68. Promises Kept: The Story of Jesus and His Death

G'day, everyone.

Dave here.

Welcome to Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

Faithful means you'll do what you say you'll do.

When you make a promise, you can be trusted.

You don't lie.

In the Old Testament, God made heaps and heaps of promises.

And for a long time, they didn't happen.

For a long time, people were waiting.

For a long time, there was a bit of a question, Will God be faithful?

Then suddenly, all those promises, every single one, were kept by God in Jesus.

Suddenly, people didn't have to wait anymore.

Suddenly, there wasn't any more doubt.

God really is faithful.

Let me show you.

Almost 2000 years ago, on the very first Good Friday ever.

Get ready for our next episode of Stories of a Faithful God for Kids.

At the end of our last episode, Pilate had said Jesus was completely innocent and then condemned him to death.

He handed Jesus over to the soldiers to do the job.

They gave him a cross and they make him carry it to the place where they kill prisoners.

In the Aramaic language, it's called Golgotha.

In our language, that means the place of the skull.

And it's at the place of the skull that they nail Jesus to the cross.

There are two other prisoners being executed that day.

They nail one up on Jesus right and the other on his left.

The place in the middle was going to be for another man, Barabbas.

Barabbas was guilty and deserved to die.

But Jesus, the innocent one, has taken his place.

When the Romans crucify people, that means putting them up on a cross.

They put a sign up saying why they're being killed.

In John 19, we're told that Pilate writes this sign to go above Jesus.

It says, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

The Jewish leaders who'd wanted Jesus killed really hate that sign.

They don't think Jesus is their king.

They think he's a pretender.

So they rush off to Pilate and they say, don't write the King of the Jews, but write.

This man said, I am the King of the Jews.

But Pilate refuses to change it.

He's probably just teasing the Jews.

Ha ha.

Look at what I can do to your King.

But actually, this was always what was going to happen to the King of the Jews.

It was always God's plan.

It's exactly why Jesus, the King of the Jews came.

He came to save guilty people like you and me.

By dying the death we deserve to die for not treating God properly.

Jesus is faithfully doing what the loving, perfect king was always going to do.

After the soldiers have put Jesus and the others on the cross, they do something.

They always do.

They're allowed to keep the clothes of the prisoners.

The prisoners are all naked by now.

The guards divide up the clothes between them.

But there's one really nice long shirt from Jesus left over.

They don't want to chop it up and just use it for rags, so instead they throw lots to see who gets it.

Throwing lots is like the ancient version of throwing dice.

It's like saying the first person who rolls a six gets to keep it.

You'd think this is just happening because the soldiers are having a bit of fun, but actually it's God keeping his promise.

John says it happens because in the Old Testament there's a verse that says, they divided my clothes among them and they threw lots for my clothing.

It's in Psalm 22, verse 18.

Psalm 22 was written by King David about a thousand years before Jesus died on the cross.

King David, a king of the Jews, is writing about some hard things he went through.

If you go back and read it though, you'll see there's all sorts of things in the psalm where you go, hey, that happened to Jesus.

That happened to Jesus.

That happened to Jesus too.

Even though one of the King of the Jews is writing about his hard time, the psalm is actually a promise of God about the greatest king of the Jews, King Jesus.

And now on this first Good Friday, God's faithfully keeping that promise.

As Jesus is hanging there, some people have come to see him.

Verse 25 tells us, Jesus mother stood near his cross.

His mother's sister was also standing there with Mary, the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene.

John's there as well as the oldest son.

It's Jesus job to care for his mum in her old age.

He knows he isn't going to be around for that.

But he's a faithful son.

He makes sure that his mum's looked after by putting her in John's family.

In verse 26, he says to her, dear woman, here is your son.

Then he says to John, here is your mother.

From that time on, this follower took her to live in his home.

Because he's faithful, Jesus doesn't leave anything unfinished.

He's getting close to death now and he knows he's faithfully done everything God's given him to do to make sure he keeps another promise from God.

In the Old Testament he says, I'm thirsty.

And you might think, oh come on, how can saying I'm thirsty possibly be keeping a promise from God?

Everyone Gets thirsty.

Especially if you've been beaten up, not slept for 36 hours, and been nailed to a cross with the sun beating down on you for half a day.

And yet this is God keeping a promise.

In Psalm 69, another Psalm written by King David, he talks about how his enemies treat him.

He says in verse 19, you see my shame and disgrace.

You know all my enemies and what they have said.

Insults have broken my heart.

I am weak.

I looked for sympathy, but there was none.

I found no one to comfort me.

Then he talks about what his enemies give him to drink.

If you're thirsty, you probably want a tall cup of water or at least a really tasty drink.

Well, King David says his enemies only gave him vinegar to drink.

Vinegar's something people put very small amounts of on food, but to drink it is totally gross.

Well, wouldn't you know it?

When Jesus says, I'm thirsty, this is what happens.

John tells us there was a jar full of vinegar there.

So the soldiers soaked a sponge in it.

Then they put the sponge on a branch of a hyssop plant and, and lifted it up to Jesus mouth.

Jesus tasted the vinegar.

Then he said, it is finished.

He bowed his head and died.

Jesus couldn't die until he'd faithfully kept all of God's promises until he'd done everything he'd been sent to do.

He powerfully kept himself alive to make sure everything happened as it was meant to.

And then when it was all done, he powerfully let himself die.

God still has promises to keep after Jesus dies.

The day Jesus is dying on the Friday is the day before the Sabbath.

The Jews hate having people up on crosses on the Sabbath.

And for them, the next day starts at sunset as the sun's going down.

They ask Pilate to hurry things along a bit.

He agrees, and the soldiers do it by something really awful.

They break the legs of the men on the crosses, and that makes them die quicker.

They break the legs of the man on the right and the man on the left.

But when they get to Jesus, they see he's already dead.

There's no need to break his legs at all.

Again, God's keeping his promise.

In the Old Testament, he'd said not one of his bones will be broken.

That made Jesus just like the Passover lambs hundreds of years before this.

On the night before God rescued his people out of Egypt, he told them to kill a lamb and and paint its blood over the doorway.

That way no one inside the house would die.

The lamb died instead of them.

When they killed the lamb, though they weren't allowed to break any of its bones.

Now on the cross, God's keeping that promise.

Jesus is that lamb.

He's the true Passover lamb.

He dies our death so we can have eternal life.

Not one of his bones is broken, just like the Passover lambs.

Well, John tells us about one last amazing thing where God's keeping his promises.

The soldiers know that Jesus is already dead.

They don't bother to break his legs.

But they want to be 100 million percent sure, because if they accidentally take a living man down off the cross, then they'll be put to death.

So John tells us this in verse 34.

He says, but one of the soldiers stuck his spear into Jesus side.

At once blood and water came out.

The one who saw this happen is told about it.

The things he says are true.

He knows that he tells the truth.

He told about it so that you also can believe.

These things happen to make the scripture come true.

Not one of his bones will be broken.

And another scripture said they will look at the one they have stabbed.

Pretty gross, right?

But when the blood and water come out of Jesus side, God's keeping an amazing promise.

In the Old Testament, in the book of Zechariah, God speaks about a time of incredible sadness.

Strangely, in that time of incredible sadness, something wonderful will happen.

In Zechariah, chapter 12, verse 10, God says this.

He says, I will give David's family and people in Jerusalem a spirit of kindness and mercy.

They will look at me, the one they have stabbed, and they will cry like someone crying over the death of an only child.

They will be as sad as someone who's lost a firstborn son.

At that time, there will be much crying in Jerusalem.

That sounds like the sort of crying that should happen when Jesus is killed, when he's stabbed in the side.

It's the saddest day in all the world.

But did you hear what God will give on that very sad day?

He talked about a spirit of kindness and mercy.

Mercy is when you're treated kindly, even when you don't deserve it.

Now listen to what God says Next.

In Zechariah 13:1.

He says, @ that time a fountain will be opened.

It will be for David's descendants and for the people of Jerusalem.

It will cleanse them of their sins and wrongs.

On the day that Jesus is stabbed, a fountain will be open and the people will be cleansed from all their sins and wrongs.

That's why Jesus died.

That's why he gave up his life.

Even though it's the saddest thing in all the world.

He was doing it to save us from sin, to rescue us from our wrongdoing so that we can be forgiven and changed into people who love to do what's right.

When the water flows out with the blood from Jesus side, it's a sign that the fountain is flowing.

The time of forgiveness and mercy and kindness has come.

Meanwhile, the sun is setting.

Two men take Jesus dead body, wrap it up and bury it in a tomb like a cave.

They close it up with a big stone and they walk away.

They think that's the end.

They think it's all over.

They think that Jesus is gone forever.

But do you remember what he told his disciples?

He'd said, you won't see me.

And then after a little while you will see me.

And Jesus is always faithful.

You can trust his words.

So something's going to happen in a little while.

But that's a story for next time.

Keep trusting Jesus.

Bye for now.