Here’s a rather basic question. Why did Jesus die? My wife and I have been going to this class called Alpha at our church. It’s a place where you are actually encouraged to ask questions and nobody is there forcing you to accept any particular answer. Last time I went the topic of discussion was why did Jesus die?
In each class there is a video that we watch where this guy goes through these different fundamental questions. His response to this question was actually quite simplistic and in a way, stereotypical of how simplistic people believe Christianity to be. His answers were based straight out of the Bible, taking specific passages that say things like “for all have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God,” Rom 3:23. He went on to say that Jesus was an atoning sacrifice for our sins as well as other analogies for why Christ died on the cross. There are actually several different analogies the disciples used to try to explain Jesus’ death and resurrection, but they were all attempts to explain something that they didn’t understand completely. So when I heard this guy explaining why Jesus died it rubbed me the wrong way, as if it were really that simple.
In the end he did admit that why Jesus died on the cross is still a mystery, but one thing we can be reasonably sure of is that he did it out of love. It was at that point that I finally thought he had come close to answering the question, because the question for me is not why did He die, but why did He exist at all?
The Christian message is often summarized (and butchered in my opinion) by quoting John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” This verse can mean many things, depending upon which theological tradition you come from. All too often, it is summarized to mean that in order to go to heaven we must believe in Jesus Christ. It can become an inward, self-centered view of God’s cosmic redemptive plan for creation. Unfortunately, that’s kind of the message I got from video. To his credit, I don’t think he really thinks it is that simple, but he didn’t make it feel very mysterious either.
What if you are from a mainline protestant tradition that doesn’t boil the good news down to a ticket to heaven? What if you don’t subscribe to the “sinners in the hands of an angry God” theology? What if you don’t believe that Jesus came to save us from God’s wrath? Rather, what if you believe that Jesus’ death and resurrection was God’s way of declaring once and for all that death has been defeated and that God’s desire is that “all” shall live eternally in communion with Him. Whether or not God gets what He wants is a different story, but the question of why Jesus died still remains. If God is all powerful and desires to grant eternal life to “all” that will trust Him and embrace the life He has to offer, why did Jesus have to come and die on the cross at all? He could have just said that since I’m God and I want my children to be with me for eternity that death isn’t the end. Why did Jesus have to come at all and die such a gruesome death? The question still remains.
So what am I to do? How can I deal with this question? I believe the best thing to do is take a step back and look at who the Bible describes God to be as a whole. If the Bible could say just one thing, I believe it would say that God loves us. So I will start from there. God is love. If the Bible could say just one more thing, I think it would say that He wants to be involved in his creation. That is, He is a theistic God that is actively involved in His creation, not a deistic God that created the universe and then sits back and watches it unfold.
Now imagine you’re God for a moment (we’re supposedly created in His image so I think we can do that at least for a second), and imagine what it must have been like to see all the pain and suffering in the world. What are you to do? Well, you could call out to the people of the world and tell them that you’re there, that this is just a glimpse of what is to come, that you love and care for them, that you experience their pain and suffering just like they do, but they won’t listen. Or if they do, they listen for just a little while and then forget about you a while later.
Then there was this one man named Abraham that listened to God. He listened and trusted God, albeit a bit imperfectly and God made a covenant with him that through him all people will come to know the one true God. Through that man came the Israelites, God’s chosen people that are supposed to be His light to the world. But they are all prone to falling short of the image of God as the rest of creation. So I guess God had a choice. He could either just allow us to continue wandering through life with only some stories that describe Him, or He could be born into creation, walk among us, provide a perfect model of who He is so that He can set the record straight once and for all. Or perhaps when He made the covenant with Abraham He knew the Israelites would fail him and His whole plan was to send a messiah in the first place. This seems like a more likely scenario.
In my mind, that is what a loving God would do. He simply couldn’t restrain himself. The only way He could even come close to telling us how much He loves us is to come and be with us Himself. His gruesome death was inevitable. He experienced a very real and horrific death so that no one can say that God can’t relate to their suffering, but He responded to the violence and anger with love and peace.
So why did Jesus die? I’m not exactly sure. But I’m pretty sure it has to do with God’s love for us.
