John 19:1-24

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✠ In the name of Jesus ✠

    Our God is a God with skin.  The Lord Jesus, true God, took upon Himself real flesh and blood, body and soul, and became true man.  He is covered with skin.  Skin clothes our bodies, yet we usually also cover up most of our skin with clothing.  This is to protect it from the sun or from the cold weather.  But we also cover our skin to cover our shame.  In the beginning, man’s skin was uncovered.  Genesis 2 says that Adam and Eve were naked and that were not ashamed.

    But you know what happened.  They fell into sin, and immediately Scripture says that they saw that they were naked.  Their eyes, which had been directed upward to God in faith and outward to one another in perfect sinless love, now were turned in on themselves.  They became self-preoccupied and self-absorbed.  That’s one way of understanding what sin is; it’s when your humanity is distorted and bent and curved in on yourself.  

    Having lost their humanity, with the image of God broken in them, our first parents sought to cover their shame with flimsy fig leaves.  We too try to keep the truth of our sin and shame from being exposed by doing our best to cover it up and hide it, or to justify it and rationalize it.  But such fig leaves don’t work too well.  They’re not a good or lasting solution.  They cannot truly hide sin and shame.

    And so according to Genesis 3, God covered Adam and Eve with skins.  The first real item in their wardrobe came from the death of an animal or perhaps several animals.  Their sin had brought death into the world, not only to themselves, but to all creation.  Their nakedness would be covered at the cost of an even deeper nakedness.  For what could be more exposed than an animal stripped of its skin? And so the first death, the first bloodshed, happened at the hands of the Creator Himself, to grant to these rebellious human beings the luxury of hiding their sin and shame behind the innocence of another creature.null

    You cannot truly hide your own sin.  Sin can only be covered with skin.  No one knows for sure what type of animal it was in the garden from which God peeled its innocent hide in order to hide the exposed and vulnerable parts of Adam and his wife.  But considering what was later used on Passover and in the tabernacle and the temple, it's not unreasonable to suspect that the first animal to die was a sheep, a lamb.

    "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world," John the Baptist declared of Jesus (John 1:29).  Behold in Jesus the fulfillment of every lamb with its throat slit to render it a sacrifice in the temple. Behold in Jesus the fulfillment of every Passover lamb roasted and completely consumed the night before God brought His people out of slavery.  Behold, the Lamb who is a man, and the man who is God.  Behold the God who literally has skin in the game.

    Jesus was scourged by the Roman soldiers with a whip called a flagrum.  It was designed to shred the skin from the back of the one being whipped, tearing away flesh so deeply that the internal organs are nearly exposed.  In order to rescue us from our shame and cover the nakedness of our exposed sin, Jesus is not only stripped of His clothing, but even His skin is torn open.  Jesus is utterly uncovered on the cross, and the soldiers cast lots for His clothing.  All He wears is the crown of thorns that were mockingly pressed into His head.  Thorns were part of the curse on Adam and Eve in the beginning.  Now that’s what Jesus wears, for He bears the curse for us to break its power over us.  Behold the God with skin, God made naked, now clothed only in the mockery of sinful men.

    This event not only exposes Jesus to shame, above all it uncovers and reveals His great mercy toward you.  It lays bare His sacrificial love for you.  Jesus’ garment is seamless and perfect.  This garment is taken off of Him so that it may be placed on you, so that you may be covered with His perfect righteousness and enveloped with His full and free forgiveness.  

    Behold the man who willingly bears your sin and shame.  Behold the man who suffers in your place without complaint.  Behold the man whose nakedness answers for Adam’s, and for yours.  Behold the man with nothing to hide, with no sin of His own to cover up.  He is stripped bare to bear all of your sins, and especially to take away the ones that cause you the greatest shame.  All of them hang there on the cross with this man, this God, Jesus, naked and dying for you.

    Baptized into Christ, you now have new skin.  Behold the man who dresses you in His own holiness, who gives you Himself to wear.  For it is written, “as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.”  Behold the man who was sacrificed for you sons of Adam and daughters of Eve, who covers you with His own skin.  Gladly wear His garment of righteousness and peace, knowing that you are dear children of God.  For in Christ, your sin has been removed, and your shame is gone.

✠ In the name of Jesus ✠