Ep 168: Why Jesus Had To Die On The Cross

"Consider Jesus as the Undercover Boss: today’s episode depicts how the unrecognized Creator fulfilled sacrifices, bore sin, removed barriers, and triumphed through the cross, turning judgment into redemption. Do YOU recognize Him?"

We connect Good Friday to the Bible’s bigger story and answer the hard question of why Jesus has to die on the cross. We trace the logic from Genesis to the prophets to the temple and show how “It is finished” means the debt is paid and access to God is opened.

• Jesus as the ultimate Undercover Boss who enters His world unrecognized
• John 1 and the Word as Creator and Light
• Genesis and the origin of sin and death
• Sin as missing the mark and God’s perfection as the standard
• Why “all have sinned” creates the need for rescue
• Leviticus and the scapegoat as a picture of substitution
• Isaiah 53 and the suffering servant bearing our iniquity
• The scarlet thread of redemption and the worm illustration
• Hebrews and Jesus as priest, sacrifice, and mediator of the new covenant
• Wrath poured out on Christ and judgment passing over those who trust Him
• “Paid in full,” the torn temple curtain, and restored access to God
• Communion and the promise that Sunday is coming 

Please click on the underlined links throughout. 

Original Service Message with Slides

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Transcript

Welcome And Good Friday Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Lord, you know!

SPEAKER_02 0:01

You're now listening to Play One is the best.

SPEAKER_01 1:06

Let's play on the Word of God. Thank you for joining us on the 630 today. Let's join Fast Teddy. Let's make the founder of Plays on the Word Theater. I need to deep dive into the Word of God.

Jesus As The Undercover Boss

John 1 And The Light

Genesis Sin And Why Death Exists

God’s Standard Is Perfection

Old Testament Sacrifices And The Scapegoat

Isaiah 53 And Substitution

SPEAKER_02 1:22

Amen. Thank you very much, Josh Taylor and Katie Kenny, for that introduction. Welcome to all of you listening to Plays on Word Radio. My name is Fred David Kenny Jr., that's right. And uh we are about to kick off our uh a short spring tour of Pete. And um we just finished Passion Week uh you know uh from Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Resurrection Sunday, of course. And at my home church at Calvary Chapel, Southport we did a Good Friday message and we dove into why did Jesus why did he what is this you know, why did he have to die on the cross? A lot of people don't completely understand that, they don't get it. And uh I just wanted to share with you the message because I think it's hot. Good Friday. Today is Good Friday. And uh before we start, before I get into this, it's gonna be a short message. Who here has seen that TV show or remembers that TV show, Undercover Boss? See a lot of yeah, undercover boss. They had uh basically, for those of you that don't know, if you don't, if you've never seen the show, either the owner of the company, the president of the company, whoever was in charge, the boss of the whole company, would dress up as like a regular worker and go and work. And uh most of the time he he or she would dress up and the employees didn't know that this was the boss. Uh he would he or she would often go and be the lowest of the uh the positions, the workers. In fact, when I worked at Comcast many years ago, I worked for Comcast, and Ralph Roberts is the guy who started that company. It's a communication company. Ralph Roberts, and he started the company, and his son, Brian Roberts, who is now the president and in charge of everything, the the boss, it's a Fortune 100 company. And uh Brian Roberts, when I worked there, I was a technician and I trained a lot of people and stuff like that. So when I first started, there was this rumor going around, yeah, Brian Roberts, he he did the rounds, he worked every position in the company. It's like a hundred thousand employees there, but he we, you know, different positions, important positions. He worked, and I was like, yeah, right, he was climbing telephone poles, really. And they were like, no, he really did. He did installations, he did everything. And uh, you know, the boss coming in and taking the lowest position is what he did. And very much so, Jesus is the ultimate undercover boss. He, or I should say, he was very much the undercover boss. Let me pray before we get into this. Heavenly Father, Lord, I just want to ask for your uh your anointing here, and I pray that you would speak to us, Lord, and that I would get out of your way. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. All right. So Jesus is first coming, the first time he appeared, absolutely, he he was the um he was the undercover boss. He built the world, the world did not recognize him. How do you know that, Pastor? Well, let's look at the text. I'm gonna read from you. I'm sure you might not be able to see that, but it's okay. I'll read it for you. It's John 1, and we're just gonna go 1 through 11. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things, and you know in the Greek, you know what that means, right? That word all. It means all. All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness about the light. The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. Now, this is the key right here. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people didn't receive him. So, this whole idea, like I said, the undercover boss. He came into his own. It'll go on to say the word became flesh and dwelt among us. This is talking about Jesus. Through him all things were made. Without him, nothing was made that has been made. He's the boss, he's the creator. Yet he takes the lowest position. And what we remember today is the pinnacle of that of him taking that lowest position. If I move on to this whole idea, though, in John 1, he talks about the light. The light shines in the darkness. Jesus said he's the light of the world. And if you remember from our Sunday studies that we're that when we're going through the book of Genesis, the verse number three of the first book of the Bible. Verse number three, the third verse of the Bible. Kind of interesting, it's the third verse. Says, and God said, Let there be light. So this idea of light, Jesus saying that he's the light of the world, and in the very prologue of the Gospel of John, the light, the light of the world. And it's not that God created light in the sense of Jesus. Jesus is not created. It's more like the light was allowed to shine. The God that said, let light shine out of darkness. So the question is this though. Why did he die? Because that's what that's what happened today. Like on this Friday, that's what we uh recognize, that's what we remember. The death of Christ. He did a lot of stuff. But all of it led to what happened on this day, 2,000 some years ago. So why did he have to die? Well, going back to Genesis again, go all the way back to Genesis. This undercover boss that made everything, he entrusted a manager, a program director. His name was Adam. He even named him. He was the manager that he entrusted. And he told him, he said, listen, you can uh you can eat from any tree in the garden. This is um Genesis chapter 2. He took, you can eat, verse 17, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat. For in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die. You're gonna die. This is where what? Wait a minute, death? What is that? From that perspective, from Adam's perspective, he didn't even know what death was. But this was the word that God gave to Adam. The next chapter, Adam and Eve, they did not listen to God, they rebelled, and mankind has been dying ever since. So I'm gonna make this point here. In Ezekiel, we we get a little more information on why, or uh as far as this death. Ezekiel, he gives us a little more, he says, Behold, all souls are mine, the soul of the fathers as well as the soul of the son is mine. He's talking about people. The soul who sins shall die. God is very clear throughout the scriptures. The wages of sin is death. All this goes back to Genesis. All of it goes back to the directive that was given to the manager. Don't eat of, you can eat from everything. Everything you can eat from. Just don't eat of that, that one back there. What's the one they eat of? That one back there. And from that point on, the wages of sin is death. Sin, what is that? What is sin? Sin means to miss the mark. What is the mark? The mark is God's perfection. This is the problem. What is this is why Jesus had to die? And I'm gonna, it's all gonna make sense in a minute. Submit the mark. Jesus would say in Matthew 5.48, he said this to the religious leaders and everybody else. This was in the Sermon on the Mount. Therefore, you must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. This is the bar. This is where the bar is set. This is the standard. Perfection. And not just perfection like shooting a basket and making it. No, perfection the way God is perfect. Okay? That's the standard. This is what man has to meet. Adam was meeting that until he ate of that fruit. And every single person since has failed. But this is this is the thing right here. You gotta be perfect. That's the standard, that's the requirement. But the Bible tells us in Romans that all have sinned. You know what that word all in the Greek means? All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. That word sin means to miss the mark, means you're not hitting the mark. So it's not even about an egregious mistake or a trespass or a transgression. It's just not being perfect the way God is perfect. Okay? He's not mean, he's just perfect. He's got standards. It would be, if I gave, I'll give you a short example. If I wanted to, if I was in high school and I had a couple, you know, like some D's on my report card, maybe an F or something in one class, or but I, you know, I was passing it in every other class, but I had some D's and some C. And I wanted to get into Harvard, Yale, or UPenn or, you know, do I have any chance to get in there? No. Not even with athletic scholarship. It it doesn't, that doesn't make them mean. They just have standards. They want you to have straight A's. They want you to be an excellent standout student. They're not mean, they just have standards. God is not mean, he just has standards, the highest standard that was ever set. You gotta be perfect the way he is. Doesn't make them mean. These are just the rules. Okay, so all have sinned and fall short. So basically, the Bible says you gotta be perfect, and then the Bible says, guess what? Nobody's perfect. This is the problem. This is where, this is where the gospel, the gospel message comes in. Because this undercover boss, before he came undercover, he did not leave us, did not want to leave us in that messed up situation. He could have. He could have just been like, uh, I'm starting over and I'm scrapping everybody. But he didn't. It says, God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whosoever would believe in him would not perish but have eternal life. The bottom line is though, God has not changed. Somebody's got to die. And pay this sin, because they have there is sin here. So, sacrifices in the Old Testament. If you look at these sacrifices, there's a text in Leviticus, there's a bunch. Now, Jesus is our high priest. He's not only the priest, Jesus is the sacrifice. He's not only the sacrifice, he's the temple, the tabernacle. He is so when he says I am, that's a loaded statement. Amen. Y'all tracking with me on that. Listen to this from Leviticus. This is from the law of Moses. Listen to this. This is from the Day of Atonement. When Aaron had finished making atonement for the most holy place, the tent of meeting, the tabernacle, the tent, and all that, the altar, he shall bring forward the live goat, and verse 21, he's to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites, all their sins, and put them on the goat's head, and he shall send the goat away out into the wilderness in the care of someone appointed for the task. The goat will carry on itself all the sins to a remote place, and the man shall release it in the wilderness. He's not bringing that goat back. That goat was that was a one-way trip. And guess who's the goat in this story? Right. Jesus is the not just the priest, he is the He's the sacrifice himself, which is amazing. And this is a picture and a type. The sins were never on this day. They were they never were erased, removed as far as the East is from the West. They were just covered over until the ultimate sacrifice would come. Look at this. Isaiah 53. Let me let me just let me just read this. I'm gonna read this for you. We read this the other night at our study, and it was it was fantastic. This is uh Isaiah writes this, he says, and this is 700 years before Christ, okay? He says, Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? He grew up before him like a tender shoot, like a root out of ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. Verse 3, he was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering and familiar with pain, like one from people from whom people hide their faces. He was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely, verse 4, surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering. Yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him and afflicted. But he look at listen to this. Look at verse 5. But he was pierced for our transgressions. What? He was crushed for our iniquities. Upon him, just like the goat, was the chastisement that brought us peace. And by his stripes we are healed, or by his wounds, by his wounds we are healed. So this idea of a substitutionary type of atonement thing happening, it's crystal clear in Isaiah here, and he's prophesying about this one that's coming. And then he says in verse 6 All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. And that's another word for sin. The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. I'm going to continue in this. He was oppressed, he was afflicted, yet he didn't open his mouth. And you remember Jesus before Herod didn't even open his mouth, just stood there. Like this. And Herod couldn't believe it. Herod wanted to see him. He was all excited to see him. And Jesus didn't even didn't even open his mouth. Because Herod was an illegitimate king over Israel. He wasn't a legitimate king. That's a whole nother story. Verse 8. By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked. Remember, he was crucified on the cross between the two prisoners there. Made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, he was innocent. There was no deceit in his mouth. Yet, verse 10, this is the key. Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him. He has put him to grief. Well, let me just stop there. Let me just stop on the first part of verse 10 there. Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him and put him to grief. This is a picture of what happened on this day that we're remembering right now. Good Friday. This sacrifice to take away our sins, to make a way for us to even be able to talk to God. You know, we take for granted, you know, that like we take for granted we have cell phones now, and you can just go anywhere and call. You know, my wife has this app that actually tracks me. It's kind of creepy. But you know, like if I go to the store and, you know, and I'm in the parking lot too long, she'll call me and be like, What are you doing in the parking lot? I'm like we take for we take for granted though. We take for granted, like, that we have this instant access. Hey, we take for granted that we have access to God. There was a cost and a price that had to be paid for us to even be able to have access to him. We can just pray and know that he hears us. This is amazing. And it's because of what happened on this day, 2,000 something years ago. There's a story, I'm going to show you these pictures here. There's a story, and I don't know if this is an accurate picture of it, but of this worm. And they used to make, like, we think of, you know, if you want to dye something now, you go to what's the fabric place? Joanne Fabrics or whatever, and you just buy dye, you know, and you buy bottle of dye, and you could dye any almost any color you want. Back in the day, they they had had to be creative. And to make red, they would take this worm, this bug type worm, and they would make the dyes from that. These these are the fabrics you can see. These are fabrics that they they've uncovered, I believe, in Qumran, uh the Dead Sea, and they're still dyed, like the dye worked and it was legit and good. Take a look at where the where the the this worm attached itself to the tree. Here's another picture from how the tree would get dyed. Listen to this. When the female of the I'm gonna back it up and I'll read it so when the female of the scarlet worm species was ready to give birth to her young, she would attach her body to the trunk of a tree. She would attach her body to a trunk of a tree, fixing herself so firmly and permanently that she would never leave it again. The eggs deposited beneath her body were thus protected, and the larvae were hatched and able to enter their own life cycle. As the mother died, the crimson fluid stained her body and the surrounding wood from the dead, uh, the dead bodies and from the dead bodies of such female scarlet worms, the commercial scarlet dyes of antiquity were extracted. What a picture this gives us of Christ dying on the tree, shedding his precious blood that he might bring sons to glory. He died for us so that we might live through him. Psalm 22 describes such a worm and gives us a picture of Christ. Now, this that quote was from Henry Morris, but Psalm 22, which is a play by play of what happened on this Friday 2,000 some years ago. And this happened, this was written, Psalm 22 was written by David almost a thousand years before Jesus was born. Okay, just for context. And he says in Psalm 22, but I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people. All the people, all who see me, mock me. They make mouths at me and they wag their heads. That's what happened when he was on the cross. People were mocking him, spitting at him, and making fun. He trusted in God. Let God come off the cross now, Christ, Messiah. They were making fun of him. But it's interesting, he says, I am a worm. And I'll just leave that there. Isaiah also says in the beginning of his book, he says, Come now, let us reason together. Though your sins be like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool. And that scarlet thread of redemption, what we look at on Thursday nights, our Thursday night study, Messiah in the Old Testament, where's the thread of redemption? There's a reason it's a scarlet thread. In Philippians, Paul says, who though he was in the form of God did not count equality with God to something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death. Even death on a cross. The undercover boss became obedient, taking the form of a servant. He lived the perfect life. It wasn't that he just, you know, uh he died. People die. This man was not subject to death. He did not sin. He had no sin. But he became our substitution, just like Aaron laid his hands on that goat, and all the sins, I confess, all the sins of the whole camp on this goat, and then they take the goat out. And they take the goat far away from the camp, and that goat's gonna die being away from the whole camp, out in the desert. That's what happened. The sins of the whole world placed on this high priest of ours who became our sacrifice, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Hebrews says, the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer sanctify for purication of the flesh. There's a lot of big words there. How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without blemish? That's another thing. All the sacrifices, they had to be perfect, pointing to Christ being perfect. Without blemish, purify conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Therefore, he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgression committed under the first covenant. A lot of big words there. But what's basically happening here is because Christ died and took our blame, our punishment, and he ushered in this new covenant that we live in by faith. We're not subject to God's wrath. We're not subject to his wrath because the wrath of God was poured out on Christ on the cross. There's a story, uh, and I have to confirm this with Jim Suggs at some point, but I heard or read that uh when firemen are fighting certain fires, I think it's when they parachute into fires like in the mountains or something. They they burn out a certain area and they they put it, they actually set a fire and burn it, a controlled burn. They let it burn out a certain area. And that area that's been burned out is an area that they can run to and get to if the fire gets crazy, because the fuel has already been burnt. The fuel, there's nothing to burn because the fuel has been burned down to the ground. So they can stand there and hopefully and be safe from the raging forest fire because the fire, there's nothing to burn. And this is the concept with Christ. The fire, the wrath of God, was poured out on Christ. We stand in him by faith. The wrath of God will pass over us. Light bulb's going off there. Yes, pass over. Right. Right. We quoted this, John 3.16. God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world. People feel condemned. No, when Jesus came the first time, he didn't come to condemn the world, but in order, and a lot of people don't know verse 17. Like everybody knows John 3.16. Look at verse 17. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Amen. He sent him in as the undercover boss. He came in as the undercover boss. And when these people are working, a lot of times they don't even recognize, they don't recognize that the boss is right next to him. And he said on the cross, it is finished to telesti. It is done. And that Greek word has a connotation of paid in full. Yeah. The debt that you all owed, and I can't just say you people, I have to say me too. The debt that we owed was paid at the cross of Christ. And when he was on the cross, and Matthew says, the curtain of the temple, which was like this thick, and it was gigantic, it was torn from the top to the bottom. How are they going to do that? It's not, I mean, they didn't even have, they didn't have the tractor, a tractor there or something, and a chainsaw. How did they do this? It was God who did it. The curtain, the the thing that was blocking access to God. When Christ said it is finished, there was an earthquake, and that curtain was ripped from the top to the bottom. Allowing access to God now, because the hostility is now removed. Paul says about Jesus, having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. The cross is a triumph. It is not any type of thing to be bummed out about. Yes, our sin is what nailed him there, but it recognized it is a triumph, and for the joy set before him, he endured the cross. And the joy set before him is you guys and me. He made a public spectacle of the enemy and his whole team. The powers and authorities. He made a public spectacle of them. Our undercover boss. A lot of people don't, they don't recognize. Just like on the TV show, they didn't even recognize. They're sitting there complaining to the boss. And then there's a reveal. But our undercover boss not only came and lived with us, the word became flesh and dwelt among us, not be not just became one of us, but he stepped in and took our blame for us and intercedes even now. And we're going to talk about that. Why does he intercede? Because there's more to this story. I just dealt with Friday. There's more to this story. Sunday is coming. Why did he have to die? Because the soul that sins has to die. And he loved us so much that he did not want us separated from him for all eternity. So he became the scapegoat, the one that was all the sins were placed on and sent out away from the camp. He is the bull that was killed where the blood had to be sprinkled to purify everything. He is every one of those sacrifices. It's him. This is our undercover boss, our high priest. Amen. So we're going to take communion and we're going to pass this out. This undercover boss. The people didn't know that the boss was with them. Some people did. And on that show, there was always like one person that knew what was happening. And then you'd get the person that was that was cheating the company and and you know not working properly. But then you would also see people that would be going above and beyond. And the boss was always amazed. Like, wow, I can't believe, I can't believe what this person is doing. They're going above and beyond. But just the same way that the people did not know that the boss was present with them and among them. The reveal always came in the show. They didn't just leave it that way. There was always a reveal when the boss was actually made known. And that's coming. The full reveal is coming. Now to the disciples and those that believed, the reveal happened on the third day. Their lives were changed forever. The reveal for the world is coming. For us right now, Sunday's coming. The story doesn't end on the cross or when he's taken off the cross and put in the tomb of Joseph. It's a brand new tomb carved out by Joseph of Arimathea. That's not the end of the story. Hallelujah. That's not the end of our story. This is what makes Christianity different than every other type of religion or faith system is what's going to happen on what we celebrate on Sunday. That's the game changer. Because it confirms what happened on Friday. What happened on Friday? Our sin was placed on our lamb. Jesus said on the night that he was betrayed, he took the bread before he went to the cross with all the disciples. He was in the upper room and he said, This is my body. And uh he broke the bread and he passed it around. He said, As often as you do this, do this in remembrance of me. Let us partake. After the meal, he took the cup and he said, This is this is the new covenant. The new covenant in my blood. As often as you do this, do this in remembrance of me. You proclaim my death until I come back, which is happening. That's gonna happen. Let us partake. Lord God, we love you. We thank you. We praise you, Lord. We are grateful for what you did for us. Yes. Amen. Amen. Well, I pray you guys are all blessed through that. Until we get together again next week, the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you.

SPEAKER_01 35:14

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