What Christ suffered at the hands of His enemies was horrible. While they thought they were beating and mocking just another criminal, we know they were doing it to God. When we realize why Jesus Christ allowed this, we may realize that we are even worse than those who killed Him.
Christ in the Old Testament
I gave My back to those who strike Me,
And My cheeks to those who pull out My beard;
I did not hide My face from insults and spitting. (Isaiah 50:6)
Our picture of the Messiah is often either a powerful king or a suffering lamb. While this prophecy seems to show us only a Savior who would face pain, we also realize how much strength and power He would have. There is a willingness to the sufferings the Messiah would face. Like a parent who allows their toddler to jump on them and “win” a wrestling match, the Messiah would offer Himself up to be beaten and mocked. He wouldn’t just suffer and die, but He would do so by His own choice.
Fulfilled in the New Testament
Then they spit in His face and beat Him with their fists; and others slapped Him, and said, “Prophesy to us, You Christ; who is the one who hit You?” (Matthew 26:67-68)
We see that Christ suffered just like Isaiah prophesied He would. Yet when we understand the truth of who Christ is, we realize why He was able to approach these moments under His own power. After all, what hope did human beings have of imprisoning, humiliating, and executing their own creator against His will?
While we are horrified to see our God treated this way, it’s important to remember how all of this could possibly happen. It wasn’t because the religious leaders wrongfully accused Him, nor was it because Judas betrayed Him. All of those things were part of God’s plan to accomplish Christ’s true purpose in coming to Earth and dying.
Everything that Christ experienced is because of us. He allowed Himself to be beaten and spit on because of where He knew it was leading. He gave strength and oxygen to the very men who nailed Him to the cross. Every moment He hung on that cross and endured the wrath of God in our place was done because He kept choosing to save sinful, hopeless people like us who could do nothing to save themselves.
Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. (Phillippians 2:8)
Christ willingly submitted Himself to all of this for us. Everything that occurred before our salvation was paid for on the cross.Not only that, but every moment of sin we’ve experienced after our salvation was also paid for. Every time we choose to lie, get angry, gossip, lust, or be selfish, we are creating another debt that Christ had to pay for. We are asking our God and Savior to suffer under the wrath of the Father so that we can believe the lie that sin will bring us some form of satisfaction.
As we consider Christ’s willingness to suffer and die for every crime we’ll ever commit, we realize how horrible our sin truly is. Things we see as harmless or “no big deal” are the same things that led to the death of Jesus Christ. When we give ourselves over to sin, we’re letting something have more power in our lives than our incredible Savior.
For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for the one who has died is freed from sin. (Romans 6:5-7)
Those moments when we feel like we can’t help but sin, we can remember that Christ gives us His power to resist and flee every temptation. The same God whose power allowed Him to choose suffering and death is the same God who gives us freedom from sin. Before Christ, we could choose nothing but those things that God hates. Now, through Jesus Christ, we can allow His power to live within us and choose those things that please God.
