This week’s Bible study was entitled “Jesus as King” and focused on
Luke 23. The reason that the church studied that topic this particular
week is that next Sunday is Christ the King Sunday. Here are some items:
A. Even at his crucifixion, Jesus was king. Jesus did not stumble
into his arrest and crucifixion but deliberately and willfully laid down
his life out of love of his Father and us; Jesus was in control of the
situation. At his trial and his crucifixion, Jesus’s enemies spoke the
truth, albeit sarcastically. They sarcastically affirmed that Jesus
saved others and was king of the Jews, so God’s truth was being
proclaimed in this dark time. Jesus on the cross was able to extend
membership in the Kingdom of God, as Jesus did to the malefactor on the
cross. According to Luke, the Kingdom is wherever Jesus is, for, in
Jesus, the Kingdom of God is in people’s midst (Luke 17:21). The Kingdom
was present even when Jesus was on the cross. The pastor speculated
that this may be why Matthew and Mark specify that one malefactor was on
Jesus’s right and another on his left (Matthew 27:38; Mark 15:27; see
Luke 23:33): it is a reference to someone sitting at Jesus’s right and
left hands in his Kingdom (Matthew 20:20-23; Mark 10:35-40).
B. Jesus told the malefactor on the cross, “Today you shall be with
me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). There is, of course, the view that the
malefactor went to heaven that very day and was with Jesus. The pastor,
however, went through a more spiritual interpretation of Jesus’s
statement. The malefactor’s confession of faith (however incomplete),
Jesus’s word of assurance to him, and the presence of Jesus with the
malefactor made the malefactor a Christian, and, due to that, the
malefactor became part of the new creation, paradise, the Eden that
Jesus was restoring in himself. Jesus said “Today” because that term has
salvific import in the Bible: today is the day of salvation (II
Corinthians 6:2; Isaiah 49:8).