"It is Finished"

The last words of Jesus, "It is finished," ring in our ears.  It is true that His life is finished at that moment.  One account says that He made a loud cry, then it was over.  But there is something special about the final words that go much deeper than the obvious.

This moment in time, the giving of the life of the Messiah, had been planned from the beginning.  We could go all the way back to the 3rd chapter of Genesis, right at the beginning of the Bible, to see that there would come a time when Jesus would have to die on this earth.  Note Genesis 3 beginning in verse 14 where the Lord was speaking to the Serpent and concludes with "And you shall bruise His heel", speaking of Jesus being bruised by Satan.  But we know that Satan would never win that battle, a point that is made more than clear in the book of Revelation. 

All through the Bible we find that there are references to the coming of the Lord Jesus, and eventually to His death.  It was always God's plan to offer His Son in order to redeem the sins of man, of you and me. 

So when Jesus made His final statement, "It is finished", He was not only saying that His life was over, He was saying that His ministry was over, that this was the end of all that had been prophesied about Him.  He had fulfilled all that had been spoken by the prophets about the coming Savior, the coming Kingdom, and the redemption of man. 

But perhaps we shouldn't overlook the fact that it was the end of all the suffering that He went through for us.  For sure, we never want to minimize the severity of that.....and the wonderful sacrifice that was made....allowing us to have the beauty of heaven forever. 

And so, it was finished, but it was also a great beginning.  It represented the beginning of a new era, a new Way, the Way of Jesus.  We see this come to fruition in the book of Acts as the apostles go forth to develop the church.

What a great plan that our God had for us!  Thanks for reading and have a great week!