WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.439 Please do have a seat and let's pray together. 00:00:07.060 --> 00:00:16.559 Paul writes to the Corinthians, for I resolved to know nothing while I was with you, except Jesus Christ and him crucified. 00:00:17.900 --> 00:00:24.440 Father God, what Paul resolved to teach the Corinthians, we ask that you would teach us tonight. 00:00:24.440 --> 00:00:34.359 Father, that we want to know Jesus Christ, the one who went all the way to the cross for each of us. 00:00:35.160 --> 00:00:42.120 Father, bless us, help us, speak to us, challenge us and change us. 00:00:42.820 --> 00:00:46.620 And do it all for the glory of your son, we pray. Amen. 00:00:48.180 --> 00:00:52.340 I want us tonight just to look at three words. 00:00:52.340 --> 00:00:56.800 These three words are in John 19. 00:00:56.920 --> 00:01:01.080 I want us to look at formed, fulfilled, finished. 00:01:01.560 --> 00:01:08.580 Those three words formed, fulfilled and finished. 00:01:09.859 --> 00:01:17.120 Oh, but they say the tongues of dying men enforce attention like deep harmony. 00:01:17.120 --> 00:01:21.020 Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain. 00:01:21.260 --> 00:01:25.260 For they breathe truth that breathe their words in pain. 00:01:25.580 --> 00:01:34.480 He that no more must say is listened more than they whom youth and ease have taught to glows. 00:01:34.840 --> 00:01:39.860 More are men's ends marked than their lives before. 00:01:39.859 --> 00:01:48.000 This is the sonnet given by John the Gaunt near death in Shakespeare's play Richard II. 00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:51.299 And his sentiment is very straightforward. 00:01:52.299 --> 00:01:55.260 That dying men don't waste their words. 00:01:56.079 --> 00:02:00.960 Men on the cusp of eternity, men about to enter oblivion, 00:02:01.799 --> 00:02:06.539 do not make adult small talk with anyone. 00:02:06.540 --> 00:02:11.540 And it's so true of Jesus in John 19. 00:02:12.520 --> 00:02:14.080 He does not waste his words. 00:02:14.219 --> 00:02:17.260 He does not spend them in vain. 00:02:19.319 --> 00:02:22.960 There is a lot of words in John 19. 00:02:24.000 --> 00:02:27.560 There's a lot of spoken words in John 19. 00:02:27.560 --> 00:02:31.759 There are spiteful words. 00:02:32.460 --> 00:02:35.000 Spiteful words from the soldiers who say, 00:02:35.479 --> 00:02:41.860 Hail, King of the Jews, in abject mockery of this man Jesus in their custody. 00:02:42.340 --> 00:02:45.719 There are fearful words throughout John 19. 00:02:46.159 --> 00:02:48.360 Pilate is terrified. 00:02:49.300 --> 00:02:51.060 Look at verse 8. 00:02:51.060 --> 00:02:55.800 When Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid. 00:02:56.439 --> 00:02:58.420 And he went back inside the palace. 00:02:59.199 --> 00:03:03.560 And he spoke to Jesus trying to find a way that Pilate would release him. 00:03:04.599 --> 00:03:08.060 Also in John 19, there are hate-filled words. 00:03:09.439 --> 00:03:10.199 Verse 6. 00:03:10.879 --> 00:03:16.199 Crucify, crucify, shout the chief priests and their officials. 00:03:16.340 --> 00:03:17.020 Verse 15. 00:03:17.020 --> 00:03:20.480 Take him away, crucify him. 00:03:20.659 --> 00:03:27.460 Words full of hate for this man who they would not have to be king over them. 00:03:28.520 --> 00:03:34.100 What is remarkable about John 19 is how few words Jesus says. 00:03:34.740 --> 00:03:39.400 In fact, in 42 verses, he just utters four sentences. 00:03:40.860 --> 00:03:42.400 And none of them are wasted. 00:03:42.400 --> 00:03:46.920 They are all pithy comments. 00:03:47.719 --> 00:03:51.300 Jesus, this one dying, is not wasting his words. 00:03:51.379 --> 00:03:54.860 He is not spending them in vain. 00:03:56.080 --> 00:04:00.439 While he's actually on the cross, he says three things. 00:04:01.719 --> 00:04:10.140 In verse 26 and 27, he talks to his mother and John the disciple who writes this gospel. 00:04:10.139 --> 00:04:11.879 Woman, here is your son. 00:04:12.359 --> 00:04:15.879 And to the disciple, here is your mother. 00:04:17.079 --> 00:04:22.479 A little bit further down in verse 28, he says, I am thirsty. 00:04:24.060 --> 00:04:29.360 And then finally in verse 30, it is finished. 00:04:30.759 --> 00:04:34.839 Scarce words, but words not spent in vain. 00:04:34.839 --> 00:04:46.099 And I want to look briefly at each of these phrases and try and draw out some wonderful truths that Jesus and John are communicating to us. 00:04:46.699 --> 00:04:48.199 So the first one is this. 00:04:48.339 --> 00:04:50.699 New family formed. 00:04:51.399 --> 00:04:53.859 New family formed. 00:04:53.939 --> 00:04:56.219 Verses 26 and 27. 00:04:56.739 --> 00:04:59.000 Jesus is hanging on the cross. 00:04:59.000 --> 00:05:05.680 He surveys the crowd on the exposed top of the hill of Golgotha overlooking Jerusalem. 00:05:06.019 --> 00:05:19.519 As he looks out, he sees a huge hostile crowd gathered, jeering at him, shaming him, hurling insults at him, accusations towards him. 00:05:19.519 --> 00:05:27.180 And as he surveys, in abject agony, his eyes fall upon a familiar group. 00:05:28.479 --> 00:05:37.240 There's his auntie, Mary, the wife of Clopas, Mary Magdalene and John, the disciple whom he loves. 00:05:37.240 --> 00:05:49.699 With them is Mary, his mother, gazing tormentedly at her tortured son, dying in agony on the cross. 00:05:50.699 --> 00:05:59.639 And as he gazes into the eyes of his mother, Jesus pushes against the cruel nails through his hands and his feet. 00:05:59.639 --> 00:06:06.639 He lifts himself just high enough to draw enough precious air into his burning and bursting lungs. 00:06:06.919 --> 00:06:09.639 And he says, woman, here is your son. 00:06:10.579 --> 00:06:13.699 And to the disciple, here is your mother. 00:06:14.500 --> 00:06:20.819 Dying words to honor his mother, ensuring she is looked after once he is gone. 00:06:21.800 --> 00:06:28.419 Now, Mary and Joseph must have had quite an odd, at times, I dare say quite a strained relationship. 00:06:28.420 --> 00:06:41.420 Right at the beginning, the shame of being a pregnant, unmarried woman in the small town of Nazareth with the neck curtains constantly rustling every time Mary was in the streets. 00:06:43.280 --> 00:06:46.520 The poverty of the stable. 00:06:48.460 --> 00:06:55.759 No room at the relative's house, but made to sleep where the cattle sleep. 00:06:55.759 --> 00:07:01.759 The creepy gifts bought from the men from the east, including myrrh. 00:07:03.759 --> 00:07:06.620 The quintessential burial, Spice. 00:07:07.079 --> 00:07:17.219 The heavy prophecy of Simeon about her eight-day-old son, saying that this child will cause a sword to pierce your own soul. 00:07:17.220 --> 00:07:24.220 A sword now deeply embedded in Mary's soul as she watches her son die. 00:07:25.760 --> 00:07:30.480 The lost 12-year-old Jesus who stays behind at the temple. 00:07:30.860 --> 00:07:39.220 The 30-year-old Jesus who gives up the family business that Joseph had worked so hard to build to become an itinerant rabbi. 00:07:39.220 --> 00:07:51.040 The radical teacher who brought controversy to their hometown by saying that no one would honour him as a prophet where he came from. 00:07:51.300 --> 00:07:57.220 The aloof son preferring to hang out with his followers than go to his family outside, saying, 00:07:57.220 --> 00:08:02.240 Who are, who is my mother and who are my brothers? 00:08:02.920 --> 00:08:04.220 A strange relationship. 00:08:05.300 --> 00:08:10.240 Now on the cross, a loving son addresses his distraught mother. 00:08:10.620 --> 00:08:13.440 Dear woman, he says. 00:08:14.280 --> 00:08:15.660 Dear woman. 00:08:15.660 --> 00:08:21.640 Not a familial term that you would use for your mother, but a highly respectful term. 00:08:21.960 --> 00:08:25.000 You would have a woman removed from you. 00:08:25.140 --> 00:08:27.260 Dear woman, he says. 00:08:27.400 --> 00:08:29.960 Respect, but not familial. 00:08:30.120 --> 00:08:31.879 Here is your substitute son. 00:08:33.600 --> 00:08:37.840 John, here is your substitute mother. 00:08:39.420 --> 00:08:43.279 Jesus forms a new family at the cross. 00:08:43.279 --> 00:08:55.019 Jesus forms a new family at the cross where people that are not otherwise related find relationship in relation to Jesus. 00:08:55.740 --> 00:08:58.939 It speaks beyond its context. 00:09:00.199 --> 00:09:02.299 Jesus dies for sin. 00:09:03.299 --> 00:09:11.839 And those gathered at the foot of the cross who stare at him in faith are formed into a new family. 00:09:13.279 --> 00:09:21.240 A new family formed out of all those who will look upon this Jesus in faith. 00:09:22.240 --> 00:09:24.740 Family expressed here this evening. 00:09:25.740 --> 00:09:28.279 That some of us are related to each other. 00:09:29.220 --> 00:09:31.539 Many of us aren't, but in Jesus. 00:09:32.439 --> 00:09:38.059 If we're looking at him in faith, Jesus forms us into a new family. 00:09:38.059 --> 00:09:43.199 That we have brothers and sisters in Christ. 00:09:44.019 --> 00:09:52.579 That as Jesus dies and sin is removed, so we're brought together as family in him. 00:09:52.580 --> 00:09:58.900 Isn't that exactly what John writes in the prologue to his gospel? 00:09:59.900 --> 00:10:05.660 Yet to all those who did receive him, he gave the right to become children of God. 00:10:06.080 --> 00:10:15.440 Children not born of natural descent, nor a human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. 00:10:15.440 --> 00:10:20.180 New family formed at the cross. 00:10:20.640 --> 00:10:28.140 Thomas Wharton, the elder, the 17th century poet, pens this in his Ode on the Passion. 00:10:29.340 --> 00:10:34.480 Beneath low, Mary weeping stands in tears most pitifully fair, 00:10:34.700 --> 00:10:39.780 and beats the breast where Christ had hung, and tears her long disheveled hair. 00:10:39.779 --> 00:10:43.919 Where can I lay my mournful head? 00:10:44.319 --> 00:10:48.980 My son, my king, my God is dead. 00:10:50.399 --> 00:10:51.439 Do you see Mary there? 00:10:51.519 --> 00:10:57.100 No longer son, but king and God. 00:10:58.179 --> 00:11:03.439 A new family, made up of all families, 00:11:04.019 --> 00:11:08.480 who will look to Jesus and say, my king and my God. 00:11:08.480 --> 00:11:11.360 It's a beautiful truth. 00:11:11.480 --> 00:11:14.920 Perhaps we're here tonight and our families have not been that great. 00:11:15.180 --> 00:11:20.139 Our natural families, they say you can choose your friends, but not your family. 00:11:21.300 --> 00:11:25.560 Well, the truth we see in this passage is that Jesus chooses his friends, 00:11:26.200 --> 00:11:31.580 dies for them and forms them as his family together. 00:11:31.580 --> 00:11:40.220 A family open to each of us who will meet this Jesus at the foot of the cross and stare at him in faith. 00:11:41.600 --> 00:11:45.980 A family open to each of us. 00:11:46.980 --> 00:11:50.780 Secondly, we see part scriptures fulfilled. 00:11:52.379 --> 00:11:54.580 Verse 28. 00:11:54.580 --> 00:12:02.520 Jesus fighting for every breath, dripping sweat and blood in equal measure. 00:12:03.580 --> 00:12:09.639 The cruelty of crucifixion engulfs every muscle and sinew in his body. 00:12:11.020 --> 00:12:14.320 And having been there a while, he cries out, 00:12:14.820 --> 00:12:17.240 I am thirsty. 00:12:17.240 --> 00:12:24.180 A truly human statement from one who is fully human. 00:12:25.580 --> 00:12:33.060 Jesus is this same fleshed out word that came and tabernacled with us. 00:12:33.500 --> 00:12:38.200 He is the same Jesus who got tired and slept, who got hungry and ate, 00:12:38.440 --> 00:12:41.919 who suffered grief and died, who got angry and acted, 00:12:41.919 --> 00:12:48.339 who felt pain and screamed, who got thirsty and asked for a drink. 00:12:48.919 --> 00:12:58.199 Jesus made like us in every way, thirsted like us as he is dying for us. 00:12:59.199 --> 00:13:01.120 But there's more going on. 00:13:02.399 --> 00:13:04.500 Look at verse 28 with me. 00:13:04.500 --> 00:13:12.480 Later, knowing that everything had now been finished and so that scripture would be fulfilled, 00:13:13.059 --> 00:13:15.799 Jesus said, I am thirsty. 00:13:16.940 --> 00:13:20.759 That yes, it is a very human response to dehydration, 00:13:20.919 --> 00:13:24.659 but there's also something going on here to do with scripture. 00:13:31.240 --> 00:13:34.220 The picture of a thirsting savior. 00:13:34.500 --> 00:13:40.759 A picture foreseen hundreds of years before by the men of old. 00:13:41.379 --> 00:13:45.259 In Psalm 22, verses 14 and 15, 00:13:45.539 --> 00:13:51.000 a psalm that Jesus is obviously reciting to himself as he goes through this pain. 00:13:53.440 --> 00:13:55.320 David writes this in verse 14. 00:13:55.419 --> 00:13:58.919 I am poured out like water, speaking of this suffering savior, 00:13:59.100 --> 00:14:00.879 and all my bones are out of joints. 00:14:00.879 --> 00:14:03.460 My heart is like wax. 00:14:03.539 --> 00:14:05.320 It is melted within my breast. 00:14:05.700 --> 00:14:08.379 My strength is dried up like a pot shirt. 00:14:09.139 --> 00:14:11.539 And my tongue sticks to my jaws. 00:14:12.039 --> 00:14:15.159 You lay me in the dust to death. 00:14:15.159 --> 00:14:19.279 Jesus thinks upon Psalm 22. 00:14:19.919 --> 00:14:24.679 I'm sure he would have recited all of it, but so anguished is the pain of the cross. 00:14:25.000 --> 00:14:26.919 He simply says, I thirst. 00:14:26.919 --> 00:14:36.059 And so the experience of Jesus superimposes perfectly onto the picture that David saw a long time in the future. 00:14:36.059 --> 00:14:39.839 About one who would come and die. 00:14:39.839 --> 00:14:46.799 A greater king, a suffering servant, a murdered Messiah. 00:14:46.799 --> 00:14:50.179 And verse 29 is remarkable. 00:14:50.639 --> 00:14:55.879 A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, 00:14:56.059 --> 00:14:59.099 and lifted it to Jesus' lips. 00:15:00.479 --> 00:15:03.599 And so David also writes the Messianic Psalm, Psalm 69. 00:15:04.120 --> 00:15:10.019 And in verse 21, he says, they gave me vinegar for my thirst. 00:15:10.019 --> 00:15:15.319 Not like sarsen's chip shop vinegar, we're just talking cheap wine. 00:15:16.679 --> 00:15:24.100 And so David, even seeing a long time in the future, he says, this will happen to this Messiah. 00:15:24.840 --> 00:15:33.639 And they will seek to saliate this dead, this dying man's thirst with cheap wine. 00:15:33.639 --> 00:15:47.759 By declaring his thirst, Jesus was declaring that his sufferings measured up to the sufferings that the Savior of the world would undergo to rescue his people. 00:15:48.899 --> 00:15:51.279 But there is something more. 00:15:52.179 --> 00:15:57.519 Because I thirst and you thirst and we thirst. 00:15:57.519 --> 00:16:01.299 Dehydration of the soul. 00:16:01.720 --> 00:16:07.419 So bad, like normal dehydration, that we don't even feel thirsty. 00:16:08.840 --> 00:16:11.220 A natural thirst. 00:16:11.879 --> 00:16:14.019 A dying thirst. 00:16:14.120 --> 00:16:18.120 A thirst that we try to quench with anything and everything. 00:16:18.519 --> 00:16:20.939 Actions, ambitions and experiences. 00:16:20.940 --> 00:16:28.380 And we try to saliate our thirst with these things, but we just get thirstier. 00:16:29.600 --> 00:16:30.560 Our thirst. 00:16:31.260 --> 00:16:42.660 This thirst, this soul thirst, will only ever be satisfied and quenched in this one who was thirsty in our place. 00:16:43.880 --> 00:16:47.760 Jesus Christ became thirsty for us. 00:16:47.759 --> 00:16:52.580 So we wouldn't have to go on being thirsty for him. 00:16:53.100 --> 00:17:02.259 Jesus speaks throughout the gospel about him being living water, welling up to eternal life. 00:17:03.000 --> 00:17:07.259 Our deepest thirst is for a relationship with this Jesus. 00:17:08.579 --> 00:17:15.680 And we will keep on panting, fainting and struggling until we meet him ourselves. 00:17:15.680 --> 00:17:20.680 Jesus says, let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. 00:17:21.600 --> 00:17:29.200 Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from them. 00:17:29.320 --> 00:17:32.400 Why are living waters able to flow from Jesus? 00:17:33.019 --> 00:17:40.560 Because he took on our thirst so that we might be saturated by these streams of living water. 00:17:40.559 --> 00:17:46.179 No one has captured it better than Edinburgh's own Horatius Bonner. 00:17:46.619 --> 00:17:51.659 I heard the voice of Jesus say, behold, I freely give. 00:17:52.059 --> 00:17:56.980 The living water, thirsty one, stoop down and drink and live. 00:17:57.179 --> 00:17:59.419 I came to Jesus and I drank. 00:17:59.700 --> 00:18:05.539 Of that life-giving stream, my thirst was quenched, my soul revived. 00:18:05.539 --> 00:18:09.379 And now I live in him. 00:18:09.500 --> 00:18:15.899 May that be our experience as we gaze on this thirsting Jesus. 00:18:17.299 --> 00:18:20.480 Finally, we have verse 30. 00:18:21.200 --> 00:18:23.599 It is finished. 00:18:25.680 --> 00:18:28.379 Spurgeon writes of this phrase. 00:18:28.380 --> 00:18:34.520 In the original Greek of John's gospel, there is only one word for this utterance of our Lord. 00:18:35.740 --> 00:18:36.260 Tetelestai. 00:18:36.660 --> 00:18:39.840 To translate it into English, we have to use three words. 00:18:40.240 --> 00:18:42.580 But when it was spoken, it was only one. 00:18:42.900 --> 00:18:46.640 An ocean of meaning in a drop of language, a mere drop. 00:18:46.920 --> 00:18:49.380 For that is all that we can call one word. 00:18:49.780 --> 00:18:51.500 It is finished. 00:18:52.420 --> 00:18:52.980 Tetelestai. 00:18:52.980 --> 00:19:00.700 Yet, it would need all the other words that ever were spoken or ever can be spoken to explain this one word. 00:19:01.500 --> 00:19:03.160 It is altogether immeasurable. 00:19:04.019 --> 00:19:04.680 It is high. 00:19:04.799 --> 00:19:06.339 I cannot attain to it. 00:19:06.720 --> 00:19:07.700 It is deep. 00:19:08.140 --> 00:19:10.440 I cannot fathom it. 00:19:10.900 --> 00:19:12.960 It is finished. 00:19:13.339 --> 00:19:14.960 Cries this Jesus. 00:19:15.960 --> 00:19:21.680 Now, if you're ever anything like me, you have a lot of unfinished stuff in your life. 00:19:21.680 --> 00:19:24.779 My fridge is full of half-eaten meals. 00:19:25.440 --> 00:19:28.220 My study is full of half-read books. 00:19:29.100 --> 00:19:33.279 I have boxes full of abandoned hobbies I never mastered. 00:19:33.660 --> 00:19:36.560 I have half-attempted DIY projects. 00:19:37.019 --> 00:19:39.799 I have partially used exercise equipment. 00:19:40.440 --> 00:19:44.000 I have half-filled out dentistry forms. 00:19:45.000 --> 00:19:47.360 Jesus, on the other hand, says, 00:19:47.779 --> 00:19:48.900 It's finished. 00:19:48.900 --> 00:19:52.320 It is finished. 00:19:52.800 --> 00:19:58.360 Jesus finished the great and sole project of his life. 00:19:58.940 --> 00:20:01.300 He got the job done. 00:20:01.600 --> 00:20:03.820 And he got it done perfectly. 00:20:04.220 --> 00:20:07.480 It is definitively mission accomplished. 00:20:08.040 --> 00:20:14.220 In perfect obedience, he has perfectly completed the will of his Father. 00:20:14.220 --> 00:20:21.160 Now, with his final breath, he declares, 00:20:21.799 --> 00:20:24.360 Tetelestai, it is finished. 00:20:24.660 --> 00:20:25.720 What is finished? 00:20:26.460 --> 00:20:28.420 Jesus' suffering is finished. 00:20:29.000 --> 00:20:32.220 Jesus' entire life was punctuated with suffering. 00:20:32.539 --> 00:20:34.059 The squalor of a stable. 00:20:34.180 --> 00:20:35.799 The forced asylum in Egypt. 00:20:36.220 --> 00:20:41.120 The attempted murder as he's attempted to be thrown off the cliff by a crowd. 00:20:41.119 --> 00:20:43.019 The constant traps from the religious. 00:20:43.439 --> 00:20:44.719 The betrayal of a friend. 00:20:44.819 --> 00:20:46.619 The desertion of all the disciples. 00:20:47.059 --> 00:20:48.199 The lashing mockery. 00:20:48.319 --> 00:20:49.819 The tenderizing flogging. 00:20:50.139 --> 00:20:51.559 The lacerating crown. 00:20:51.659 --> 00:20:52.319 The injustice. 00:20:52.539 --> 00:20:53.319 The brutality. 00:20:53.839 --> 00:20:54.519 The spitting. 00:20:54.679 --> 00:20:55.319 The slapping. 00:20:55.439 --> 00:20:56.159 The stripping. 00:20:56.579 --> 00:20:57.799 The pain of the cross. 00:20:58.119 --> 00:20:59.779 The abandonment from his Father. 00:21:00.079 --> 00:21:01.219 The poured out wrath. 00:21:01.319 --> 00:21:03.059 The light of the world snuffed out. 00:21:03.059 --> 00:21:06.039 And Jesus says, it's finished. 00:21:06.919 --> 00:21:08.599 I've done it. 00:21:09.319 --> 00:21:12.319 I have completed the race. 00:21:12.980 --> 00:21:15.159 I have done it all. 00:21:15.279 --> 00:21:16.839 I have suffered it all. 00:21:16.980 --> 00:21:18.700 I have mastered it all. 00:21:18.799 --> 00:21:20.299 I have dominion over it all. 00:21:20.559 --> 00:21:22.000 I have finished my work. 00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:26.420 He's finished suffering. 00:21:26.500 --> 00:21:29.539 But he's finished suffering for our sin. 00:21:30.759 --> 00:21:34.220 Our enslavement to sin is now ransomed. 00:21:34.700 --> 00:21:39.880 Paid in full by the sacrifice of the perfect spotless Lamb of God. 00:21:39.880 --> 00:21:41.700 It is finished. 00:21:42.079 --> 00:21:43.960 Jesus says, paid in full. 00:21:44.359 --> 00:21:45.200 Tetelestai. 00:21:46.240 --> 00:21:46.920 Finished. 00:21:46.920 --> 00:21:52.840 Just the word to describe what Jesus did on the cross for us. 00:21:52.900 --> 00:21:53.740 He paid it all. 00:21:54.240 --> 00:21:55.620 He suffered it all. 00:21:55.779 --> 00:21:57.039 He atoned for it all. 00:21:57.259 --> 00:21:58.519 He redeemed it all. 00:21:58.620 --> 00:21:59.920 He reconciled it all. 00:22:00.140 --> 00:22:02.519 He finished it all. 00:22:03.259 --> 00:22:06.120 When Jesus cried out, it is finished. 00:22:06.120 --> 00:22:09.200 He was not uttering a sigh of relief. 00:22:10.259 --> 00:22:13.900 He was not giving a moan of resignation. 00:22:13.900 --> 00:22:19.820 Jesus was announcing ultimate and eternal victory. 00:22:20.360 --> 00:22:23.420 The triumphant shout of the champion of champions. 00:22:23.680 --> 00:22:24.880 I did it. 00:22:25.920 --> 00:22:27.600 It is finished. 00:22:28.780 --> 00:22:31.100 I have won. 00:22:32.500 --> 00:22:38.460 This is the Robert Indiana statue that stands in Philadelphia. 00:22:39.180 --> 00:22:43.100 Philadelphia, the city of literally brotherly love. 00:22:43.900 --> 00:22:50.680 And the thing about that statue, which is imaginatively called love, is that it's finished. 00:22:51.540 --> 00:22:53.560 You can't really add anything to it. 00:22:53.600 --> 00:23:01.820 If you put G on top to make it glove, you would utterly ruin it by adding something to it. 00:23:01.819 --> 00:23:06.879 And so it is with this finished work. 00:23:06.960 --> 00:23:08.279 There is nothing to add. 00:23:09.200 --> 00:23:13.439 By trying to add, you merely spoil it all. 00:23:14.919 --> 00:23:18.019 Done is the work that saves. 00:23:19.919 --> 00:23:21.579 The end of verse 30. 00:23:21.579 --> 00:23:35.399 This is a completely unique event that will never, ever happen in history except for this occasion. 00:23:36.539 --> 00:23:39.139 Every other human death is inevitable. 00:23:39.140 --> 00:23:45.500 None of us have the opportunity to simply give up our spirit. 00:23:45.620 --> 00:23:51.440 But for Jesus, the author of life, it is willful submission to die. 00:23:52.440 --> 00:23:59.200 It is the final act of obedience from a perfectly obedient son. 00:23:59.200 --> 00:24:04.100 Jesus said earlier in the gospel, for this reason, the father loves me. 00:24:04.759 --> 00:24:09.220 Because I lay down my life that I might take it up again. 00:24:10.140 --> 00:24:14.319 Jesus willingly lays down his life. 00:24:15.480 --> 00:24:19.259 And so what do we learn from what Jesus tells us at the cross? 00:24:19.259 --> 00:24:24.180 He says, in him a new family is formed. 00:24:25.500 --> 00:24:28.779 A new family made up of everyone who will look at him in faith. 00:24:29.779 --> 00:24:33.220 And know life and forgiveness and joy forever. 00:24:33.960 --> 00:24:38.099 Who gives us not only peace with God, but peace with each other. 00:24:39.299 --> 00:24:42.980 We see that by him, part scriptures are fulfilled. 00:24:42.980 --> 00:24:49.059 That we know he's the real deal because he perfectly matches everything that God had revealed 00:24:49.059 --> 00:24:51.859 about this Jesus in the past. 00:24:52.960 --> 00:24:57.399 And because of him, eternal work is forever finished. 00:24:57.899 --> 00:24:59.259 Finished for us. 00:24:59.559 --> 00:25:03.059 Meaning that grace is available and flows freely to us. 00:25:03.299 --> 00:25:05.619 If we will trust Jesus. 00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:10.200 Work we cannot contribute to ourselves. 00:25:11.579 --> 00:25:14.220 Work that we can live in the freedom of. 00:25:14.859 --> 00:25:17.539 Knowing that Jesus is forever for us. 00:25:17.539 --> 00:25:20.259 And in the end will welcome us. 00:25:21.359 --> 00:25:23.740 And so we leave John 19. 00:25:24.599 --> 00:25:27.700 As darkness envelops this Friday in view. 00:25:27.700 --> 00:25:31.680 And Jesus now hangs silently on the cross, dead. 00:25:32.279 --> 00:25:33.639 Before being buried. 00:25:35.420 --> 00:25:39.000 We remember, however, that Sunday will soon be here. 00:25:39.000 --> 00:25:47.140 And this now risen Lord Jesus will soon ask the distraught Mary by a now empty tomb. 00:25:48.259 --> 00:25:52.240 He'll use his words to say, woman, why are you crying? 00:25:53.319 --> 00:25:56.000 Who is it you're looking for? 00:25:56.000 --> 00:25:57.839 Let's pray together. 00:26:01.839 --> 00:26:03.460 Paul writes to the Philippians. 00:26:03.559 --> 00:26:04.900 I want to know Christ. 00:26:06.359 --> 00:26:12.259 Yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his suffering. 00:26:12.779 --> 00:26:15.440 Becoming like him in his death. 00:26:15.440 --> 00:26:20.279 And so somehow attaining to the resurrection from the dead. 00:26:21.600 --> 00:26:24.299 Father God, this would be our prayer as well. 00:26:24.900 --> 00:26:26.960 That we want to know Christ more. 00:26:27.539 --> 00:26:29.440 We want to know him better. 00:26:30.340 --> 00:26:34.340 Father, that we might have the joy of participating in his suffering. 00:26:34.339 --> 00:26:38.980 That we too might become like him in his death. 00:26:40.179 --> 00:26:50.799 So that we might know the powerful, unstoppable, glorious resurrection that he has won for us. 00:26:52.019 --> 00:26:57.879 And so Lord, this Friday, capture all of our attention on your son dying on the cross. 00:26:57.880 --> 00:27:09.660 Father, do this for the glory of your son, we pray. 00:27:10.460 --> 00:27:10.760 Amen.