Adrian
Old-Sunday Worship March 22nd, 2026
- Bless His Holy Name
- How Deep The Father's Love For Us
Romans 8:1–11ESV
Romans 8:1–11ESV
- Give Thanks
- Doxology
Luke 23:12–34ESV
- “Two Thieves, One Savior”K. Adrian ScottMarch 22, 2026Contextual Introduction.Luke 23 encompasses the eyewitness account of the arrest, trial and ultimate death or crucifixion of God’s sacrificial Lam and the world’s Savior, Jesus the Christ. Our text describes an awful and dreadful day when one of the most heinous miscarriages of justice was carried out, not in secret, but in full public view.It is a day that has gone down in human history for what was done to the accused from the beginning, an illegal trial; how the accosted Lord Jesus was publicly and cruelly shamed, flogged and callously hung on a Roman crucifix. But on a positive note, this day is historically noteworthy because of what was accomplished, not by Rome, but by the divine providence of God the Father, a sacrifice of inestimable and unimaginable proportion, so magnanimous (‘forgiving in spirit’) it would revolutionize the religious society of that day, and it would also change the course of religion universally and for all time. This event, though done with great malice and contempt, was the much-prophesied sacrificial death of God’s one and only Son, which constituted the full and complete payment for all sin for all time - “The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1.29).Speaking of costs, the building of the Brandeburg Airport in Berlin, Germany began in 2006 with the expected date of completion in 2011. It was estimated the cost of building the Brandenburg Airport in Berlin, Germany would total 2.8 billion euros when completed. However, it was not completed until 2020, nine years later than they originally projected it would be completed and at the final cost was 7 billion euros! Over $ billion dollars more than they initially estimated. Then Canada’s Montreal Olympic Stadium project was estimated to cost a mere $134 million Canadian dollars in 1976, however at its completion in 1987, 11 years after it was projected to be completed, the total cost was $1.1 billion Canadian dollars. And finally, New York’s MTA East Side Access Project, a mere mile long addition to their subway system, was estimated to cost $3.5 billion US dollars, but at its completion the cost totaled $11.7 billion US dollars, or $1 million dollars per foot!I noticed in our text that there was no such miscalculation regarding the cost of paying for humanity’s debt for sin. God the Father asked for no time extensions, and there was also no cost overrun or divine delays in keeping Jesus on time and getting Jesus to the cross of Calvary - “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly" (Romans 5.6).Every adherent to the religion of Judaism, so steeped in a system of substitutionary sacrificial atonement, will one day, some sooner and some later, be able to identify with this sacrifice, when a tree became a Roman crucifix and at the same time an altar of sacrifice! This sacrifice this day was not a lamb but a man, one equally innocent as a young lamb, and selected by the Father to die for the transgressions of others who were not innocent.At the crucifixion scene there is great hostility toward Jesus. In the mixed crowd of the religious and the profane, government leaders and common Roman citizens, soldiers and civic employees. A multitude cried out for Jesus to be put to death. “Crucify him” they cried out to the authorities concerning Jesus, while at the same time they cried out, “release him” referring to a known criminal named Barabbas who had been previously tried and convicted and did not believe in his own innocence.What a backwards world. The crowd desperately and overwhelmingly wanted the known criminal to be released, and the man known for His innocence and good works among the people to be crucified!The Text; Telling the Story.v. 33; And when they came to the place that is called ‘the skull’, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, the one on his right and the other on His left.”Note: No matter what our circumstances are, there are benefits to being close to where Jesus is! Also notice, each criminal had equal access to Jesus - ‘one on His right and the other on His left! There is no discrimination or favoritism here!Now, despite a lack of evidence or verifiable proof of guilt, the persons in charge did the unthinkable, they crucified Jesus the Christ. Well, I guess we are justified in being leery of putting all our confidence in a system of justice because sometimes they can also be a system of injustice! In the case of Jesus Christ, that is exactly what has happened. Here is the cold, calculating heart of the officials in murdering the Lord of glory. Everyone ever opposed to Christ, or whoever rejected Him, wre once counted among that crowd on that day. It was me who wouldn’t listen to or hear the evidence of the beauty of Jesus even as I sat in a church, completely indifferent to the claims of Christ, even aftre having witnessed His compassion on the hurting the marginalized. Sadly, I was once among those officials and so were you. I did not want Jesus to interfere with my life, my plans and ambitions, not knowing that without Him none of those plans or ambitions would ever materialize.v. 34; “And Jesus said, Father, forgive them.”Preaching Point.Notice the first response of Christ to His enemies was not to curse them as they did Him, not to threaten them or strike them down with a terrible illness, because certainly the Lord had the power to do so. Instead, Jesus chose to pray for them, that He would be their sin-bearer also, and that the heaviness of their wicked sin be placed on His shoulders and not theirs - “Father, forgive them”. Jesus prayed for their forgiveness; that the magnitude of their sin would be swallowed up by the wideness of God’s capacity to forgive! This is another revelation of the nature of Christ and His godliness, and that is to pray for or” bless those who curse you.” Jesus here is the model Christian, and He could not teach His disciples to “love their enemies” if He, the Christ, could not love His enemies, or to “pray for those who persecute you” if He, Jesus did not do the same.v. 37; “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!”“Save yourself” was their demand, but this was not the mission of the Messiah! It wasn’t that Jesus could not, but He chose not to save Himself at the expense of everyone else! He was mockingly accused of not being capable of saving Himself, but the absurdity of that claim is, Jesus did ot want to be saved from the horrors of the cross, but instead, He wanted to fulfill the will of the Father - “Father, not my will, but yours be done” (Luke 22.42).Wicked people who are incapable o saving themselves unknowingly are rejecting the only possible payment for sin, that is, God’s one and only Son! Here, God the Father through Jesus the Son is doing something no woman or man, no boy or girl can do – save ourselves!Jesus surely could have come down from the cross, and in effect, save Himself, but who then would have saved you and me? He could have shaken the very foundation of the earth until every edifice was reduced to rubbish. Jesus could have dismissed the seas and oceans, the rivers and lakes, flooding the entire earth with water. But He chose not to. He could have called legions of angels to His rescue and charged them to slay the scoffing multitudes who made light of His piety and laughed at His naked shame, but Jesus did not. It is not outside the realm of one’s imagination that Jesus could have gone back to the glories of heaven and solely enjoyed the fellowship with the Father as He had enjoyed from all eternity, but He did not. Instead, Jesus chose to tell His mighty angels to stand down; the oceans and the seas to stay calm; and the earth to not quake. He chose to tell the multitude of angelic beings who would have instantly responded to Christ’s call to action, to watch in silence while He stayed on the cross and saved you and me! Jesus chose to forgive them!Question. What if Jesus had not prayed that prayer of forgiveness?v.38; “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!”One of the two criminals is defiant to the bitter end. As John Gill says and I paraphrase, ‘perhaps if in joining with the persecutors of Jesus, the criminal soon to be dead is interested in the favor for man rather than the favor of God.’ That is possible.Preaching Point #2.Maybe he thinks if he joins with Jesus’ detractors, they will reduce his sentence and spare his life. That is a possibility also, but we do not know that to be true. He says something interesting, however. He says, ‘save us too.’ He is not fully convinced Jesus is who Jesus says He is but, perhaps this statement is the criminal’s attempt to play it safe just in case Jesus is who He says He is! But we know we cannot have it both ways. There is a decision that everyone needs to make concerning Christ - “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he” Matthew 22. 42. Either a person is ‘for’ Christ or ‘against’ Him.Another problem with this “save us” request; no matter how sincere or insincere it may be, we must all answer for ourselves. We cannot repent for someone else! This dubious prayer is not a prayer of saving faith. But here is another example of the grace of Christ – the longer Jesus suffers on the cross the more time this criminal and all other unbelievers have to repent!v. 40-41; “But the other rebuked him, saying, ‘do you not fear God, … since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due record for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.”The second thief sees himself as guilty. He is focused on himself, his guilt, his shame, and his need for forgiveness. He offers no excuse but accepts his lot as guilty before the state and guilty before the eyes of God. He knows he is condemned to death, no less, by the Law, and is receiving what he deserves, yet he had an audience with the sinless One. He compares his life of crime with the giving, sacrificial life of Christ, who went about only doing good, going about His missions of mercy when he would heal the sick and help the helpless. At the transfiguration of Jesus, God the Father said of His Son Jesus, “this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 17.5). The character of Jesus was so holy that in a moment o honesty even a criminal says, “This man has done nothing wrong.”v. 41; “And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds.”The second of the two criminals is sorrowful; he is repentant. His confession is late in life, but not too late! What time is it? What time is it? The hands on the clock of life are ticking! One day the bell will toll. One day, the watch keeper will say to us all, “time will be no more!”Preaching Point.This man, broken, and whose life is in shambles; once distant from God, but by God’s providence is near to Christ now! He saw Jesus, the One hanging next to him on another cross, as God’s Son crucified for him and even those who were crucifying Him. Recognizing his gracious opportunity he dared to say,v. 42; “Jeus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”Whether he was in the same courtroom as Jesus and heard silence when it was time for court evidence to be presented about Jesus, we do not know We suppose he witnessed Jesus being beaten unjustly, yet gracefully, and he no doubt heard the slurs and hat speech directed at the Lord. And even as they walked up Golgotha’s hill, Jesus walked up that road of agony in silence. This man witnessed the love of God that endured hatred and Christ’s compassion in the face of hate.Preaching Point #5.But once on the cross he saw something he would never forget; this criminal saw mercy under scrutiny and grace under pressure! He saw love, God’s love, offered to the unlovable, and hope of reconciliation offered to the estranged. At that moment something inside of his heart and consciousness changed. The scales that had blinded him from seeing the Savior all his life, fell off, and he saw things he had never seen before. He saw the beauty of Jesus in all his glory compared to the stark evidence of humankind’s appetite for evil in all its ugliness.Note: God’s sovereign, providential grace is never too late! As long as there is life, there is hope!“Remember me” the man said. He recognized Jesus as the ‘door” to eternal forgiveness. He recognized Jesus as he only one who can save him from the miseries of a future separated from God! “Remember me”, he said.v. 43; “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.”Where Christ goes, he would go, today. Because the criminal will exit the earth today, because he will close his eyes in time but will open them in eternity! He will fall asleep ‘in’ Jesus and awaken ‘with’ Jesus! His reservation has been confirmed because it has been paid for! The receipt will be provided in just a few days when Christ resurrects from Joseph’s new tomb.“I say” means it is the voice of authority that is making this promise! Jesus said it, and the repentant criminal can believe it. Spiritual regeneration is such a simple process, yet it is profound.Here is a changed life; changed even while hanging on a cross! If you do not know Jesus, if is not too late. This man’s life was changed even in the face of prosecution for evil. The thief is not a former unbeliever. The criminal is a saint! The condemned is now forgiven and the spiritually dead has been raised to new life!Proposition.Friends, that man hanging on the cross is also you and me. We, like him, we distant from God, aliens to Christ’s righteousness and spiritually we were condemned, good as dead. Not dead by the law of mankind, but dead by the law of God. We were like him, fully and justly deserving death and eternal separation fro our holy God.The thief does not get the punishment he deserves, but instead he is given mercy, where God held His anger and made room of r grace, the unmerited favor of God.God’s mission of reconciliation is accomplished. It i not too late; the man is saved and rescued from a Christ-less eternity.The Close.Having seen Jesus’ on the cross today, are you also ready to say, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Luke 23:12–34ESV
John 1:29ESV
Romans 5:6ESV
Luke 23:33ESV
Luke 23:34ESV
Luke 23:37ESV
Luke 22:42ESV
Luke 23:38ESV
Matthew 22:42ESV
Luke 23:40–41ESV
Matthew 17:5ESV
Luke 23:41ESV
Luke 23:42ESV
Luke 23:43ESV
Luke 23:42ESV
Luke 23:42ESV
1 John 2:1ESV
Isaiah 55:6–7ESV
- Amazing Grace
Adrian
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