And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise. And it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. And the sun was darkened, and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having said thus, he gave up the ghost. (Luke 23:43-46 KJV)

The first two crosses were represented as how we respond to God when He would call us to come home. We may seem to settle here for good, but when we think about it that our own life has very limited lifespan. As we will get older, we will loose sight and eating habit, and become disabled (see Power of Disability Series). So, we can conclude that our earthly home is not eternal living settlement. However, our earthly life is depending on which place that we would be living eternally—Hell or Heaven.

Without understanding of third cross, we would become useless for the Kingdom of Heaven . This final cross explains why Jesus had to die for our sins and resurrected on the third day. Some philosophers may think Jesus didn’t die, but faking it. If that was true, then why apostles were shocked when they saw the empty tomb?

Jesus died to redeem our sins. He had conquered the darkness of sins for us, so that we may become children of God. He resurrected on the third day, so that He can live in us. The Bible tell us if we repent our sin and believe that God raised His Son from the dead, we shall be saved. This means that God doesn’t remember all our sins more, unless we would bring up back to Him, and can access to Him.

As we see Luke 23, Jesus saved the second man from going to Hell, because he reasoned why he and his partner had to die. If there is a man who would be willing to die for his wrongdoing, God would probably change His mind to punish him. Instead, He would bring him to His home as what the father had done to his prodigal son did (Luke 15).

Are you saved by the grace of God? If you are not saved but want to be saved, I’d like to invite you to know Jesus Christ today. Only Jesus Christ can save you from the darkness of sins. Freemasonry, Islam, or Roman Catholicism or any Christian denomination churches cannot save you, except through Jesus Christ. He is the Redeemer who has conquered Satan and has a key to Hell. He is Christ the Messiah who will come to the earth as King of kings and Lord of lords. There is no other substitution to enter the Kingdom of Heaven , except through Jesus Christ.

And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. (Luke 23:39 KJV)

Before Jesus died on the Cross, there were two other men hanged beside with Him—one man with anger issue and another with calm and peace. Although the Bible does not mention why these two men were captured by Roman soldiers, we are all guilty as these two men to turn our ways from God.

We were once rebelled against God just a man in Luke 23:39. Romans 3:10-12 says, “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.” We were once become a children of Satan who decided to refuse all the goodness of God. See what this first man say to Jesus. He didn’t have idea who Jesus was. Next week, we will look the second man on the cross.

Look around our community today and try identify ourselves the changes over the years which we have made. You may have begun your life journey without Jesus Christ. Or you may have decided to let Jesus go in your life since you were 16; and now, you want Jesus to return to in your life. It’s hard to continue our life journey without Jesus Christ. We all have experienced to rebel against God and it’s not go away easy. We cannot stop to make mistakes, because Satan is still trying to come into our lives and destroy our relationship with Jesus Christ.

But we can stop of being friends of rebellion with Satan. We have the power to destroy Satan’s plan if we decide to come and realize that we need our personal Savior, Jesus Christ. Jesus said in John 10:10, “The thief [Satan] cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.”

The three crosses were not just crosses for capital punishment, but they represent why Jesus had to die for us. One of the crosses was for those who rebel again God.

We can never fathom the agony in Gethsemane , but at least we need not misunderstand it. It is the agony of God and Man in one, face to face with sin. We know nothing about Gethsemane in personal experience. Gethsemane and Calvary stand for something unique; they are the gateway into Life for us.

It was not the death on the cross that Jesus feared in Gethsemane ; He stated most emphatically that He came on purpose to die. In Gethsemane He feared lest He might not get through as Son of Man. He would get through as Son of God - Satan could not touch Him there; but Satan's onslaught was that He would get through as an isolated Figure only; and that would mean that He could be no Saviour. Read the record of the agony in the light of the temptation: "Then the devil leaveth Him for a season." In Gethsemane Satan came back and was again overthrown. Satan's final onslaught against our Lord as Son of Man is in Gethsemane .