April 18, 2025 Words From The Cross: Father, into Your Hands I Commit My Spirit. | Luke 23:44-49; John 13:1-2; 19:28-35

Today is Good Friday. We will wrap up our Lenten series Words from the Cross by reflecting on Luke 23:44-49; John 13:1-2; John 19:28-35, Father, into Your Hands I Commit My Spirit. Satan believes he has won as the King of kings hangs on a cross dying. As Jesus draws close to death, in the darkest moments, he reveals his deep trust in his Father, committing himself into his Father’s hands, a place of safety and belonging.

Transcript

Father, Into Your Hands I Commit My Spirit

Luke 23:44-49; John 13:1-2; 19:28-35

It’s Good Friday, the most somber day of the church year on the church calendar. We’re only 5 days past the people celebrating Jesus as the coming Messiah, the king who has come to save his people, singing “Hosanna, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blesses is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Blessed is the coming kingdom of our father David! Hosanna in the highest!” On Palm Sunday Israel was thinking of God’s promises like in 2 Samuel 7:11-14, “And I will provide a place for my people Israel and will plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed. Wicked people will not oppress them anymore, as they did at the beginning and have done ever since the time I appointed leaders over my people Israel. I will also give you rest from all your enemies. “‘The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you: When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be his father, and he will be my son.” These promises were repeated over again in the psalms and prophets, and the people were praying that Jesus is the promised Messiah king, but they quickly turned on Jesus because they misunderstood the nature of the coming Messiah.

Israel didn’t see the coming Messiah through the eyes of Isaiah and his passages on the Messiah as the Suffering Servant, best described in Isaiah 53 which is fulfilled in all its exhausting detail, “He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed…. By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.” 

Yet, even in this passage of the Suffering Servant, we get glimpses of the glory and hope that comes out of Jesus’ death; a reassurance that the cross brings us peace, brings us shalom which entails flourishing, wholeness, reconciliation, and healing, reinforced by Isaiah pointing out, “by his wounds we are healed;” healed from the sin that like a bad virus has infected us throughout our entire body, soul, and mind; healed into a renewed relationship with our God.

As Jesus’ death draws close, he first cries out in anguish, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Jesus is given a drink of wine vinegar, after which he cries out, “It is finished.” Now Jesus cries out again in a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” We hear Jesus move from despair, to a place where he knows his suffering is coming to an end as he accomplishes our salvation, to a place of trust and faith in his Father, placing his very soul into the safest place he can, his Father’s hands! Jesus knows his Father’s hands are a place of belonging and strength, especially in the battle against sin and death. 

Jesus faces death with hope and confidence because he knows where he is going, that he’s going home to paradise and into the presence of his Father, as he reassured the criminal on the cross beside him. Jesus trusts in his Father even as he is covered in the sin of the world and so was forsaken by his Father. But Jesus also knows the loyalty and commitment of his Father to his people and to his beloved Son; a loyalty and commitment that our Father gives to us as we see in all the covenants the Lord makes with his people, covenants that he is always faithful to even when we fail to be faithful back to him. Our Father’s commitment and loyalty to us is something we can always trust in. This is seen in Jesus’ powerful cry: in the Greek Jesus “phōnē megalē,” which means voice loud, from which we get our English word megaphone, a megaphone voice; it’s as if Luke is telling his readers that this is a cry meant to go around the world for all humanity to hear.

In Jesus’ cry, we hear an echo back to Psalm 31:1–5, “In you, Lord, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness. Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me. Since you are my rock and my fortress, for the sake of your name lead and guide me. Keep me free from the trap that is set for me, for you are my refuge. Into your hands I commit my spirit; deliver me, Lord, my faithful God.” The Jews often used this psalm as an evening prayer, knowing that they are safe in God’s hands while they’re vulnerable and unable to protect themselves. This is a prayer of deep trust, of turning to God as the place of refuge when it feels like you’re being overwhelmed by life and events, and even by the actions of others against you.

Jesus knows death is close, but so is the end of why he’s come to earth and become human. “It is finished,” shows Jesus knows his work at this point is done. What is finished? Whose work is completed? It’s the work of Jesus and of his Father. Jesus early on in his ministry talked about why he was here and where he found the strength to do it. After talking with the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4:34, when his disciples offer him the food they had gone to town for, Jesus tells them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.” Now, at the cross, that work has been completed. 

The work of Jesus is the salvation of God’s people. It’s so much more than his sacrifice on the cross. Jesus became human like us, so that he was completely human and divine so he could take on the curse of death as a result of our sin. This is finished on the cross, but Jesus’ work continues on as our king, as high priest, and as prophet. Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father in the seat of authority, ruling over all creation. Jesus is the high priest entering into the presence of God and continually interceding for us with the Father, and Jesus is the great prophet who brings the word of God to us; he is the living word of God. The cross reminds us that the great reconciliation between God and we his people has been achieved. All this is accomplished on the cross, Satan and death are defeated. “It is finished.” 

As the creator of this sermon series writes, “The work is complete. No one can add to it. No one needs to try. We just lift up the cup of salvation and bless the name of the Lord. God’s glory shines through Jesus here, now, in full strength; shining brightly even into the darkest places of our world today.” We see the dying of Jesus on Good Friday, we don’t see the work God and Jesus are doing in the time of darkness on the cross, the time of sorrow on Saturday, but we do know that because of who Jesus is, we look forward to new life and hope.