Luk 23:46

Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit

That dying believers are both warranted, and encouraged, by Christs example, believingly to commend their souls into the hands of God

I.

WHAT IS IMPLIED IN A BELIEVERS COMMENDING OR COMMITTING HIS SOUL INTO THE HAND OF GOD AT DEATH?

1. That the soul outlives the body.

2. That the souls true rest is in God.

3. The great value believers have for their souls. He thinks but little of his body comparatively.

4. These words imply the deep sense that dying believers have of the great change that is coming upon them by death; when all visible and sensible things are shrinking away from them and failing. They feel the world and the best comforts in it failing; every creature and creature-comfort failing: For at death we are said to fail (Luk 16:9). Hereupon the soul clasps the closer about its God, cleaves more close than ever to Him: Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit.

5. It implies the atonement of God, and His full reconciliation to believers, by the blood of the great Sacrifice; else they durst never commit their souls into His hands: For it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living Heb 12:29).

6. It implies both the efficacy and excellency of faith, in supporting and relieving the soul at a time when nothing else is able to do it.

II. WHAT WARRANT OR ENCOURAGEMENT HAVE GRACIOUS SOULS TO COMMIT THEMSELVES, AT DEATH, INTO THE HANDS OF GOD? I answer, much every way; all things encourage and warrant its so doing: for–

1. This God, to whom the believer commits himself at death, is its Creator; the Father of its being: He created and inspired it, and so it hath relation of a creature to a Creator; yea, of a creature now in distress, to a faithful Creator (1Pe 4:19).

2. As the gracious soul is His creature, so it is His redeemed creature; one that He hath bought, and that with a great price, even with the precious blood of Jesus Christ (1Pe 1:18). This greatly encourages the departing soul to commit itself into the hands of God; so you find Psa 31:5).

3. The gracious soul may confidently and securely commit itself into the hands of God when it parts with its body at death; not only because it is His creature, His redeemed creature, but because it is His renewed creature also. All natural excellency and beauty goes away at death (Job 4:1-21. ult.), but grace ascends with the soul; it is a sanctified, when a separate soul; and can God shut the door of glory upon such a soul, that by grace is made meet for the inheritance? Oh, it cannot be!

4. As the gracious soul is a renewed soul, so it is also a sealed soul; God hath sealed it in this world for that glory, into which it is now to enter at death. Surely, if God have sealed, He will not refuse you; if He have given His earnest, He will not shut you out; Gods earnest is not given in jest.

5. Moreover, every gracious soul may confidently cast itself into the arms of its God, when it goes hence, with Father, into Thy hands I commit my spirit. Forasmuch as every gracious soul is a soul in covenant with God, and God stands obliged, by His covenant and promise to such, not to cast them out, when they come unto Him. As soon as ever thou became His, by regeneration, that promise became thine (Heb 13:5).

6. But this is not all; the gracious soul sustains many intimate and dear relations to that God into whose hands it commends itself at death. It is His spouse, and the consideration of such a day of espousals may well encourage it to cast itself into the bosom of Christ, its head and husband. It is a member of His body, flesh and bones (Eph 5:30). It is His child, and He its everlasting Father (Isa 9:6). It is His friend.Henceforth, saith Christ, I call you not servants, but friends (Joh 15:15). What confidence may these, and all other the dear relations Christ owns to the renewed soul, beget, in such an hour as this is!

7. The unchangeableness of Gods love to His people gives confidence they shall in no wise be cast out. They know Christ is the same to them at last as He was at first the same in the pangs of death as He was in the comforts of life. Having loved His own which were in the world, He loved them to the Joh 13:1). He doth not love as the world loves, only in prosperity; but they are as dear to Him when their beauty and strength are gone, as when they were in the greatest flourishing. If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or die, we are the Lords (Rom 14:8).

Deduction

1. Are dying believers, only, warranted and encouraged thus to commend their souls into the hands of God? What a sad strait, then, must all dying unbelievers be in about their souls? Such souls will fall into the hands of God, but thats their misery, not their privilege. They are not put by faith into the bands of mercy, but fall by sin into the hands of justice.

2. Will God graciously accept, and faithfully keep what the saints commit to Him at death? How careful then should they be to keep what God commits to them, to be kept for Him while they live.

3. If believers may safely commit their souls into the hands of God, how confidently may they commit all lesser interests, and lower concernments into the same hand.

4. Is this the privilege of believers, that they can commit their souls to God in a dying hour? Then how precious, how useful grace is faith to the people of God, both living and dying?

5. Do the souls of dying believers commend themselves into the hands of God? Then let not the surviving relations of such sorrow as men that have no hope (J. Flavel.)

The last words of Christ

Jesus Christ did not die for Himself, any more than He lived for Himself; and He not only died, the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God, but the manner of His dying was a lesson and a pattern for us. That is the Christian way of dying–the way for all to die; and who would wish, or could imagine, any fitter or happier way? Who would not, in this sense, say, Let me die the death of my Saviour, and let my last end be like His! And how it disarms our helplessness of its terrors! I am powerless, it seems to say, and therefore I commend to Thine omnipotence this frail and sensitive soul, which came at first from Thy creating hand. I do so reverently, but I do so confidently, for I do so as a child who calls Thee, My Father. I have said it expresses dependence–and so it does; but in Christs case, and even in our own, the confidence expressed is more prominent still. In His case there seems a suggestion of the words, No man taketh My life from Me, but I lay it down of Myself; I, as My own act, commend it, Father, to Thee. We do not possess that power; our souls are required of us. But, more than that, we are accustomed to think of dying as the most terrible crisis of our history; the hour of supreme peril to our souls; the appalling event which decides our fate for ever. It is a great mistake. Our dying does not decide our future fate: it is our living which does that; the course we have taken, the choices we have made when opportunities were in our hands, and we used them, or threw them away! And therefore, I say, the peril of living is greater far than any peril there can be in dying. I commend My spirit into Thy hands to be delivered. Consider any human spirit now; consider your own. Before it are great possibilities of good and of evil. It must be so. If we can be Gods true children, and live with, and become like our Father, it is terrible to fail of this; and it is more dreadful still–it is an indescribable degradation–not even to care about it. Since, then, we are in this case; capable of being Gods children, but hindered and prevented from being so by our evil, there is supreme need for us each to cry, Father, hear met deliver me! Into Thy hands I commend my spirit–my sin-stained spirit. I am Thine. Save me! I commend my spirit into Thy hands, to be made pure. The deliverance and reformation which the Scriptures say that we require, they describe by the strong expressions a new birth, a new creation. They say that is needed in order that we may stand without blame before God. Does not our sad experience say the same? God prescribes it. God promises to perform it, and on us. (T. M. Herbert, M. A.)

Soul-resignation into the hands of God

Yea, and it is a very profitable thing for us to do it hereby we make a virtue of necessity; and where can we lodge our souls in safer hands? If a man cannot keep a thing himself, but must betrust and deposit it in other hands, will he not do it in the safest hands that he can find? Now three things there are that are required to a safe hand: power, wisdom, and love. If I deposit a thing in a mans hand to keep, he must be able to keep it for me against violence, else his hand is no safe hand; though he be able and have power to keep it for me, yet if he be prodigal and lavish, and not wise, I shall not count his hand a safe hand to keep my depositum: but though he be never so wise, yet if he be not my friend, I shall not betrust him with any great matter: but if a man be able, wise and friendly, then his hand is a safe hand to keep my depositum. And again if we do not commend, commit, and resign ourselves and souls into His hands, we must be responsible for them ourselves. What benefit shall we get thereby? Much every way. This resignation of our souls and selves unto God is an inlet to many mercies, graces, and comforts. As for mercies and blessings; what greater blessing can there be in in this world than to enjoy ones-self; under God to enjoy ones-self, and to be free from all things? As it is an inlet unto many blessings, so it is an inlet unto many graces and duties. What grace or duty will ye instance in? Will ye instance in prayer? It opens the sluices of prayer; and, as one speaks well, though you pray never so long or loud, yet if you do not resign up your soul and will unto God, your prayer is but nonsense, and a contradiction in re. As it is an inlet unto many graces, so it is an inlet also unto many comforts; yea, indeed, unto all our comforts: for what comfort can a man have in himself or condition, till he hath truly resigned and given up himself and soul and will unto God? but being done, ye may freely go about your business. If a man have a suit in law, and have left his cause in the hand of an able, careful friend and lawyer, he is quiet; much more may we be quiet, when we have left and lodged our case and way and soul with God. Well, but then how is this work to be done that we may truly resign and give up ourselves, our souls, and our wills unto God? It is not to be done slightly and overly, but seriously and solemnly. It is an ordinary thing with men to say, The will of the Lord be done. As this work is not to be done slightly and overly, so neither is it to be done forcedly and lastly, but freely and firstly. As it is not to be done lastly and forcedly, so it is not to be done partially, and by halves, but fully and totally. I am Thine, saith David to God, Oh, save me (Psa 119:94). As this resignation must not be done partially, and by halves, so it must not be done conditionally, but absolutely. As this resignation is not to be done conditionally, so it is not to be done passively, and in a way of submission only, but actively. It is one thing for a man to submit unto Gods will, and another thing to resign up himself and will to the will of God. As this resignation is not to be done passively, so it is not to be done deceitfully and feignedly, but in all plainness and sincerity. Well, but when is this work to be done? It is to be done daily. There are some special times and seasons which do call for this work. I will name five. When a man doth convert and turn unto God. When a man is called forth unto any great work, or service, or employment, especially if it be beyond his own strength and power. When a man is in any great danger, distress, and affliction, then he is to resign and give up himself and will unto God. And if you would be able to do this work of soul-resignation in the day of your death rightly, then use yourself to do it every day. That is easily done which is often done. (W. Bridge, M. A.)

The soul given to God

Be sure that you do not give away your soul from God to anything else whilst you live. If you have given away your soul unto other things whilst you live, it will be a vain thing for you to say Christs words when you come to die. When men come to their death, ye know they do ordinarily make their wills; and in the first place they say, I give my soul unto God; then if they have lands, or houses, or money, they give them to their wives, children, relations and friends, according to their pleasure. But suppose, now, that a man shall give land or house to such or such a child or friend, which he hath sold or given away before, shall his will stand in force? Will not all men say, This he could not give away, for he had sold that or given that before? So in regard of ones soul; though upon my death I say, As for my soul, I give that to God; yet if I have sold away my soul before, for unjust gain, or have given away my soul before unto filthy pleasures, how can I resign and give that to God when I die; will not the Lord say, Nay, this is none of yours to give, this you had sold or given away before? Oh, then, be sure of this, that whilst you live, you do not sell or give away your soul from God, for then death-bed resignation will be but as the act and deed of a man that makes his will when he is not compos mentis. (W. Bridge, M. A.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 46. Into thy hands I commend my spirit] Or, I will commit my spirit – I deposit my soul in thy hands. Another proof of the immateriality of the soul, and of its separate existence when the body is dead.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice,…. A second time; for at the first loud cry, he uttered these words, “Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani”; and at the second what follows; see Mt 27:46.

[See comments on Mt 27:47].

[See comments on Mt 27:48].

[See comments on Mt 27:49].

[See comments on Mt 27:50].

he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my Spirit; not the Holy Spirit, nor his divine nature, but his human soul: for that he had a reasonable soul, as well as a true body, is certain; from his having an human understanding, will, and affections, ascribed to him; and indeed, without this he would not have been a perfect man, nor like unto us; and could not have been tempted, bore sorrows and griefs, and endured the wrath of God; nor could he have been a Saviour of souls: now just as he was expiring, as he made his soul an offering for sin, and which he offered unto God, he committed it to his divine care and protection; and to enjoy his presence, during its separation from his body, using the words of the Psalmist in Ps 31:5 and this shows, that his spirit, or soul, belonged to God, the Father of spirits, and now returned to him that gave it; that it was immortal, and died not with the body, and was capable of existing in a separate state from it, and went immediately to heaven; all which is true of the souls of all believers in Christ; and what the dying head did, dying members may, and should, even commit their souls into the same hands: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost; breathed out his soul dismissed his spirit, laid down his life, freely and voluntarily, and which no man, or devil, otherwise could have taken away from him.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

Father (). Jesus dies with the words of Ps 31:5 on his lips.

Gave up the ghost (). First aorist active indicative of , to breathe out, to expire, old word, but in the N.T. only here and Mark 15:37; Mark 15:39. There is no special reason for retaining “ghost” in the English as both Mt 27:50 (yielded up his spirit, ) and Joh 19:30 (gave up his spirit, ) use which is the root of , the verb in Mark and Luke.

Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament

I commend [] . See on ch. Luk 9:16.

Gave up the ghost [] . Lit., breathed out (his life). Wyc., sent out the spirit. See on Mt 27:50.

47 – 49. Compare Mt 27:51 – 56; Mr 14:38 – 41.

Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament

1) “And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice,” (kai phonesas phome megale ho lesous eipen) “And Jesus cried with a great (loud megaphone like) voice, and said,” Mat 27:46, “It is finished,” Joh 19:30; 1Pe 2:23.

2) “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit:” (pater eis cheiras sou paratithemai to pneuma mou) “Father, into your hands (your care) I commit my spirit,” of my own accord, willingly, Mar 15:34; Mar 15:37; Joh 19:30; Psa 31:5.

3) “And having said thus, he gave up the ghost.” (tou de eipon eksepneusen) “Then when he had said this, he expired,” gave out and away His spirit-breath, Mat 27:50. The veil of the temple was then rent or torn from the top downward, denoting that the earthly Holy of Holies was no longer to be entered for worship, or as an approach to God, Mar 15:37.

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

(46) And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said. . . .Better. And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and said . . . The English text emphasises too strongly the distinctness of the act, possibly with the implied suggestion that the cry might have consisted of the words which St. Luke does not report. On the other hand, the other Gospels make the great cry immediately precede death.

He gave up the ghost.Better, He expired, or breathed out His spirit, the verb containing the root from which the Greek for spirit is derived. The Greek of St. John, which appears in English as though it were the same as St. Lukes, corresponds more closely to the final utterance, He delivered up His spirit.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

142. JESUS’S DEATH, EMBALMMENT, AND ENTOMBMENT, Luk 23:46-56 .

See notes on Joh 19:31-42; Mat 27:51-61; Mar 15:38-47.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

‘And Jesus, crying with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” ’

Luke omits Jesus’ citation of Psa 22:1, possibly because he does not feel that his Gentile readers will recognise its source and may therefore receive the wrong impression. He does not want them to think that Jesus died in despair but rather that He was in control of His departure. Thus while both the Jewish writers emphasise the final travail of soul, very much in line with Jewish thinking, the Gentile is concerned rather to present Jesus’ power over death. All Luke tells us is that He ‘cried with a loud voice’.

“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Luke is the only one who cites these words, but that is not surprising. It is quite understandable why Matthew and Mark both wanted to end with His terrible cry, and did not want to take attention away from it.

The loud voice goes with the experience expressed. It is His one last expression of life as His life begins to ebb away. And following it He commended His spirit to God. The quotation that follows comes from a regular evening prayer, but was here applied to an obviously deeper experience. By it Jesus was committing His spirit to His Father. Luke wants us to see that as in life, so in death, Jesus was in control.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

‘And having said this, he yielded up the spirit.’

By these words Luke makes clear that His words had not been just a pious prayer, but a deliberate committing of His spirit to God. He really was in control. His work being done He handed Himself over to the care of the Father, and we are to see that all was finally well. The speed of His death confirmed the severity of the flogging that He had received, a fact further evidenced by His being unable to bear His cross all the way. And yet all His thought had been for others. The weeping women on the road to the cross, the guilty men who stood before Him lying under the wrath of God, the evildoer dying beside Him. His scope had been wide. It was only at the end that He allowed a thought for Himself.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Luk 23:46. I commend my spirit: , I place, as a precious deposit. See on Psa 31:5 and for the next clause, the note on Mat 27:50. Dr. Heylin has well and nervously described our Lord’s passion in the following manner: “The appointed soldiers dig the hole in which the cross is to be erected,the nails and the hammer are ready,the cross is placed on the ground, and Jesus laid down upon that bed of sorrows,they nail him to it,they erect it,his nerves crack,his blood distils,he hangs upon his wounds, a spectacle to heaven and earth!” It is not unusual for those who speak in public, to profess that their subject surpasses their utmost efforts; and when they have exhausted their abilities in saying all that they possibly can, to break off in interjections, and abrupt exclamations of wonder and astonishment. Whatever may have given occasion to these passionate figures of speech, it is sure that they can never find their place so properly as here. For what tongue of man or angel can suffice to tell the depth and the height,the profundity of his sufferings, and the sublimity of perfection to which they raised him?We must here adore in silence what we cannot comprehend. See his Lectures, vol. 1: p. 103 and Sir Richard Steele’s Christian Hero.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

46 And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost.

Ver. 46. See Mat 27:50 .

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

46. ] The use of shews that this was the cry to which Matt. and Mark allude. The words are from the LXX, varying however from the common reading , and giving the verb in the present, which is also the rendering of the Hebrew ( ).

These words have in them an important and deep meaning. They accompany that, which in our Lord’s case was strictly speaking the act of death. It was His own act not ‘feeling the approach of death,’ as some, not apprehending the matter, have commented; but a determinate delivering up of His spirit to the Father . , John: see Joh 10:18 , . None of the Evangelists say ‘He died: ’ although that expression is ever after used of His death stated as one great fact: but it is, ., Matt.; , Mark, Luke; , John.

The here is the Personality the human soul informed by the Spirit, in union: not separated, so that His soul went to Hades, and His spirit to the Father (Olshausen). Both are delivered into the hand of the Father by Whom quickened (but of 1Pe 3:18 is to be rendered ‘quickened in the spirit’ by the Father is understood in ) He worked His great victory over death and Hell.

See again 1Pe 3:18-19 , and notes, and Rom 8:10-11 .

The latter part of the verse in Psa 31 , ‘ for Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, thou God of truth ,’ is not applicable here. The whole Psalm is not strictly prophetic, but is applied by the Lord to Himself.

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Luk 23:46 . : this expression is used in Mt. and Mk. in connection with the “My God, My God,” which Lk. omits. In its place comes the “Father, into Thy hands”. Here as in the agony in the garden Lk.’s account fails to sound the depths of Christ’s humiliation. It must not be inferred that he did not know of the “Eli, Eli”. Either he personally, or his source, or his first readers, could not bear the thought of it. . . .: an echo of Psa 31:6 , and to be understood in a similar sense, as an expression of trust in God in extremis . Various shades of meaning have been put on the words, among which is that Jesus died by a free act of will, handing over His soul to God as a deposit to be kept safe (Grotius, Bengel, Hahn, etc.).

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

commend = commit, or entrust. Compare Psa 31:5. Act 7:59. 1Pe 2:23.

spirit. Greek. pneuma. App-101. Compare Luk 8:55.

gave up the ghost = expired, or breathed (His last).

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

46.] The use of shews that this was the cry to which Matt. and Mark allude. The words are from the LXX, varying however from the common reading , and giving the verb in the present, which is also the rendering of the Hebrew ().

These words have in them an important and deep meaning. They accompany that, which in our Lords case was strictly speaking the act of death. It was His own act-not feeling the approach of death, as some, not apprehending the matter, have commented; but a determinate delivering up of His spirit to the Father.- , John: see Joh 10:18- , . None of the Evangelists say He died: although that expression is ever after used of His death stated as one great fact:-but it is, ., Matt.; , Mark, Luke; , John.

The here is the Personality-the human soul informed by the Spirit, in union: not separated, so that His soul went to Hades, and His spirit to the Father (Olshausen). Both are delivered into the hand of the Father-by Whom quickened (but of 1Pe 3:18 is to be rendered quickened in the spirit-by the Father is understood in ) He worked His great victory over death and Hell.

See again 1Pe 3:18-19, and notes, and Rom 8:10-11.

The latter part of the verse in Psalms 31, for Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, thou God of truth, is not applicable here. The whole Psalm is not strictly prophetic, but is applied by the Lord to Himself.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Luk 23:46. , Father) The Father received the Spirit of Jesus; Jesus receives the spirits of believers: Act 7:59 [Stephens last prayer, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit].-) I will commend, in the very act.[264] [As a deposit committed to Him at death. It was at this point of time, the most precious truly of all, that the atonement was made.-V. g.]

[264] So Rec. Text and L. But in ABCPQ Orig. 3,726e; commendo, in abcd Vulg. Hil. 1074, Syr. and Memph. Versions. So Engl. Vers.-E. and T.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

gave up

(See Scofield “Mat 27:50”).

Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes

cried: Mat 27:46-49, Mar 15:34-36

Father: Psa 31:5, Act 7:59, 1Pe 2:23

having: Mat 27:50-56, Mar 15:37-41, Joh 19:30

Reciprocal: Gen 35:18 – her soul Psa 22:24 – neither Psa 25:20 – O Psa 49:15 – shall Psa 73:24 – receive Psa 89:26 – Thou Isa 49:2 – in the Luk 24:39 – for Joh 10:28 – neither Act 14:23 – they commended 2Ti 1:12 – which I Jam 2:26 – as 1Pe 4:19 – commit

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

THE LAST WORD FROM THE CROSS

Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit.

Luk 23:46

Do those we have lost still live? The last word of Jesus gives us the answer, an answer which we cannot mistake. Yes; the soul lives. Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit.

I think our Saviour helps us very simply by dwelling on two fundamental truths of religion which we are very apt in the strain and stress of life to forget or overlook.

I. First of all there is the true Fatherhood of God.If God seems other to us than the Father, if He seems a hard taskmaster or tyrant, if He seems to us a relentless force that carries us we know not where, we have yet to learn the chief lesson which Jesus came to teach; and if that great truth is to sustain us at death, as it has sustained so many, we must learn to grasp it and make it our own now.

II. And the other great truth that Jesus would have us remember to hold fast throughout life is the reality of spiritual things.You have only got to look within you, and there you find the presence of your Lord Jesus Christ. If you have only got a longing to serve God better, that longing is His gift, whereas if you know that you have the Spirit of your Father within you, you need no other evidence that He is at work in the world, and that God Himself is your God, your Father, your guide even unto death.

III. Every Christian man and woman lives in two worlds.There is this world that surrounds us and hems us in so closely that it seems, as it were, to shut out the sight and the thought of God. And yet there is another world. The Christian is in London, just as of old he was in Galilee, in Philippi, in Rome, in Ephesus; but he is also in Christ. There is his true home. And here is our comfort, our last word of comfort, as we think of the dead. We and they are alike in Christone in Christ as our home, as the atmosphere in which we walk and move, and they also are in Christ.

Illustration

If you once begin honestly and whole-heartedly to believe in the Fatherhood of God, you are on the way to become one of those who adore the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and who find their freedom and their joy and their blessedness in the ancient faith of the sons of God from the beginning. Hold fast to the Fatherhood of God. There you shall find a secret that shall transfigure life. You will look upon all your work as given you by a Fathers hand; you will look upon your suffering as measured by a Fathers love; you will feel that sense of sonship growing up within you which will imperatively lead you to acknowledge the Divine Sonship of the blessed Saviour Himself.

(SECOND OUTLINE)

THE UPWARD LOOK

I. Up to the Father the Sons heart went, at the opening of the Passion, as they nailed Him to the tree. Father, forgive!

II. Up to the Father His eyes still turn as the agony hastens to its end: the last and the first words, Father. From first to last the Father is felt overshadowing, embracing the entire scene.

III. Up to Him our hearts turn, in Him our last thoughts close. Into His hands, as our dear Lord does, may we too venture to commend our spirits!

Rev. Canon H. Scott Holland.

Illustration

We dare not imagine, of course, what pain and sorrow can be to God the Father! But this one thing the Cross makes sure to us, that the pain and the sorrow, bitter and searching, which the Son endured, are the true and perfect expression of that intense desire which works in the heart of the Father for our forgiveness and for our glorification. We may not sound or measure the deep things of the Fathers spirit. But we do know that as we shudder at the awful price paid for our winning by the Beloved Sonwe do know a little of what it costs the Father. Through the gaping wounds in feet and hands and side we read out all that can be told us of the Fathers longing, of His passionate tenderness, of His unshaken faithfulness, of His inexhaustible pity.

(THIRD OUTLINE)

THE DEATH OF CHRIST

I. Nothing now remains but to die.To diethe last sad necessity of human kindwas needful to the Saviour: (a) That He might go through the conditions of human life. (b) That He might become Lord of the spiritual as of the physical and external worlds, making (as it would seem) the dwellers behind the veil sharers of the benefit of His atonement by actual communication with them (1 St. Peter Luk 3:19).

II. The death of Christ a pattern for us at the hour of death.The words with which He died ought to be our words when we die. Could we so use them? The Church is a witness to us of our duty, in that a Commendatory Prayer for the parting soul is put into the lips of the priest who is attending the dying. But how can the soul that remains still in its sins appear before its righteous Judge? For it there is no resting in faith and loveno committing itself as unto a faithful Creator (1Pe 4:19), but rather the fearful looking for of the judgment which the past life has deserved. But to Christs own people His death and passion the source of all peace and joy.

Thine the sharp thorns, and ours the golden crown.

III. Let us therefore go on our way with thankfulness in our hearts too great for words.We have seen the Saviour suffer; we have heard His words; we have seen Him die. Let us enshrine this memory in our hearts, to be their holiness and their safeguard in time of temptation. Let our life be modelled on the spirit of Christs passion.

Illustration

Our souls are sinful, sin-stained at their best, serving God with a divided allegiance, unworthy to offer themselves to Him, still more unworthy to be commended to Him. But He makes us one with Himself. Because we are made one with Him, therefore we, too, are accepted in the Beloved. When God accepted the human soul of Christ, He accepted also the brethren of Christ. This commendation of His soul to God includes us too. We, listening to these words, take courage that when our last hour shall come we may do the same, though our obedience has fallen so far short, so utterly short, of His. So, as these closing words went through the spaces up to the throne of God I fancy that I hear the great response From henceforth blessed are the dead that die in the Lord. Yea, saith the Spirit, for they rest from their labours. They who die in the Lord are accepted in Him. His words are their words; in His steps their feet tread; He receives their spirits; He presents them to the Father. The words of the first martyr tell us this.

(FOURTH OUTLINE)

THE LOOK FORWARD

All the last four words from the Cross are words which come from the human soul of Christ, from His human soul in its suffering, in its endurance, in its emergence from that endurance, and lastly in its blissful self-surrender into the Fathers keeping.

I. This last word is a word of peace.Those of us who have striven to enter into the fellowship of the sufferings, to conceive something of the agony of the long slow hours of bodily anguish, and still more frightful spiritual trialthose of us who have in any degree striven to realise this, will find no difficulty in sympathising with the intense joy and peace of this final commendation. It is the return to the Father of Him Who has done the work it was given Him to do, and Who knows that He has done it.

II. As the It is finished looked back on trial conquered, so the I commend My spirit looks forward to the recompense of the reward: the human soul of Christ triumphant; perfected through sufferings, now commended unto God.

III. It is the crown and triumph of the human soul to be able to commend itself to God.

Illustration

Have we noted that no less than three of the seven sayings from the Cross, three of the four that alone had reference to Himself, are quotations from the Psalms? In those hours of darkness, was the Lord recalling through and through those prophetic Psalms of the suffering servant, and applying them to Himself? We know not; but we know that He was steeped in the Old Testament, that His whole life was a fulfilment of its prophecy, that the words with which He repelled temptation at the beginning were words from the Old Testament. It is written, it is written, it is written. Is not this meant to enhance our reverence for the sacred Scriptures when we reflect that not only did Christ base His own moral teaching upon the Old Testament, but made it and its language the staple of His own religious life? It has been finely said: What was indispensable for the Redeemer can hardly be other than indispensable for the redeemed. In these days of higher criticism, when the Old Testament is likely to be disparaged, let us remember that. Let us Churchmen who say, and truly say, that it is the province of the Church to teach the Bible, remember that it is better to say it after, and not before, we have steeped and saturated ourselves with the teaching and words of the Bible.

(FIFTH OUTLINE)

PEACE AND SECURITY

I. There is a false peace of death, the peace of mere exhaustion, or the peace of the unawakened conscience, when the spirit is asleep and there is no sense of sin, none of the feeling that prompted the publican to cry, God be merciful to me a sinner! That is a false peace.

II. But there is a true peace, too, and it may be ours, the peace of a will that, having been surrendered to God, has with it the sustaining will of our Redeemer. That peace will carry us through the valley of the shadow, and, as we come out into Gods presence, we may come with Christ as our Companion.

III. Father. Hear the word once more, see the glad confidence in it, the old confidence restored, the full certainty now that the darkness is gone, the light of the Fathers face revealed.

IV. Into Thy hands. What security is there? God bears Jesus into Paradise. The spirit returns to God Who gave it, and on the third day God raises Him again to sit at His right hand for evermore. So for us also, if our wills are Gods now, He will bear us into Paradise, and at the last raise us again to eternal life with Him in heaven.

Rev. Lionel G. B. J. Ford.

(SIXTH OUTLINE)

OBEDIENT UNTO DEATH

This is the word of Expiration. I always like to remember that our Lord said this with a loud voice, because He died when He willed. No man took away His lifeHe laid it down. It is not, He was put to death for mea thousand times NoHe died for me.

I. We have all to taste of death.However young you are, however strong, you have to go through it. The coward dies a thousand deaths, the strong man only one. Face it with a heart that can love and a mind that can think. Expiration, dissolution, death. It is so hard to become obedient to this. The Lord, we are told, learned obedience by the things that He suffered. Let all that you suffer teach you the same lesson. I am speaking to dying men and women, and I am a dying man myself. It is a certain fact; and we can learn to die best at Calvary. That is why I say, Learn to die now, that, through the grave and gate of death, with Him you may pass to your joyful resurrection. Be true men and women now, and learn how to die, because you do not know how you are going to die. It may be a sudden death, or a lingering death; it may be without pain, but it may be even the death of the Cross; but whatever death it is, let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus, Who became obedient to death, even the death of the Cross.

II. When you think about your death, say our Lords own words, Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit. And then we must add, For Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, Thou God of truth. The spirit came from God: we give our spirit back to God from Whom it came. Into Thy handsthe Creators hands, and now the wounded handsI commend my spirit, for Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord, Thou God of Truth.

Rev. A. H. Stanton.

(SEVENTH OUTLINE)

FATHER!

It was that word Father which summed up the whole purpose of Christs life.

I. The removal of sin.And it suggests, first of all, that here is the result of the removal of sin. Through the darkness He was bearing the curse of sin as He had borne it at no other time. Then, having made atonement, having borne the curse, having taken it away, having made a living new way by which men might approach and come back to God, it is not My God, but it is Father. So it is with us.

II. The purpose of life.And yet, again, that word Father seems to sum up the whole purpose of our Blessed Lords life. You remember how constantly He was saying, I go to My Father. Now the time has come when He is going to His Father. If you and I could have that same thought in our minds, do you not think that as we look upon our lives it would unravel many of the mysteries? We are faced with so many problems, but our Lord saw no mystery in them. He saw no mystery in suffering and pain as He shared it. It was quite plain. Why? Because of this great fact of Fatherhood.

III. The source of comfort.Not only that, but they also come to us in words of comfort. The death of Jesus has been called a magnificent and royal procession, and yet how He shuddered and shrank from it! You and I need not think that we are faithless because we have a fear of death. Most of us have that, and, believe me, the more we realise what life is, the more we realise what life can be, the more we realise that our bodies are the temples of the living God, the more, perhaps, will that fear of death come to us.

Rev. T. G. Longley.

Illustration

The sunshine of love came through the darkness. Father, it thrilled the heart of Jesus, I am coming back to Thee. Take care of Me. I commit all to Thee. Perfect trust. Perfect love. Oh, let us come back to our Father God. He will receive us. Daily, let this be our first step on rising. Each day committed into the Fathers hand will be our rest and peace. Soon for us will dawn the long day that knows not night.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

6

See the comments on Mat 27:50.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Luk 23:46. Crying with a loud voice. Matthew and Mark mention this without giving the words.

Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit. Our Lord dies with Scriptural words on His lips (Psa 31:5). The whole Psalm is not necessarily Messianic, for, by saying Father, our lord gives the whole its higher meaning for this hour. Spirit here means the immaterial part of Him who was dying. It is idle to say that the soul went to Hades and the spirit to His Father, for He had told the robber that He, the Personal object of His faith, would be in Paradise that day (Luk 23:43). In this prayer which came after the sixth word (It is finished), with its announcement of the completed work, our Lord freely gives up His spirit to the Father. The dying would indeed come in the course of nature, but this represents it as the supreme act of love and obedience.

Ullmann: Whoever could think that Jesus, with these words, breathed out His life forever into the empty air, such an one certainly knows nothing of the true, living spirit, and, consequently, nothing of the living God, and of the living power of the crucified One.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

Luk 23:46-49. Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit The Father receives the spirit of Jesus; Jesus himself the spirits of the faithful. See on Mat 27:50. When the centurion The Roman officer, who stood over against him and guarded the execution; saw what was done In so miraculous a manner, in those amazing prodigies that attended Christs death; he glorified God By a free confession of his persuasion of the innocence of Jesus; saying, Certainly this was a righteous man Notwithstanding all the vile reproaches which have been cast upon him. And all the people that came together On this remarkable occasion, among whom, doubtless, were some of those who, but a little before, had been insulting him in his dying agonies; beholding, the things that were done, smote their breasts For sorrow and remorse; in terrible expectation that some sad calamity would speedily befall them and their country, for the indignities and cruelties they had offered to a person, for whom God had expressed so high a regard even in his greatest distress. See these verses elucidated at large on Mat 27:54-56. And all his acquaintance Who these were, Matthew and Mark inform us, in the verses just referred to.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Luke next recorded Jesus’ death and, just before it, Jesus’ final prayer to His Father.

In this prayer Jesus offered Himself to God as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. Jesus voluntarily laid His life down; no one took it from Him (Joh 10:15-18; cf. Joh 15:13). His words were similar to those that many Jews used in prayer before they went to sleep at night (cf. Psa 31:5). [Note: Liefeld, "Luke," p. 1045.] They expressed Jesus’ trust in God as well as His commitment to Him.

"How many thousands have pillowed their heads on them when going to rest! They were the last words of a Polycarp, a Bernard [of Clairvaux], Huss, Luther, and Melanchthon. And to us also they may be the fittest and the softest lullaby." [Note: Edersheim, 2:609-10.]

The strength with which Jesus cried out showed His physical strength but, more important, the significance of His declaration. Jesus sovereignly controlled His circumstances to the end of His life.

As God rested after six days of work on the creation (Gen 2:1-3), so Jesus rested after six hours of work on the cross in which He made a new creation (2Co 5:17). [Note: Wiersbe, 1:277.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)