grand indictment quashed—and "No condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus," are words written as in letters of living light upon the cross.