SERMON MANUSCRIPT
This morning, using Scripture and song, we have travelled from the anticipation of Jesus to the crucifixion of Jesus. But now we come to the end. As “He [himself] said, ‘It is finished!’ And [with that] he bowed his head and gave up his spirit” (John 19:30).
All the prophecy and preparation, all the taunting and torture, it all led here. This was the intended terminus. This was the predetermined conclusion. On the cross, “It was finished.” But what was finished, exactly? I can think of six things, at least.
First, and most obviously, Jesus’s suffering ended. It was finished. He had suffered emotionally, physically, and spiritually but it all ended right here.
It’s like when an anesthesiologist tells a patient to count backward from ten. At about eight or nine, whatever pain there was is gone. Ten, nine, eight … “It is finished.” Jesus’s suffering ended.
At the same time, prophecy was realized. It was finished.
And there had been so many. The world was told that its Saviour would be hung on a tree, accursed by God, and that he would die without protest and without breaking a bone. The binding of Isaac, the Exodus from Egypt, and the Mosaic sacrifices all pointed to Messiah’s death. Perhaps most potent are Isaiah’s words, foretelling that the Deliverer would be, “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief… Smitten of God, and afflicted … pierced through for our transgressions … crushed for our iniquities” (Isa. 53:3, 4–5).
Like Babe Ruth calling his shot, God said what he was going to do and then did what he said. And when Jesus announced, “It is finished,” all of that prophecy was realized.
Third: the Law was fulfilled. In the Old Testament, God provided a detailed legal document to show his people the kind of people they had to be to be his people. And the bar was impossibly high. No one could fully keep it. And that was the point: left to ourselves, we can never be good enough for God.
And when Jesus arrived, he said, “I haven’t come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.” The Law was from God and was good. It doesn’t deserve abolition. We do! People are the unholy ones.
But, instead of destruction, God sent his Son to live the life we’re supposed to live, but can’t and don’t. He fulfilled that obligation. He lived a holy life and died an undeserved death and in doing so, “the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ” (Gal. 3:24). The perfect Law highlights the only perfect law-keeper—Jesus. “But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor” (3:25).
It’s like a graduate walking across the stage and receiving their diploma. They’ve fulfilled the obligations of their courses and are now free to stand atop that which was once a burden.
Jesus walked that stage for you and me and I, for one, am glad that burden has been lifted and that tutor removed. I’m glad that the Law was fulfilled when Jesus said, “It is finished!”
Related to the Law, when Jesus died, God’s will was completed.
Jesus himself said, “I have come down from heaven to do the will of God who sent me, not to do my own will. And this is the will of God, that I should not lose even one of all those he has given me …. For it is my Father’s will that all who see his Son and believe in him should have eternal life” (John 6:38–40).
And then, right before he went to the cross, the Son prayed to the Father: “I glorified you on the earth, having accomplished the work which you have given me to do” (John 17:4).
It was God’s will to save sinful humanity through the sending of his Son. That Son, Jesus Christ, submitted himself to that good and perfect will and, when he groaned, “It is finished,” God’s place was accomplished, his project was done, his will was completed.
Fifth: Sin’s power was broken. The Bible is clear when it comes to sin. It is a corrupted disposition in all human beings that bends us away from our Creator. It is universal. It is a curse. It is enslaving. It is intoxicating. And it is damning. It is powerful.
But when the perfect Lamb of God laid down his sinless life for sinners like us, he “disarmed the rulers and authorities, he made a public display of them, having triumphed over them” (Col. 2:15). The nails hammered through his flesh were nails in the coffin of death itself.
As Paul explains, “Our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin.” (Rom. 6:6–7).
The cross of Christ overpowered the stain of sin, threw open the jail cell doors, and offered liberation to those in captivity. That many continue in rebellion against God—and we do—doesn’t change the fact that when Jesus said, “It is finished,” sin’s power was broken.
Finally, ultimately, and climactically, redemption was accomplished. In a sense, the word Jesus uses means something like, “Paid in full.”
While the sins of the world built up an enormous moral debt with a holy God, the one against whom we have sinned, Jesus’s death settled the score. It took his blood to wipe the red from our ledger. We who “have been purchased by his blood,” “have redemption through his blood.”
As Paul makes clear to Christians: “You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins. He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross” (Col. 2:13–14). Redemption was accomplished when Jesus said, “It is finished.”
So, what was finished? Jesus’s suffering ended and prophecy was realized. The Law was fulfilled and God’s will was completed. Sin’s power was broken and redemption was accomplished. I think it’s safe to say that these words from the lips of Jesus are words finality, words of certainty. No wonder we call it “Good Friday.”
Now, I don’t expect you to remember all of those things, but just to remember this one thing: all that Jesus finished in his death, you and I couldn’t do a single one. We couldn’t endure that suffering, fulfill prophecy, keep the law, heed God’s will, break sin’s power, or save our selves. If it wasn’t for Jesus Christ, nothing would be finished except our hope. “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 15:57). “It is finished.”
Josiah has served the Oakridge Bible Chapel family as one of its elders and one of its pastoral staff members since September 2018, before which he ministered as an associate pastor to a local congregation in the Canadian prairies. Josiah's desire is to be used by God to help equip the church for ministry, both while gathered (edification) and while scattered (evangelization). He is married to Patricia, and together they have five children—Jonah, Henry, Nathaniel, Josephine, and Benjamin.
