And Father, as we now come to your Word, we thank you for your Word, and we remember that it is inerrant, inspired, infallible, sufficient, efficient, and that your Word never returns void to you. So we ask, O Lord, that you would use your Word today to nourish us, to strengthen us, to encourage us, maybe even to convict us. Lord, you know what our needs are. You know what your word can do. And so we ask that your word would do your work in us today. May we hear the voice of the shepherd speaking to us today. And may we grow in his likeness by your grace. In his name we pray. Amen. Well, if you have your Bibles with you, please turn to John Chapter 19. We'll be looking at verses 17 to 19 today, but like I said, you might want to keep a finger in Luke Chapter 23. And you might be thinking, well, we're going into the Christmas season here pretty soon, so isn't it kind of weird that we're studying the crucifixion? And the truth is, the crucifixion is what adds meaning to Christmas. If there was no crucifixion and resurrection, Christmas would be absolutely pointless. It would just be another secular holiday. There would be no meaning to it. the purpose of Christmas is revealed in the crucifixion and the resurrection. And so in one sense it is indeed kind of fitting that we will be studying the crucifixion through the Christmas season. So today we'll be in John chapter 19, verses 17 to 19. But again, might wanna have a finger in Luke chapter 23. Now, generally speaking, the most important events in human history are documented extremely thoroughly by volumes and volumes of books and other resources that teach us about those events. I mean, if you, for example, want to learn about World War II, which was absolutely a significant event in history, you could read countless books. You could spend the rest of your life reading books and studying, you know, resources on World War II. How many chapters? are there on World War II? How many books could you possibly write on World War II, on any event of great significance? And I don't actually expect you to answer that question. I don't think there's a way to answer that question. I just wanna help you see that significant events typically have a lot written about them. But the key word there is typically. Because the most significant event in all of human history took place 2,000 years ago when the second person of the Trinity, the Lord Jesus Christ, took on human flesh and lived a perfectly sinless life. Why did he do that? Why do we have Christmas, you might ask? It's so that we could have Easter, so that we could have crucifixion and resurrection. It's so that Jesus could die in the place of helpless, ruined sinners. His death, the event that we refer to as the crucifixion, is easily and by far the most significant event in all of human history. Wars, inventions, crusades, revolutions, empires, all those things are, they can be very significant, but they pale in comparison to the significance of the crucifixion of Christ. What's odd, however, is that while so much has been written about the crucifixion since the invention of the printing press, The men who wrote our four Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, actually didn't tell us a whole lot about the crucifixion. Think about it. For example, Matthew devotes three chapters to the Sermon on the Mount, but he only devotes 17 verses to the crucifixion. Luke devotes 14 verses to the crucifixion, but he devotes 23 verses to the Passover meal when the Lord's Supper was instituted. And John follows the trend here. We saw almost an entire chapter of Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus back in John chapter 3. But then when it comes to the crucifixion, John only gives us 14 verses in which he describes what happened that day when Jesus was crucified. In fact, as we enter into this portion of his book, of the narrative that he gives us, we'll see that he puts virtually no emphasis on any of the physical aspects of the crucifixion. He doesn't underscore the brutality of it. He doesn't talk about the barbarianism or the gore of it for the most part. He leaves most of those details completely out. He just omits all the physical aspects for the most part. And now, as students of Scripture have noticed this, they've tried to explain it. Why did he leave out all these details that Matthew, Mark, and Luke, you know, did include? Now many would say that he omitted the gore simply because his audience was already all familiar, all too familiar with how gruesome, how bloody and barbaric the practice of crucifixion was. And I think there's something to that. They probably did. That's entirely possible. But I also think it probably has more to do with the entire theme of this section of the book that we entered into back starting in chapter 18, That theme being that Christ is triumphant and reigns supreme in every circumstance. And indeed even in his death, Christ is triumphant and reigns supreme because it was the will of the Father for Jesus to be crucified and Jesus remained in the will of the Father even until the very end. Now we've seen Jesus stand trial before the Jews, and we've seen him stand trial before Pontius Pilate, who knew that Jesus was innocent. In fact, he proclaimed him to be innocent, and yet he refused to do what was right in the eyes of his disciples. to release him for fear of what it might cost him before men. It would anger the Jews. And the Jews have threatened to take this issue to Caesar if Pilate wants to make it an issue, if Pilate will not comply with the demands of the mob. That is always how the mob works. The human heart is the same today as it was then, as it has always been. But for fear of serious consequences, for fear of serious repercussions with man, Pilate violated his own conscience by sentencing Jesus to die by crucifixion, just as the mob demanded that day. And so we've seen that Jesus is a victim of a terrible injustice. In fact, he was the victim of the greatest injustice ever committed, because not only had he done no wrong in this instance, but he never did anything wrong. He never sinned. He was sinless. But one of the great hopes that we have in this life is that as Christians, we know that God is always just. Has somebody ever wronged you? And there were no consequences for it? Well, you shouldn't have felt hopeless if that happened, and that happens to all of us, by the way. But we're not without hope. Instead of wasting your time trying to figure out how to make sure that there are some consequences, trying to find a way to seek vengeance, remember that the Lord says, vengeance is mine. I will repay. Man's justice almost always falls short. true justice that's just the way it is in this world in this life in one way or another man's justice almost always falls short but God's justice is perfect and it never fails and so it was on this day when Jesus had to face God's justice not for his own sin, because he had none, but for the sins of all who believe on him in order that their sins may be cleansed of them, that God may pour his wrath out on those sins, and that those people will be washed clean. So the point of our passage today is simply this. Christ's substitutionary death is sufficient for the redemption, forgiveness, and salvation of anyone who will believe savingly on him. So having tried everything that he possibly could to appease the mob, Pilate sentenced Jesus to die by crucifixion. That's what we saw in verse 16 of chapter 19. Pilate sentenced Jesus to die by crucifixion. So our text picks up immediately after Pilate's sentencing. We read this in verse 17. They took Jesus, therefore, And he went out bearing his own cross to the place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha. Now the people referred to as they here aren't the Jews, but they are the Roman guards. Now normally, just prior to the act of crucifixion, the subject would be forced to endure a scourging, a thorough scourging by the Roman guards as a means of hastening the process of execution, really, hastening the death of the subject. But Pilate, you remember, trying to appease the bloodthirsty mob by giving them just a taste, a sight of Jesus' blood, and failing to evoke their pity, by the way, we should add. He has already had Jesus scourged. So Jesus' back is already ripped to shreds. He's already started the death process. But next, the New Testament and other ancient documents from this time period would tell us that the subject would have the horizontal beam of the cross tied to his back with his arms around it and he would be led by a centurion, one centurion guard and four Roman guards through the city to the site of the crucifixion. And finally there would typically be a sign or a placard with the crimes which the subject was guilty that would be carried before them as they marched through the city. And so as the subject would arrive at the site of the crucifixion, his clothes would be stripped from him and they'd become the property of the soldiers responsible for crucifying him. And the beam would be lifted up to rest on the vertical bar by two soldiers on either side. And at that point, the soldiers would either nail the hands or really technically the wrists, although there's not a distinction that they made back then between the hands and the wrists. They would be nailed to the beam and the ropes would be cut. Or sometimes they would even just leave them there to hang with the rope, not nailing their hands and feet. But in most cases, the feet were also nailed or tied to the cross. Now the barbaric aspect of that, of the feet being nailed to the cross or tied to the cross, is that doing that actually prolonged death by a long shot, by quite a bit. It made the process of dying far more drawn out because it allowed a man who was suffocating because of the weight of his body pulling down, and therefore he wasn't able to breathe, it would allow him to push up in order to release some pressure in his diaphragm so that he could actually breathe. And whether he meant to do that and prolong his own death or not, that's another subject, but eventually the subject of crucifixion would die, obviously, of either blood loss or suffocation, or their organs shutting down from the trauma of being scourged and then crucified, or maybe just a combination of all of these things. But we know that the walk from Pilate's praetorium to the site of Christ's crucifixion was something that Jesus, who was not only truly God, but was true man as well, it was something that he was unable to complete on his own strength in the flesh. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell us that a man named Simon of Cyrene was a bystander who was recruited to help Jesus carry his cross. It is extremely likely that Simon ended up becoming a Christian. How else do they know his name? It was probably because he was in Christian circles. But John identifies the exact location for us as the place called the place of a skull, which is called in Hebrew Golgotha. Why was it given that name, the place of a skull? We don't really know. There's a lot of speculation out there. Some people will say, well, the hill was actually shaped like a skull. Okay, maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. The scriptures don't tell us exactly why it was called that. It just tells us what the name was. But the fact is we simply don't know why it was called the place of a skull. But one interesting fact for us to make note of, if you've ever heard the word calvary in church, it's a word that we use frequently, but do you know what it means? It's actually Latin for place of the skull. That's where the word calvary comes from. But calvary, the place of a skull, would be the place where God's justice, God's wrath, would be poured out on Jesus. The physical suffering that Jesus endured was absolutely nothing in comparison to the suffering that he endured under the full outpouring of God's wrath. When he was sweating blood the night before, it wasn't because he was afraid of physically what was going to happen. He wasn't afraid of the physical pain. There were men who had done this before, and they didn't sweat drops of blood, but the reason they didn't sweat blood is because they didn't have to endure the wrath of God the way that Jesus did. And if they did, they had no idea what they were in for. Jesus knew how awful the wrath of God was. He knew how serious God's justice was and that's why he was sweating drops of blood. And the location of this is important. It tells us that it was outside of the city of Jerusalem and that's important because Leviticus chapter 16 verse 27 instructs that the carcasses of sacrificed animals on the day of atonement must be carried outside of the camp. So it was only fitting that Jesus, as the unblemished Lamb of God, would also be subjected to the demands of the law. But further, the author of Hebrews exhorted his readers in Hebrews 13.13 saying this, he said, let us go out to him outside the camp bearing his reproach. What that is is an invitation to depart from worldliness, to leave the world behind. What he meant specifically for his audience was that those who follow Christ, he was writing or speaking, if it was a sermon, some think it was maybe a sermon, I think it was maybe a sermon, but they were Jews. They were Jews who were converting to Christianity. And so he was exhorting them to leave Judaism and all her external rituals behind in order to receive the spiritual blessings that Christ had earned for all who believe in him. him. Now one of the things that we want to look for as we study the scene of the crucifixion is similarities or harmony, harmonious aspects between the four gospel testimonies. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John all tell us about the crucifixion and they all give us slightly different details because they're focused on different things. So they're all coming from different perspectives, but what we want to look for is the things that they have in common. And one of the things that they have in common is they include the fact that Jesus was not the only man sentenced to die by crucifixion on that day. So John tells us in the next verses, verses 18 and 19, there they crucified him. and with him two other men, one on either side and Jesus in between. Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It was written, Jesus the Nazarene, the King of the Jews. So John's testimony here, what he tells us about Jesus being crucified between two men. is very brief. Matthew and Luke particularly give us a lot more detail. And so we're gonna be considering some of the things that they say about these two men. But why do you suppose that all four gospel authors even felt that it was necessary to include this fact? That Jesus was crucified between these two men who were thieves as Matthew tells us. It's because while, yes, they are literal men who were literally crucified on either side of Christ, they also represent every single person who has ever lived, including you and including me. Every person here and every person who has ever lived is represented by one of these two thieves on either side of Jesus. One of them is a picture of you. One of them is a picture of me. One of them is a picture of everyone. These men are important because one of them, perhaps more than any other figure in all of scripture, one of them reminds us that Christ's substitutionary death is sufficient for the redemption, forgiveness, and salvation of anyone and everyone who will believe savingly on Jesus. And so as we're initially introduced to these two men, the Jews were taunting and mocking Jesus as they have been all morning, as they went to Pilate's praetorium, they were mocking him there. They're continuing to mock him as he marches through the city and as he's crucified. They're saying things like, you who are gonna destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself. If you're the Son of God, come down from the cross. That's what we see in Matthew 27, 40, or in Luke 23, 35. They're saying to Him, He saved others, let Him save Himself, if this is the Christ of God, His chosen One. They're just insulting Him. They're just mocking Him. Mocking the fact that, well, if you are who you say you are, you should be able to free yourself. Not realizing why He's doing what he's doing. Now, if you've been through high school, you know that the most natural thing in the world for people to do when they see somebody being insulted and mocked and jeered is to just chime in and join in with the crowd. And initially, that's exactly what actually both of these thieves, both of these criminals did. Matthew tells us in Matthew 27, 44, the robbers who had been crucified with him were also insulting him with the same words. Notice it says robbers. So both of them are joining in with the crowd, even though they have nothing personally against Jesus, and they're insulting Him and mocking Him. So these two robbers started off actually in the same position as everyone else. They're a picture of the unregenerate world, a picture of humanity's irrational, rebellious hatred of God. These two thieves start off in the same classification as Barabbas, the insurrectionist who was released earlier by choice of the mob over Jesus. In fact, Matthew and Mark actually both use the same Greek word to refer to these two robbers or thieves that John used to refer to Barabbas. So they're in the same category. In fact, if you put it all together, what we see is that they were apparently intended to be crucified with Barabbas, beside Barabbas, meaning they were probably involved in all the same crimes that Barabbas was. Murder, insurrection, robbery, and more. These were not nice guys. These were not gentlemen. These were vile, wretched criminals. And that's the point that we're supposed to see. The point is these men were wretched, wretched sinners, not just because they were criminals, because they also were doing what the world's doing. So everybody is guilty of the same things now, blaspheming Jesus, that these two guys are. But then, in the middle of the day, As they're hanging on their crosses, God works one of the greatest miracles in all of scripture. Don't let the fact that this is a miracle escape your attention. If you get a book or if you go to a website or something that lists all the miracles in the Bible, this one probably isn't listed. But don't miss the fact that this is one of the greatest miracles in all the Bible, and that it occurs with one of these two thieves. So as the mob continue to mock and jeer and insult Jesus, as they continue to spit at him, one of the thieves suddenly has a moment where he apparently goes silent and thinks for a moment, and he tries to figure out why he had so much hatred toward Jesus. And as he's searching himself for answers, his heart of stone is suddenly replaced by a heart of living flesh. And for the first time, he has eyes in his life. He has ears to hear and he has eyes to see. And with those eyes, he looks over and he sees the beauty and he sees the purity and he sees the sinlessness and the glory of the man identified by an inscription above him that says, Jesus the Nazarene, the King of the Jews. Now he doesn't just see this with his physical eyes. For the first time in his life, he sees something with spiritual eyes. He sees the truth. No longer do the jeers and the insults being thrown at Jesus inflame his heart. It's not like pouring oil on a fire, which is what it was just two seconds ago. But now, he hears them with ears to hear. And he's just revolted by them. He's disgusted by them. He sees how irrational they are. And so instead of participating, he goes from participating to now rebuking them. Instead of participating with the insults, he starts rebuking those who are insulting him, defending Christ's honor. He turns to his companion on the other side of Jesus and he says to him, Luke 23, verse 40, he says, do you not even fear God since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? Now think about this for a second. What just happened? In the blink of an eye, in a flash, he goes from insulting Jesus to rebuking his partner in crime. What has changed? How can this man go from cursing God, from blaspheming God incarnate one minute to suddenly defending his honor the next? The answer is so simple that I think people overlook it and that is God works a miracle here. God works a miracle in this man's heart and suddenly he's not even the same person anymore. Literally he is in an instant. A new creation. With new desires and new affections, new things that revolt him, new things that he loves, new things that he hates. Now outwardly, He looks exactly the same. Outwardly, you never would have known that any kind of change took place. But the tongue reveals what fills the heart. And this vile criminal's tongue reveals that his rebellious nature was suddenly slain and replaced. In an instant, right there in his dying hour, as he's dying, he's born again. Praise the Lord. And so he continues to rebuke his friend on the other side of Jesus. He tries to reason with him. He tries to be rational with him. He says to him, we indeed are suffering justly for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds. But this man, referring to Jesus, but this man has done nothing wrong. And he's right. He's right. He recognized that Jesus didn't belong up there on that day. Now this is a man who I would think has probably seen many crucifixions in his life. There's a very good chance that he actually knew several men, maybe he even had friends, who had been crucified up there before. He knew what kind of men were worthy of this type of execution, this barbaric, gory execution. And he knew, he could see that Jesus was not that type of man. And when his partner shows no sign of remorse or repentance, the thief turns his attention to Jesus and says, Jesus, remember me when you come in your kingdom. It's from Luke 23, 42. This is astounding. This is miraculous. There's a very good chance that this is a man who spent decades as a criminal. He was a career criminal. He'd done all sorts of heinous, evil things. Two seconds ago, he was blaspheming Jesus just like everybody else, but then in the blink of an eye, this miracle that we call regeneration happens, and suddenly, he's a new man. He's no longer the man who did all the things that he's up there dying for. And what does Jesus do when this sinner who's dying by his side calls out for him to remember him when he enters into his kingdom? Does Jesus chastise him for it? Does he say to him, you know, buddy, it's too late for you. You spent years sinning and rebelling against God. It's too late for you. Does he say, don't you know that faith without works is dead. You can't do any works. Your arms and your hands and your feet are all bound. There's nothing that you can do. Faith without works is dead. You've done no works to validate God's work in your life. Did he say, Wow, that's really convenient that you would choose now to suddenly believe in me as you're dying in your dying hour. I'll just see what I can do when you stand before me in judgment. Is that what he says to him? No, he doesn't say any of these things to him. We know that he said none of these things and said we know that he replied to the man by saying Luke 23 43. Truly, I say to you today you shall be with me in paradise. Friends, rejoice with me as I rejoice with the angels in heaven that this man, in his dying hour, is adopted as a son of God and became our brother in Christ. Because God showed mercy to this man in his final hour. What an incredible detail for our Bibles to include in the story of this man. The same Bible that assures us that God is sovereign over all things, that He ordains everything that comes to pass without causing evil or sin, tells us that it is possible for a man who hates God, who has spent his entire life rebelling against God, defying God, to come to Christ savingly, in His final hour. Christ's substitution is sufficient for the redemption, forgiveness, and salvation of anyone and everyone who will savingly believe in Him no matter what their past is, no matter what they have done, including those who come to Him in saving faith even in their final hour. Now, I think it's important to add that just because a person can receive salvation in their final hour doesn't mean that they should. It doesn't mean that you should think to yourself, well, this guy waited until his final hour. I've got quite a bit of life left ahead of me, and I've got a lot of things that I want to enjoy, so I'm just going to follow his example. No. Just because a person can receive salvation in their dying hour does not mean that you should wait until your final hour to get straight with God and to come to Christ in saving faith. In fact, this is one of the most foolish things that a person can possibly do or think about doing. A person imagines that he's going to have this moment before he dies where he can think straight and he can do whatever he wants, where he can say a prayer, as if he can just be saved by hearing and repeating some magic words. Listen, no man or woman will die instantly without even five seconds warning. How many people go in their sleep But more importantly, you're not saved by repeating or reciting a prayer. You are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Salvation is by God's grace alone and received through faith alone, in Christ alone. And if you don't believe now in your health, what would convince you to believe in your dying moments? Nothing. What if I said, you know, I'm just going to make the decision to love my wife in my last hour? You'd say, well, why don't you love her now? What's going to change between now and then? Nothing. If you don't believe now, you're not going to believe then. You see, when a person puts off believing in Christ, he's not really putting anything off. He's only hardening his own heart against God. That's what happens when you prolong coming to Christ in faith. It does not get easier. It becomes exponentially more impossible. That's why the Scriptures admonish us with things like today, if you hear His voice. Today, not tomorrow. Today, if you hear His voice. Do not harden your hearts, because if you prolong, if you wait, if you put it off, you are hardening your heart. And so in his dying hour, having been given ears to hear by the grace of God, this man hears the voice of the Good Shepherd calling his name, and he follows him into eternal life, joining him in paradise that day. Regardless of what he's done, he's cleansed of all the crimes that he's done, all the rebellion, all the defying God, of God that he's done in his life, he's cleansed of it, it's gone, and it's put on Christ. And Christ's perfect righteousness is placed on him. Friends, his testimony isn't a lesson in waiting or prolonging, waiting until your final hour to be saved. His testimony is a lesson on the importance of responding to the gospel by believing in Christ immediately. This man, like any and every other saint, was chosen by God from the foundation of the world for salvation. Now, the interesting thing about this man's testimony Is it faith comes by hearing? And. Nobody appears to have preached the gospel to him as he was hanging there on the cross. How do we explain that? I mean, I guess we we could say that. Well, it's just normative that faith comes by hearing, but that this man is proof that there are exceptions. That's one conclusion I suppose you can come to but I would say this, I'd say it seems far more likely that he actually had heard the gospel at some point. Perhaps he had been among the masses who heard Jesus preaching and yet did not respond at that time. Perhaps a seed had been planted by Jesus himself at some point prior to this point. But it's also more likely that this man had grown up in a Jewish home and that he'd been instructed in the Scriptures as a child. Maybe, maybe he recognized this scene as a fulfillment of what Isaiah had prophesied in Isaiah 53, 12, which says of the Messiah, he poured himself out to death and was numbered with the transgressors. Or it's more likely that it was just a combination of these scenarios. In addition to the fact that he was also there when the Jews informed Pilate that Jesus claimed specifically to be the Son of God. And suddenly, by God's grace, he believed what Jesus had claimed and been charged with and convicted of by the Jews. So I would be very reluctant to think that this man's testimony proves that there are exceptions to the principle that faith comes by hearing. Instead, I see his testimony as a lesson, as incentive for us, for you, and for me, and for every other Christian to evangelize. That's the point of his story. That we would have confidence that God can save absolutely and that it's never too late for anyone. So we need to be getting the Gospel in as many ears as we possibly can, knowing that if we can plant the seed, and that's the only responsibility that we have. We're not responsible for somebody's conversion. We're responsible for faithfully planting seeds, sharing the Gospel. And if we know that if we can just plant the seed, that God can cause that seed to take root and produce fruit in anyone. in anyone at any time. Now, we may not see the results, and that's fine. We don't evangelize primarily for the sake of seeing results. When we see results, praise the Lord. It encourages us. And we continue doing it, right? But we evangelize because we believe that faith comes by hearing. And we have been instructed to evangelize until the day that the Lord returns, trusting that God is sovereign over the results of our labors. and trusting that if God wants to save someone, if God is going to save someone, nothing can thwart, nothing can sway the sovereign hand of God in salvation. Now as I said at the beginning, everyone in history, everyone of us, everyone outside, everyone in history identifies with one of these two thieves. Just as there are two thieves, there are only two responses to Jesus Christ. If you have believed in Jesus Christ, this repentant thief is a picture of you. Though you by nature were an enemy of God, though you had spent some time in your life rebelling against God and defying God, and were an enemy of God, and as such you hated him, By grace, He gave you ears to hear and eyes to see the truth of the gospel and the glory of Christ and your need for Him. By grace, your heart of stone was replaced by a heart of living flesh, a heart that desired God, a heart that desired to know God, to please God, to love God, to serve God, and to obey God. And you were drawn to Christ by the Father. That's how salvation works, John 6.44. If you have believed in Christ, the repentant thief is a picture not only of what happened to your heart, but what happened to your sin. How could a criminal Like this man who is guilty of all these vile crimes against humanity and sins against God. How could he possibly enter into heaven's gates? It's because his sin was no longer on him. His sin was transferred by grace, it was imputed to Christ, and Christ's righteousness was imputed to Him. That is the only way anyone gets into heaven, is if they stand in Christ's perfect merit, perfect righteousness, which is received by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. If you've believed in Christ, this repentant thief is a reminder that it is 100% Christ's merit. It is His perfect righteousness that justifies you. This thief's hands were bound to the cross. What kind of works was he able to do? There was no work that he was able to do. The only reason we know that he was saved is because the one part of him that wasn't bound was his tongue, which he used to call on the name of the Lord. He reminds us that our works are not the basis of our justification. Our works are part of our sanctification. But justification and sanctification are not the same thing. And when you start conflating those two things, you end up with a false gospel where you have to work in order to be justified. No, he reminds us that our works are not the basis of our justification. Only Christ's perfect works are the basis of our justification. And we have absolutely nothing to add to what Christ has done. His work was not only perfect, but it was sufficient for the salvation of all who believe on him. Two thieves, two possible responses to Jesus Christ. The first response is demonstrated by the repentant thief who was saved, who believed and was saved. What are we to say about this other thief, the one who didn't believe? Can we just excuse him? Can we say, well, you know, who can blame him? I mean, after all, it appears that nobody preached the gospel to him on that day or anything like that. There's no proof that he ever heard anybody preach the gospel. There's no proof that he was raised in a home in which he was taught the scriptures. There is, however, We should note proof that he knew that Jesus claimed to be God. After all, he did challenge Jesus to save himself if Jesus really was who he was claiming to be. So he knew what Jesus claimed to be. So can we excuse this other thief? The answer is, just like everybody else, no. No, we can't. The truth is that everybody knows some truth about God through natural revelation. God has revealed Himself through the creation, and upon seeing God's divine power and authority reflected in creation, Paul tells us in Romans 1 that humanity suppresses the truth in unrighteousness. chooses to worship the creation rather than the Creator and thus Paul says they are without excuse. And that is exactly what this man did just like every other unbeliever does. So was God unjust in saving one thief but not the other? Think of it this way. Were it not for God's grace, both thieves would have remained in hardened unbelief. God didn't owe the repentant thief grace, so he was not unjust in not pouring his grace out on the second thief. That's the definition of grace. You don't deserve it. Nobody is owed grace. That's how grace works. We don't deserve it. What do we deserve? We deserve wrath. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We deserve justice. And justice demands that we suffer eternally under God's holy wrath against sin. That's what we deserve. God didn't say to this second unrepentant thief. He didn't say to him, I'm not gonna open the door of salvation for you. I don't want you to be saved. I don't want you to receive salvation. So what kept him from believing in Christ? What kept him from receiving salvation by believing in Jesus? Only, only his own stubborn pride and his love of self. His love of sin. That's what kept him from believing in Jesus. And it's the same with everyone who doesn't believe. God doesn't hold anyone back from believing in Jesus. People hold themselves back. Pride holds us back. Nobody can blame God for not electing them. They can only blame themselves for preferring their love of sin and self over Jesus. The second thief who persisted in his unbelief reminds us that apart from God's grace, we truly have no hope because we wouldn't even want salvation. None of us would. None of us would care. He reminds us that the unregenerate heart is so dark, that the unregenerate heart is so depraved, that the unregenerate heart is so dead in sin that a man can be hung on a cross literally just feet away from Jesus who was God incarnate, and yet, even in His dying hour, remain steadfast in His determination to cling to His love of sin and self. Even though his trusted friend tried to reason with him. Even though someone might plead with him to reconsider in his final hour. The unregenerate man is unwilling. The second thief is the one who reminds us of how foolish it is to delay in coming to Christ in faith. He shows us how hard the heart remains even in our final hour. And to delay is to choose to harden your heart. This man has a hardened heart until his last breath. So what should he have done? The second thief, the one who didn't repent, what should he have done? Well, he should have done what his friend did. He should have done what the repentant thief did. First, the repentant thief, he knew some things, just like the unrepentant thief knew some things. The repentant thief knew that Jesus had claimed to be the Son of God. So did the unrepentant thief. He knew that the Son of God had come to establish his kingdom. I imagine the unrepentant thief knew that. If he didn't know that, well, he just heard his friend say it. He knew that he was a wretched sinner and that his only hope of being included in this kingdom was grace and mercy. And I imagine the unrepentant thief knew that too. In other words, he recognized that he was a sinner. The repentant thief recognized that he was a sinner whose greatest need in life was a Savior who would take his sin, who would take his place, who would take the wrath that he deserves in his place. Secondly, he recognized and believed that Jesus was that Savior. He recognized that Jesus was innocent, that Jesus wasn't a sinner. He recognized, he believed that Jesus was, in fact, the sinless Son of God. So far, though, if you just take these things, these two things, the fact that he knew some things, the fact that he believed some things to be true, so far, you have the same faith that the devil has. Because the devil knows that Jesus is a Savior. The devil knows that Jesus is sinless. The devil knows that sinners need a Savior. Demons believe that Jesus is the sinless Son of God. So what's the difference between this repentant thief, the one who did repent, who became a child of God in his dying hour, what's the difference between him and demons? And the answer is trust. Trust. He entrusted himself to Christ. He trusted that Christ really would do everything that he promised he would do, including seeing him in paradise that day. Think of it this way. This is how you can think of saving faith. Say you're an airline pilot. And say you're on a 10-hour flight over the Atlantic on your way to Europe, and halfway through, suddenly, you really need to take a bathroom break. Now, you have all the information about the autopilot function of the plane. You know how to program it, all those things. You're very educated. You have the information about these things. You believe that it is fully functional. After all, they tested it before takeoff. You believe that the plane is operating properly and that, hypothetically speaking, it's capable of doing what it's supposed to do. But at some point, if you want to take a bathroom break, you're actually going to have to set it and trust it. and walk out of the cockpit. That is what you must do with Christ. You must actually believe that He will do what He has promised He will do, and trust in Him. You must really believe that you have no righteousness of your own, but that His righteousness is sufficient for you personally. So that when you stand before God someday and he says, why should I let you into heaven? You can say, because I'm a sinner that Jesus died for. Because I stand in Christ's perfect righteousness. He gave it to me and I gave him my sin. And he bore the wrath that I deserved for it. And you really need to live in light of that reality. Trusting that your works are not going to justify you. Your works are not the basis of your justification. Christ's works are. And you can stand on that because you trust it. You entrust yourself to Christ. And friends, just like the repentant thief, you must know that each one of us, you and me both, We are sinners who need a Savior. You must believe what the Bible says about you. You must believe that as a sinner you cannot save yourself, just like this repentant thief couldn't save himself. And you must believe what the Bible says about Jesus. And then you must actually put your money where your mouth is, so to speak, and entrust yourself to Him. Stand on Christ. Stand on His righteousness. Commit your life to Him. Commit your ways to Him. Be willing to stand on the fact that Christ's substitutionary death is sufficient for the redemption, forgiveness, and salvation of anyone who will believe savingly in Him. Stand on the fact that this substitutionary death of Christ is sufficient even for you. And for me, you must know intellectually and you must believe that it doesn't matter what sins you have committed. You can't work off the debt that's owed for those sins. But Christ is too late. You must know that tomorrow is never guaranteed, that your next hour even is never guaranteed. How many of you can guarantee that in one hour your heart will still be beating? Not one of us. Not one of us. And therefore, If you hear his voice today, don't harden your heart by putting it off, by delaying. Don't say to yourself, you know, I'll have this Christianity thing all figured out someday and then I'll believe. Do you think this repentant thief had his theology all squared away and figured out? No, he didn't. And you don't need to either. But he was born again. As he was dying. He heard the voice of the Good Shepherd calling his name. And he responded. In faith. By leaving his life behind, even as he hung there on the cross and following Jesus unto eternal life by God's grace, friends. May the same be said of you. And me. Two thieves. One under God's wrath, one a blessed recipient of God's grace. Two thieves, two responses to Jesus. What will yours be? Let's pray. Our most gracious God, We thank you for this story. And we look forward to the day when we can meet this brother in glory. When we can meet him in heaven. We thank you for the fact that we can see ourselves in him. And we thank you for the grace that allows us to see ourselves in him. We thank you that though we were lost in darkness, though we might have thought we knew what we were doing, we had no idea. We had no idea how dead we were, how lost we were, how helpless we were, until you gave us ears to hear and eyes to see. So we thank you for the grace that not only regenerated us, but that continues to sustain us and sustain our faith in Christ. We pray, Lord, for for our testimony to be seen by the world, just as this man's testimony was witnessed by how many? We praise you for his salvation, but we also praise you for our salvation, because we recognize, Lord, that we recognized, we deserved your wrath just as badly as he did. but your grace, your grace washed him clean just as it has washed us clean. We thank you for that and we pray, Lord, that we would live our lives in light of the truth that we have been purchased by Christ, redeemed by him, forgiven, washed clean, adopted as sons and daughters of the one true living God. May our lives, our thoughts, our words, our deeds bear witness to this truth, for the glory of Christ to be seen in our lives. In His name we pray. Amen.