Sermon from January 7, 2007
"Crucifixion was a powerful symbol throughout the Roman world. It was not just a means of liquidating undesirables; it did so with the maximum degradation and humiliation. It said, loud and clear: we are in charge here; you are our property; we can do what we like with you," (Jesus and the Victory of God, 543).

And yet the New Testament never calls the death of Jesus an execution, assassination, or tragedy. It doesn't say that Jesus was cut off in the prime of His life. The four Gospels spare us the gruesome details of crucifixion in which, e.g., Mel Gibson's movie specialized. The writers did not deny the gruesomeness; they had seen crucifixions, they saw His; but their reporting and interpretation of that event ignored the gruesomeness altogether. How do we account for this absence of language and detail in the New Testament that would naturally belong to any contemporary, journalistic account of Jesus' execution?

The Death of Jesus As Atonement
Last spring, we considered one answer to this puzzle, which is given by the New Testament letter of Hebrews. It goes like this. The deeper meaning of Jesus' death preempted the political meaning and the gruesomeness of His death. As the Jewish high priest, alone with sacrificial blood in the Most Holy Place of the temple, was the sole representative of the Jewish nation before God, so Jesus, our great High Priest, alone with His sacrificial blood in the Most Holy Place of heaven, is the sole Representative of the human race before God.

That has altered the human situation permanently, because one of us has atoned for our sins and is permanently in the presence of God, representing our interests as the Mediator between God and man.

The Death of Jesus As Witness
But Hebrews does not give the only answer to this puzzle of His death. The book of Revelation agrees that the deeper meaning of Christ's death preempted the political meaning and the gruesomeness of His death. But Revelation opens another chapter on that meaning. Hebrews interpreted Jesus' death by comparing it to the Jewish Day of Atonement. Revelation interprets it by comparing it to a witness.

In Revelation 1:2, John wrote that he, John testifies to everything he saw – that is, the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ. Then, he addressed this letter in verses 4-5 this way: John, To the seven churches in the province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

In 1 Timothy 6:13, the Apostle Paul referred to Christ Jesus, who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession. John in the book of Revelation was interested in Jesus Christ as a witness to the truth of God, even to the point of giving up His life for that truth. He was interested for two reasons.

The witness of Jesus Christ to the truth of God, even to the point of giving up His life for that truth, was the way He overcame the evil of our world and redeemed for God an innumerable company of people, who became His chosen people in the world.

In Revelation 5:9-10 the hosts of heaven sing to the Lamb of God this song: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth."

But John has a second, over-riding interest in the witness of Jesus to the point of death. The Church is to imitate Jesus' witness to the point of death. In Revelation 12:11 John wrote this about the Church's encounter with the devil: They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.

Pastor Bill Heider walked into my office a year ago or so and said to me, "Tell me in one sentence what the book of Revelation is about."

I said, "Bill, as I read it, the message of Revelation is that the Church is to imitate Christ by bearing witness to the truth of the Gospel, even to the point of death. That is how the conversion of the nations will come about."

The Pastoral Center of Gravity
From now through Easter we will with the Holy Spirit's help try to understand why Revelation made that theme central to its prophetic teaching. If we have ears to hear, we will hear what the Spirit says to the Church in America in our generation. Blessed are those who hear and take it to heart.

But today, around the Lord's Supper, we can bridge the teaching of Hebrews and the teaching of Revelation by remembering Jesus, the faithful witness, our High Priest, who in the words of Revelation 1:5, loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood.

Do you believe that He loves you? Do you believe that He has freed you from your sins by His blood? On Christ's behalf, I implore you: believe in Him! Believe in Him, and be baptized, confessing Him openly and joining yourself to the Church, the people, who are to bear faithful witness to Him, even to the point of death.