"Victory Shouts For You!" John 19:30

Good Friday                                                                     7-April-2023
Sermon Text: John 19:30 So when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished!" And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.
Sermon Theme: “Victory Shouts For You!” by Rev. Nathan J. Rusert

I.N.R.I. “Golgotha” the “Place of the Skull” is where our Lord Jesus is crucified between two condemned thieves. About two thousand years earlier the only beloved son of father Abraham carried the wood of the sacrifice upon his back to this spot. Isaac willingly obeyed his father’s Word and God’s will laying down on the wood to be sacrificed. The Lord intervened, a Substitute would die in Isaac’s place - a ram - a Lamb with its head caught in a thorny bush wearing a thorny crown - in the “Mount of the Lord It Shall Be Provided.” Backing up in history another two millennia may be where the “Place of the Skull” received its name. The scholarly church father Origen wrote, “The place of the skull is said to have some special appropriateness for the death of him who was to die for humankind. A Hebraic tradition has come down to us that says that the body of Adam the first man was buried just where Christ was crucified.” Christian artists often include a skull at the foot of Jesus’ cross. Adam’s skull - testifying to the truth of God’s unchangeable Law and the wages sin pays out- “Rom 5:12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned—”
    In Adam we all die. His sin corrupted all of human nature and polluted creation. Just as stage four cancer invades the entire body, but it doesn’t belong to the body’s true nature. Sin has corrupted us, but it isn’t what makes us human. Sin makes us inhuman. Tears us from our Creator to trust in lying words of Satan, the world, and of our own thinking and doing. Sin tears us from the community of humanity. Turned inward, living only for our own best interests, we are isolated, lonely, loving only our foolish sinful desires.
  The Second Adam has come to rescue us from Satan’s tyranny, our prison of selfishness, and our separation from our Creator. Jesus - The God-Man born of the Virgin Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit comes to bring “us from Satan to God, from death to life, from sin to righteousness, and ... preserve.. us in the same.” Jesus, the King of the Jews, is lifted up from the earth to draw all men, even us Gentiles, back to His Kingdom of Life. Freeing us from Satan’s tyranny and the fear of death - He will clothe us in His righteousness, innocence, and blessedness as we live under Him - our compassionate King.
      The battle against Satan for mankind began the cool of the day in Eden. The bearing of our sin began with His conception. John the Baptizer, a priestly descendant of Aaron, scapegoated Jesus with all my sins - all your sins baptizing them upon Him in the Jordan. “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” God’s just punishment of hell that we deserved began with His passion and reached its crescendo in complete darkness covering the world from noon to three as Jesus hung cursed on the Tree. He is forsaken by His Father that you might be brought Home through His crucified flesh and blood.
      The Light now pierces the darkness. Scripture must be fulfilled. Jesus thirsts. Receiving gall mixed with sour wine - He shouts in triumphant victory, “τετελεσται” - “It is Finished!” This is not the whimpering cry of a defeated dying man, but the shout of triumph. Battle hardened Roman soldiers knew the victorious battle cry. No one would take Jesus’ life from Him. He had power to lay it down and power to take it up again. Triumphant He shouts! Luk 23:46 And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, "Father, 'INTO YOUR HANDS I COMMIT MY SPIRIT.' " Having said this, He breathed His last.” The battle hardened Centurion seeing how He suffered and died confesses, “"Truly this was the Son of God!"
          What our first father Adam did now is undone by the second Adam. The Tree of Life is Jesus’ Cross. After Jesus’ body rests in our grave for three short days - death will be defeated the grave robbed of its prey. It is Finished! Baptized into Jesus’ death and resurrection - every day your baptism - “works forgiveness of sins, rescues from death and the devil, and gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, as the words and promises of God declare. “
          VICTORY shouts for you- IT IS FINISHED!-He lives His victory is given shed and sealed upon you.
            The place of the skull can no longer terrify you. Origin wrote, “And so, as in Adam all die, so in Christ all should be made alive. In the place that is called the place of the skull or head, the head of the human race should find resurrection along with the whole people through the resurrection of the Lord and Savior who suffered there and rose again. For it was unfitting that when many born from him received remission of sins and attained the blessing of resurrection, the very father of all people should not also attain this grace.” God the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life, testifies through St. Paul’s pen: “Rom 5:18-21 Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. (19) For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous. (20) Moreover the law entered that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, (21) so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Amen.