Words of Grace – March 17, 2016

“What is man?” This question is asked in Psalm 8:4, and again in Hebrews 2:6. The answer is that man was made by God, and man was made “a little lower than angels” (Psalm 8:5) (Hebrews 2:7).

When the Bible tells us that Jesus, who is God, was made “a little lower than the angels,” we understand this to mean that God became a man. Hebrews 2:9 says that Jesus was made “for the suffering of death,” that he “should taste death” on the cross for all of us.

The old rugged cross was the “emblem of suffering and shame, as the beloved hymn reminds us. Hebrews 12:2 tells us to look upon Jesus as he endured the pain and the shame of the cross.

We read in Philippians 2:8 that Jesus, as a man, humbled himself to become obedient in his death. But his death was not an ordinary death; it was “even the death of the cross.”

Death on the cross was not only death but suffering unto death. Cicero, the Roman politician and philosopher, said that crucifixion was the cruelest and most disgusting method of punishment ever invented. Another philosopher, Seneca, stated that anyone who was facing crucifixion would prefer to die before going to the cross.