On a recent hike through a beautiful Texas State park, as we were walking through a narrow path in a heavily wooded area, a young lady was approaching us from the other direction. Her shirt had a message on the front which said, “The death penalty kills innocent people.”  I know there are Christians on both sides of this issue, and my purpose in sharing this here today is not to enter a political discussion. I know there are people who have been executed for crimes they did not commit, and that is horrific. However, I want to share with you the thought that struck Cheryl and I when we saw that t-shirt. After that that young lady walked away, we were talking about that message on her shirt and we said “You mean like Jesus?”

The Roman government practiced a brutal form of execution known as crucifixion. It was a death penalty. And we know for certain that they executed the only truly innocent person there ever was. They were God’s instrument in carrying out His plan to buy us back from sin and death. God used the death penalty to accomplish our forgiveness, life and salvation.  Paul wrote about it this way:

2 Corinthians 5:17–21 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

“Him who had no sin” – the innocent one – became sin for us, took our punishment, paid our debt, and reconciled us to God. The only truly innocent one that ever lived endured the death penalty so that we might become righteous. God truly makes all things work for our good.