Leading a Rebellion: The Thief on the Cross

Leading a Rebellion: The Thief on the Cross

Rebel:

-A rebel is a person who resists any authority, control, or tradition.

The Story So Far: Most of what we’re going to be talking about involves the 12 hours leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion. I want to set the scene a little bit before we get into our rebel for the evening.

-Mark 14:32-42 Jesus is under serious distress and takes His three best friends and asks them to go off into the woods a little bit and pray for Him, as He goes a little further into the woods. Three times He came back to find them sleeping.

-Mark 14:43-52 Jesus was betrayed by one of His twelve disciples, He was arrested, and watched all of His closest friends run away and abandon Him at His greatest hour of need, including the author of the Gospel of Mark, who when grab by his clothes fled away naked into the town.

-Mark 14:66-72 One of Jesus’ closest friends, Peter, denied three times to a slave girl, the lowest of the low on the social totem pole, that he even knew Jesus.

-Mark 15:16-20 The roman soldiers mocked Christ.

-Matthew 27:39-44 Everyone who passed by mocked Jesus. The religious leaders mocked Jesus. The thief crucified next to Him mocked Jesus.

-The only people standing there watching Him that were not mocking and insulting Jesus was three different Marys, and the apostle John. Everyone else had abandoned Him or was mocking Him.

-We also need to understand that the Roman Empire crucified people to make a point. When they crucified people it was in a very public place, and the person being crucified was naked. Imagine being nailed up on two beams of wood, naked as the day you were born, in the Wal-Mart parking lot.  

-Psalm 22 was written by David several hundred years before Christ was even born, but describes perfectly what Jesus suffered through on the cross. We could talk extensively about this Psalm but tonight we’re just going to focus on the scene and not what He went through.

Psalm 22:6-8 But I am a worm and not a man,
    scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
⁷ All who see me mock me;
    they make mouths at me; they wag their heads;
⁸ “He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him;
    let him rescue him, for he delights in him!”

12-13 Many bulls encompass me;
    strong bulls of Bashan surround me;
¹³ they open wide their mouths at me,
    like a ravening and roaring lion.

16-21 For dogs encompass me;
    a company of evildoers encircles me;
they have pierced my hands and feet^[b]—
¹⁷ I can count all my bones—
they stare and gloat over me;
¹⁸ they divide my garments among them,
    and for my clothing they cast lots.

¹⁹ But you, O Lord, do not be far off!
    O you my help, come quickly to my aid!
²⁰ Deliver my soul from the sword,
    my precious life from the power of the dog!
²¹     Save me from the mouth of the lion!
You have rescued^[c] me from the horns of the wild oxen!

The Rebellion: Now that we understand the scene a little bit better, and we can grasp just how popular of a guy Jesus was on that particular day, we can get into the rebellion.

-It was at the height of the hatred towards Jesus that one man, an unlikely hero of the story spoke up and defended the condemned Christ.

-Have you ever found yourself in a situation where everyone is ripping on someone? Picking on a defenseless kid, or the outcast for no reason at all? Everyone is piling on that person, the most one-sided mob scene ever? This type of behavior is not uncommon in school. Have you ever stood up and defended the person? Have you ever thought, “Hey, this isn’t right. I should say or do something,” but then you don’t do anything. Just sit there and watch a helpless person get humiliated.

-Also being crucified that day were at least two other people.

Luke 23:39-43 One of the criminals who were hanged railed at him,^[a] saying, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” ⁴⁰ But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? ⁴¹ And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” ⁴² And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” ⁴³ And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

-One of the two criminals joined in the mocking and said, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us?” At best he was only interested in saving his skin. At worst, he was piling on and joining in on the mocking.

-But the second one, knowing that there was no one else jumping in to stop the mocking of Jesus, knowing that he was the only one with the guts to say anything said, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? ⁴¹ And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.” ⁴² And he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

-Have you ever thought about this thief’s life? Who was he? What did he do? What was his purpose in life? We can look at JBAP and say his purpose in life was to prepare the way of the Lord. We can look at Paul and say his purpose was to reach the gentile world for Christ. We could even say that the purpose of Judas’s life was to betray Jesus. Was this thief’s purpose in life to repent, and receive salvation, verified by Jesus Himself, at the very end of his life to establish the validity of deathbed conversions?

-Many people receive Christ on their deathbed. It is the first time that the ever really looked death in the face and had to actually consider the claims of Christ. If the thief on the cross didn’t ask for and receive salvation then it would leave the door wide open for all kinds of questions like: “How could he be saved if he didn’t get baptized?” or “How could he be saved if we never saw the fruits of his salvation?”

            -Nope. This cat died without getting baptized, and without doing any good deeds upon salvation, and Jesus still said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

Application: There’s a real temptation to say, “Hey I’m young. I have my whole life ahead of me. I can live the way I want and get saved right before I die.” The problem is we’re not guaranteed another week, day, or even another breath. Christ could return in the snap of a finger. You could die on the way home tonight. We don’t know.

-A few years ago, we had a young man stay with us at the Cold Weather Shelter named Tommy. He stayed with us a lot. He used to use my phone in my office. Pastor Brian used to give him rides to work. We used to help him get warm clothes that would fit him, because he was a bigger guy. We even offered to help him get into a very effective center to help him get off of alcohol. Brian shared the gospel with him, and asked him several times over the weeks that we knew him if he was ready to accept Christ. He kept saying no because he was a young man, only in his 20’s, and would accept Christ when he was older and done having fun. A few weeks after the shelter was closed we got a report that a body washed ashore behind Crabs on Pensacola Beach. It was Tommy. We can only hope that in the last few moments of his life that he accepted Christ, but with the alcohol coursing through his veins, the chances of that are slim.

-You can’t wait to accept Christ. You may never get another chance.

-If there is anyone here who knows that if they died tonight that they would go to hell, please come and see me.