I love all the gospels, I guess, for a variety of reasons. The Gospel of Luke is special to me in this sense: His Gospel highlights Jesus’ concern for the meek and the lowly of our world. I don’t know if you’ve ever thought about this or not, but consider these things…
The Gospel begins by highlighting Jesus’ lowly position in society—born in a stable with a feeding trough for a crib…
In Luke’s description of Jesus’ ministry, we find Jesus consistently concerned for the sinner—the outcast, the unclean, and what society would consider … the ‘nobody’…
In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus clearly defines his mission as coming to ‘seek out and to save the lost’ (Luke 19:10)…
It shouldn’t be a surprise, then, that only Luke’s Gospel records a conversation between Jesus and two thieves … as they all hung on crosses. As we consider this conversation today, we’ll focus on Jesus’ words in this conversation and find out what we can learn from them—that will help us to walk closer to our Lord. Listen now to our scripture for today (Luke 23:32, 39-43, NLT)…
Two others, both criminals, were led out to be executed with him. … 39 One of the criminals hanging beside him scoffed, “So you’re the Messiah, are you? Prove it by saving yourself—and us, too, while you’re at it!” 40 But the other criminal protested, “Don’t you fear God even when you have been sentenced to die? 41 We deserve to die for our crimes, but this man hasn’t done anything wrong.” 42 Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” 43 And Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
So, 1) what does this scene teach us about Jesus … and 2) what does it teach us about ourselves? Let’s get right into it, shall we? First…
JESUS ASSOCIATED WITH SINNERS. It’s said that … a person is known by the company they keep! Well, in both life and in death, Jesus associated with sinners…
Folks, Jesus’ associations bothered the religious people of his day; that’s for sure! Just listen to these examples:
Luke 15:1-2 (NLT) – “Tax collectors and other notorious sinners often came to listen to Jesus teach. 2 This made the Pharisees and teachers of religious law complain that he was associating with such sinful people—even eating with them!”
Some others examples would be: 1) Jesus allowing the prostitute to wash his feet with her tears, 2) calling tax collectors and garden-variety sinners to be his disciples, and 3) he touched lepers and ate with unclean people…
And even at the end of his ministry, just before he was crucified, he invited Zacchaeus down from the tree (Luke 19:5) and went to his house to eat…
Eating supper with someone in the Middle East in biblical times meant you were willing to call that person your friend. So when Jesus said that he wanted to eat at Zacchaeus’ house, the religious people couldn’t believe it! Why would Jesus stay with a known degenerate like Zacchaeus?
And, to top it all off, Zacchaeus invited all his sinful friends to dinner, too—prostitutes, tax collectors, and thieves (so the cross probably wasn’t the first time this happened)… I can just picture Jesus eating with them, laughing, and telling stories about the kingdom of God … in such a way that people wanted to know more. And I picture the religious elite … outside … waving their fingers and saying things like, “Why does he eat with people like that?” … And that’s when I imagine Jesus getting up from the table, going over to the religious folk, and saying, “You just don’t get it, do you?” And then he gave them his personal mission statement (Luke 19:9-10):
“Jesus responded, ‘Salvation has come to this home today, for this man has shown himself to be a true son of Abraham. [Here it comes…] 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.’”
Folks, as Jesus lived, so he died… Even as he was being crucified, Jesus was carrying out his mission statement and associating with sinners. Jesus did not die alone. His companions at Golgotha were … two known criminals. DO YOU SEE HOW IMPORTANT REACHING LOST PEOPLE WAS—AND IS—TO JESUS? It’s really the very thing that drove him to the cross, so that in his dying he might save the whole human race from self-destruction, self-worship … well, sin; and so in his resurrection he might conquer death and save us from that as well…
If this is what mattered most to Jesus—reaching people who were lost—what does that mean for us as his followers today? If Jesus wasn’t afraid to associate with criminals, prostitutes, and people who were considered unclean, what is the application for us?
Let me make this personal now: Do people who do not know Jesus Christ feel comfortable around you? Do they feel small or valued and accepted after a conversation with you? Are you willing to associate with people others might consider riffraff? Do you get the idea? Reaching those who are lost was the driving mission of Jesus—all the way to the cross. It’s meant to be our driving mission, too! Here are a couple more things I need to share from Jesus’ words today: There were…
TWO CRIMINALS, TWO RESPONSES. There are two possible responses we might make to Jesus, too!
Both criminals witnessed the same event that day: a man who claimed to be the Messiah—the revolutionary king—abused and crucified. They saw all the cruelty and hate heaped on Jesus by the crowd. They heard him cry out, “Father, forgive them” (Luke 23:34)! But, they had very different responses to him, didn’t they? From the conversation they had (only recorded in Luke), we see…
The one man’s heart was HARD… Even as he hung on the cross himself, naked and dying, he attempted to validate himself by joining in with the crowd as they insulted Jesus—trying his best to make Jesus feel small (and make himself feel ‘big’ in the process, a bully’s way). He looked at Jesus and saw a failed Messiah—one who refused to take up arms and fight the nasty Romans who were killing him. When he heard Jesus pray, it made him mad…
But something happened to the heart of the other man, as he watched and listened to Jesus on the cross. At some point, the light went on; he stopped hurling insults and turned to his friend on the other cross and rebuked him. Maybe, realizing that he would be dead in a few hours, he needed to look for HOPE where he could find it. And he saw something in Jesus … something worth following … and he said (Luke 23:42), “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.”
In this world we live in, there are still those of both persuasions—those who consider Jesus a failure … and those who only see HOPE when they consider him. The question we must ask ourselves today is this: Which thief will I be? And this brings me to the end of this message where I need to show you this: Jesus ends this conversation with…
…A SIMPLE BUT SIGNIFICANT STATEMENT. Take a look with me at Jesus very last statement in this conversation, would you? From this one simple statement (Jesus’ response in Luke 23:43), we can learn important truths about: 1) life after death, 2) God’s mercy, and 3) heaven—all very popular and contemporary topics. Now, let me share the three truths from this statement with you very briefly. Here, Jesus listens to the second criminal’s plea and replies…
First notice what some have called … the Peace of Jesus’ Words: He says “Today…”
After 30+ years of study, this verse heavily shapes my views of what happens to us when we die. In the Heaven Class, we learned that this was what is called “The Present Heaven.” Though there will be more changes at a later time, there is a place called ‘Heaven’ or ‘paradise’ that exists today. And Heaven, folks, is basically this: It’s where Jesus is. And what did Jesus say here? “Today…” It’s a place that if we were to die today … we can go there … to be with Jesus, if we too will give our lives over to him, just like this second thief on the cross…
Folks, Jesus’ use of the word ‘Today’ is reassuring and comforting to us. And, if that doesn’t bring you some PEACE, I don’t know what will! So here, Jesus brings peace to this second thief … and to all who are listening (including us). Next…
The Point of Jesus’ Words: He says “You Will Be With Me…” The foremost point of Jesus’ words to the thief on the cross are to demonstrate the great mercy that God shows us…
Luke, whose focus throughout his Gospel is on Jesus’ concern for the nobodies of this world, wants us to see that even a criminal on a cross is offered salvation. God’s gift of mercy is open to all … and then…
The Promise of Jesus’ Words: He says “In Paradise!” The Greek word here for ‘paradise’ is a transliteration of a Persian word that refers to ‘the king’s garden.’
It’s as if we started in the Garden at the beginning of time … and it’s to the Garden we return … to be ‘In Paradise’—the one Jesus restored on the cross…
These final words of Jesus for today point us toward his mission… The truth is it’s also our mission: to seek and to save those who are lost! And this includes those who, to us, may seem hopelessly lost… No one is beyond God’s grace, folks, if they will simply pray as the thief on the cross did, “Remember me…” or rescue me, Jesus … and he will! Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:”Table Normal”; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:””; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”,”serif”;}