Lent Day 38–Victory through God’s Completed Work

When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished” (John 19:30).

There is a moment of relief and satisfaction at the conclusion of a job well done.  Maybe it’s most notable for those of us with a task-oriented personality, but I wonder if we all have a hard-wired sense about us that is ingrained in the image of God in us.  When God looked back at His creation after the six days, He proclaimed it very good.  It must have felt good to see the finished product.

As Jesus was close to death upon the Cross, I wonder if there was an odd sense of satisfaction that everything was finally done that caused Jesus to say, “It is finished.” 

• He had fulfilled all Scripture, particularly the ones about the Messiah that the prophets had foretold.
• He had been fully righteous.
• He had perfectly obeyed the Father.
• He had fully revealed the character of God.
• He had resisted every temptation to serve Himself.
• He had been truthful in every endeavor.
• He had spoken only what was right His entire life.
• He had endured all sorts of opposition.

 

And now, He was moments away from the finish line of death.

But He had yet to be victorious over death…so why did He say “It is finished” before He died? 

The obvious answer is: for our benefit.

The encouragement that we get from this is that there is nothing we can do to save ourselves.  There is nothing we can do to right our wrongs.  There is nothing we can do about our imperfections.  There is no way we can be perfectly obedient.  There is no way we’ll resist every temptation.  There is no way that we will speak truthfully all the time no matter how hard we try.  And there is no opposition we will face that compares to what Jesus experienced.  For us, it is impossible to lay our lives down for our fellow man as Jesus did.  So we can stand with hearts of gratitude knowing it is for our benefit that Jesus did it all and could say, “It is finished.”  It was all for our benefit.  Now what remains is for us to recieve the gift of grace that He made possible by finishing the work of God.