I am thirsty
Lord God, whose blessed Son our Savior gave his body to be whipped and his face to be spit upon: Give us the grace to accept joyfully the sufferings of the present time, confident of the glory that shall be revealed; through Jesus Christ, your Son our Lord, who spoke on the cross saying “I am thirsty” .. the same Jesus who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.
Amen.
Yesterday, we heard a message on the 4th words of Jesus on the cross.
Introduction
This morning we are going to look at the fifth statement of Jesus on the cross. It is recorded in the Gospel according to St. John the 19th chapter, beginning at the 28th verse.
28 Later, knowing that everything had now been accomplished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” 29 A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips.
Jesus was willing to suffer and die for us. As Jesus hung on the cross he made seven different statements. But only one of those statements deals with his physical suffering. It is one word in Greek: DISPAO, but in English, it is two words: I THIRST.
I thirst! I believe the first reason Jesus made that statement was to show us that he really had physical humanity, and that he was a real human being. And the second reason was to fulfil the prophecies made about him thousands of years ago.
When apostle John was writing his gospel, about A.D. 100, a certain tendency had arisen in religious and philosophical thought, called GNOSTICISM. One of its great tenets or beliefs was that spirit was altogether good and matter (that is anything that we see) was altogether evil. Based on this belief, certain conclusions followed. One was that God, who is pure spirit, could never take upon himself a body, because that was matter, and “matter” was evil. The gnostics therefore taught that Jesus never had a real body. They said he was like a ghost. Thus, for instance, when Jesus walked, his feet left no prints on the ground, because he was pure spirit in a phantom body.
To accept the teachings of Gnosticism means, we accept that Jesus never suffered physically. And if Jesus never suffered physically how could he have paid the price for all our sins?
There is another group called Docetists. The word Docetists comes from the Greek word dokeo which means “to seem.” Docetists claimed that Jesus seemed or looked human. And that Jesus lacked full humanity. They deny that God had become a human being in the person of Jesus Christ. But the truth is Jesus of Nazareth, our fully human brother is the second person of the Trinity. In other words, Jesus was not hiding behind his divinity pretending to suffer on the cross as the early Docetists or gnostics falsely asserted. Jesus truly bore the penalty of our sins in his humanity as he slowly suffered death for us.
Like the Gnostics and Docetists, another heretic group was Apollinarianism. Apollinarianism denied the full humanity of Christ. They taught that Jesus’ two natures, human and divine could not co-exist in the same person. But the truth about Jesus is that at the Church council at Constantinople in AD 381, it was rightly, accepted and confessed that Jesus has a fully human nature as well as a divine nature. He is completely human and completely divine.
There is another false teaching about the humanity of Jesus. The Modalists assert that there is only one person in the Godhead. That the persons in the Trinity are not distinct but rather are three modes or forms so that at one time Jesus was Father, another time Son and another time Holy Spirit. No, Jesus is always the Son, the second person of the Trinity. What was true of his humanity didn’t apply to his Deity and vice-versa, i.e. as man he got tired and was hungry and thirsted, but as God his energy and power are infinite and inexhaustible.
Being fully human, the Nicene Creed states that God sent his Son, “born of a woman, born under the law” (Gal 4:4). If Jesus was ever to redeem man, he must become man. He had to become what we are in order to make us what He is. This Jesus took the form of a servant, humbled himself to the point of dying on the cross (Phil 2:7-8). On the cross, Jesus became the victim of all that assaults us, and stands in for us, by receiving the full punishment of the Law’s condemnation and death.
Besides being human, Jesus is God. He is true God and true man. The two natures within the one person of Jesus Christ, the second person of the Holy Trinity, is called personal union or hypostatic union. The council of Chalcedon confessed that the two natures are inseparable but remain distinct from each other (Emeritus Robert Kolb’s: The Christian Faith: A Lutheran Exposition, on the Person of Christ, page 132-133).
What brought about man’s condemnation and death?
In six days, God had created everything in the world good by his Word. He made Adam and Eve caretakers of the world but they disobeyed Him. Hence the relationship between God and man was broken as sin entered the world. This sin known as “original sin is not a slight corruption of human nature, but rather a corruption so deep that there is nothing sound or uncorrupted left in the human body or soul” (Formula of Concord, Epitome). Human beings also suffer from actual sins, which are sins of commission and sins of omission. Dr. Robert Kolb says sins of commission are generally easier to identify. But sins of omission often have a much deeper impact on the relationship with God or the neighbor.
To reconcile us to Him, God instituted a sacrificial system. At the temple, priests would sacrifice the blood of goats and calves continually to take away our sins. But Christ came as High Priest, who gave his life as the final sacrificial Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world, and provides eternal redemption for all mankind (Hebrews 9). Christ’s sacrifice was a once and for all offering. His suffering or death accomplishes something others could not do by their suffering or death. He “bore our sins in his body on the cross,” freeing people from their sins and enabling them to live a new way of life characterized by righteousness (1 Peter 2:24).
Terrible Pain
There is no doubt that Jesus was experiencing the absolute worst physical pain imaginable. He was arrested in the middle of the night. Slapped around. Pushed around. Mocked. Slapped again. Crowned with thorns that went into his scalp. Hitting him again and again and again until his back was shredded. They took his beard and ripped it out. They beat him and beat him again. They made him carry the cross. They nailed the nails into his hands and into his feet. Not for one second did he have a moment’s rest. Not for one moment had anybody offered him anything. You get the picture! Jesus is in pain and exhausted. He has lost a lot of blood and is dehydrated.
I am thirsty reminds us that our Lord Jesus Christ shared our human nature and its infirmities. Jesus had thirsted upon his journey when he asked from the Samaritan woman a draught of water from Jacob’s well. Jesus seems to have taken no refreshment from the time when he supped with the apostles in the upper room. Since then he had endured the agony in the garden. He passed through the repeated examinations before the Jewish council and the Roman governor, and had hung for hours upon the cross. The bodily anguish and exhaustion of crucifixion, aggravated by his unspeakable mental distress, account for the thirst which possessed the dying Sufferer.
After about six hours on the cross, the event surrounding the crucifixion of Christ then moved quite rapidly. Apostle John tells us, Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, “I AM THIRSTY (John 19:28). The hardest part of the suffering was now over and now Jesus asked for a drink. He wasn’t in some deep coma as the heretics say. Jesus was alert in his suffering. On the cross, he was in control even to the moment of his death.
Having said that he was thirsty, a Roman soldier poured some cheap sour wine onto a sponge and lifted it up on a hyssop branch to the lips of Jesus. Oh, you have heard of the hyssop before in the book of Exodus. The Israelites in Egypt during the exodus were instructed to take a bunch of hyssop and dip it into the blood of the lamb put on their doorpost. King David in his prayer of repentance in Psalm 51:7, says, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean.” Now the hyssop is used in a biblical story. The sponge dipped in the sour wine is put on the hyssop. The soldier stretches it out. In those days they didn’t crucify people very far off the ground. So with the stalk, which would be about 18-24 inches long, a tall soldier could reach Jesus’ lips. When the refreshment was offered, Jesus moistened his lips with the posca, or sour wine, offered him in the sponge raised on the stem of hyssop. This seems to have revived him, and strengthened him for the last cries which he uttered in his humiliation. We can be sure he was thirsty, thirstier than any of us have ever experienced or could imagine. Unquenchable thirst was one of the agonies that accompanied crucifixion. John notes that Jesus said, “I am Thirst,” not only as a statement of physical reality, but also in order to fulfil the Scripture. And Lenski, a Lutheran theologian wrote, “The entire Scriptures in all that they present concerning the earthly work of Jesus have now been turned into actuality, the work mapped out by Scripture is now a work actually accomplished.”
My strength is dried up like a potsherd,
and my tongue sticks to my jaws;
you lay me in the dust of death. (Psalm 22:15))
I am weary with my crying out;
My throat is parched…
They gave me poison for food,
And for my thirst, they gave me sour wine to drink (Psalm 69:3, 21).
A.T. Robertson, a New Testament scholar and theologian writes, “This is one of the severest agonies of crucifixion.” The thirst was excruciating and intensified as he hung on the cross. The Scriptures had indicated that the Messiah would be a Suffering Messiah. Jesus is the one and only one who fulfils the Scriptures pointing to the coming Deliverer.
Was Jesus a Failure?
Was Jesus a failure? You could make a good case for the answer to that question as “yes.” In fact, I think you could make a decent case that Jesus was the greatest failure that the world has ever seen. Just look at his life! He was born into an unimportant family in an unimportant little village called Bethlehem. He was ignored, he was taken for granted, he was laughed at. When he talks and when he speaks, the powers that be, want nothing to do with him. He faces nothing but ridicule and opposition and misunderstanding all his life. When he asks for a drink he is given the cheapest sour wine, wine that the poorest people and soldiers drink. And in the end, he is crucified like a criminal. His sufferings in those last few hours are unspeakable. When he dies he appears to be yet another forgotten footnote in history. Yes, I think you could make the case that was a failure.
Is it not true, however, that you can do everything you know to be right and still end up suffering in ways that you will never understand? You can pray and pray and pray and your prayers sometimes will not be answered. You can go to work and can live by the rules. You can do a good job and still the day comes when you are fired without any warning. You may save money for the dream of your life and suddenly have your money stolen. You may work hard to make a marriage hold together and in the end, it may fall apart though you have done everything humanly possible to save the marriage. You may have dear friends whom you love who will turn against you in the moment of crisis even though you know you have walked in integrity and told the truth. There is no guarantee, is there? You can do everything right and it could turn out all wrong.
No guarantees
Suffering and hard times are no sign you are out of the will of God. It is, however, possible that you have done something wrong and you are suffering for it. Jesus told the cripple man he healed that his sins led to his sickness. We all suffer for our mistakes. But far more often when we face difficulties, they do not come because we have done something wrong. Far more often they come because we have done something right and it just has not worked out. Case in point – the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at him on the cross. Look at that bloody mess on the cross. Look at the Son of God reviled and hated and mocked. Look at him begging for water to quench his thirst. What has he done wrong? What sin has he committed? What terrible crime has he done? He has done nothing but obey the Father’s will perfectly. And what he got for it was the cross.
Do you understand what this means? I am saying that your loneliness does not necessarily mean you are outside the will of God. Your unemployment, your challenges, your poverty, etc. do not necessarily mean you are outside the will of God. Your pain does not necessarily mean you are outside the will of God. The broken relationships you have experienced do not mean you are outside the will of God. Your sickness does not necessarily mean you are outside the will of God. Your inability to follow the Ten Commandments does not mean you are outside the will of God. Why? Why are you not outside the will of God? You are not outside the will of God because Jesus Christ did the will of God and he ended up on the cross for you. So, I ask the question again. Was Jesus Christ a failure? The answer is “NO.” He was not a failure. He was rather the greatest success this world has ever seen. Nobody ever accomplished more than Jesus Christ did. But for him, success came through suffering, hardship, loss and an agonizing death.
Here is a word of comfort for all believers, especially in the hours when the attacks of doubt are directed against the assurance of salvation. Salvation is absolutely the work of God alone in Christ, and everyone who thirsts after salvation, may freely have this wonderful gift without money and without price (Isaiah 55:1,2).
When the Son of Man comes in his glory, this is the good news he has for you, “Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you gave me clothing. I was sick and you took care of me. I was in prison and you visited me. Truly, I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.”
So, in conclusion, I see my Savior at work on the cross, fulfilling every iota of prophecy so there could never be any doubt as to whether or not He is Messiah. His death was heinously painful and agonizing, and yet He did not hang there passively waiting to die and get it over with…He was conscientiously fulfilling the Scripture that He knew so well, even to the very end. I learn of His humanity…his flesh was just like ours. He got hungry, tired, thirsty, felt pain as well as human emotions, yet without sin. He was thirsty but became the River of Living Water for me so that my spiritual thirst is quenched as we are now in a relationship.
Amen!
The Benediction
Credit is given to:
Alvin J. Schmidt, author of Hallmarks of Lutheran Identity
Frank J. Matera, author of New Testament Christology
Jacob A. O. Preus, author of Just Words: Understanding the Fullness of the Gospel
Paul E. Kretzmann, author of Popular Commentary of the Bible, NT Vol 1, 2
Robert Kolb, author of The Christian Faith: A Lutheran Exposition
Robert Kolb and Timothy Wengert, editors of Book of Concord
Top of Form
So Jesus was willing to suffer and die for us. As Jesus hung on the cross he made seven different statements. But only one of those statements deals with his personal, physical suffering. It is one word in Greek, dispao; two words in English, “I thirst.”