cross

He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels. (Isaiah 53:12)

Sooner or later we all feel the painful effects of sin. Sometimes it’s the weight of our own sin and the shame and embarrassment of having failed miserably. At other times, it’s the load of someone else’s sin that weighs us down-someone who betrayed, deceived, abandoned, ridiculed, cheated, or made a fool of us.

Think about a time when the weight of that guilt or pain was so heavy that you couldn’t pull yourself out of bed. Now try to imagine the heaviness of the combined grief that everyone’s sin has caused your family, your church, your neighborhood. Add to that all the suffering sin has caused everyone in your city, province, nation, and the world. Now try to imagine the accumulated grief that sin has caused throughout the centuries since creation. Is it any wonder that the weight of all this sin began squeezing the life out of Jesus on the night He was called to bear it? (Matthew 26:36-44). The next day, even His beloved Father would forsake Him. No other suffering can compare.  

Sin put Jesus to the ultimate test. But His love endured it, His strength bore it, and His power overcame it. Thanks to Jesus’ death and resurrection, we know beyond a doubt that sin will not and cannot win.

The empty tomb of Jesus shows us that sin is no longer our master and that we are no longer slaves to its fear and shame. Paul says in Romans 6:14:

For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.

In Romans 6 Paul connects the events of the death and resurrection of Jesus as the foundation for the reality of the spiritual transformation that have taken place in our lives after our decision of believing and confessing that Jesus is our Lord, being our experience of baptism the proof and testimony of that. In Romans 6:4 he writes:

We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

All this shows us that the salvation that Jesus brings is complete. Sin cannot win and our faith in Jesus’ victory cannot fail.

Listening Prayer: “Lord Jesus, what are the lies that I’ve been believing about myself that won’t allow me to enjoy your victory? Please help me to identify them and stop believing them. I’m victorious in You, Jesus.”