Now one of the malefactors who had been hanged spoke insultingly to him, saying, Art not thou the Christ? save thyself and us.
Three men hang on crosses. Luke turns our eyes to the two criminals on either side of Jesus. One of them mocks Him with words that sound like a plea for rescue. His demand raises a question: what does a dying man really need saving from?
Luke tells us about one railing voice, but the other Gospel writers show that this was not one man's sin. Commentators point out that nothing separated the two criminals up to this moment.
Scripture is completely silent about anything of this kind. It is silent about any redeeming or qualifying circumstance. More than that, it gives us the testimony of two inspired witnesses. They prove that right up to the moment when Luke introduces him to us, he was busy in the terrible work of railing on the Son of God, just like his fellow on the other side. In Matthew 27:44 we read, "And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way." So too in Mark 15:32, "Those who were crucified with him also reviled him."
That fact leaves the reader nowhere to hide.
No sorrow, no shame, no suffering brings the heart too low to scorn Jesus; a robber hanging on a cross despises Him! There is an instinct, so to speak, in every unrenewed heart against Jesus. It was not quieted even by that power of love in which He was going down into the deepest humiliation, to suffer the wrath due to sin. Do not say that you are one bit better than this wretched man. In two words, there is no difference. In God's sight you are as bad as the unrepentant thief who railed at Him.
Nothing the man says would strike an ordinary listener as outrageous. Heaven weighed it differently.
There may be the surest reviling of the Saviour without one word that people would consider blasphemous. In this very case the unrepentant robber simply said, "Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!" It was a thought, it was language, not unnatural to a man's mind in such circumstances. It was blasphemy to the mind of the Spirit. He was the promised centre and channel of every blessing for the earth, for man, and for God here below. That such a One should die on a cross did seem beyond measure strange. He had all power to save others, not to speak of Himself. That He should choose to die that way was incredible to the natural mind. Man does not understand how deep the humiliation of Jesus went. He understands the grace of God no better. And he does not understand his own utter need, which both of them measure and meet.
The man does ask to be saved. What he wants saving from is the problem.
Blindly, the robber thought only of being saved from the just sentence of his guilt. His hardened heart showed no concern for the seriousness of his eternal end. It showed no regard for the grace of the Lord Jesus either, who had prayed for the forgiveness of His enemies. He callously refused his last opportunity of forgiveness.
Taken at face value, his demand asks for two things that cannot both happen.
We find that the two robbers proposed something impossible — "Save yourself and us." If He saved Himself, He could not save them. He had to go through it all.
The man beside him asked and received. That fact settles what was available on the third cross.
But what do we see on that third cross? We see an unbelieving sinner. This is the solemn point. We may say without any hesitation what would have happened if he had thrown himself on the grace of the dying Saviour, as his repentant companion did. He would most certainly have met with the same response. There was grace in the heart of Jesus to meet the one as well as the other. But he did not want it, would not have it. He stayed unrepentant and unbelieving until the dark shadows of death gathered round him. Then the darker horrors of hell burst on his guilty soul. He perished within arm's length of the Saviour and salvation.
- Same start. Matthew and Mark say both robbers reviled Jesus. Nothing set one above the other.
- Same instinct. That scorn lives in every unrenewed heart. No reader stands above the man who mocked.
- Same grace offered. The grace the repentant robber received was within the other's reach too. He did not want it.
- A different asking. One asked only to escape the sentence his guilt deserved. The other threw himself on the grace of the dying Saviour.
- A different end. He perished within arm's length of the Saviour and salvation. Jesus could not save Himself and save others; He went through it all.
But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost *thou* too not fear God, thou that art under the same judgment?
Two criminals hung beside Jesus, and both began by mocking Him. Then one turned on the other, and his first words were about God, not about his crime.
Nothing in this man's record marks him out as the better of the two. One writer puts the case bluntly.
This is conclusive. It proves, beyond all question, that there was no difference between the two thieves. They were both condemned criminals. And more than that: right at the edge of eternity, both were busy with the terrible sin of reviling the blessed Son of God.
The change came fast, and one writer traces it to what the man saw hanging next to him.
What then produced such an entire change of feeling in the man? Faith. Yes, it always produces repentance when it is genuine. Faith makes a man willing to see sin as he never saw it before, and makes him see it because God is revealed to him. We never can see sin, except through the cross of Christ, in the light of God. It was Christ crucified who brought the light of God into the man's conscience. How exceedingly sinful his sins must have been, to bring down the Son of God to die for them!
His question is not "aren't you ashamed of yourself?" It reaches past the crime to the One the crime was against.
When God has dealt with the conscience, we make no more promises for the future. Unlike the naughty child who says, "I'll be better tomorrow," the soul confesses sin today. "Do you not fear God?" is the word — not "Are you not ashamed of being a thief?"
Where does such fear come from? One writer says grace alone, since no one is born with it.
Moral alienation marks the whole human family, so such fear of God is the fruit of divine grace alone. The dying thief shows this clearly. At first he mocked the Son of God in the hour of His suffering. Yet soon we hear him say to his fellow, "Do you not fear God?" As he drew near to eternity, God rose up before his soul and reverent awe filled him.
He does not claim a better position than the man he corrects. What changed in him showed at once, without any teaching.
It is deeply interesting to see that a newborn soul discerns according to God. It does so by instinct, through the new nature, where no one had given or received any formal teaching. The converted robber at once warns his unrepentant fellow of his sin and sets his danger before him. He confesses his own natural state, his own life and ways no less evil than the other's. And in the most serious and feeling way he defends the glory of the Lord Jesus. … There they were, "under the same sentence," as a fact, but how different in God's eyes!
By ordinary reckoning he had no right to speak. He was condemning behaviour he had joined in only hours earlier.
He rebukes his fellow criminal for doing the very thing he had done himself just before. He had only just stopped doing it. As men count it, this was inconsistent. Quite so. When conscience comes into God's presence and has the light of life, it acts in a way people would call very inconsistent. He was inconsistent as a man, but consistent as a saint. … This true taste of what sin is differs completely from the dread of sin's consequences.
It would be easy to read his honesty as the reason God accepted him. One writer shuts that door firmly.
Here are the accents of genuine repentance. … He felt and owned that his sentence was just, and that he was only reaping what his deeds deserved. Was there anything meritorious in this? By no means. It was the judgment of himself, the condemnation of his ways, the sense of his guilt. … It was the fruit of the Spirit's work in his soul, and enabled him to appreciate God's salvation. … It is impossible that the sense of guilt could ever form the basis of righteousness.
- Same crime. Both robbers began by mocking Jesus; nothing in the penitent one made him the better man.
- Same sentence. He admits he is under the same judgment. His rebuke claims no higher ground than the man beside him.
- Different light. Faith came in through the crucified Christ, and light showed him his sin as God sees it.
- Fear first. His first concern was not shame over theft but reverence toward God. Grace alone produces such awe.
- No merit. His self-condemnation was the Spirit's work in him. It opened his eyes to salvation, but never earned it.
and *we* indeed justly, for we receive the just recompense of what we have done; but this [man] has done nothing amiss.
The two men crucified beside Jesus start out the same way, but one of them breaks rank. His words to his fellow criminal confess something about himself and declare something about Christ. How did a dying robber come to see either thing so clearly?
The first half of his sentence points at himself, and it holds nothing back. One writer traces the confession to what he was looking at:
Listen to his dying words: "And we indeed justly ... but this man has done nothing wrong." It was the tremendous contrast between himself and Christ that forced the confession — "We indeed justly." There was no excuse, no explaining away. He does not try to make the guilt look smaller. He does not complain that the sentence was too harsh. He does not argue that his position is unjust.
Notice what he asks his companion, and what he does not ask.
In the case of the repentant thief, we see the first touch of the Eternal Spirit in the words he addressed to his fellow: "Do you not fear God?" This is the very earliest fruit of His sanctifying work. He does not say, "Do you not fear punishment?" ... A person may fear judgement, fear hell, and fear the consequences of sin, without the smallest particle of hatred of sin itself. But where the Spirit of God is really at work in the heart, He produces a real sense of sin and of God's judgement of it.
He admitted that he deserved his sentence. That was right, but it bought him nothing. The same writer is careful here:
Here are the accents of genuine repentance: "we indeed justly." He felt and owned that his condemnation was just, and that he was reaping only "the due reward of our deeds." Was there any merit in this? By no means. It was the judgement of himself, the condemnation of his ways, the sense of his guilt. And this was right. It was the sure forerunner of conversion to God... It is utterly impossible that the sense of guilt could ever form the basis of righteousness.
The second half of the verse is astonishing, because this man had no way of knowing Christ's record. He vouches for all of it anyway:
"This man has done nothing wrong." He would vouch for the whole life of Christ. On the contrary, this was a divine revelation to the soul. What Christian would not lay down his life for this? ... It was a divine revelation of the perfection of Christ's Person. Could your soul answer for Christ in that way? Here is a man who does so when everybody is deserting Jesus: here is divine faith that He was perfectly sinless.
Another writer hears in the same words a work that reached inside the man, not just outside him:
Most certainly, no soul was ever saved except by a work done for him — and Jesus alone did that work... But where the heart knows the work done for the soul, there is a work done in that very soul... There was more than righteousness here. There was a sense of grace, as well as of sin, and a sensitivity to God's will. There was delight in "this man," Jesus. His holiness made such an impression that the poor criminal, now a believer, could challenge all the world.
His verdict was not just accurate on the day; it marks Christ off from the entire human race:
The light that shone into his soul was not vague and ill-defined, but clear and distinct. It was the light of a contrast between the Christ of God and himself... "This man has done nothing wrong" will be loudly proclaimed as true of Christ alone in the glory... In all Adam's race, from Eden down to the setting up of the great white throne, only one ever fitted this description — the seed of the woman. Of no one else could it truly be said, "This man has done nothing wrong."
Seeing the contrast is not the end. It is the reason he turns and asks:
I think I hear that poor dying thief saying to his neighbour: "You and I never did a right thing. Here is a Man who never did a wrong thing. I am going to trust that Man." His faith found expression in the prayer: "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."
- Light — One sentence, two halves, one beam of light. It shows him what he is, and it shows him who Christ is.
- Fear — The Spirit's first fruit here is fear of God, not fear of punishment. Dreading consequences is not the same as hating sin.
- Justly — He makes no excuse and disputes no part of his sentence. Yet honest self-condemnation earns nothing: guilt can never be the basis of righteousness.
- Nothing wrong — He never watched Christ live, yet he vouches for that whole life. Divine revelation showed it to him, while everyone else deserted Him.
- Alone — Of all Adam's race, only one Man ever fitted that description. The man who saw it turned to Him and asked to be remembered.
And he said to Jesus, Remember me, [Lord,] when thou comest in thy kingdom.
One man hanging beside Jesus, dying for his own crimes, looked at a bleeding figure on a cross and addressed Him as a King with a kingdom still ahead of Him. Everything in sight said the opposite. Commentators treat his short prayer as one of the most remarkable acts of faith in the Bible.
Nothing visible supported what this man said. His confidence rested on something he had been taught inwardly, not on what his eyes reported.
Here is every mark of conversion, and of the most remarkable faith. The fear of God, the beginning of wisdom, is there; conscience upright and vigorous. He knew the perfect sinless righteousness of Christ as man. He owned Him as the Lord when His own disciples had abandoned and denied Him, and when there was no sign of His glory or of the dignity of His Person. Men counted Him as one of themselves. His kingdom was only a subject of scorn to all. But the poor thief is taught of God; and all is plain. He is as sure that Christ will have the kingdom as if He were reigning in glory.
Some translations read "in your kingdom" instead of "into your kingdom." One writer builds his point on that wording, and also notes what the man did not ask for.
He did not ask for any sacrifice to be offered on his behalf. His prayer tells us that he did not feel the need of it. The Lord's answer shows us there was no need of it. "Remember me when you come in your kingdom," not into, but in — that is, in the royal splendour and power which belonged to Him who was then, and is still, the King.
The other criminal wanted rescue from the cross. This one, in the same agony, asked for none.
As soon as he has finished his witness to the other thief, his heart turns to Christ by instinct. How undistracted he was! Was he thinking of his pain? Or of the people around the cross? He was completely taken up, as always happens when a person is aware of God's presence. To all appearances he was completely helpless. Yet he heard the Shepherd's voice, and knew Him as the Saviour and King. … The other criminal thought only, if he thought at all, of being rescued right now. This one saw the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.
One writer looks past the work done for this man to the work done in him, and traces its order.
Where the heart knows the work done for the soul, there is a work done in that very soul. So it was with this man. Even though it all happened so fast, the Spirit of God has given us the great moral marks of it. First of all appears a hatred of sin in the fear of God; then the repentant heart rebukes the shameless evil of his fellow.
A convicted robber asked the King of kings to keep him in mind. That was a bold thing to ask.
He does not ask for a part in His kingdom, but to be remembered by Jesus then. What! He, a robber, to be remembered by the King of kings and Lord of lords? Even so. He was right, and those who would judge him wrong are wrong themselves. They do not enter, as he did, into the glory of Jesus, Who calls His own sheep by name now, and Who, when that day comes, will not forget the last any more than the first, in the perfection of His love. … Others might put up the sign over the Crucified without faith. But the name and kingdom of the Crucified were written on the converted robber's heart.
He asked for a distant day. He was given that same afternoon.
The Lord went far beyond what the crucified criminal expected. He said, "Today you will be with me in Paradise." Later the man would share in the glory of the kingdom. … But meanwhile the Lord would have him with Himself in Paradise. There he would wait with Christ for the time his soul had desired. Such is grace — divine grace. It loves to go beyond our desires, and to bless according to the heart of the Giver rather than the need we put into words.
Another writer looks at what this man's words meant to Christ Himself:
What a balm for the heart of Christ that was! What a blessed, wonderful cheer from God for the heart of His own Son.
- Taught — God taught him, so he was sure of the kingdom when nothing in sight backed him up. Even Christ's own disciples had gone, yet he owned Him as Lord.
- Turned — the work inside him came out in a clear order. First the fear of God and a hatred of sin, then an open rebuke of the evil beside him.
- Asked — he wanted no relief from his pain and no sacrifice for his sin. He asked one thing: that the King in His royal power would remember him.
- Answered — grace gave more than he asked for. Not a distant day but that same day, and not only remembrance but Christ's own company.
- Comforted — the prayer that owned Him as King was a balm to the heart of God's own Son as He hung there.
And Jesus said to him, Verily I say to thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
Two criminals hung on crosses beside Jesus. One of them asked to be remembered when Jesus came into His kingdom. The answer names a time, a place, and a companion.
The dying man looked ahead to a coming kingdom.
The dying robber prayed the Lord to remember him when He should come in His kingdom. Jesus said, "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise." So He offers a blessing beyond and better than the one he asked for. To the renewed mind it is a dearer prize than any outward display, however glorious: the joy of being that very day with Christ Himself, where the Father delights to love and honour the Son.
Some move the punctuation, so that the Lord only says "I tell you this today." Commentators reject that reading for two reasons.
The usual way of handling this text is to change the punctuation. They would have us read the words like this: "Truly I say to you today: you shall be with me in Paradise." They make it mean, "today, this day of my humiliation, I say to you." But the word order in the sentence is all against them... Besides this, the Lord is answering a prayer in which the thief named a time when he wished to be remembered... The Lord says in effect, "You shall not wait for that: today you shall be with Me."
The word has a background outside the Bible.
A word on paradise. It is Greek, and said to be derived, whether rightly or not, from the Persian, and is used of an enclosed garden or pleasure park (Song 4:13; Neh. 2:8). In the New Testament it occurs as a description of the present place of the saints who are out of the body (Luke 23:43; 2 Cor. 12:4), and also of their future place of bliss, in which the tree of life will be found (Rev. 2:7)... Paul clearly distinguishes it from the third heaven.
Commentators differ here. Another writer reads Paul's account as naming one and the same place.
Paradise is identified with the third heaven by Paul in 2 Corinthians 12. In Revelation 2:7 the Tree of Life is there, a reminder of the earthly paradise, but filling the whole scene.
The circumstances of this conversion rule out every other explanation for it.
So we see how brightly grace shines in the salvation of the thief on the cross. There can be no possible mistake about him. Clearly he had no good works to trust in. He had done no deeds of charity. Of baptism and the Lord's Supper he knew nothing... For what could he do? Where could he turn? His hands and his feet were nailed fast to a criminal's cross.
So is his case an exception, or the rule?
The thief is an example, not of extraordinary faith, nor of an unusual way of saving sinners, but of the only way. I believe God has singled him out to give us an example, free of any later details. It shows us that the title to heaven and the fitness for heaven are both given the moment the sinner believes... There was no need of any preparation for Paradise beyond the preparation which divine grace gave him.
The promise settles what happens to a believer between death and the raising of the body.
A similar truth appears later in the case of the converted thief. The point there is just the same — immediate blessedness, not just later, when the body is raised from the dead. That is what he looked for when he asked to be remembered at the coming of Jesus in His kingdom. But the Lord adds more — immediate blessedness now.
Of the three parts of the promise, one carries the weight.
How did the saved thief enter heaven? With Christ, and in all His perfectness... He was not merely to be inside the door, but with Christ, wherever that might be. Oh, these blessed words "with me"! They settle and define everything about our heaven.
One question remains: who speaks like this?
"Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise." Who is this, coming out with His "Amen" when He is about to die? Who is this whose eye could, before closing in death, turn on a poor sinner and send a ray of glory into his soul?
- Asked — He prayed for a place in a future kingdom; the answer gave him something better and sooner.
- Today — Word order and the man's request both tie "today" to the promise, not to the speaking of it.
- Paradise — A garden of delight; used of the present home of departed saints and of the future scene where the tree of life stands.
- Fitness — Hands nailed down, no works, no rites; title and fitness for heaven arrived the moment he believed.
- With Me — Not merely inside the door but in Christ's own company, and that on the very day he died.
And it was about [the] sixth hour, and there came darkness over the whole land until [the] ninth hour.
Darkness covers the land for three hours at the brightest part of the day, while Jesus hangs on the cross. Two questions follow. What could cause it? And what was God saying by it?
The "sixth hour" sounds odd today because Luke counts the hours from six in the morning. Set against a modern clock, the day falls into place.
It is important to see that John (as throughout his Gospel) gives Roman time. He counts from midday and midnight, as we do. The other Gospels give Jewish time, counted from six o'clock. So we have these times connected with the crucifixion: 6 a.m. — Pilate sits down "on the judgment seat at a place called The Stone Pavement" (John 19:13). 9 a.m. — (the "third hour," Mark 15:25) the Lord was crucified. 12 midday to 3 p.m. — (the "sixth" to the "ninth" hour) the three hours of darkness. 3 p.m. — Jesus died.
It was the time of full moon, and at full moon a solar eclipse is impossible. That one fact rules out the natural explanation.
Supernatural it certainly was, for it being the time of full moon, there was no eclipse of the sun to account for it. It was, however, in perfect keeping with what was taking place. At the fall of the king of Egypt God declared, "I will cover the heavens and make their stars dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light" (Ezek. 32:7). How much more might that literally happen when the Creator was dying on the cross! He is the One who upholds all things by the word of His power. For three hours that mysterious darkness continued. It was the first sign since the Lord's arrest that God was not indifferent to all that was going on. During that time men seem to have been mostly quiet, probably overawed by what was happening.
One writer links this darkness with a rule in the law about making atonement.
At the last stage of this great transaction there is darkness over all the earth. How fitting that it should be so! God and Christ were alone there. Long before, these words pictured this scene: "No one may be in the tent of meeting from the time he enters to make atonement in the Holy Place" (Lev. 16:17). In one sense that darkness pictured the darkness resting on the mind and heart of the nation at that moment. It was the terrible moral darkness that lay on Israel. Yet God surely meant to withdraw His Son in that hour. No eye was to see what passed between Him and Christ when the Blessed One bore the judgment of God against sin.
The lost sunlight was a picture. Something far darker was happening to the One on the cross.
From the sixth hour (noon), with the sun in mid-heaven, to the ninth, there was darkness over all the land. Three full hours — this suggests the full measure of the cup of wrath poured out to Him. "God is light," and from our sin-Bearer the light is absolutely withdrawn. The eclipsing of the sun was only a figure of a more awful eclipse upon the soul of the holy Son of God.
The death of God's Son was too great an event to leave the world as it was.
God would not let so great an event as the death of His Son leave the world unaffected. He had made that world. Nor would He leave untouched the legal system He had set up through Moses among His earthly people.
In the temple a heavy curtain shut off the inner room, called the holiest. What closed over Christ opened for everyone else.
The three brightest hours of the day were darkened, as the sun was veiled. There was something very fitting in this, for the true "Sun of Righteousness" was bearing our sin at that time. A divine hand also tore the veil of the temple. This showed that the day of the visible temple system was now over, and that the way into the holiest was about to be made known — see Hebrews 9:8. Our true "Sun" was veiled for a moment, enduring our judgment, so that there might be no veil between us and God.
- Hour — Luke counts from sunrise. The sixth hour is noon and the ninth is three in the afternoon. The brightest stretch of the day turned darkest.
- Cause — No eclipse is possible at full moon. This darkness was God's own act, the first sign since the arrest that He was not indifferent.
- Cover — No one could be in the tent of meeting while atonement was made. So God screened the cross. No eye saw what passed between Him and His Son.
- Cost — The lost sunlight pictured a deeper loss. God's light was withdrawn from the One bearing our sin, and three hours measured the full cup.
- Consequence — The true Sun was veiled for a moment and the temple curtain tore. Now no veil stands between us and God.
And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple rent in the midst.
Two signs stand together in this verse. The sun's light fails at midday. The curtain that shut off the innermost room of the temple is torn. Both come from God's hand, and both say something about the death of Jesus.
The date of the crucifixion rules out any natural cause, as one writer explains.
He was crucified at the third hour. Everything we have read of happened before the sixth hour, which is noon. Then a supernatural darkness covered the land — the sunlight failed, as some translations render it. It certainly was supernatural. It was the time of full moon, so no eclipse of the sun could explain it. That mysterious darkness lasted three hours. It was the first sign since the Lord's arrest that God was not indifferent to all that was going on.
The darkening and the tearing belong together. One writer shows the exchange between them.
The three brightest hours of the day went dark, because the sun was veiled. There was something very fitting in this, for the true "Sun of Righteousness" was bearing our sin at that time. God's own hand also tore the veil of the temple. This showed that the day of the visible temple system was now over, and that the way into the holiest place was about to be made known — see Hebrews 9:8. Our true "Sun" was veiled for a moment, enduring our judgment, so that there might be no veil between us and God.
No falling masonry or shaking ground tore the curtain. What it stood for ended with it.
The veil of the temple, which marked out the whole system of the Jewish religion, was also torn from top to bottom. No earthquake did this, and no other physical cause. The natural light disappeared, and Judaism vanished, so that a new and true light might shine, giving anyone who saw it free entry into the holiest place of all.
Luke's wording is not quite the same as Matthew's and Mark's. Where the ESV has "torn in two," older translations read "in the midst." Matthew and Mark add "from top to bottom." One writer finds meaning in the difference.
Matthew and Mark both write that the veil was torn in two from top to bottom (Matthew 27:51; Mark 15:38). That speaks of God coming out to meet man as a Saviour God. But in Luke 23:45 the veil is said to be torn "in the midst." This surely means that the legal system of Judaism, in which there was no access to God, had been set aside in the death of Christ, so that by that same death men might have access to God in an entirely new system.
Who tore it matters, and so does what people have tried to do since.
God had said that He would dwell in thick darkness. But He dwells in it no longer. Before, God was hidden, though He acted. He stayed hidden behind the veil. But now He reveals Himself in the death of Jesus, and by means of that death. The veil of the temple separated God in His holiness from man, and shut man in his sins out from God. It was torn in two from the top to the bottom — that is, from God to man. The veil was torn in two as soon as Jesus died. But people in our day want to put it up again, to put God in the darkness and man at a distance from Him.
Luke names the tearing before he reports the death. One writer answers carefully, without forcing the point.
Luke often leaves the strict order of time. He loves to give us the moral setting or the results of the ways, words or work of the Lord Jesus. But here none of the three Gospels seems to give clear marks that let us say for certain whether the tearing came before or after our Lord's death. In the four Gospels we have God's full and complete account of Christ's atoning work.
Others are firmer. One holds that the tearing happened only after the Lord had died, and that Luke groups the two wonders together and then goes back to tell of the death (C E Stuart). Commentators differ here.
- Darkness. No eclipse can happen at full moon, so the failing sunlight was God's own doing. It was the first sign since the arrest that heaven was not indifferent.
- Exchange. The true Sun was veiled while bearing our judgment, so that no veil would remain between us and God.
- End. A divine hand tore the curtain that stood for the whole Jewish system, and that system passed away with it.
- Access. Luke's "in the midst" marks a legal order with no way in, set aside so that men could approach God in an entirely new way.
- Direction. The tear ran from God to man, not man to God. So every effort to hang that curtain back up puts God in the darkness and man at a distance again.
And Jesus, having cried with a loud voice, said, Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit. And having said this, he expired.
The final words from the cross in Luke are not a cry of abandonment but an address to a Father. Luke alone records them. They raise two questions. What changed between the darkness and this moment? And how could a dying man still speak with full strength and place His own spirit where He chose?
Earlier the other Gospels record a different cry: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" One writer links the change of address to the finish of the atoning work:
Then when all is over, when the great work of atonement is done, and the suffering reaches its furthest point... God hears the cry of the Sufferer, and the answer comes. Christ can say, "You have heard me." The resurrection proved to man that God had heard Christ and accepted the work. Still, Christ Himself knew He was heard and accepted the moment the atoning work was finished. So at once, we learn from the Gospels, the Lord spoke the language of perfect communion.
These are not the words of the atonement itself. One writer marks what they are, and what they are not:
Here there is no cry to God as the forsaken One, when His soul became an offering for sin... Nor does He speak here as the Son, conscious of His own deity, declaring the work finished for which He had come. This is the ever perfect man, Christ Jesus, committing His spirit into His Father's keeping with unwavering confidence... The words here do not express His suffering as the forsaken One making atonement. They express the peaceful departure of His spirit, as man, into the hands of God the Father.
The sentence is not new. Psalm 31:5 says, "Into your hand I commit my spirit." There the sufferer speaks to the LORD — Jehovah, in older translations. One writer notes the one word Jesus changed, and what it opens for believers:
The Lord did not hesitate to take its words for Himself at that moment (Luke 23:46). He only put "Father" in place of "Jehovah," as fitted Him. And now, risen from the dead, He gives us the right to do the same, in the faith of His redemption.
Luke notes that Jesus cried out loudly before speaking. One writer asks why that detail is recorded:
Jesus cried with a "loud voice." Why is that recorded? Why does the Spirit of God dwell on it here? To show that our Lord Jesus Christ kept the full, undiminished, unchanged strength of His manhood. He still had all His powers as a Man. He was not wasted, not worn out with suffering. What He had gone through had not weakened His strength in any way. In the full vigour of perfect humanity He cried with a "loud voice," and said, "Father."
Because His strength was unbroken, His death was not something that happened to Him. One writer sets this against a line from Ecclesiastes:
The wise man of the Old Testament has told us, "No man has power to retain the spirit, or power over the day of death" (Ecclesiastes 8:8). But here is One who had that power. He is able at one moment to lift up His voice with unimpaired strength, and the next moment to deliver up His spirit... Here is One who has full command over His spirit; He delivered it up to His Father, and so He laid down His life.
Luke also records the first words Jesus ever spoke. One writer sets the first beside the last:
His first word was "Father." His last word is "Father"; and between the two the darkness and tempest... Only Luke's gospel records this cry. Luke is also the Gospel that gives His first recorded words, "Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" (Older translations read "about my Father's business," which is the sense that follows.) That business was finished now, not one bit of it left undone. In the serenity and calm of that knowledge He commends His spirit to His Father and bows His head in death.
Stephen died with almost the same sentence, but not the same verb:
Jesus could say, and He alone could say it rightly, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit."... He could lay down His life and take it up again, so He could speak this way to the Father. But the servant of the Lord could say, rightly and with blessing, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit."
- Finished — Christ completed the atoning work before He spoke this word. That is why the address changes from "My God" to "Father."
- Father — The psalm gave the sentence. Jesus gave the name. Risen, He gives believers the right to use it too.
- Strength — The loud voice proves He did not die of exhaustion; He was in the full vigour of His manhood.
- Command — No one else has power over his own spirit in the day of death; He handed His up as His own act.
- Echo — Stephen could only ask to be received; Christ alone could commit. The dying believer borrows the confidence, not the authority.
Now the centurion, seeing what took place, glorified God, saying, In very deed this man was just.
A Roman officer had just carried out an execution. When it was over, he praised God and called the man he had killed righteous. The ESV translates his word as "innocent"; the writers quoted below use the older wording, "righteous." Luke records the confession in a form found in no other Gospel. Commentators hear in it both the verdict of a startled conscience and the summary of everything this Gospel has said about Jesus.
The officer's verdict is not a stray compliment. One writer treats it as the sentence that gathers up Luke's whole portrait of Jesus:
The main subject of Luke's presentation is the person of the Lord Jesus as Son of Man. He is the true and perfect man. He lived as the only just one among the unjust, and He suffered death for them — on the cross. This is why Luke describes in great detail how the Son of God became man. He tells of His birth, His childhood, His obedience towards Mary and Joseph and His growth in every respect... In no other Gospel do we find the Lord Jesus in prayer and speaking about prayer as often as in this Gospel. In this way He shows His perfect dependence upon His God and Father. The centurion's words under the cross sum up the Holy Spirit's intention in this Gospel: "Certainly this was a righteous man."
The value of the confession lies in who said it and when. Every human court had already reached the opposite conclusion:
The centurion is mentioned here as owning Jesus to be "a righteous man," whatever man might have judged or done.
Matthew reports the same officer confessing Jesus as the Son of God. Luke keeps only this half of what he said, and the choice fits his subject:
Even the centurion in charge of the execution became sure that "certainly this was a righteous Man" (v. 47). Matthew mentions that the centurion and others with him also declared Him to be the Son of God. Luke emphasises His manhood, and so leaves that statement out.
The words came out of a man who had no stake in defending Jesus. That is what makes them so telling:
The Roman centurion stationed there to watch the crucifixion completed is the great witness of the power of the cross on conscience. The effect and power of what his conscience took in through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ forced the almost involuntary testimony from his lips as he gazed at Him: "Certainly this was a righteous Man"... I am bold to say there is no power on earth or in heaven equal to the power of the cross. Its effect on conscience, heart, and affection is beyond man's power to describe.
Commentators differ on how far this went. Some call it the faith of the centurion; another is careful to claim no more than the text says:
The poor centurion was struck by all that had taken place. He confesses that this Jesus whom he has crucified was certainly the righteous man. Such is the power of the cross upon the conscience. I say conscience, because I do not pretend to say that it went any further than that in his case.
The man was an outsider to Israel. One writer sees his place at the front as a sign of what was coming:
Luke records the faith of the Gentile centurion in a different form from the other Gospels: "he glorified God, saying, In very deed this Man was righteous." He is righteous in the full sense, not just by comparison with other men. Everything the centurion has seen proves it. He is prompt and outspoken in his confession. The Gentile takes the first place now, as he has done for many centuries since. He is the first sign of the change that is coming.
His testimony did not stand alone. It closed a chain of statements from people who had every reason to say otherwise:
Testimony to this was borne by the centurion who witnessed the scene because of his official duty... The centurion became a fourth witness to the perfection of Jesus, joining Pilate, Herod and the dying thief.
- Verdict. The officer in charge of the execution called Jesus righteous. Every human court had judged the opposite.
- Full sense. He meant righteous in the full sense, not righteous by comparison with other men. Everything he had watched proved it.
- Conscience. The cross itself forced the confession out of him. Writers differ on whether it went beyond conscience to faith.
- Fourth. He joined Pilate, Herod and the dying criminal as one more witness to Jesus' perfection.
- First. A Gentile was first to speak, taking a place he has held ever since — the early sign of a coming change.