Eberhard Arnold

Why Did Jesus Die?

[Arnold, Eberhard and Emmy papers – A.D.]

[Draft Translation by Bruderhof Historical Archive]

EA 12/10

Halle A.P. 23 Feb, 1912

I

Why Did Jesus Die?

A. We can only see clearly why Jesus died when we realize what He lived for. For His death is nothing but the necessary culmination of His life, the crown of His endeavor.

Jesus lived and worked in order to make the living God known. Through His life He proved God to be God as love, God as power, God as Spirit.

What He wanted, what He lived for, is the lordship of this God, His sovereignty both over the earth and over human beings. He proved by His life that God must have dominion over the Spirit of Darkness, over disease and death, and over sin and evil. He gave proof of himself, as the Son of God as victor over dark spirits, as victor over disease and death as well as over sin and evil.

God's sovereignty was incarnate in Him personally. Here lies the basic reason of the conflict, and why Jesus had to die: a humankind bound by sin, fettered by evil, could not endure letting this Witness live. A world ruled by the spirit of disobedience and death could only be stirred up to cry out once more, "We will not have this man to reign over us!" (Luke19:14b RSV).

If He went straight forward on the way, if He remained in the God who had sent Him, He had to be ready to dare to the utmost, to go to the extreme limit. "My food is to do the will of Him who sent me, and to accomplish His work" (John 4:34 RSV).

The Greatest Deed in History

Pages 7-12

Dessau, May 1, 1911

Jesus revealed the name, the character, of the Father. He made His being fully and truly known: so that He was able to say at the end of His life, "I have glorified Thy name on earth." Now we know God in His love and power. "He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, will he not also give us all things with him?"(Rom.8:32 RSV).

ROMANS 5:6-10 Have the red Elberfeld Bible open.

While we were yet helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. Why, one will hardly die for a righteous man – though perhaps for a good man one will dare even to die. But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we are now justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life (Romans 5:6-10 RSV).

In that Jesus glorified God as He did, He was himself made known and glorified on the Cross.

"Glorify Thy Son that the Son may glorify thee."

"I have accomplished the work that thou gavest me to do.

Now, glorify thou me in Thyself!"

"When you have lifted up the Son of man, you will know that I am he!"

"The Good Shepherd gives his life!"

Thus, in this way, we recognize why Jesus died:

I. Because God loves us and has to overcome us as His enemies, as quoted above in Romans 5:6-10.

"I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Gal. 2:20b)

He reconciled through the Cross with God, after he had killed hostility through the same and proclaimed peace. For through Him we have access to the Father (Eph.2:16 free).

II Because God condemns sin, and has to judge and overcome it in man. "The death he died he died to sin, once for all" (Rom. 6:10a).

"The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

"Christ died for our sins."

"Christ ransomed us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse for us" (Gal.3:13).

"He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness" (1 Peter 2:24).

[2 COR-5:20, 21 ELBERFELD BIBLE – EA's note]

So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor.5:20,21 RSV).

III. Because God wanted to bring about a pure way for return and forgiveness, "he gave himself for us to ransom us from all lawlessness, and purified for himself a people of his own." My body for you! My blood for you. Also as our Pascal lamb: Christ slain.

ROMANS 6:3-11 ELBERFELD BIBLE

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the sinful body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. For he who has died is freed from sin. But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. For we know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him. The death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Romans 6:3-11 RSV).

IV. Because God wanted, as victor, to win the earth and men from Satan.

Christ gave himself up for our sins, in order to bring us out of this evil world according to the will of our God and Father.

You have been bought at a price! . . . That He might give His life as a ransom for many. "You do not belong to yourselves." Glorify God with your body and your spirit!

"To this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living" (Romans 14:9).

"For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died."

"He died for all, that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised" (2 Cor. 5: 14, 15).

COLOSSIANS 1:19, 20 ELBERFELD BIBLE

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross (Colossians 1: 19, 20).

Thus the word of the Cross is to us the power of God!

"The power of God and the wisdom of God" (1 Cor.1:24).

Witness of power!