Perhaps few, if any, have truly understood the meaning of Christ’s sacrifice.
Many of the women who lived in Jerusalem wept as the scenes of the cross unfolded. They wept as we have probably never wept when we think about Christ’s death for us. They wept because they understood and felt the excruciating tragedy of His brutal death.
Jesus’ reaction was unexpected. “Daughters of Jerusalem,” He gasped through His pain, “do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children” (Luke 23:28).*
Clearly, Jesus perceived that these women wept without an appreciation of what His death actually meant. They understood the human experience of suffering and loss. But they didn’t understand who Jesus was, nor did they recognize the human condition that necessitated His sacrifice.
Cain’s Mistake
The first human to inherit the sinful nature also didn’t understand his condition.
Cain saw no good reason to offer a slaughtered lamb to God. Perhaps he believed that his harvest offering was an equivalent substitute. After all, although Abel offered a lamb, Abel was a shepherd. A lamb was something that Abel loved and cherished and took care of. Certainly Cain’s plants must have been meaningful to him also. He cultivated them. Tended them. Loved them. Through the sweat of his own efforts he had produced his own resources that he was willing to offer to God.
Indeed, offering part of our resources to God is not in itself wrong. The Bible teaches the principle of tithing for the very reason that He wants us to recognize Him in our material pursuits.
God, however, wasn’t interested in receiving Cain’s tithe as a symbol of substitutionary atonement.
When God did not accept his offering, Cain became angry. In response God attempted to show Cain his condition. He warned, “Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it” (Gen. 4:7).
If Cain had understood his condition and the sinful desires that existed within him, he would have recognized his need for atonement. His inability to discern his need for dependence on a perfect Sacrifice turned into an inability to control his emotions. Lashing out in a violent rage, he slaughtered his own brother and became the world’s first murderer.
Faith in Self Versus Faith in Him
Perhaps reflecting on this sad story, Jesus used the Sermon on the Mount to teach His hearers the lesson that Cain missed.
“Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees,” Jesus explained, “you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment” (Matt. 5:20-22).
The scribes and Pharisees had a religion that reflected Cain’s morality. They enjoyed making small sacrifices, but they lacked an awareness of their true selves. They did good deeds, but they did “all their deeds to be seen by others,” they preached “but [did] not practice,” and they tithed “mint and dill and cumin” while neglecting “the weightier matters of the law” (Matt. 23:5, 3, 23).
In an effort to help them see their need for Him, Jesus denounced the religion of the Pharisees. “Woe to you,” He declared. You “outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness” (verses 27, 28).
Jesus’ words to the Pharisees, unfortunately, didn’t create a spiritual reformation among the religious elite.
The Pharisees, in fact, had lots of faith. They had faith that they were righteous because they carefully kept the law and were circumcised descendants of Abraham. The problem was that their faith was in their identity, rather than the Promised One.
The Pharisees didn’t see their spiritual need, because they didn’t consider themselves as sinners. Sinners, in their eyes, were people such as the tax collectors and prostitutes who followed Jesus—people who performed egregious acts of sin and violated the covenant that Israel had with God.
The Pharisees weren’t legalists because they lacked faith. Indeed, they based their assurance of salvation on the promises contained within Scripture. For example, God had promised Joshua that if he was careful to “do according to all that is written” in the law, he would have prosperity and success (Joshua 1:8). Psalm 119:1 similarly declared that those who keep the law are “blameless” or, essentially, righteous. Finally, Moses had declared over all Israel the blessings that would fall on them if they kept the covenant and the curses that would follow if they didn’t (Deut. 27-30).
The Pharisees, in fact, had lots of faith. They had faith that they were righteous because they carefully kept the law and were circumcised descendants of Abraham. The problem was that their faith was in their identity, rather than the Promised One.
Before they could receive His sacrifice and recognize who He was, Jesus knew that the Pharisees—and those who followed their teachings—needed to see themselves the way He saw them.
During one of His sermons preached in the temple in Jerusalem, He declared, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
Jesus’ listeners were immediately offended. “We are offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say, ‘You will become free’?”
“Everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin,” explained Jesus. “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are offspring of Abraham; yet you seek to kill me. . . . You do what you have heard from your father.”
“Abraham is our father.” They retorted.
“If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing the works Abraham did,” Jesus replied.
Squirming under conviction, Jesus’ audience presented the evidence of their salvation and status as righteous members of the covenant. “We were not born of sexual immorality. We have one Father—even God.”
Jesus would not be deterred. “If God were your Father, you would love me. . . . You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires.”
Jesus’ audience did not appreciate being told that they were lawless and lacked the pedigree required to be part of the covenant. The conversation rapidly escalated. They denounced Jesus as a demon-possessed Samaritan. Jesus replied that He was the eternal God who had existed before Abraham. Unconsciously fulfilling Jesus’ prophecy, the self-described righteous children of the covenant picked up stones and attempted to kill the God who would question their identity and dare to call them sinners (John 8:31-59).
The Law, Genetics, and Faith
Paul, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, later elaborated on these themes of covenant and identity to explain the value of Christ’s sacrifice. Tearing apart the argument that the Jews were members of the covenant because they were Abraham’s descendants, Paul exegeted Genesis 12:7. “The promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, ‘And to offsprings,’ referring to many, but referring to one, . . . who is Christ.” He went on, “The law, which came 430 years afterward, does not . . . make the promise void” (Gal. 3:16, 17).
In other words, keeping the law could not make someone a member of the Abrahamic covenant. Rather, the law was meant to be a “tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (verse 24, NKJV). Indeed, Paul was clear, it is only “if you are Christ’s” that you can call yourself “Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise” (verse 29).
Although much of Jesus’ interactions with the Jewish leaders were often hostile, there was one Pharisee who was willing to have his identity challenged.
Nicodemus came to Jesus at night, presumably because he didn’t want to tarnish his reputation by openly fraternizing with such a divisive figure. Jesus looked past Nicodemus’ pride and saw his spiritual desire.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
Nicodemus was flustered. “How can a man be born when he is old?”
Jesus’ answer indicated the spiritual nature of the new birth. “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit,” He explained, “he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit” (John 3:3-6).
Here Christ deftly juxtaposed the assurance the Jews had for their salvation with their true means of deliverance. Being a physical descendant of Abraham would not grant someone the right to become a child of God and be saved. They must instead have a new, spiritual experience that could give them new spiritual life.
Having defined what kind of birth He was talking about, Jesus then explained how to experience it.
“As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life” (verses 14, 15).
As it turns out, one can be a member of the covenant only through faith in Christ’s atonement for us. Without this, none of the promises of the covenant can apply to us. We might keep the law externally, and yet our best efforts will never be enough. Our good deeds can’t change our hearts.
That’s what Cain got wrong.
That’s what the scribes and Pharisees got wrong.
That’s what the women who wept at the crucifixion got wrong.
Christ’s death, as brutal and horrific as it was, was in another sense the most beautiful and incredible moment of all time. At the cross God revealed a love that is greater than death. Indeed, He demonstrated that we cannot be separated from Him by anything other than our own refusal to accept Him.
Through His sacrifice, Christ did away with the curses that should have been ours through our failure to keep the covenant. He, “who knew no sin,” became sin “so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21).
*Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, © by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. ESV Text Edition: 2016. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
