Death of Christ

Did Christ merely suffer in His death? Was His own agency not concerned in it? Then, was He not a Priest on Calvary, but merely a Lamb? If so, the question at once arises, “Who offered up this Lamb of God, the eternal Son of God, a sacrifice upon the cross?” Either the Father or the Spirit was the Priest, neither of Whom was ever “taken from among men” or “ordained for men…that he may offer” (Heb 5:1); or there was no Priest. For assuredly no creature could be admitted to the honour of offering up the only begotten of the Father. In any case, in this view, Christ’s death occurred outside His Priesthood. If that is true, His death can be nothing to us.

I refuse to believe in the cross of Christ as a mere passive endurance. And I refuse to discuss the doctrine of His death under any such restriction of its marvelous, [singular], and transcendent glory. I deny that His God-glorifying agency was overborne before He died, leaving Him a mere victim to causes and means of death, aside from His own active will and power offering Him to God. I deny that on His cross all His duty turned at last into patience and became negation. It was His duty to die, and He discharged His duty…Christ acted in dying. It was His duty to die—His official duty. Official action was in it: priestly agency. He dismissed His Spirit (Joh 19:30). He “gave himself ” (Gal 1:4; 2:20; Eph 5:25; 1Ti 2:6; Ti 2:14). Herein is His love: herein also is His power—herein the triumph and transcendent glory of His victory over death. He is an unquelled,[69] unconquered, conquering agent in offering Himself up to God.