G.K. Wallace
John tells us that Christ has “in his hands the print of the nails” (John 20:25). Matthew tells us that the mob on the hill of Calvary challenged Christ to “come down from the cross” (Mat. 27:40). What was it that held Christ to the cross?
1. It was not the nails that held Him to the cross. He had power to remove the nails. He could have called “more than twelve legions of angels” to help and remove Him from the cross (26:53). He who had the power to still the storm, feed the multitude, and raise the dead could have removed the nails. That crowd could not have killed Christ if He had not wished to do His Father’s Will. “Therefore doth the Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one taketh it away from me, but I lay it down of myself” (John 10:17-18).
2. The Father’s will and wish held Him to the cross. Jesus prayed in the garden and said, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass away from me: nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Mat. 26:39). It was the will of God that His Son became the “propitiation,” that is, an atoning sacrifice for our sins (1 John 2:2). The Savior’s love and your sins held Christ to the tree.
3. God’s eternal purpose held Christ to the cross. Jesus died to purchase the church with His own blood (Acts 20:28). The church is the institution through which the eternal purpose of God is to be made known to the world (Eph. 3:10). Without the death of Christ, God’s purpose for the world have been aborted. Thus, His love for God and man held Him to the cross—not the nails.
4. The joy set before Christ held Him to the cross. In the Hebrews’ letter we learn that the “author and perfecter of our faith” disregarded His suffering and “for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame” (Heb. 12:2). The mocking by the angry mob at the foot of the cross was ignored by Christ because of the “joy set before Him.”
Neither the lack of the power nor the nails held Jesus to the cross. His resignation to the Will of God and His love for the souls of mankind bound Him to the tree on which He died. Our love for God and His Son should cause us to remain faithful to the kingdom of God, despite the mocking of all who would have us depart from the path of duty be by virtue of the fact that God would not accept us, but because of the fact that we would not respond unto Heaven’s call—that we would not turn and be converted, that God might blot out our sins and initiate us into the family of the First-born.
