Imperishable Inheritance

Con­stantly being drawn back to the cross is a very healthy prac­tice that all Chris­tians should engage them­selves in. Just re-reading through the cru­ci­fix­ion account in Luke, I found the fol­low­ing gem:

One of the crim­i­nals who were hanged there was hurl­ing abuse at Him, say­ing, “Are You not the Christ? Save Your­self and us!” But the other answered, and rebuk­ing him said, “Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sen­tence of con­dem­na­tion? “And we indeed are suf­fer­ing justly, for we are receiv­ing what we deserve for our deeds; but this man has done noth­ing wrong.” And he was say­ing, “Jesus, remem­ber me when You come in Your king­dom!” And He said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Par­adise.“
Luke 23:39–43

Both crim­i­nals illus­trate the vary­ing nature of those who deny Christ and those who humbly accept Him (only by way of the Holy Spirit). What does the first crim­i­nal say? He mocks Him and tests Jesus; which is inter­est­ing because in Luke Jesus affirms that we are not to test God (Luke 4:12). This crim­i­nal is dead spir­i­tual and about to be dead lit­er­ally (Mark 3:29), but the other crim­i­nal on the other side of Jesus has a much dif­fer­ent tone.

He rebukes the other crim­i­nal by his procla­ma­tion: “Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sen­tence of con­dem­na­tion?” This man affirms his humil­ity before God right next to him; he is acknowl­edg­ing the very nature of Christ’s cru­ci­fix­ion. Jesus took the death, and result­ing humil­ity, of dying as a com­mon crim­i­nal (Philip­pi­ans 2:5–11). Not only does this man estab­lish that, but he estab­lishes that Christ has done noth­ing wrong (which would imply that he know some­what of Jesus’ min­istry and charges against Him).

After this, the man cries out to Jesus: “Jesus, remem­ber me when You come in Your king­dom!” And how does Jesus reply: “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”

Now, if that doesn’t give you goose bumps and hum­ble you then some­thing is wrong. Jesus looks aside of the criminal’s crime and sees into his faith in Him, and grants him for­give­ness on the cross (Luke 5:24). We see the judg­ment of Jesus in a lit­eral fash­ion; no anthro­po­mor­phism needed. Jesus is clearly sep­a­rat­ing a sheep from a goat on His cross (Matthew 25:32–33). And not only that, He speaks to this man in an indi­vid­ual (not cor­po­rate) fash­ion: “…you shall be with Me in Paradise.”

To look over, as you are about to die, to leave the very human­ity that was granted to you and for­give some­one. What an incred­i­ble dis­play of His human­ity and divinity.

Have this atti­tude in your­selves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equal­ity with God a thing to be grasped, but emp­tied Him­self, tak­ing the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the like­ness of men. Being found in appear­ance as a man, He hum­bled Him­self by becom­ing obe­di­ent to the point of death, even death on a cross. For this rea­son also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will con­fess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Philip­pi­ans 2:5–11