A man can tell a lot about how valuable something is based on how much he’s willing to pay for it.
I still remember standing at the glass counter of The Diamond Gallery picking out an engagement ring for my wife.
I was in over my head, and I knew it.
(So did the salesman.)
I found the ring my fiancée had fawned over and tried to pretend there was a world in which I wasn’t leaving with that ring in hand.
I worked up the courage to look at the price tag, and my heart nearly stopped. It was a small fortune. I slowly handed over most of the money to my name after a wasted hour of negotiations.
Why?
Because next to the decision to turn my life over to Jesus, this was the most important choice I’d ever made. And next to Him, this was the most important person in my life.
A man can tell a lot about how valuable something is based on how much he’s willing to pay for it.
As men, we know what it feels like to chase after and sacrifice for someone who means the world to us.
Every Good Friday, I think about this truth.
I think about what Jesus was willing to endure to ransom us from the clutches of the enemy, and it moves me—often to tears.
Ransom means to buy back, or pay the price to set free.
This is exactly what Jesus did for you and me.
The Gospels tell us that Jesus sweated blood in the Garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:44). It’s a condition called hematidrosis, in which inhuman levels of stress cause the blood vessels in your skin to burst, mixing blood with sweat and causing it to leak from your pores.
Just imagine the anguish He was feeling.
They tell us Jesus was struck with fists and staffs, mocked, spit on, and ridiculed, then He was crowned with a crown of inch-long thorns pressed deep into His skin (Matthew 27:27-31). He was flogged with a whip called the “cat of nine tails,” bringing Him within an inch of His life (Mark 15:15), then forced to carry a 200-pound crossbeam for miles before they would hang Him on it (John 19:16-18).
Crucifixion was a slow death of suffocation, where the extended stretching out of your arms put pressure on your lungs, making it hard to breathe. Eventually, you could no longer pull yourself up on the nails in your feet or in your wrists to catch your breath, because it was either too excruciating or you were too exhausted.
Add to that the weight of the sin of humankind on your shoulders and the separation from your heavenly Father for the first time in history, and you get a glimpse of what the Cross was like for Jesus.
Every Good Friday, I think about this picture. I can’t escape it.
Every year, it reminds me of just how much Jesus loves me. That is what Jesus was willing to endure to rescue us, and it forms three incredibly important reminders that men need to hear as we prepare our hearts for this weekend.
First, if you’re ever wondering if you are loved, cared for, or valuable, remember the Cross.
The statement that “God loves you” stands on its own, but the Cross is what that love looks like in vivid detail (1 John 3:16), and it helps me cross the distance from my head to my heart.
If you’ve ever felt unloved or devalued, or if you’ve ever felt alone in this cold and hard world, think on the Cross. It is a stake in the ground that will forever remind you that you are loved, cared for, and, because of God’s great love for you, valued (John 3:16).
Remember, how much you are willing to pay for something reveals how valuable it is to you—and you were valuable enough for Jesus to endure all of this Himself.
This world will isolate you, break you down, separate you from those who care for you, and the enemy will try to make you think you are alone—but the Cross proves you aren’t!
And never will be.
So many men are lonely and suffering in silence these days. They feel discarded by a world that doesn’t care about them anymore, and unvalued for what they have to offer.
But the Cross proves you are worth more than you could possibly imagine to the God who made you, and there is nothing He wouldn’t do to get you back.
You are loved and valued, full stop.
Second, if you are ever struggling to find the motivation to cut sin out of your life, remember the Cross.
Remember the great lengths Jesus was willing to go to set you free from the sin that held you in chains. What if sin wasn’t just “one more website” or just “one night of bad decisions?”
What if these things were actually matters of life and death?
Sin isn’t child’s play; it is a death sentence that someone else had to pay for you. It was God’s great love and unfathomable mercy that put Jesus in our place that we might walk free (Galatians 5:1).
This picture adds gravity to the dangers and effects of sin. Sin is measured in blood, sweat, and tears. Because Jesus took our place and broke those chains that held us down, you can be free from the sin in your life!
Sin isn’t just child’s play; it is a death sentence that someone else had to pay for you.
Why not start today? Because of the Cross, you can be free!
Finally, the Cross marks the end of a man’s old life and the beginning of his new life (2 Corinthians 5:17).
The Cross is only the first half of the Easter story, and it is the first half of your salvation story.
Three days later, Jesus rose again and walked right out the front door of the tomb that held Him (Acts 2:24).
He invites you to join Him in this thing called “the resurrection life.” You have no idea the kind of man you could be if you let this resurrection life of Jesus loose in your life! It would literally transform you into someone entirely new.
A man can tell a lot about how valuable something is based on how much he’s willing to pay for it—and the Cross shows us the value that God places on us and the work that God wants to do in us.
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