Good Friday 2026 | Luke 23:34 | Forgiven.

Preacher: Scott Hollingshead

Text: Luke 23:34

Big Idea: Good Friday reminds us Jesus’ death purchased our forgiveness and empowers our forgiving.

1. Christ for us - He died that you might be forgiven  

2. Christ in us - He forgives that you might be forgiving

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Church, let's pray. Father, we pray to you, the great blesser, that we have such confidence to come before, to enter into your presence to seek mercy and grace in our time of need, because it was Jesus who was slain on that good Friday. Because of Jesus, we can testify with David in Psalm 32. Blessed indeed is the one whose transgression is forgiven. Blessed is the one whose sin is covered. Father, that that's even possible, should astound us. And yet in Christ, that is true. For those who have faith in Jesus, blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit. Father, this is the way forward to bring our sins to you, to your Son, who alone can blot out our iniquities. For if we deal with our sins in our flesh, when we keep silent, your word says our bones waste away. Through our groaning all day long, for night and day, your hand is heavy upon us, Lord, when there is a better way. Our strength is dried up as by the heat of summer. And yet we can be relieved of all of that. For we can acknowledge our sin to you. We cannot cover our iniquity. We're free to bring it to you because of the sacrifice of Jesus to confess our transgressions to you. For you are the forgiver of the sinner. Therefore, let everyone who is godly here, who has found faith in Jesus Christ, offer prayers to you. You are a hiding place, you are a preserver from trouble. You surround with shouts of deliverance. Father, many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts, who trusts in the Lord. God, may many be glad, for they've already trusted in you and rejoice in their hearts for what Christ has done. But I also pray, Lord, for the others here who have not yet trusted in Jesus, that today would be the day. Today they would leave with their sins forgiven. It's only possible by the blood of Jesus, applied by the Spirit, your Holy Spirit, God. So do that work, I pray. In Jesus' name. And all God's people said. Amen. Church, welcome to Good Friday. Tonight begins kind of a journey for the next seven years. We're going to be considering one at a time the seven statements of Jesus from the cross. You may think to yourself, why go seven years looking at those statements of Jesus from the cross? And maybe the way to answer that is to say, what makes those statements so special? I think one of the things that makes the statement special is that they're some of Christ's last words before he dies. If you've ever had the privilege of being at someone's bedside, maybe it was a friend or a mentor, maybe it was your grandfather or someone like that, and you had the privilege of hearing the last words of someone you love. There's something significant about last words, aren't there? There's something about them that, and actually it's intended that way. Last words are intended to stick with you, they're intended to be remembered in a way that years down the road, you think back and you go, do you remember when so-and-so said that? They had that sticky effect. Another reason why I think we ought to consider these words is because they're precious words from a precious Savior dying on a cross, fighting for every last breath. When you think about how to get words out, you gotta take a breath in to get a word out. When breath was such a commodity on the cross, you think of Jesus being hung on a cross to suffer and die for sinners, the penalty, the way you die, being horrific, being torturous, suffering from asphyxiation that slowly takes over. Jesus is giving these words, pouring out not one word wasted on the cross. Another thing that makes these words so special is that there's seven of them. Think about seven in the Bible, and the number seven is a number for perfection or completeness, that there's something about this number of sayings that gives us a full picture, if you will, a complete picture of the significance behind the cross, not just knowing the one who died, but why he died. In fact, if we looked at those seven statements from Jesus on the cross, it would help us to unlock the mystery of Good Friday. It would help us to understand how to interpret that death that Jesus died. And so tonight, we're going to be looking at the first of those statements from Jesus on the cross. And for that, I want to invite you to turn to Luke chapter 23. Luke chapter 23. For those of you who've been at Doxa, you know that we've been covering Luke chapter 23 as of late. We even covered these very words of the Lord Jesus. But we're going to cover them again. And the specific words we're looking at today are found in Luke chapter 23, beginning in verse 34. In fact, those that is the verse. Luke chapter 23, verse 34. May these last words of Jesus be stitched upon your heart. And Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. The title of the message tonight is forgiven. Tonight's the night of forgiveness. We're going to talk about Christ's forgiveness of us who are in Christ, and we're going to talk about how Christ empowers our forgiveness of others, and we're going to anchor ourselves in this very statement in the book of Luke. Maybe one of the ways that I can draw out the significance of this moment is to have you consider for a second what you would or how you would respond if, say, you were, let's go with working a construction project. Say it's with your kid and you're building something in the backyard, and you allow him to use that hammer to hammer the nail into two pieces of wood. And imagine you're the one as a good dad, maybe for a young kid, holding the nail for your son. You know where this is going. And imagine your son or daughter swung through with that hammer and missed the nail, but managed to connect with your hand. What would be your response? Please don't say it out loud. Because one of the things I want to draw your attention to is the fact that when the nails were driven through Jesus' hands, he does something that is frankly quite the opposite of what any of us tend to do in a moment like this. Even if you're Christian. And things like fiddlesticks count. When we, if the nails were driven through or a hammer was slammed upon our hand, would respond with cursing, then it's stunning to see that Jesus' first words, as the nails were driven through his hands, were ones of blessing. As the great preacher J.C. Ryle said, as soon as the blood of the great sacrifice began to flow, the great high priest began to intercede. Do you think about this moment on the cross? This is the very beginning of his crucifixion. The trial had taken place, the cross had been carried, and now Jesus is being nailed to the cross, and it's as if that first drop of blood hits the ground. And two things become very clear. Both about Jesus being the high priest. One, that blood is an atoning sacrifice to cover the sins of his people. But two, if ever you had a doubt as to how to interpret what Jesus' blood being shed meant, he tells you what it means. On account of that blood shed, Father, forgive them. Hebrews 9 22 is overwhelmingly clear. Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins. So big idea for this evening. What does Good Friday remind us of? One of the centerpieces of the good news of Good Friday is that reminds us that Jesus' death purchased our forgiveness and empowers our forgiving, does both. To be reminded afresh that Jesus' death purchased our forgiveness and empowers our forgiving. Often when we sit in on a message like Good Friday, we we tend to reflect solely in the category of what Christ has done for us. I want to move us beyond that to understand that if you are in Christ, you have the very Spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit dwelling in you, which means Christ is not done doing things for you, he's doing things in you. In fact, the evidence that you have the things that Jesus is doing for you is that he's doing some things in you that are evident. So I just want to break it down on these two points Christ for us and Christ in us. And what does this mean for us as we consider the good news of Good Friday? Number one, Christ for us. Right? He died that we might be forgiven. He died that we might be forgiven. Sometimes it's easy to take forgiveness for granted. You think about the reality of how cheaply and flippantly it's often tossed around in our kind of greater cultural context. I mean, I think it's like what? Every single time a presidential campaign gets started, one of the guys out there is going, Oh, and by the way, I'm also gonna forgive all your student loan. Every last dollar, all of it, it's gonna be taken away. And everyone's like, yeah, cheering, except the few of us going, how is he going to what? Pay for that. Because there is no forgiveness without a payment. Somebody has to pay. Or maybe you've noticed the flippancy of forgiveness when you've sought forgiveness from somebody and they say, I forgive you, but they haven't really forgiven, have they? And so when we come to this statement of Jesus on the cross, it's easy for us to minimize the significance of it. As we look at the statement in chapter 23, verse 34, the first thing I want to ask is what forgiveness, this prayer of forgiveness, implies about our situation. And I think it implies several things. The first thing I think it implies is that it assumes God's willing to grant it. The fact that Jesus has such confidence that the minute that blood begins to hit the ground, he's saying, Father, forgive them, is not just an acknowledgement, that God's willing to forgive. I think we need to go back beyond that and say God's eager to forgive. God is moved to the heart of the sinner who pleads the blood of Christ on behalf of their need as a sinner. But I think it assumes another thing too. It assumes that God's willing to give and even eager to extend forgiveness, but it also assumes man needs it, doesn't it? So in case you come in here and you're like, what are you talking about? I don't need forgiveness, I'm doing great. Plus, this isn't even written to me. This is Jesus with a crowd. What do you got there? You got people that stand by in verse 35, you got the rulers, you got the soldiers. I mean, I think if we were to be just like really particular, he's speaking to the soldiers, right? Father, forgive them. For they know not what they do. There's one commentator who said, Oh, the soldiers just stand there as a type for all of us. Father, forgive them. For they know not what they do. And that's the issue, isn't it, with some of us is that we have no clue that we even need to be forgiven. Or if we believe we need to be forgiven, we don't think we need to be forgiven of that much. And you think of this statement, right? It sounds like Jesus is speaking to a kind of ignorance with these soldiers, right? For they know not what they do. Let me be really clear about this ignorance. This ignorance doesn't make anyone, anyone innocent. This ignorance that Jesus is talking about doesn't make anyone worthy of a path. It doesn't alleviate you, it doesn't excuse you. What Jesus is saying here is that those who are crucifying him have no idea the magnitude of their sin. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2. For if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. And of course, the truth is, when you think about the reality of Jesus' death on the cross, Jesus was dying for the sins of all of his people of all the time. So, in a sense, without you maybe even knowing it, church, Jesus was hanging on that cross because of us. Now Pilate had been clear, Jesus was innocent. The Sanhedrin, no legitimate charge was brought against Jesus. He was innocent, which means he was suffering for something he didn't deserve to suffer for. The fact that the soldiers have no idea who they're crucifying doesn't eliminate the guilt. In some ways, it testifies to part of the human problem. We just have no idea how sinful we actually are. Well, one of the ways to figure out what that looks like, how sinful we actually are, is to define forgiveness biblically. If we were to break down the word forgiveness theologically and biblically, and you were to take everything that the Bible says about forgiveness, organize it into a few categories, then flip it to the opposite implication, you get a sense for how desperately needy we are for the forgiveness of Jesus. And so if you want, come with me on this journey. When Jesus said, Father forgive them, what did he mean? Well, he meant three things. Probably boil everything down to these three things. That on account of my sacrifice, my people would be these three things. Relieved of their guilt, released from their punishment, and restored in relationship with the God who made you. And so if you were to flip those to the opposite, you go, what do I need forgiveness for? The guilt that has amassed to your account apart from Jesus Christ because of your violation of the law, the punishment due to sinners for the wages of sin is death, and the separation, even enmity between you and God apart from the work of Jesus Christ. So you could say it another way, you are in need of a cleansing of your conscience, you are in need of a clearing of your debt, and you are in need of a connecting back to the Lord Jesus Christ. And so when Jesus is praying, Father forgive them, he's saying, on account of me, be relieved of, would you relieve them of their guilt? That's the first thing. The guilt of violating God's law. That's the objective side. The subjective side is what we carry in us all the time. How many of us mostly are frustrated about the feels of guilt? The feels of guilt are just the reality of an objective standard that has been violated. And Jesus is saying, on account of my blood shed, clear their guilt. I love it. One of the ways to understand literally the word forgiveness is it's it's used a couple different words in the Bible. One is to blot out. What a great word. That the blood of Jesus would actually blot out all of your sins. And here's the great thing: you don't even know all of your sins. The best among us, here's the thing: the more you grow in Jesus, the more you're aware of your sin, but you're still not fully aware of the extent of your sin. But Jesus makes sure, because of his blood being shed, that it would be sufficient to cover every last sin, even the ones you're not aware of. That your guilt may be blotted out, that your sins may be carried away. See, that's the next portion that on account of his sacrifice, you be released from punishment, right? This isn't God letting sin slide. The death of Jesus, and more importantly, the resurrection that we celebrate on Sunday, is the Father's declaration that the Son's sacrifice was sufficient to satisfy the wrath of God to sinners. Jesus does that. In fact, you could say that Jesus' death on the cross is the verdict already in. The punishment has already been meted out. And it's fallen upon Jesus for every last one of us who places their faith in Jesus. And then the last thing is this that on account of his sacrifice, you be restored in relationship. Not just a legal standing shift happens, right? Where you go from guilty to innocent, even more, guilty to righteous, that alone would be an incredible blessing of Good Friday. But God's not just interested in changing your legal status, He actually draws you in, He brings you near, He makes you part of the family. You didn't deserve it. He's delighted to give it. And He looks at the work of His Son, He looks at the sacrifice of His Son and goes, apply that to them. And then bring them near. This is what the death of Jesus accomplished for us. Now you say, how do I get to be a part of that? Because that would be the worst thing. We talk about all this, we assume everyone's in here is Christian, and then someone's not, and the Lord's working on their heart, and you have no idea how to lay hold of the blessing of the forgiveness of sins. Well, amidst this group of people in Luke chapter 23 who hear this prayer, and by the way, yes, it's most directly to the soldiers, but it's heard by a slew of people because again, crucifixion was meant to be public, it was meant to be. An example. It was meant to humiliate in front of a whole bunch of people. You got a whole bunch reviling, right? They're throwing around all kinds of things. He saved others. Let him save himself if he's the Christ of God. If you're the king of the Jews, verse 36, save yourself. They even put an inscription over his head. This is the king of the Jews. One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him, saying, Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us. But then there's another thief on the cross. See, Jesus was crucified between two thieves. Both of them started reviling the Lord Jesus. Come on, you're who you say you are? Why don't you get off the cross? All of a sudden, something changes with one of the guys. And three things seem to happen. You go, if I were not a believer, I sense the Lord calling me to respond, how would I respond to the offer of forgiveness in Jesus Christ? And the first thing is there's something that comes over those who respond. And that is this fear of God. Assaults your heart. And I'm not talking of fear like run away from God. I'm talking about a fear that draws you near. I'm talking about a fear that arrests your attention. I'm talking about a fear that understands walking closely to God is for my good. You see something that happens with the thief on the cross. This fear of God comes over him in verse 40. Do you not fear God? He's speaking to the other man on the cross since you're under the same sentence of condemnation. But then he does this something about the fear of God upon his heart leads him to doing two things. How do you respond to the offer of forgiveness through Jesus? First, forsaking of sin. He says, We're here indeed justly. For we are receiving the due reward of our deeds. But this man has done nothing wrong. You see what happens there in the forsaking of sin? This man, first of all, admits his guilt. He says, We're receiving the due reward of our deeds. Being on this cross is evidence that I'm a sinner. Then the second thing he does, he acknowledges the deservedness of judgment, and we are here indeed justly. And then in contrast to himself, he affirms the innocence of Jesus, but he is innocent. So forsaking of sin means you're admitting your guilt before God. It means you're acknowledging your deservedness of the judgment that should fall upon you, and you affirm the innocence of Jesus. And then it's as simple as this. And forsaking your sin, you throw yourself upon the mercy of God. It's this simple. Here's the example. And he said, Jesus, remember me when you come in to your kingdom. Remember me. That old testament language of covenant mercy. Now he's expecting something out in the future. He's acknowledging Jesus as the king, but he's expecting this king is going to return in the future. And when you return in the future, would you remember me in your covenant mercy? Would you show favor to me when you show favor to your people? Which is the same way of saying, would you show grace to me? Have mercy on me, a sinner. But see, the stunning part is, Jesus says, the reality of what my blood being shed can do for you is not out in the future. It's right now. He says, Today. Today you will be with me in paradise. Not tomorrow, not in a year, not when you die. All that's included, but he's going, it can start today. Today you will be with me in paradise. Here's the great news of the gospel. If you will come to Jesus by faith, he will cleanse you. One author said it like this: mercy prayed on the cross so that misery would pray in response. We're the miserable. We're the ones in need of a savior. And boy, would you know it, when you receive Jesus Christ, it's nothing that you do. You come with open hands. Actually, the only thing in your hands is all the sin you've committed. That's it. You come with nothing, you earn nothing, you do nothing. Even faith is just an instrument to grab hold of the work of Jesus Christ. You're resting in Him alone. And this amazing thing happens. Jesus Christ changes everything about you. Thought I'd walk you through a few things of what being forgiven means as we think about the implications. Maybe suggest, even if you're taking notes, that you wouldn't take notes and you would just kind of listen and lean in for a second as I consider some of these implications. We're gonna burn the house down. Thank you, Tyler. To be honest, I'm impressed that I haven't like smacked the table, lit the whole place on fire. Consider that a win so far. Let me tell you what happens when you are forgiven. It means a few things. I'm gonna rattle a few off. First thing I think of is this you no longer live as though Christ's payment for your sins was insufficient. It is completely sufficient. It will always be sufficient because he was covering all of your sins, even your future ones, and that's true now. You think back, every picture in the Old Testament was a picture pointing to Jesus Christ. You go back to the Passover story. Do you remember the angel of the Lord? You know what the angel of the Lord didn't do? Kind of snoop around in every house, make sure every single person in the house was worthy for judgment to pass over. Is that what happened? No. The angel looked for what? Are you covered by the blood? Wasn't looking around to figure out who's worthy and not worthy. Are you covered by the blood? That was enough to pass over you in judgment. Not just that, but your standing with God is secure. You think about the great idea of justification, one of those great Christian words, Bible words, justification is a legal standing, a legal declaration. Though you, while still remaining in the present state of sin, positionally before God, are declared legally righteous, not just innocent, righteous. And that by faith in Jesus Christ. And it is a one-time, once-for-all declaration. There's no fluctuating, there's no potential take backs, God's not assessing you by your every move and then deciding how he wants to treat you, which is how many of us think about God. And because of that, another thing, your identity is altered. You're not just a screw up, you're a saint. You're not just a failure. You're forgiven. Yes, consequences remain, but your identity isn't defined anymore by your sins, but by your Savior. And your future isn't defined anymore by your past, but the one who suffered and died for your sins. As such, the good news about the cross is not just that the penalty of sin has been paid, but the power of sin over you has been severed, which means oftentimes we can, even Christians do this, live as though we're enslaved to our sin. And the truth is that you're not. Christ has canceled the dominion of sin. So that you can rightly be a slave to the one, the only master, who's worthy of being a slave to. There's so many more. How about this one? God's heart towards you is one of favor perpetually, not one of wrath. He is not living perpetually disappointed with you. His disposition towards you is settled in Christ. He loves you. He delights over you. He, because of Christ, rejoices over you with singing, he loves you as he loves his only son. You say, how can it be only in Jesus Christ? Now God does discipline, but that's a good sign. It's not a sign of punishment, it's a sign of his care because he's not merely tolerating us, he's made us sons and daughters, and as such, he's not just interested in our toleration, but our transformation that we might bear the family resemblance. He actually makes us like the Savior. The evidence that you are saved is that you're becoming like Jesus by the power of his Holy Spirit. Which leads us to inevitably the second question, right? Christ for us. How does this change us? How does Christ for us change us? And it's in this. Number two, Christ in us. He forgives that we may be forgiving. When you walked in this evening, you had a card on your seat with a pen. Did you get that? Did some of you throw it away already? Okay. That card is a card for you to participate in something we're calling the great exchange. See, the gospel is this great exchange whereby you bring your sin to the cross and you leave with salvation. One of the things we're gonna do is we're gonna picture that tonight. This great exchange. On that card, you have the opportunity to write down something, something that comes to mind between you and the Lord or between you and someone else that you're seeking forgiveness for. And remember, believers, this is a regular rhythm of our lives. 1 John 1.9. Right? We confess our sins. That's enjoying the ever-present application of the full forgiveness of Christ over every last one of our sins so that in every time we sin, even as believers, we're reminded of the gracious covering of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we're gonna work through this in the idea that you're gonna take some time and you're gonna write down something that the Lord brings to mind. And the picture's gonna be awesome. You're gonna bring your sin, so to speak, and you're gonna lay that card on the table. And then you're gonna pick up the elements of the supper, and you're gonna celebrate the grace of Jesus. How about that? You leave your sin at the table and you pick up the supper. You drop your sin down here and you grab hold of the Savior. And so what's gonna happen in the next few minutes is we're gonna open up the opportunity for you to consider these things before the Lord. To understand that one of the clear marks in the Bible is that forgiven people forgive. Save people don't forgive for their salvation, saved people forgive from their salvation. It's the overwhelming evidence that you've received it when you're willing to forgive others. See, the cross reshapes how we measure the sins committed against us. When we understand our sins before a holy God, man, it minimizes the massive way we take offense to the sins committed against us. There's nothing you've ever been sinned against in any way that matches even close to what Christ has forgiven you for. And so I'm gonna invite you in now. Where do you need to forgive? Where do you need to ask for forgiveness? And let me be very clear: forgiveness doesn't mean there's an immediate trust if it's towards someone else that's a restored or a perfectly reconciled relationship with another human being. No, it may take time. You're not minimizing what happens when you are thinking, Father, give me a forgiving spirit towards X situation. Forgiveness isn't an invitation to tolerate manipulation of others. It's an opportunity to say, Father, forgive me. Father, grant me grace to not leverage someone's offense as a weapon against them. It's saying, Father, grant me the grace to not speak about this person because of this situation in a way that harms them. It's saying, Father, grant me the grace to not rehearse the offense because man, it is on replay in my head. It's saying, Father, help me not harbor bitterness, resentment. Man, we think we're empowered by bitterness, and it is actually seeking to destroy you. Bitterness is not over until it has put you in the ground. It's like taking poison yourself and hoping the person you don't like dies. So we're gonna invite this moment. Take some time with the Lord, even now, and as you come for the elements, you're gonna bring that card, you're gonna lay it down with the freedom that Jesus Christ gives you through his bloodshed on the cross. You're gonna take the elements, and then we're gonna take those elements together. Let me pray for us. Father, thank you for the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Would you bless the good news unto many hearts, unto salvation by someone for the first time placing their faith in Jesus, or to sanctification in the lives of the already forgiven, applying the benefits of that forgiveness to their circumstance. In Jesus' name. Amen.