Research Paper On Jesus's Crucifixion

According to the New Testament, nearly 2000 years ago, the world was changed forever thanks to one man. Born of the Virgin Mary, Jesus grew up to become a greater advocate for the Jewish faith than any other man or women preceding him. Going from town to town, he healed the sick, befriended the poor, and captivated the hearts of nearly everyone to whom he preached the word of God. Yet, none of his life impacted the world quite like the climax of Jesus’s life: his crucifixion. Jesus Christ, the son of God, did not have to die on the cross, and yet he did so that we might not be burdened by sin—Christians, or those whom believe in Jesus Christ, are taught this from day one. Generic as it might be, this widespread understanding is not far off

from what we are taught by the apostles in the New Testament; nonetheless, it lacks a certain depth and breadth of understanding that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ truly deserves. In his letters, Paul gives insight into the true meaning and importance of Christ’s crucifixion. Paul the Apostle reveals to us that the crucifixion of Christ is a means through which God restores his relationship with humanity; he frees his people from sin and offers all who have faith in him salvation and everlasting life. Furthermore, through Paul we recognize that this is of great importance because it makes known to us the unending grace of God for all his people. For these reasons, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ changed the world.
Despite humanity's constant disobedience and unfaithfulness, Christ’s crucifixion meant that all men and women were justified, or made right with God, which effectively restored God’s relationship with his people.

Throughout the Old Testament and up until the crucifixion of Christ, we find God’s people constantly falling away from him through sin and disobedience; thus, it is Christ’s crucifixion which restores the balance in the relationship between God and humanity. This act of justification through Christ’s crucifixion, however, can take on several means and explanations. According to the HarperCollins Bible Dictionary, John H.P. Reumann describes several models that explain the meaning of the crucification of Jesus relative to how it ultimately justified people: substitution, redemption, reconciliation, and participation

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In the context of substitution, we find that all people were guilty of, at the very least, original sin. According to Paul’s letter to the Romans, “the wage paid by sin is death; [yet] the gift freely given by God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” . In this sense, Jesus gave his own life so that we might be spared this punishment, despite him being entirely free of any sin or wrongdoing himself. Therefore, through the perspective of substitution we understand the meaning of Christ’s crucifixion to be an ultimate sacrifice which was intended to salvage us from what only Jesus Christ the Lord himself was capable of avoiding: sin.
Another model of crucifixion that contributes to the meaning behind Christ’s crucifixion is that of redemption. In redemption, we find Christ Jesus’s crucifixion as a means through which God frees us from sin, or are redeems us, and thus obtains our unhindered obedience. Through this, we are no longer bound by Law and sin but by our desire to love Him. Paul uses the analogy of a Christian being freed from slavery in order to illustrate this emancipation from the Law and subsequent ability to be of complete service to God. Paul says that “while we [are] still living for our natural inclinations, the sinful passions aroused by the Law [work] in all parts of our bodies to make us live lives which [are] fruitful only by death.” When we are bound by the Law, we find ourselves focusing on its stringent details and consequences rather than what matters most to God—our relationship with Him. But through Christ’s crucifixion we are “set free from the law of sin and death” and justified through a new law: the law of the spirit. And so, redemption allows us to interpret Christ’s crucifixion as a means through which we realize that it is not ourselves that we live for, but for Christ and for God.
Yet another model through which we can understand the meaning of Christ’s crucifixion is reconciliation. In reconciliation, we recognize that we have, since the designation of Israel as His people, been in conflict and opposition with him. Jesus, therefore, serves to bridge the gap between God and his people: “For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more can we be sure that, being now reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.” In a way, Paul’s reflection on humanity’s reconciliation suggests that perhaps God sacrificed his one and and only son as an ultimate sign of vulnerability and love; further, it was this unprecedented act of vulnerability that finally resonated with God’s people, ultimately bringing them back into his loving embrace. Through reconciliation, therefore, we can understand the crucifixion of Jesus as being God’s attempt to regroups his people who have wandered astray.
A final model that can help us interpret the meaning of Christ’s crucifixion is participation.

In participation, we view the crucifixion of Jesus as a means to escape the power of sin, allowing us “to die and rise to new life” with him. In writing to the Romans, Paul declares that this emancipation from sin is not to be taken as a ‘free pass.’ Rather, Paul reminds us that “when we were baptised into Christ Jesus, [we] were baptised into his death.” Since through baptism people are united with Christ, so we shall too “be a resurrection like his; realising that our former self was crucified with him, so that the self which belonged to sin should be destroyed and we should be freed from the slavery of sin.” According to the participation interpretation of Christ’s resurrection, Baptism, therefore, allows us to participate fully in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and thus opens the door to seeing ourselves as not only “dead to sin but alive to God in Christ

Jesus.”
These four modes of justification together explain the underlying meaning of Christ’s crucifixion: Jesus Christ was sacrificed for the forgiveness of sin and the promise of new and everlasting life for all people who have faith in Lord Jesus Christ. Though this is important in it of itself, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ has an even greater significance beyond the forgiveness of sin and promise of eternal life. In the climax of Christian theology and of the history of the world, we learn of God’s unending love and grace for us.
We have not been justified through Christ’s crucifixion merely because God felt obligated to salvage his creation, but rather, Jesus Christ’s crucifixion and subsequent justification of humankind is the single most powerful displays of grace from God. According to HarperCollins Bible Dictionary, Paul “associates God’s grace with God’s unmerited favor shown to sinners through Jesus Christ and expressed supremely through Christ’s death and resurrection” . Paul describes this act of grace as being a “free gift” because, as HarperCollins mentions, the favor in which God shows humankind is unmerited. If anything, humanity was deserving of another flood or at least some sort of retribution in response to the world’s injustice and unholiness. And yet, in the New Testament, we find God’s punishing humanity by sending his only begotten son to die for our sins, sharply contrasting from the typical plague, firestorm, or destruction of the Old Testament God. Thus, this explains the way in which God saves us through Christ: “it is a work of spontaneous love to which no one had any claim….It was an act of grace.” Furthermore, Paul makes the clarification that the crucifixion of Jesus, the subsequent justification of man, and God’s grace is not exclusively for the Jewish people, but rather, “no distinction is made: all have sinned and lack God’s glory.” Stemming from this impartial grace, the crucifixion of Christ offers to the faithful a path to salvation and eternal life, rather than simply to those who uphold the Law or identify as Jews.
At the root of God’s promise to eternal life through the crucifixion of Jesus, anchoring both our justification and God’s grace, is faith. According to Paul, people are justified by the grace of God not through their adherence to the Law, but through their faith in Jesus Christ. What makes the justification of humanity so special in the case of Jesus and his crucifixion is that it applies through faith to Jews and Gentiles alike. Paul gives the example of Abraham, who was uncircumsized when he was blessed by God; as Paul illustrates, it was not Abraham’s relationship with the Law that made him an upright person in the eyes of God, but rather, “his faith was reckoned to him as uprightness.” Thus, what is significant about the crucifixion of Christ is that it not only reveals the unending grace of God, but it offers “God’s saving justice….through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe,” be it Jew or Gentile. And so, in faith we find the grace of God, manifested in the deliverance and crucifixion of his one and only son for the justification of all.
One man brought sin into the world, but how much more glorious it was that one man offered the free gift of grace, sacrificing himself for the forgiveness of sin in all people, Jews and Gentiles alike. In his letters, Paul helps us comprehend this ultimate sacrifice. We find that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ meant the forgiveness of sins and justification of God’s people through the models of substitution, redemption, reconciliation, and participation. Through Paul, we also learn of the importance of Christ’s crucifixion; we learn how it is through faith that people are justified by grace, not through adherence to any law or way of life, which ultimately opens the door to salvation for all of God’s people. What Paul teaches us about Christ’s crucifixion is that, through such, we are freed from sin and offered hope for new and everlasting life through Christ’s subsequent resurrection; just as Jesus Christ conquered death, so shall we too find ourselves free of the constraints of death and in the embrace of eternal life through the limitless grace of Lord Jesus Christ.