Amen.
Amen. If you serve a risen savior, can you say amen today? And I'm grateful that he is alive and well today, and he is our living hope.
Can we have a word of prayer and then we'll dive right into it today? Father, God, it is so good to be able to sing how you are alive today. And Father, the grave could not hold you. And Father, we are grateful today as we reflect on what you did on the cross for us, all of the pain that we had caused, all of the sin that we had committed, all of the shame that we had provided. Father, you did all of that. You took all of that upon yourself. Father, dying on that cross for each one of us. And like Pastor David mentioned earlier, you did it willingly.
You did it because you wanted a relationship with us. God, I know for many of us, we're church people. We've heard that. We've heard this story, the message of the cross, so many times. And Father, sometimes it just becomes another story in a book. And Father, I pray, Lord, that today as we reflect upon that and we dive into your word together, God, I pray that you would speak to us. God, I pray that we would see something new today from your word, something that maybe perhaps we've overlooked in the past, Father. And ultimately, I pray that our eyes would be upon Jesus today. God, that our eyes would be upon the cross.
Father, because it's with the shedding of the blood, that's how we have remission of sins. God, I pray that you would speak to us today. Open up our hearts. Fill us with your spirit. Fill me with your spirit as I proclaim the word. But Father, as each person receives the word of God today, I pray that they're filled with the spirit, ready to receive the message that you have for each one of us. Lord, we love you. We thank you for the opportunity to be here today.
For it's in your name we pray and all God's people said, amen and amen. You guys can have a seat here today. Well, let me just welcome each one of you. And I'm so glad that each one of you are here. And you guys, this is a little bit more than we usually have in our 11 o'clock.
And I wonder why. Some of you guys just were like, I'm taking advantage of this time change. How many of you were up ready to go this morning without a problem? Any of you out there? All right, we're judging every one of you that had your hands raised, okay? Everybody around you is rolling their eyes at you. How many of you, let's just be honest.
David, I mean, he mentioned that he was a wreck this morning, wore different socks and stuff. And so how many of you would say this morning was tough and it was hard to get out of bed? Raise your hand.
Don't be ashamed of it. And I feel you. And I almost called in and asked Pastor Bailey to speak for me today. I was like, man, this is just too tough.
And how many of you would just say, let's just make a decision on the time and not have time change at all? Anybody with me? I'm like, why in the world are we doing this?
I don't get it. And any of you really, how many of you, and I know this is a lot of questions. This is like 20 questions for me. How many of you still, the night before, you still go around your house and you do the traditional thing of changing your clocks and stuff? Any of you still doing that? Okay, a few of you.
Wow, okay. And I tell you, I go to bed on time change Sunday and I'm not kidding you. I am kind of stressed out about it because for me is I'm just like hoping that all the technology in my house automatically changes on its own. And so I'm like at the mercy of the technology before I go to bed. So I set multiple alarms. I even set one at the other time, right, that we just changed to. I set two at both times to make sure that I don't miss anything because I'm just nervous.
I'd struggle to trust technology. But it is good to see you today. Let me just echo what Pastor David said. If we have not met before, my name is Josh. I'm the pastor here at Union Grove and it's my delight to have you here.
And perhaps this is your first time or the first time in a good while. Let me say thank you specifically to you. And before you leave today, let me encourage you to grab one of those new here cards in the seat back directly in front of you. And I'd encourage you to take one of those, fill that out. And our welcome center is right outside this door. We would love a record of your visit and we would also love just to connect a little bit more with you. There are a couple of people I just want to mention.
Don't do this all the time. But this is kind of interesting. I met one of our missionaries, we think for the very first time. Isn't that sad that the pastor of the church is still meeting his missionaries? But he is here. I did want to recognize Rob Whitty is here and he is with us. Rob, kind of wave your hand.
I'm not going to ask you to stand. But this is one of our missionaries in Ghana and he is here today. So thank you for being here. And I got his parents with us. We know them. They're no strangers to Union Grove and we are glad that you are here. And then also we have Pastor Robert Whittaker, met him this morning, one of Pastor Fletcher's friends. Robert Whittaker, raise your hand for me.
And that's him as well. And I love meeting people like Robert Whittaker because he kind of comes from the same vein as Pastor Fletcher. And Pastor Fletcher, they're going to preach all the way to their grave, those kind of guys. And so they have just been through it.
They've retired from the ministry and they're still traveling around preaching at different churches. And so it is nice to meet you and have you here today. So if you have your Bibles, and I hope that you do, I'd invite you to join me today in Luke chapter number 23. If you forgot your Bible, I get it. It is time change Sunday.
We're all a little bit of a mess today. If you forgot your Bible, the words will be up on the screen today. But we'll be in Luke chapter number 23. Now, we started a series, this is week number two in a brand new series. We started this series actually three weeks ago, called Words from the Cross.
And we started, it's funny, we started this series week number one, and then we had two weeks off. I was in Honduras for one of those weeks, and then we had missions conference. By the way, did you guys enjoy missions conference? I hope that you did and stuff. I'm feeding off that enthusiasm, so tone that down just a little bit.
And so it's time change Sunday. You were excited, so good. And so, but missions conference was awesome. And it's really special because it's like our first one that I've ever led. And so it was really cool, and I thought it was just great. I just want to thank every one of you who gave. We were able to raise for our missionaries, we'll be sending them a check, the ones that were here. We actually were able to raise almost $15,000 for our missionaries, which is awesome.
Can we clap for that? That's good news. And that'll go to some of the missionaries that were here. Also, our kids in our Christian school took up a love offering for the kids, the missionary kids that we had represented. And so each one of those kids left the conference with a check of $100 and some dollars, which was awesome.
And so super exciting. We took on three brand new missionaries for support at the conference. And so we are excited. And if you believe that the gospel still works, can you say amen today?
It is still working here locally in our community, but also around the world. But I say all that to say we took a couple of weeks off of our series, and so we are back in it today. And this series is going to take us all the way up to Easter Sunday. I want to say one thing about Easter. Easter is on April the 20th. I cannot believe that we're already talking about Easter, but we are.
And it's on April the 20th. And here's what we did. Our team got together, and we were planning some things for Easter.
And we had what I originally announced. We had a 7 a.m. sunrise service, and we had one service 10 a.m. And I'll be honest with you, I love as the pastor when we bring everybody together and just have them packed in here and that kind of thing. But we began to think about this, and we were like, we're not going to have a whole lot of room for guests.
And we wanted to plan for guests, and we wanted to strategically make room for that. So we ended up adding another service to our Easter schedule. And the reason for that is we need every one of you to invite somebody to join you for Easter Sunday. So we're going to have our 7 a.m. sunrise outside here.
That is a different service. If you've never been to one, be there. And if you're like, man, I can't get up that early, just remember time change Sunday and just act like it's that again and get up and join us. And be there for that. And then we'll have two identical worship services in here at 830 and 1030. And we're excited about that. We'll have an egg hunt for the kids in both of those services, the 830 and 1030, right after the service.
So it's going to be just a great day. Be here, invite somebody to be with you, and we'll celebrate the empty tomb together. Luke chapter number 23, as we dive right into it here today. Before we get into God's word, though, I want to kind of set this thing up with an idea that is very prevalent. In fact, a lot of non-Christians, unbelievers, would believe this. You've heard this, that good people go to heaven, right?
Isn't that kind of what you hear from time to time? And here's what I'll tell you, is that a lot of people believe this idea that good people go to heaven. I mean, it's funny that, you know, this is a Christian belief about heaven and hell and things like that. But here's what I'll tell you, is that everybody, believer or unbeliever, wants to believe that after this life, they get to go to a good place.
Like, have you ever been to a funeral or maybe even popped in when somebody lost a loved one and they're unbelievers and that kind of thing, but yet they still might make reference of they're in a better place or something like that. Everybody wants to believe that there is a good place, that there is a paradise called heaven that is awaiting us. Everybody wants to believe that. And here's what I'll tell you, most also believe that they're going to all go there, don't they? Isn't that a belief that we hear about from time to time? We hear about this idea that, yes, there's a good place that we're going and we believe that we're going to go there and here's why. Because most people are convinced that good people go to heaven and that they are good.
You've heard this before, this isn't anything new. And this is something that, you know, really is our society is good will get you into heaven. And here's why a lot of people believe this.
It's because in some ways it makes a lot of sense. If you think about that idea, it makes some sense and that's why our society at large believe that good will get you into heaven because it sounds fair. It aligns with this idea that, yeah, if there's a good God and he has provided a good heaven, wouldn't he want to occupy it with good people? So it makes sense to believe that good people go to heaven. But here's the question that I ask to anybody that believes that good people go to heaven, it's this question. It's like, well, how do you characterize good? Think about it. Like if you're talking to somebody at work and they think good people go to heaven or you're talking to a family member and they say, wow, I'm a good person.
So, yes, I'm going to go to heaven. Here's the first question I always ask them is how good is good enough? Right. How good is good enough? How good do I have to be to go to to go to heaven? Right.
That's the question. And here's the problem with that belief and with that philosophy that good people go to heaven is because here's what's true. Good is always a moving target, is it not?
Good is always a moving target. Every single one of us would define or describe good differently. And when you compare that idea, this this secular belief that good people will go to heaven.
When you compare that secular belief with what scripture has to say, you will find that that belief should concern and scare anyone that believes that. And here's why. It's because throughout the gospels, Jesus raised the bar for what good is. Remember that question, how do you characterize good? He raised the bar of goodness so high that it made every one of us look bad. It made all of us look bad.
And here's why. Because the standard of good to get into heaven was so high that every single one of us fall short. In fact, if you look throughout scripture, especially in the gospels, here's what Jesus actually taught. It actually was completely opposite of this philosophy that good gets you into heaven. He actually taught this, that bad people, you see this throughout, that really bad people have the potential to end up in heaven.
And the best of the best and the good of the good actually are going to fall short. He completely turns that secular belief on its head, and today's word from the cross challenges and ends the debate of that question, do good people go to heaven? So in Luke chapter number 23, we're going to see the second words from the cross that Jesus made. We know he made seven statements while on the cross. The first one we looked at a couple of weeks ago when he said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. And today we're going to look at the second one. Look at Luke chapter number 23 verse 32.
Here's what it says. And there were also two other male factors led with him to be put to death. Now the term male factors, you might not know what that means here in the King James Version. It just means evil doers. It means criminals. It means that Jesus was gone up to be crucified in between two thieves as we know them.
People that deserved to be where they were and that deserved to be sentenced to the death that they were about to die. Verse 33. And they were come to the place which is called Calvary. There they crucified him and the male factors, one on the right hand and the other on the left. And so they went up to this place called Calvary. This is also called the place of the skull and we call it Golgotha. This was the place where Jesus was crucified. Now I know I'm talking to many church people in here. Crucifixion, it's something we, I mean it's the foundation of our faith.
But here's what I'll tell you. Crucifixion, the reason why this was so terrible is the point of it was to make somebody suffer as long as they possibly could without killing them quickly. That's why it was drawn out for hours and hours and hours through this whole process of crucifixion. And so what they did was they brought them up to this place called Calvary and they were prepared to crucify Jesus in the center with two thieves, two criminals on both sides. Verse number 34. Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do and they parted his raiment and cast lots. The people stood beholding and the rulers also with them derided him saying, He saved others, let him save himself. If he be Christ, the chosen of God and the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him and offering him vinegar. Verse 37, and saying, If thou be the king of the Jews, save thyself. A superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew and it said this is the king of the Jews.
And one of the male factors which were hanged railed on him. By the way, if you look at the other gospel accounts here, you'll find that both thieves, both of the criminals that were next to him, both of them started cursing Jesus when all of this happened. And so one of these criminals looked to him and he said this, verse 39, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other criminal answered, he rebuked him, he rebuked the first criminal and he said, Dost thou not fear God? Now, can I stop it right here?
Put yourself in this story. Have you ever been around somebody who said something to the effect, like, I don't go to church because there's too many hypocrites there? You ever heard that? Now listen, what they're talking about is all the other churches in our community. Union Grove doesn't have any hypocrites, okay? But if you think about this, this idea of hypocrites, people are like that. And here's what I'm going to tell you, like, we don't go to church because there's too many hypocrites.
There's too many fake people. This would have been a perfect moment for that other criminal to say, Are you kidding me? To this guy. You got two criminals, both had lived terrible lives. Both of them, you know, they were thieves and they had stolen. They'd made life terrible for everybody around them.
They deserve to be where they are. And all of a sudden, at the very end of their life, this one criminal starts rebuking the other one saying, Don't you fear God? I'd have said, Wait a second, who do you think you are?
You're as big of a hypocrite as anybody else, right? He begins to rebuke this other criminal saying, Don't you fear God? And then he explains, he says, Seeing thou art in the same condemnation. In other words, he says this, we're under the same sentence.
We're all going to die today. And then he goes on and he explains in verse 41, But we, talking about his death, the two criminals, we indeed justly. You know what he's saying there? He's saying this, he's saying, We deserve this. Justice is coming down on you and me.
That's what he's telling this other thief. He's saying, We deserve this. This is justice for us. Because of the decisions that we have made, here we stand being condemned for the sins that we have committed. Because, he goes on, For we receive the due reward of our deeds. But then he goes on and says, But this man, talking about Jesus, hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, the second thief, he said, Jesus, Lord, remember me, when thou comest into thy kingdom. Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise. And it was about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over all of the earth until the ninth hour.
And the sun was darkened and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. Here we have this story, very familiar, and listen, I think I said this a couple weeks ago. Anytime we come to a familiar passage of scripture, you know my story. I've been in church my whole life, and we were in church more times than I can ever count. My parents, they drug me to church so much.
The church that I grew up in, we had Sunday school, we had Sunday morning, we had a Sunday night service, we had a Wednesday night service, we had revivals all the time. And so my parents had me at every one of these church services. And here's what I'll tell you, because I bet we can relate to this just a little bit. When you come to a passage like this, you immediately think, I've heard this story a thousand times. I know everything I need to know about this story, so I can kind of just sit back, I can relax or whatever.
I really want you to lean in, because there's a lot happening here in this very familiar story. You have three crosses, we know that. And around this time of year, many churches might put crosses outside and have three crosses. If you've ever wondered why there's three, why couldn't Jesus have just died by himself on a cross?
Because that's what we remember, that's what people wear as jewelry and stuff like that. Why couldn't it have just been one? Jesus was trying to teach us something, and we need to learn it, because every single one of us, it's the story of humanity, and it's the story of the entire human race, because every single person finds themselves on one of these two crosses. You have three crosses. On one cross, you have the cross of rejection. That's the first thief, crying out, Jesus, if you're the Christ, save yourself and save us. In other words, he's just saying, God, get me out of this thing.
Get me out of this mess that I have got myself into, and that's what he's crying out. That's the cross of rejection. On the other side, you have the cross of repentance. You have the cross of repentance, and then the middle cross represents the cross of redemption.
So you have the redemption there in the middle, and you have the cross of rejection, and the cross of repentance. These two criminals, both of them deserve to die, which brings us to this point. You have two robbers, two thieves. You have two requests. Both of them cried out for salvation in a different way, and we're going to see this. Both of them cried out with two different requests.
By the way, there was a couple of things about their requests that we're going to look at here in a minute, but here's the thing. They get different results from Jesus. Two criminals, two requests, and only one gets the result that every single one of us want.
And we're going to look at that for why that is. By the way, I think it's important to know when you look at this story, both criminals deserve to be there. Both criminals deserved to be where they were for the actions that they had committed, and don't miss this, both criminals had equal access to that middle cross. Both criminals had equal opportunity with the middle cross. But yet here, the first one, the first criminal cried out, Thou be the Christ, save thyself and us.
By the way, it's very similar to the mockers that are around. He's crying out this same prayer, fix this, get me out of this. And by the way, a lot of people, that's what salvation is to them. That's not genuine salvation.
God, get me out of the mess that you've got me into. That's not a prayer of salvation. That's not a prayer of repentance. Because that's what a lot of us do. We use God almost as a genie to just get us out of the mess that we have got ourselves into.
And we try to use him in that way. That's what the first cross was doing. That's what this first thief was doing. Then you have the second thief, and he says this interesting prayer, this interesting prayer of salvation, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And on the cross, here in this moment, to that second thief, Jesus responded with these words from the cross.
Today, thou shalt be with me in paradise. The question is this that we have to ask ourselves. What made the second thief's request different? Like both of them cried out essentially for salvation. What made the second thief get a different response from Jesus?
Well, I want to show you a couple of things that help you understand this better because it matters for each one of us. The reason the second thief received a different response from Jesus, today thou shalt be with me in paradise, is a couple of things. Number one, the second thief believed the gospel.
The second thief believed the gospel. Look at this, very familiar passage, but don't just breeze through this. Look at every word that we have in scripture. Look at verse 40. It says this, but the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost thou not fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, we deserve to be here, for we received the due reward of our deeds, but this man hath done nothing amiss.
Here's what's interesting. Remember, we started this sermon off with this idea, this secular philosophy that good people go to heaven. The reason why that belief that good people go to heaven, the reason why we can box that notion and really just put that debate to rest is because this thief wasn't good. Like, this thief didn't deserve anything.
This thief was actually hanging there because of a lot of bad decisions. This would have been a guy that we would have all said, man, he deserves to rot because of what he did. He was an evil man. He had destroyed lives. He had done so many bad things.
He deserved to be where he was because he was a criminal and he was a thief. So what's happening here? Well, when we talk about this second thief believing the gospel, you have to go to the foundation of what the gospel is, of what the gospel is, this good news that we have as a church.
Like, what's the foundation here? Well, the thief recognized a couple of things about the gospel. The first thing he recognized is this. He recognized that he was a sinner.
In verse 41, we just saw it. I deserve to die. We indeed justly.
We deserve to be here. We deserve to be punished. We have stolen. We've killed people. We've ruined lives. We deserve. He's talking to this other thief. We deserve to be where we are.
And no one's arguing against that. But then something changes about him. He admits that he deserves to be where he was, and then he recognized that Jesus hung there, not deserving to be there. So you've got to go to the foundation of the gospel.
It's this. The foundation of the gospel, before you can be saved, before you can be delivered, you have to recognize your deep need for deliverance. You have to recognize that you deserve to die because of the sin that you have committed.
You see, that's the difference in the two requests. This second thief, he's recognizing, I deserve to be where I was. You deserve to be where you are. But the difference between me and you, talking to the first thief, is this. I recognize that the man on the middle cross don't deserve to be where he is. He's actually hanging there for the sins that we have committed and the sins of the entire world.
You see, that second thief, he believed the foundation of the gospel, that we deserve death, not him. You remember, Jesus, he set the bar. Remember, we started this conversation, this sermon, with talking about the goodness bar, right? The goodness bar. Like, this idea, we have people, friends, family, co-workers, people in our community, that believe if I'm just a good person, that I'm going to inherit paradise, that I'm going to get to heaven by being good, by doing a lot of good things, whatever.
And here's the thing. That bar of what determines good, Jesus has raised so far to where every single one of us look bad in comparison to that bar. In other words, the scripture would say this in the book of Romans, we all fall short. Every single one of us. We all fall short of the glory of God.
So in other words, what we can learn from this is this. We deserve to be where we are on a cross, right? That's what we deserve. But Jesus hung there completely innocent because he hung there as our substitute.
As our substitute. The lamb without blemish, without spot. You see, he died so that you and I could go free. And so you say, what's different about the two thieves and their requests? Well the first one, he didn't understand the gospel because he just wanted God to get him out of the situation. The second thief believed the gospel, the fact that he's a sinner and that Jesus, being perfectly innocent, died for his sin. But the second thing is, the second thief called out to God for salvation.
Verse number 42, he says this, remember me, he says, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. Now, I want you to understand this and I get it. It is time change Sunday and some of you do not want to think. You just want to be told certain things and you don't want your mind to be working a whole lot and I get that so I'm going to be very careful when I say this. But here's what I'm going to tell you. What you got to understand here is that what this second thief is asking is completely illogical. Makes no sense.
And here's why. It's because we live in a world that believes that if you do good, you get good results. But if you do bad, you have consequences.
You get bad results, right? Isn't this what we teach our kids, right? I know I teach my kids this. It's like, hey, if you do good and you don't embarrass me while we're out and about today, right?
Don't judge me. You say those same things to your kids. If you guys are good while we're out, then you get ice cream later, okay?
All right? Any of your spouse treats you that way? Any of you got a spouse that says the same thing? But we say this to our kids and here's why. There's nothing wrong with this. But we really are taught and it's kind of just this society belief that if we're good, we get good results. You're rewarded, in other words, for goodness and you're punished for bad. So in other words, okay, when you get home and your kids, they did embarrass you. Well, what you should do is not reward them, right?
Okay? Don't reward them because they don't deserve it. So here's my point and I'm going somewhere with this. The thief should have said to Jesus, this would have made much more sense, he should have said, I deserve to be punished. And he did say that. He should have said, I deserve to be punished, so punish me. He should have said, I deserve to be punished, so punish me. Or he could have said, I deserve to be rewarded, which we know he didn't. I deserve to be rewarded, so reward me.
And that would have made much more logical sense because when you're good, you get good results. When you're bad, you're punished. But what's interesting about this story, and this is kind of the mind-blowing moment for me as your pastor because I breeze through stories like this because I've heard them a thousand times.
But when I got into studying this, here's what's amazing to me. What the thief is actually saying is this. I deserve to be punished, so reward me. I deserve to be cast out, so bring me in.
Think about that. It makes no sense. Like in fact, I mean, Jesus is receiving this, and it would have made much more sense for Jesus to almost say, hey, listen, I think you're a little confused. You're saying you deserve to be crucified, you deserve to be where you are, and you're asking for a reward.
Which is it? Because those who deserve to be crucified don't get rewarded. Right? Doesn't that make much more sense? But you know what Jesus said? When he says, I deserve to be punished, so reward me.
I deserve to be cast out, so bring me close. In the midst of that moment, Jesus, he says, bingo. The second thief understood it. The second thief got it.
And here's the thing. Is this not the sinner's prayer? This is the sinner's prayer right here in front of us, right here in scripture. This is the sinner's prayer, and it's saying this. This is what it looks like for salvation. And by the way, if you've kind of slipped in here, and you don't know Jesus as your savior, or you're skeptical, or you're struggling, or you're thinking that your good works, or your giving, or your church attendance, or all these things are going to be enough to get you into this place called heaven, this place called paradise, and things like that.
Here's what I'm going to tell you is this. You need to lean in a little bit, because here's what salvation is. It's recognizing that we deserve to be punished because of our sin. It's recognizing that we deserve to be punished, and in the midst of that, calling out to him, asking him that in the midst of our punishment, God, reward me. It's saying, Father, I deserve to be cast out, so bring me in.
I deserve to die, so give me life. That's what the second thief is realizing. He realizes the gospel, and he understood what is happening here. You say, what in the world? How in the world can you deserve punishment and ask somebody for a reward? That'd be like you messing up your life at your job and doing some very bad things, embezzling money or something like that, and you get caught for it, and you're sitting there with your boss, and you're looking your boss dead in the eye, and you're sitting there with him, and you're like, listen, I embezzled money. I deserve to be fired, but boss, would you give me a promotion today?
That's the kind of thing we're talking about here. That's what the second thief is saying. He's saying, I deserve to die. I've made a ton of terrible mistakes.
I've ruined a lot of people around me's lives because of my mistakes. I deserve to be crucified, so reward me. I deserve to be cast out today, but I'm asking you, Jesus, to bring me close. You see, what was happening here that this thief understood was found in verse number 44. Remember, after this moment, what happens in verse number 44? Darkness covers the whole earth. You say, what was happening? The second thief understood what was happening.
What was happening here? You know, we don't have time to look at the passages in the Old Testament, but here's what I'll tell you. Every place, mark my words on this, every place in the Old Testament that describes Judgment Day, where the justice of God will come down to destroy evil once and for all, here's what I'll tell you. It's always called a day of darkness.
Look throughout Old Testament. It always is called darkness. When God's judgment comes down, God's wrath comes down, it always is called darkness, and now Jesus is on the cross and the world becomes dark. You say, what was happening here in this moment? It's very significant.
Do not miss this. You could say it this way, that what was happening on the cross was like a Judgment Day before Judgment Day. You see, the Scripture talks about a Judgment Day coming, right? We know that what was happening on the cross was Judgment Day before the Judgment Day.
You say, what do you mean by that? It's this, the darkness had to come down on Jesus, the man on the middle cross, so that it would not have to one day come down on you. You see, the darkness had to come down on him and that darkness signified the judgment of God, the wrath of God. It was coming down on that middle cross so that that second thief could be free, and so that you could be free. You see, that's what's happening here. That's what the second thief understood. He recognized that right here in this moment, Jesus, this man on the middle cross, he just admitted he deserved to be here, Jesus is sitting here, he doesn't deserve to be here. Jesus is dying, experiencing the wrath of an Almighty God, the judgment of an Almighty God is coming down on that middle cross so that we would escape the judgment that is coming. Do you get it?
Say it this way. He was punished so that you could be rewarded. He was cast away from the Father so that you could be brought close. That's the gospel, that's what's happening. And so the second thief, he called out to God for salvation.
But last, I want you to see this. This is what I skim over half the time when I'm going through the Bible and when you study it, it's so good. And by the way, let me just say this, the Bible is alive and it speaks to us. And so I know that I'm on a different, I'm paid to get up here every week and preach to you and I get it because I've sat where you've sat my entire life and sometimes we breeze through scripture. Let me encourage you, go deep and understand what God is trying to teach us because you'll learn something.
And there's something that I learned here that I just want to show you. The second thief, number three, he died with Jesus. With, W-I-T-H, with Jesus. Verse number 43. And so he just prayed, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.
And there's a lot happening here and I'm gonna be very honest with you. As your pastor, here's what I always focus on with this verse, is paradise. That sounds good, doesn't it?
That sounds good. And for me, when I look at this, here's what I always highlight, paradise. Paradise.
That's gotta be what he's meaning. And let me tell you this. Yes, there is a place called paradise. Yes, there is a heaven. Yes, we should look forward to it.
Yes, we get to dream about it. But there's so much more happening in this verse that you cannot miss. Here you have a thief and he calls out, Lord, remember me. And Jesus responds with something even better and in some ways you could say like, Jesus responded with something different than his original prayer. Lord, remember me? And here's what Jesus said.
He said, I'm gonna do something better. Today, you are with me. Think about that. Today, you are with me. Present tense.
Like, look at that. Today, you are with me. Spurgeon said that Jesus' last companion on earth was his first companion at the gates of paradise.
You see, this is so significant for us for two reasons. Christians, or followers of Christ, are with him. You say, what exactly does that mean? That phrase, with me, I never really paid much attention to it, if I'm honest.
But here's what was happening here in this moment. If you look throughout the New Testament, specifically the Apostle Paul writes about this a lot. He writes about these different things that happen when we trust in Jesus. And what happens is it's almost like we become with Christ. So, the most familiar one that really applies to this, you know what Paul says? He says, I am crucified with Christ.
By the way, this man's the only one to ever experience that from a literal perspective. And so here, he's crying out, he says, Lord, remember me. And Jesus says, hey, I'm going to do something way better than that. Today, right now, as we hang here on these crosses, you are with me. Here's why that matters for you. At the moment, you trust in Jesus as your savior.
Here's what happens. Everything that Jesus has done becomes yours. It's almost like you could say it this way. Everything Jesus did, you become that. Remember, the only ones that could ever inherit eternal life are the ones who are perfect and good, right?
He set that bar so high. Well, all of us fall short, so none of us can do that. So what Jesus came to do is Jesus came to live the perfect life, something that you and I could never do that's worthy of heaven. So what happens when I trusted in Jesus, I got saved when I was a kid, five years old.
You know my story if you're part of our church. And so when I trusted in Jesus as a five-year-old boy, here's what was happening in that moment. I trusted in him, and in that moment, all of Jesus' righteousness, all of his goodness, by the way, it's perfect goodness, all of that was given to me. So now it's almost as if I am good, and when God looks at me, he sees Jesus now.
And then he goes further. We've been crucified with him. So in other words, his goodness is ours, his crucifixion is ours, we share in that, and now we've been resurrected with him. You see, everything in God's eyes that Jesus did is now true of you and true of me if you've trusted in Jesus as Savior. Today we are with him. But then second, I do want to make note of the word paradise. I want you to see that paradise is where Jesus is. And I'm wrapping this thing up.
Listen to this. The beauty of heaven is not streets of gold. Now, I'll be honest with you. Streets of gold sounds pretty cool. Like, I'm excited to see stuff like that. The whole mansion thing, yeah, I look at that. I kind of daydream just like anybody else can't wait, right?
It's going to be great. Loved ones that have gone on before, sure, we dream of the day that we are reunited, but here's what I'm going to tell you, and this is what he was telling them. As Jesus stood there in the middle cross, and I can imagine he's kind of looking over at this thief, and he says, today you're with me in paradise.
Here's what I want you to understand. Paradise, this place that Jesus has prepared for us, the beauty of it, it's not a place. It's who's there that makes it beautiful. It's not a place.
It's a person. And you see, that's the point. That's why I can say today I'm living in paradise.
You know why? Not because of the world that I'm living in, but because I know who is with me. I know he's with me. And so for us, paradise, this place that Jesus has prepared, it's a real place, but it's where Jesus is. So in closing, we see that being good or doing your best, that can't get you into heaven. Paradise and having this relationship with Christ, it's when you recognize that you deserve to be cast aside, and in the midst of you recognizing that, you ask God to bring you in. So my question is this for you as we kind of close this.
Are you with him right now? That's the question that every single one of us must ask ourselves. It's not, have you been in church your whole life? That's not the question. Hey, did you grow up in a Christian home? That's great, but that's not the question. Are your parents Christians?
Yeah, that's not the question. Do you do really good? Do you live right? Are you moral? I hope you are. That's not the question. Do you give? Are you generous? I hope you are. That's not the question. The question is this. Are you? You can't look at everybody around you. You.
Are you with him? Or better yet, let's ask it this way. What side of the cross are you on? You have one cross of rejection. Father, fix this. Get me out of the mess that I have gotten myself into.
And then you have another one. Father, I deserve to be in the mess that I'm in. But bring me close. Let me be with you when I deserve to be turned from you. That's the prayer of salvation. Are you with him? Can we bow our heads for prayer?
