This week’s devotions are based on Week 6 of Cross Examined: Don’t you fear God? (LISTEN HERE)
Luke 23: 39 One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!”
40 But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence?
This interaction the Luke records for us of the two thieves hanging next to Jesus is short but profound. It would be easy to read over the interaction and focus just on Jesus’ words (which often times happens as they are included in the seven words spoken from the cross). However, the question that Thief One poses to Thief Two is a question worth pausing on, “Don’t you fear God?”
With their fate all but secured, the two criminals had no dog in this fight about Jesus. The religious leaders were mocking him. The soldiers were having fun at Jesus’ expense. Perhaps the benefit of Jesus receiving all the attention that day is that they were getting none of the ridicule that might have come their way without Jesus being crucified with them!
Yet the interaction of the criminals is worth pausing on as it reflects realities that can also be found in our hearts.
The first criminal chose to use two precious breaths to join the religious leaders and soldiers in “hurling insults” at Jesus. As if he were on the ground a free man ridiculing the one hanging on the cross the first criminal took a shot: “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!”
Like many of those around the cross, there is no indication this thief had any level of confidence Jesus was actually the promised Messiah. The fact that Luke labels it an “insult” was like berating a place kicker who missed the winning field goal, “Aren’t you the best kicker in the league?” The insult comes from a place that has no belief that person is, but rather revels in the fact that they are not living up to the claim they made or others placed on them.
When an insult is “hurled,” the one throwing it assumes a superior position over the one they are insulting.
The thief also puts one test out for Jesus: “Save yourself and us.” Would this have convinced the thief if Jesus pulled the nails out of his hands and let them walk away free? Perhaps, but I sincerely doubt it.
It seems the first criminal is simply playing the same ploy as the Pharisees did earlier:
Matthew 12:38 Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from you.”
39 He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. 40 For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 41 The men of Nineveh will stand up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and now something greater than Jonah is here.
The unbelief of the thief was the same as the Pharisees and teachers of the law who put Jesus on the cross. There was no heart to be convinced. The heart was hard. There was no respect to be proven. They had no respect for Jesus. There was no sign to be given because there was no faith that would believe it.
This is what happens when there is no fear of God.
God is dismissed. God is mocked. God is thought of as a genie in a bottle to give me whatever I want when I want it. God is set aside for my ego to be better and wiser than God. God is not recognized because I don’t think he has any value to me.
We may not be hanging on the cross, but the poignant question of Thief Two is for us to hear as well, “Don’t you fear God?”
Do you?
Apply: How can you find yourself acting in a similar way to the first criminal on the cross? How does a lack of reverence for God show up in your life?
Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you for taking the mocking of those around your cross. Thank you for staying on the cross when you could have saved yourself. You stayed to ensure I would be saved. AMEN.