One way Christians have remembered the day Jesus was crucified—traditionally known as Good Friday—has been to meditate on the Lord’s last words spoken from the cross. Preachers have traditionally identified seven such words. Taken together, they can help you think more deeply about the work our Lord was sent to do.
To begin, His first word was a prayer.
When they arrived at the place called The Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals, one on the right and one on the left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, because they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided his clothes and cast lots (Luke 23:33-34).
What was happening was an act of gross injustice. Yet, Jesus did not cry out for revenge, or curse His crucifiers. Instead, He did what He had commanded His disciples to do, namely, “pray for those who mistreat you” (Luke 6:28). This prayer shows us Jesus’ profound compassion and mercy, even for those who are actively crucifying him. Indeed, that is precisely why He came to die—to save His enemies (cf. Rom 5:10). As Tony Evans said, “Don’t miss that even as he was being tortured to death, Jesus remembered the purpose for which he came—to open the door of divine forgiveness for all who would receive him” (Tony Evans Bible Commentary, p. 1011).
The Gospels tell us that the Lord was crucified between two thieves, one of whom ridiculed Jesus’ claims to be the Messiah. But the other man slowly came to a different conclusion:
“Then one of the criminals hanging there began to yell insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”
But the other answered, rebuking him: “Don’t you even fear God, since you are undergoing the same punishment? We are punished justly, because we’re getting back what we deserve for the things we did, but this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom” (Luke 23:39-42).
That condemned man had no works of righteousness to offer for his salvation. On the contrary, he realized that he was guilty and getting exactly what he deserved. He also believed that Jesus was not only innocent, but the Messiah, and asked the Lord to remember him in the kingdom.
Thus, the Lord’s second word was a promise.
And he said to him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).
Do you remember the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector (Luke 18:9-14)? In that story, a sinful man went to pray in the temple, and instead of boasting about his righteousness, he prayed, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner!” Jesus said that man “went down to his house justified.” Isn’t that a picture of the dying thief? With no righteousness to boast of, he asked Jesus to remember him when He came into His kingdom. In other words, he was asking for salvation. And in response, Jesus assured him that he would be in paradise that very day. That promise assures us, too, because the thief on the cross exemplifies that salvation is a merciful and gracious gift, not based on anything we have done but given through simply believing in Jesus, calling on Him to save us (cf. Rom 10:13).
When Jesus was first arrested, most of the twelve apostles abandoned Him, but not everyone. Several of the Lord’s disciples were brave enough to stay by the cross, such as the disciple that Jesus especially loved, traditionally identified as John, and the women closest to Him, including His mother. Mary was probably a widow by that time, which raised the question: who would take care of her after Jesus died?
Hence, Jesus’ third word concerned parentage.
Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple he loved standing there, he said to his mother, “Woman, here is your son.” Then he said to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from that hour the disciple took her into his home (John 19:25-27).
Mary would be an adopted mother to John, and John would be an adopted son to Mary. And from that hour on, John took her into his household. Years later, John would emphasize that all believers are adopted by God: “But to all who did receive him, he gave them the right to be children of God, to those who believe in his name” (John 1:12). Christ’s death created a new family, related, not by their blood, but His blood.
One of the things that makes crucifixion so cruel is that the victim slowly suffocates to death. At first, the arms strain to keep the body upright, but the pressure eventually pops the arms out of the shoulders, forcing the victim to use his chest muscles to keep upright. But the chest can’t bear the weight of the body. The victim can try to push Himself up by the feet to get a breath—but the Romans made sure to nail people by their ankles, making it extremely painful. The longer you stay crucified, the harder it becomes to breathe as your lungs slowly fill up with fluid. That, plus the scourging that Jesus had already experienced, pushed Him to the brink of what the human body can suffer.
No wonder, then, that His fourth word was of pain.
About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Elí, Elí, lemá sabachtháni?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” (Matt 27:46).
Jesus was quoting the opening verse of Psalm 22, a remarkable prophecy that foretold how the Messiah would be mocked (“But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by people”), taunted (“He relies on the Lord; let him save him”), crucified (“they pierced my hands and my feet”), and His clothes divided (“They divided my garments among themselves, and they cast lots for my clothing”).
But amidst all this defeat, Psalm 22 also hinted at a final victory. Though the Person in the Psalm felt abandoned by God and evidently suffers and dies, by the end of it, He stands before God (“I will give praise in the great assembly because of you; I will fulfill my vows before those who fear you”), the kingdom comes, and the whole world is blessed (“All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord. All the families of the nations will bow down before you”). In other words, Psalm 22 teaches that victory would come through suffering. And that is why Jesus died—through shedding His blood, Jesus purchased a people and made them a kingdom (cf. Rev 5:9-10).
But His suffering was terrible, and Christ’s humanity could only bear so much.
Thus, the fifth word was a plea.
After this, when Jesus knew that everything was now finished that the Scripture might be fulfilled, he said, “I’m thirsty.” A jar full of sour wine was sitting there; so they fixed a sponge full of sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it up to his mouth (John 19:28-29).
Although Jesus is the divine Son of God (cf. John 1:1; 20:28), He became flesh, i.e., He was fully human. That means the One who offered living water to believers (cf. John 4), could also thirst for earthly water. And the world would not even give Him that much comfort.
Here again, I think of a parable—the one about the Rich Man and Lazarus. You will remember how the Rich Man found himself being tormented in Hades and cried out for a drop of water to relieve his suffering and was denied it. Likewise, Christ was denied relief in suffering for our sins. But that was the plan all along. Christ became sin for us, “suffered for sins once for all” (1 Peter 3:18). And after hours on the cross, His suffering finally came to an end.
Hence, His sixth word proclaimed the final propitiation.
When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished” (John 19:30a).
That afternoon, the Lord completed the work of being the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, making propitiation for all sin—for yours and for mine (cf. John 1:29; 1 John 2:2). Thanks to His death on the cross, God would be just whenever He justified and forgave all those who believe in His Son (Rom 3:26; 4:4-8).
And with His work done, Christ’s seventh word was about peace.
And Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I entrust my spirit.” Saying this, he breathed his last (Luke 23:46).
Jesus took His last breath, and His soul departed from His body. His corpse would be taken down from the cross, prepared, and placed in Joseph’s tomb. But Jesus’ spirit went elsewhere, descending to the lower parts of the earth (cf. Ephesians 4:9)—He “descended to the dead” as the Apostles’ Creed says—where He preached to the spirits in prison (cf. 1 Peter 3:19). But He wouldn’t stay there. Soon His spirit would be reunited with His body in glorious resurrection, never to die again.
That is enormously comforting because Jesus promised that all who believe in Him would experience that resurrection, too (cf. John 11:25-26). That means, when our time comes, we can die in peace, trusting our spirits to the Father, who will welcome us, just as He welcomed His Son because that is who we belong to (cf. 1 Cor 3:23).
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