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The story is told of love illustrated on a plaque in a children's home in Michigan,

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for there on the chapel wall of what is called Eagle Village, a treatment center for boys

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located near Hershey, Michigan, there hang the portraits of two 12-year-old boys.

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One of them is blonde-haired, Rick, and the other is a youngster, a black youngster, whose

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name was Rosie.

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The pictures hanging on the wall recall an incident of several years ago now.

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Some of the boys from Eagle Village were on a canoe expedition on Lake Superior.

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They were pulled ashore to make camp for the night, but Rosie spotted something floating

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there still in the water and pushed off in a canoe to go get it.

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The wind was blowing strongly, and it did not take long for the winds to blow him away

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from the shore altogether.

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The staff that was sponsoring the trip quickly realized the peril that Rosie was in and started

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off in two canoes to go out and rescue him.

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Rick, who happened to be Rosie's best friend, also saw what was taking place and jumped

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in one of the canoes to try to help his friend who was in danger.

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So there were three canoes out on Lake Superior as evening was coming and the wind was blowing.

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In fact, the wind picked up, and it was not long before all three of the canoes being

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helplessly tossed about were capsized.

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Miraculously, despite the frigid waters, the staff members all made it back to shore, but

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Rick and Rosie were both lost to the depths of Lake Superior.

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In their memory, there hangs a plaque between their pictures, and on the plaque it says

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this, To Rick, who loved enough to give his life for another.

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To Rosie, who was loved enough to have another pay that price.

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It seems to me that that illustration and the words on the plaque help us to grasp the

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symbolism of the cross.

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For the cross stands for one who loved enough to give his life for others, and it stands

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as a testimony that there were those who were loved enough to have another pay that price.

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So powerful is the message and the symbolism of the cross that it has been transformed

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from a grotesque reminder of execution in the ancient world to a wondrous sign of deepest

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love and self-sacrifice.

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For it was on that old rugged cross that the Son of God hung and died.

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Thousands of times people died on crosses in the ancient world, but it was that one person

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who died who caused the cross to be transformed in its symbolism.

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The significance of the cross of Jesus Christ might be summarized in three legal concepts

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that the Bible wraps up in the work of the cross.

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The first place the cross signifies a transaction that is accomplished.

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A transaction that is accomplished.

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Jesus Himself said, the Son of Man has come to give His life a ransom, a ransom on the

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behalf of many.

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Matthew 20, 28.

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The Bible tells us that humanity is in slavery to sin.

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We like to think of ourselves as being free, but in fact we are enslaved to our own sinful

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lusts.

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We are not free.

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We are in bondage.

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Liberation from slavery demands a price, a purchase price.

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Things must be bought in order to be freed.

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That is exactly why Jesus died.

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That is the meaning of the cross.

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For on the cross He paid a redemption price for us.

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The price of our redemption was His death, and by His death the shedding of His blood.

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That is why the cry from the cross, it is finished, is so very special to us.

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Those three words come out of one word in the language of the New Testament, tetelestai.

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And what it means, it is finished, what it means is the price has been paid.

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The purchase price for our freedom was laid down by the Son of God.

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Not only was the price laid down, but our freedom was given to us.

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We have now been released from the consequences of our slavery to sin.

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The New Testament further puts it this way in Titus 2, 14.

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He gave Himself for us that He might redeem us from every lawless deed.

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Or as Paul writes to the Ephesians in Ephesians 1, 7, in Him we have redemption through His

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blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace.

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Go rich in grace was the Son of God that He came into the world and on the cross paid

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out of His riches the price for our forgiveness and our redemption from sin.

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Slavery is such a foreign concept to us in the 1990s that we have a hard time understanding

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and grasping in our emotions what it means to be freed.

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But if any of you saw the Civil War series on PBS in recent weeks, perhaps you were able

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to be reminded of the meaning of liberation, of emancipation, being set free from lifetime

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bondage.

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That is what Jesus Christ accomplished for us at the cross.

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When we think of the significance of the cross of Jesus Christ, we must remember that it

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signifies a transaction that is accomplished.

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A price has been put down for slaves.

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Those slaves have been purchased from their original owner and now set free.

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But the cross also signifies justice that is satisfied, justice that is satisfied.

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For you see, human sin is not merely something that is not very nice, that is troublesome.

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Human sin is an offense against a holy God.

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While our sin has consequences for ourselves and our relationships to other people, the

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primary direction of sin is upward.

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It is an offense against a holy and righteous Creator.

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And because He is holy and righteous, He must respond to sin with justice, and He did.

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And the penalty of sin is death.

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The soul that sins, it shall die, God said.

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The wages of sin is death.

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Death is the just penalty for human sin.

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God declared it so as the righteous judge.

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But the wonderful thing is that God who laid down the penalty for sin and who proclaimed

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this as justice is the same God who came into the world in the person of Jesus Christ to

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pay for us that very penalty that He established.

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What a wondrous thing is this work of the cross.

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For now the very God who exacted the penalty of death in His holiness and justice is the

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God who came in grace and in mercy and in love that He might satisfy His own justice

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by the death of His Son.

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That is why the death of Christ is called in Bible terminology propitiation, a big word

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that simply means God is satisfied.

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His justice has been satisfied.

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What it means is that people do not have to die and go to hell to pay for their own sin.

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They may and they will if they insist.

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But God has paid the penalty for us and has satisfied His own justice.

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This last week I visited in a prison in Rochester.

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If you've ever been in a prison you know the feeling when those doors slam shut behind

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you and suddenly you're locked in from the rest of the world.

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As I saw some of those who are residents there at that prison, they look just like me and

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you.

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They look like our next door neighbor.

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The only problem is they're criminals.

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They have committed some crime for which they have been found guilty and they are incarcerated

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in that place by the federal government until justice has been satisfied.

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The fact is that in this world we are all the criminals.

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We have offended the law of God and God who is just and who is holy declares punishment

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upon sinners, the punishment of death, not merely physical death but eternal and spiritual

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death as well in hell.

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How wonderful is our God that seeing us whom He loves in such peril under His justice,

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He came into the world and satisfied His own justice on our behalf through the death of

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His Son.

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He Himself says the Apostle John.

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Christ Himself is the propitiation, the satisfaction for our sins.

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Paul says regarding Christ, whom God set forth publicly as a propitiation.

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The writer of Hebrews says it this way, Christ had to be made like His brethren in all things,

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that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God to

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make propitiation for the sins of the people.

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So the cross of Jesus Christ signifies not only a transaction that's accomplished, the

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price has been paid, but justice that's been satisfied.

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And finally, the cross of Jesus Christ signifies a separation that has been bridged.

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Sin is a great separator.

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It alienates us from God.

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It alienates us from one another.

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It alienates us from the creation of God around us.

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Sin is a great separator.

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Through the death of His Son, God has provided that that separation could be bridged.

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He has made it possible for us to be saved by the death of His Son.

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What Jesus did on the cross provides the answer and the only answer to the alienation that

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exists between God, our Creator, and we as creation fallen in sin.

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Paul says it this way in 2 Corinthians 5 19, Christ, God was in Christ reconciling the

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world to Himself.

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And in Colossians he says, it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell

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in Christ and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself.

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Having made peace through the blood of His cross.

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So when you and I think of the cross, we see the legal work of the cross.

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The legal work of the cross, it is a business transaction where the price is paid for a

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slave that he might be purchased and set free.

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It is a legal judicial transaction where the price of justice has been satisfied so that

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the law breaker, the criminal, can be set free from his penalty.

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It is a personal transaction.

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For by the death of Jesus Christ, the relationship between the sinner and God is regulated and

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there is the possibility of peace.

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If we observe this Good Friday merely for its facts, its history, and we miss the personal

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meaning of it, then we have lost the heart of what it is all about.

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The meaning of Good Friday is that Jesus died for us.

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Rembrandt apparently understood this truth.

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One of his great paintings is that of the crucifixion.

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As you look at the painting, first your attention is drawn to the dying Savior in the middle

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of the picture.

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And then you see the crowd around Him there at the cross with various attitudes and actions

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as they were putting Him to death.

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But finally your eyes stray to the side of this painting and there in the shadow you

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see a painting of Rembrandt himself.

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He put himself in the painting as he recognized that his sins had helped to nail Jesus to

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the cross.

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Friend the cross stands for one who loved enough to give his life for others.

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And it stands as a testimony that there are those who have been loved enough to have another

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pay that price for them.

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How do we respond to that love?

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Faith, love, devotion is the only proper response.

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Giving our hearts to Jesus Christ, repenting of our sin, and trusting Him alone as our

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Savior.

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But as we recall His death today, as we remember the cross, let us remember that when He died

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and gave up His Spirit, it was not resignation, it was not defeat, but it was victory.

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A victory that He proved three days later.

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He said the Son of Man must suffer, must be put to death, and must rise again on the third

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day.