John 19:30

“When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up His spirit.”

 

I was sitting on the couch with my friend the other day; she then asked me the question, “If you were to choose one verse out of the whole Bible to sum up Jesus, what verse would you choose?” I sat there for a few minutes, grabbed my Bible, prayed, and then chose this verse. When Jesus made this statement He was on the cross. I believe the cross and resurrection are the two most powerful things Christ did. As well as, in this verse it states he, “gave up His spirit,” which is profound because that is the very reason why Christ came was to surrender for us. All this happened after he received the sour wine drank of the cup given to Him by the Father, the very cup that he prayed about being passed from Him in the garden. Not to mention, Psalm 23 talks about how God is our Shepherd and his love and care for us overflows our cups; the greatest example of His care for us is His death on the cross for us. All those things being said, I am a strong believer in “the why.” You can know a lot of truth, but if you don’t know the why its hard to deeply understand. Yes love, yes he’s the Father, yes His ways are higher than mine and I will never understand his grace and love for me, but why. Adoption. Adoption is the why. Christ came to pour out the spirit of adoption. John 15:15 talks about how we are no longer servants for servants do not know what the master is doing; we are sons. Satan attacks a lot of Christians with the spirit of abandonment, the spirit of fear so that we close our hearts to the love being poured into the cup of our souls. But why ever close our hearts to the love being poured in? I believe one of the reasons that we can have so many idols in our lives is fear of accountability. Fear. Fear. Fear. Kills, steals, destroys. I was talking to a girl here the other day during a class I was teaching, she couldn’t think of the word idol and through that said one of the most profound statements I have ever heard. “God made people, but people keep making gods.” Whoa. Such a true statement birthed from a lack of words yet a heart of wisdom. God made us, and gave up His Spirit for mankind, and here we are constantly making gods. One god in my life that I felt convicted about was that of letting people into my life. I live with people who keep my accountable, but I also have responsibility to maintain honesty and confess where I am at and that is something I could do a better job at. Just being honest. I know that I am a child of God and adopted into the family, but I still act like an outsider sometimes, usually when sin is present in my life, forgetting grace and living in fear. Yet that is not what God wants. Jesus received and drank of the sour cup, and bowed his head. He bowed His head; the ultimate form of submission. I pray that I am the same when the Father tells me His will and asks of my obedience. For Christ is the greatest example, the greatest servant of all time, so who am I to do anything other than bowing my head to that which the Father lovingly asks me to do. This is one of my favorite verses, and God has been using it greatly in my life and ministry that I have been getting to be apart of.