Why Jesus Was Crucified

On Calvary Christ “became obedient unto death”. In so doing he submitted to a particular form of death, “even the death of the Cross” (Philippians 2: 8). It is clear that in God’s purpose there was some special significance in death by crucifixion, not found in other forms of death.

The Jews had intended to hurl Jesus over the precipice at Nazareth (Luke 4:29-30), and they went to stone him in Jerusalem (John 8:59), however God’s purpose in the Scriptures was that he had to undergo death on a cross. Why?

When discussing the manner of his sacrificial death, Jesus referred to the lifting up of the brasen serpent during Israel’s wilderness wanderings, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:14–16). “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. This he said, signifying what death he should die.” (John 12:32-33).

As the brasen serpent was lifted up for all to see and look to in faith for healing, so Jesus needed to be lifted up by means of crucifixion as a public declaration of God’s righteousness that we can look to in faith for healing from sin and death.

The Parallel With the Lifting Up of the Brasen Serpent

The parallelism between Jesus death on the cross and the lifting up of the brasen serpent in the wilderness is striking.

(a) As the brasen serpent was impaled and “lifted up” on a stake (Numbers 21:6–9), so was Jesus (John 12:33–35).

(b) As those mortally bitten in the wilderness, who looked on the serpent on the pole, were saved from death, so those mortally bitten by sin, by looking to Jesus on the cross, are saved from sin and death.

The character of the life-giving serpent is of particular significance in this parallelism also, for where the fiery serpent was actively venomous and destructive, the brasen serpent was impotent and harmless, not destroying men’s lives but saving them. As such, the brasen serpent, though in form a replica of the very enemy that brought death by its bite, became a source of recovery to those who looked upon it in faith. Therefore,

(c) As the impaled brasen serpent was a harmless symbol of sin, so the crucified Jesus was a sinless bearer of our sinful flesh nature, (ie mortal human nature with natural inclinations to sin from within), which the brasen serpent represented.

This third parallelism emphasises the symbolism of crucifixion as used by Paul.

1. “Our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed” (Romans 6:6).

Here again the parallelism is significant. We die symbolically as Christ died physically - but in each case the death is “to sin” (Romans 6:2,10). Our “old man” is figuratively crucified in baptism, as Christ’s body was literally nailed to the tree.

2. “They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts” (Galatians 5:24).

Our Lord experienced crucifixion literally, while believers undergo it symbolically. The principle involved, however, is the same in each case; the affections and lusts which are natural to “the flesh” or human nature are denied and crucified by the believer, as they were repudiated finally by Jesus on the cross. Expressing the same idea in different language, Paul says, “If ye mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live” (Romans 8:13).

3. “Put off the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts” (Ephesians 4:22).

Using the past tense Paul tells the Colossians, “Ye have put off the old man with his deeds” (Colossians 3: 9). His two statements are clearly complementary. Baptism is a summary act done once, while discipleship is a continuous process - both of crucifixion. The one destroys the body of sin ceremonially, the other does so in a moral sense. The old man is corrupt, for his lusts are deceitful and his deeds evil. “The old man” is correctly understood to be our mortal sinful nature, which needs to be both redeemed and brought into subjection.

The Significance of the Cross

The significance of the Cross becomes evident when considering passages like these.

(a) As death, (and no more), the Crucifixion represented the mortification of a sinful flesh nature, the cutting off of human flesh with its inclination to sin (which is a body of sin in the case both of sinners and Jesus who was sinless.

(b) As a “lifting-up” it declared those principles openly and prominently to all.

(c) As a violent, premature death it was a voluntary and deliberate submission by Jesus to this public declaration of the principles of God’s righteousness in his own crucified body.

In concise terms, the Crucifixion symbolised "the judgment of this world," demonstrating clearly that the "the prince of this world" was "cast out." In other words sin was being publicly condemned and destroyed in its own flesh.

The death of the two wrongdoers crucified alongside Christ could not accomplish the same purpose, even though they shared the inheritance of a sinful nature with Jesus. Crucifixion in their case was the consequence of sinfulness, but in Jesus case it terminated a life of sinlessness. Such sinlessness was essential in a sacrifice intended to justify men, or declare them righteous. Thus when he “bore our sins in his own body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24), he did so effectually only because he was without moral flaw and blemish (1 Peter 1:19). As Paul expresses it, God “made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

People naturally have no righteousness of themselves, but are “ made righteousness ” when they identify themselves in faith with Jesus. By virtue of the fact that he offered himself without sin to God, his blood purges our conscience (Hebrews 9:14) and by it we are justified (or made righteous), our faith being counted as righteousness for his sake (Romans 5:9; 4:5).

Jesus As Our Representative

Likewise, due to the shared identity arising from the common sinful nature he shared with us, Jesus who did no sin was "made sin." In other words, God, in His mercy, accepted Christ's "body of sin" as representative of all other human flesh, in which sin dwells (ie the natural inclination to sin). Even though Christ literally died on a cross, which we don't need to do, we are, nonetheless, "crucified with him." He is our representative, for if he died as a substitute instead of us, we could not be "buried with him."

He did this because "sinful flesh," which is the cause that leads all others to sin (which is its effect), was seen by God in his person, as representative of the sins of humanity. This is what is meant in (1 Peter 2:24) "who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed." Just as he rose from the dead, free from all association with sin, they rise symbolically to a new life in him.

It follows that Christ’s sacrifice was efficacious for his own redemption and deliverance from mortality also. “By his own blood he entered in once into the holy place having obtained eternal redemption” in and for himself so as to obtain it for us as our representative (Hebrews 9:12), that is, “into heaven itself” (Hebrews 9:24).

His baptism symbolised this fact. It was his identification with the sacrifice he was to make to declare the righteousness of God and condemn his sinful flesh nature with its impulses to sin. Anticipating his crucifixion, Jesus declared, “I have a baptism to be baptised with” (Luke 12:50). Unlike all others who approached John confessing their sins at the Jordan River, Jesus came without sins to confess but insisted that John baptise him, (Matthew 3:15) “And Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness.”

Jesus understood the significance of John's declaration that all flesh is grass (Isaiah 40:3–8). He understood that despite being sinless, he still needed to repudiate and condemn his sinful flesh nature with all its lusts in faith by being baptised, in anticipation of the actual condemnation he would later suffer, and by which he would destroy Diabolos (Hebrews 2:14), the personification of the power that leads to death (Romans 5:21). So “to them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation” (Hebrews 9:28).

While emphasis must be laid on the fact that Christ died for us, “for the ungodly” (Romans 5:6), “to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15) and “to bear the sins of many” (Hebrews 9:28), it must not be forgotten that he was saved from mortal sinful flesh through his own sacrifice, on the basis of his faith in the principles of God’s righteousness he declared in it, “when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, he was heard in that he feared” (Hebrews 5:7).

God’s purpose in and through him necessitated his resurrection. So God raised him up, “having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be holden of it” Acts 2:24. He is now, in consequence, alive for evermore, having as our “forerunner” entered into “that within the veil (symbolic of immortality)” Hebrews 6:20.

The Meaning of Christ's Sacrifice

The meaning of sacrifice is succinctly conveyed by Paul, “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God: being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness; that God might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus” (Romans 3:23–26). When Jesus was crucified God was reconciling humanity to Himself, while upholding His just and necessary law of sin and death without compromise.

In what way did Christ's Crucifixion declare God's righteousness? It did so in that Christ had human nature that was under the condemnation of death, ensuring that there was no infringement of God's justice in his death. His death was not morally wrong, thus his willing sacrifice declared God's righteousness by not waiving unconditionally God's sentence of mortality imposed in Eden. If the death that Jesus endured were one to which he was unrelated, it would have instead declared God's injustice, as God would have allowed the unrequired death of an innocent man.

The death of Jesus death was just and right, for as the Son of Man (John 3:14), he was subject to the condemnation brought about by Adam. Consequently, God was righteous in requiring his death. Through his death, Jesus declared God's righteousness, enabling God to remain true to His own decree and yet act as the Justifier of those who are naturally unjust, but believe in Jesus.

Adapted from “Redemption in Christ Jesus” by W F Barling