He saved others, not himself
Hey savvy news reader! Thanks for choosing local.
You are now reading
1 of 3 free articles.
Editor,
Honest confessions don’t come easy. When the chief priests and scribes, those religious leaders and doctors of divinity of Jesus’ day had succeeded in nailing him to the cross, they gloated, “He saved others; Himself he cannot save” (Mark 15:31). That mocking confession unmasked a despicable hypocrisy. Those jealous pretenders had insisted that Jesus’ miracles were a fraud, that He was demon possessed and that all of his supernatural cures were the work of Beelzebub, the devil (John 8:48; Matthew 12:24). No sooner had they accomplished their sinister plot to have Jesus put to death, they confessed what they had known all along, “he saved others.” Hypocritical jealousy of prestige or position may be the most common sin among us. Those temple dignitaries could not stand to have the people pursue someone other than themselves.
Unknown to those joking, jealous, jeering, religious elite, they were confessing the foundational principle of redemption; “He saved others; Himself he cannot save.” If he had saved himself (which he certainly could have done) he could not have saved others. They supposed that his inability to save himself proved that he could not be the Savior of others, whereas the very opposite was the case. His ability to become the Savior of others required that he not save himself. Jesus walked the talk, he practiced what he preached; “I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels, a plentiful harvest of new lives” (John 12:24 NLT). By his death, many, many, now live.
Those spiteful, sneering crucifiers confessed the true meaning of Jesus’ life and death, “He saved others.” Oh, yes he has — millions. It was in order to save that he lived, died and rose again. He had died to save them too, but by the word “others,” they excluded themselves. It is still true today. The only ones excluded from salvation and eternal life are the self-excluded.
Harvey A. Town
Polson
