“It is finished.” The implication of the Greek word is “This is complete.” It is accomplished, fulfilled, completed. Then you can put an exclamation point after the phrase. There is no question mark. Redemption is complete. You can’t add to it. You can’t subtract from it. It doesn’t need something added to it. Jesus accomplished perfect redemption for men. He completed what we could not even begin. His blood was shed. It’s more than all the blood of all the sacrifices ever offered.

Hebrews 10:8-14: “First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them” (although the law required them to be made). Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second. And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.”

Christ finished the task God purposed him to do. God finished his work on the Cross so that his redemption might be complete in our lives.

Have you completed the task God has for you? Can you say “It is Finished. I have completed what God has given me to do? God’s plan and purpose for my life have been accomplished. God has used the minutes, hours, days, months and years that have been entrusted to me and God’s will and purpose have been done in my life.”

John, standing at the foot of the cross, relays to us Christ’s final words. They are words, not of despair, but of triumph – “It is finished.” His redemption for you and me is complete. There is nothing we can do to add to it. There is nothing we can do to earn it. Nothing can take it away.

All that is left for us to do, is in gratitude and love to let him to continue to reach out to a lost and dying world through us. To proclaim God’s offer of redemption triumphantly to anyone who will place themselves at the foot of the cross. Our prayer is that God might finish His purpose through us as well!

Easter Collection

Get more than 80 creative ideas for planning a Youth Easter celebration or Easter Party. You can immediately download my best Easter Icebreakers, games, illustrations, Easter activity ideas AND MUCH MORE in a useful ebook!

=> Tell me more about the Easter Collection

“Into thine hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit.” (Lk 23:46)

It has been suggested that since the Lord’s last words were “Father into thy hands I commend my spirit”, His first words at the resurrection would have been a continuation of the Psalm 31:5 from which He had quoted: “Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth”. But David didn’t say Ps. 31:5 on his deathbed. They were not words of despair. It was not a final giving in after a time of struggle. Instead, it was an expression of David’s desire to commit his soul to the Father in gratefulness and praise.

It’s so difficult to place our lives into the hands of someone else. The apostles must have been quite disturbed to hear Jesus first words from the cross “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mk 15:34). Those words, taken from Psalm 22, words begin with David’s feelings of despair but end with words of thanksgiving for victory.

When Jesus said, “Father, into your hands,” He knew He was in safe keeping because He was in His Father’s hands. He knew God would never drop Him and He was safe and secure. Jesus speaking of us said, no man would be able to pluck us out of the hands of God. Paul said the same thing in 2 Timothy 1:12: “For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.”

We do not need to fear. We are in the hands of God. We must make the same journey from isolation and despair with God’s seeming lack of help – “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” to commitment to allow God to finish his will in us – “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit”.

Easter Collection

Get more than 80 creative ideas for planning a Youth Easter celebration or Easter Party. You can immediately download my best Easter Icebreakers, games, illustrations, Easter activity ideas AND MUCH MORE in a useful ebook!

=> Tell me more about the Easter Collection

At times in Christ’s life, we see both His humanity and His divinity. When Jesus said that He was thirsty…we see His humanity.

The Son of God the divine Creator of the rivers and oceans of water said, “I thirst.” The Son of God who makes the rain to fall from the sky and the fountains to burst forth from the depths of the earth said, “I thirst.” The one who said, “I am the water of life and anyone who comes to me and drinks, out of his innermost being will flow rivers of living water,” Thirsts.

The words of Jesus not only show us his humanity, but they were also a quote from Psalm 69:31. “I thirst and they gave me vinegar to drink.” It was an obscure passage. But John the Apostle, from the foot of he cross, heard the detail, and saw it and recorded it.

Psalm 22:15 from which Christ’s first words on the cross were spoken hints at this as well. “My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth.” Some have suggested it was not to alleviate Christ’s thirst or relieve the suffering that he makes his request. Instead, it was to momentarily relieve the dryness in his mouth so that His next, and final triumphant words might be uttered clearly and triumphantly.

As we approach Easter, we are reminded that Christ suffered as one of us, yet was also divine. He knows true suffering. On the cross he clearly identifies himself with us, and suffers with us, in our place so that on Easter morning his divinity might clearly burst forth! God knows what you are going through. Don’t be afraid to cry out to God. He hears your cries. He knows your thirst. And he offered himself as living water that you might never thirst again. He offered himself to death on the cross that you might live forever with him in paradise.

Easter Collection

Get more than 80 creative ideas for planning a Youth Easter celebration or Easter Party. You can immediately download my best Easter Icebreakers, games, illustrations, Easter activity ideas AND MUCH MORE in a useful ebook!

=> Tell me more about the Easter Collection

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
This phrase feels very familiar. I wonder how many times we have asked God the same question. Where are you? Where were you when this happened in my life? Why did you abandon me in my greatest time of need? Why don’t you do something? I am hurting here! Where is your comfort?

Yet at the same time, we know that God is working according to his eternal purposes. We know it, but it doesn’t make it any easier. We still have those feelings. There are times we all feel abandoned, isolated, as if we are going through things alone. We know that God cares but sometimes it is hard to reconcile the reality of the moment with the truths we know. And we’re not alone in these feelings.

King David wrote these exact same words in Psalm 22: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” His words continue: “why are you so far from saving me Lord? Why are you so far from my groaning? Why do I cry out to you, but you do not answer?” King David had these feelings in his heart that God had forsaken him, abandoned him, deserted him.

Job also experienced many personal tragedies. He lost his farms, his animals, his children, his wife, his health, and his friends. Job lost everything. And he also felt as if God had abandoned him, deserted him. Job even went one step further and was angry with God.

Yet God still loved both David and Job, even in the midst of their crying out to him in frustration and hurt. God still loved Jesus when Jesus expressed those feelings and he also loves us when we express them.

This Easter, remember that God can handle your feelings. He understands. He cares. Be honest with him. And in the end all things will work out. As someone I know says, “In the End, everything will work out. If it hasn’t worked out, its not the end yet.” God’s work isn’t finished yet. That comes later!

Easter Collection

Get more than 80 creative ideas for planning a Youth Easter celebration or Easter Party. You can immediately download my best Easter Icebreakers, games, illustrations, Easter activity ideas AND MUCH MORE in a useful ebook!

=> Tell me more about the Easter Collection