BORN TO DIE!

BORN TO DIE!

by Beverly Wages

Scripture reading; Matt. 27:45-46; Mark 15:33-35; Ps.22; Ps.16:10; Acts 2:25-31; Acts 13:34-37; 1 Peter 3:18; 1 Peter 2:24.

"My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" These are the words that Christ spoke on the cross when He bore our sins in His own body on the tree. This is perhaps the fourth statement He made while on the cross. The very first, statement He spoke to God, and called Him, Father. Why then would He call out to the Father, and call Him God? Why did He feel forsaken by God? The answer to this would be because God was separated fro m Him. It was our sin that caused this. Christ was bearing all our sin upon Him self. The scripture says in Romans 6:23: "For the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. our Lord." Jesus Christ was paying the price for our sinful condition-not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. Our God is such a perfect, righteous God that He cannot stand to look upon sin. Christ had the penalty of all our sin upon Him.

The worse thing that can happen to anyone is to be separated from God. Anyone that will not accept what Christ did for us all on the cross, will some day have to experience this!

If you will notice in the scripture reading, in Matthew and Mark (given above), there was darkness for three hours. Imagine, this was in the middle of the day, and there was complete darkness. Remember Jesus came into the world as the Light of the world. When He took the place of sinners, this light was made darkness. Can you now see why we entitled this lesson Born to Die? This was the reason Jesus came into this world, in a human body, so that He could become our Saviour.

To do this, He had to perform the price of sin, and then come triumphantly from the tomb. There is so much celebrating of His birth into this world as a little baby. Yet, there are so many who never give thought to why He was born. The scripture tells us that "without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sins!" Christ then, came to die, shed His blood so that we could be forgiven and redeemed from our sinful condition.

As Christians, we should be very sober in our observance of the birth of our Saviour. Let us not get carried away with all the glitter and tinsel of holidays, and give little or no thought to our Saviour. When we read the words of our text today, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?", may we take time to realize just what our Lord went through as He suffered physically, and spiritually, as He paid for our sins. We should not be able to read this account in our Bible without emotional feelings.

If we realize the depths of love that He showed for mankind, and to each of us individually, how can we help but give ourselves to Him, to serve Him for as long as He leaves us in this life. We thank the Father that the Son was "Born to Die", but that He also was resurrected, and later ascended and is now at the right hand of God the Father. Someday we will go to be with Him, if we have accepted what He did for us.

Eleventh Avenue Church
http://www.eleventhavenuechurch.com/