Or, more specifically, for what cosmic reason did Jesus need to die?
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Most people know Jesus is considered an important historical figure and that Christians see him as having accomplished something in the spiritual realm. But it can be difficult to understand why that matters or what it has to do with us individually. But, as I have discovered, many of the symbolisms and parables Jesus lived and told were related to water and boats. Some of these make unseen spiritual concepts easier to understand. The following excerpts from my book, Nautical Allegories of Scripture, provide glimpses of why Jesus’s life matters to us today, hundreds of years after he lived and died on Earth.
Overboard
A boat provides safety, rest from trying to stay afloat, and warmth from the cold. Not that being spiritually lost always involves noticeable discomfort, or that those who find salvation never struggle emotionally. Still, the idea depicts how people immersed in the world often feel waves of emptiness and despair until they catch the life preserver of Christ’s love and come into the refuge of his grace.
But this also helps us understand the significance of Jesus’ death. An important clue leading to this conclusion is in his comparison of it to the story of Jonah. From that connection, we see how he was cast out of God’s favor, as Jonah was from the ship, and allowed himself to be thrown into the cold waters of condemnation. Not that he deserved it, but he accepted it in place of those who do.
He was cast out not only of God’s favor, but of society’s as well. Not as a passenger but as the captain, in a mutiny. And although that kind of thing might typically raise doubts about the effectiveness of management, his life demonstrated his worthiness for leadership in every way.
Being cast out represents God’s judgment on evil, as we see in the parable of the dragnet Jesus told in Matthew 13:
The kingdom of Heaven is like a net cast into the sea that gathered every kind of creature: 48 which, when it was full, they drew up onto the beach and sat down to gather the good into containers and cast the bad out. 49 So it will be at the consummation of the ages: the angels will come forth and separate the wicked from among the righteous. Matthew 13:47-49
This parable links to the comparison of his death to Jonah’s experience, showing how he became an undesirable thing for God to cast out in judgment. “Him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in him,” (2 Corinthians 5:21). Verses about the loss of Pharaoh’s chariots during the Exodus confirm the idea that being cast into the sea is a metaphor for judgment:
You divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of it on dry land; and you cast their pursuers into the depths, like a stone into the mighty waters. Nehemiah 9:11
He has cast pharaoh’s chariots and his host into the sea; his chosen captains sank in the Red Sea. Exodus 15:4
The example Jesus gave in Matthew 18:6 about judgment against those who hurt “little ones” reflects the same theme:
Whoever causes one of these little ones that believe on me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a millstone hung around his neck and be sunk into the depths of the sea. Matthew 18:6
But Micah 7:19 adds a twist to the theme by indicating that God has compassion on us by casting our iniquities into the sea:
You will turn and have compassion on us; you will subdue our iniquities; and you will cast all our sin into the depths of the sea. Micah 7:19
When Jesus died, he allowed himself to be thrown overboard as a substitute for those who deserve judgment. In accepting the penalty of condemnation, he “bore our sins on his own body” (1 Peter 2:24) and carried them into the ocean’s depths. The burdens of the world were heaped on him, like a millstone. When on the Cross, despair and hopelessness flooded his soul as he was being cut off from the Father. Psalm 69, which has several messianic links, portrays his last moments as like being in deep waters:
I have come into deep waters, where floods overflow me. 3 I am weary from crying; my throat is dry, and my eyes fail as I wait for my God.... 15 Let not the flood waters overflow me, neither let the deep swallow me up; and let not the pit shut its mouth on me. Psalm 69:2b, 3, 15
In the Heart of the Earth
People are sometimes puzzled by Jesus’ statement in Matthew 12:40 about being in the heart of the earth for three days and nights as Jonah was in the whale, since he wasn’t in the grave for that long, but the biblical account of Jonah’s experience reveals what he meant. He wasn’t implying he would be in the grave for that long, but was referring to having an experience like Jonah’s.
Since water is a characteristic element of the earth, the idea of Jonah being in the midst of the sea is akin to being in the heart of the earth. Chapter two of his book reflects that concept when it says he “went down to the bottoms of the mountains…” (verse 6). Note how some of the descriptions match the themes of Christ’s suffering we’ve been describing:
I cried out to HWHY in my affliction, and he answered me. Out of the belly of the grave I cried, and you heard my voice. 3 For you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me; waves and billows passed over me. 4 And I said, “I have been cast out of your sight; ...” 5 The waters surrounded me, up to my soul. The deep was around me; weeds were wrapped about my head. 6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains, the bars of the earth closed around me forever, yet you have brought my life up from the pit, Oh HWHY, my God. 7 When my soul fainted within me, I remembered HWHY; and my prayer came unto thee, into thy holy temple. Jonah 2:2-7
In the Bible, water is often figurative of concepts, positive or negative. For example, in Revelation 17:15 it symbolizes people and nations. It can also be associated with trouble, as in Psalm 69. As Jonah was in the water while in the belly of the whale, Jesus was in waters of spiritual trouble when he took the world’s guilt upon himself as the substitutionary sacrifice (1 John 2:2). It started in the Garden of Gethsemane on Thursday night. At that time, he described the feelings that enveloped his soul by saying, “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death…” Matthew 26:38b).
He was arrested soon after, then taken back and forth in a grueling trial that culminated in the scenes of his crucifixion on Friday. It was as if he were swallowed up by the things that were happening to him, cut off from the encouragement of God’s presence, and defenseless from attack. He probably could have compared that chaotic time to feeling as if he were in darkness with seaweed wrapped around his head, as Jonah said.
Earth is the only planet where evil has arisen. Sin originated in Heaven with Lucifer (Ezekiel 28), after which he, and the angels who rebelled with him, were cast to the earth (Revelation 12). Then Adam and Eve joined in the rebellion against God (Genesis 3) by disobeying his instructions, which introduced iniquity into the world. Thus, evil is a representative characteristic of Earth.
So, for Jesus to say he would be “in the heart of the earth” portrays him as being directly exposed to evil during those three days, as he experienced the abusive attitudes of those who crucified him. Throughout his life and ministry, he was loving and kind. Before the days leading up to his crucifixion, he had probably never known abuse or torture.
Since death is isolated to planet Earth, Jesus’ time in the grave was a part of his being “in the heart of the earth.” As for the total count of days, in those times a day and night seemed to be a description of one day. And biblically, each day starts in the evening at sunset (Genesis 1). Also, Jesus would have used inclusive counting, according to the custom of the time, which counts any part of a day as if it were a whole. So, when he was raised just before dawn on Sunday (Luke 24:1), it was within “the third day” of when he began to suffer on Thursday night (Luke 24:21).
But because they counted the days as starting at sunset, his resurrection would have been counted as within three days from his death as well, since Friday would have started on Thursday evening. So, whether you count from the start of his suffering or from when he was laid in the grave, the time starts on Thursday evening when counting days inclusively. That they saw the count as according to their typical way of counting is evident in 1 Corinthians 15:4b, “He was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.”
When Jonah speaks of crying out from the “belly of the grave (Jonah 2:1)” the word is “sheol,” which means the grave, but is sometimes translated as “hell.” What Jesus went through was like hell, in the sense that he died of ultimate separation from God, as those who don’t accept his substitutionary sacrifice on their behalf eventually will (Revelation 21:8). In this way, he tasted death for everyone so that no one needs to experience God’s judgment if they receive what he did for them (Hebrews 2:9).
Redemption Reservoir
As far as why Jesus needed to die, you might be wondering, couldn’t God just let things pass? Well, you know how the saying goes, “easy come, easy go.” Perhaps if we were made to feel there were no consequences, we wouldn’t understand the need to turn away from damaging behaviors and attitudes. If God shrugged his shoulders and said, “it’s okay, I forgive you,” it might seem as if nothing was wrong to begin with.
But evil is a very big problem in the universe and its influence quickly grows into an unstoppable force of destruction. The law of God is the recipe for life and happiness. Turning away from it brings death (Psalm 19:7-14). When it was first broken, the floodgates of sadness and pain were opened to the world.
God sees and measures the collective burden of evil in society and understands the ultimate results. Though he can’t show us everything, he has given one simple illustration: the death of his son, Jesus. Through dying the death of final separation from God, Jesus was showing us what’s at the end of that road, what sin leads to.
We don’t understand how bad it really is because we seldom see how many ripple rings of misery flow out from pursuing our own happiness at the expense of others. We can’t discern how much pain we are causing. It’s like little droplets that look so small and harmless, but when they trickle together, they soon become a roaring torrent of muddy water. Though not every wrong results in death, every step on the downward path leads in that direction, as another drop of rain joining a cascade.
Our natural tendency is downhill. We are drawn to evil as the water to the sea. The sea is like death in that it’s the ultimate destination of water. All the minerals brought into it can never leave, as with the Dead Sea. We can take nothing with us past that point, no matter how enriched we are. Though a part of us lives on in our offspring, like the vapors that arise from the ocean, each generation has but a moment to shine upon the earth, one short course to run.
In dying on the cross, Jesus was stepping in front of a runaway force. By accepting condemnation in place of sinful humanity, or damnation, he laid himself down like a dam to stop us from the downward way toward becoming unpleasant and unpalatable, to keep our spirits fresh. John 15:13 describes the magnitude of his love for us: “No one has greater love than this, than to lay down his life for his friends.”
Jesus let the morbid tidal wave of evil crash upon himself so it wouldn’t wreak havoc downhill. Only the Son of God was a big enough target to take the brunt of that. His death wasn’t merely symbolic. God allowed him to bear the penalty for all wrongs and what they would ultimately lead to.
As Romans 6:23, explains, the “wages of sin is death.” Wages are the payback that comes from something, the natural result. Since the payback in this case is death, it’s a penalty. Those who don’t accept Christ’s sacrifice on their behalf will have to face their own penalty, or payback, for everything wrong they have ever done.
God knows how much pain and suffering have resulted from each wrong act, and how much more would eventually grow out of it. All of that will be considered in determining the penalty that each soul must face. As Jesus indicated in Luke 12:46-48, in the final judgment, people will only suffer according to the wrong they’ve done as well as the level intent or awareness was involved. As with a jury, “justice for the people by the people,” it will all be validated and verified by ordinary people who have lived their lives on Earth (1Corinthians 6:2-3; Revelation 20:4).
The Cross showed us what it will be like if we don’t accept Christ’s substitutionary sacrifice on our behalf. When Jesus was dying of separation from God, his heart was wrung with sorrow as he cried, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Matthew 27:46. This is how everyone who turns from him will eventually feel, both in this life and in the second death, when God cleanses the earth by fire.
Turning from the Creator results in separation from the source of life and happiness. There are no drugs or thrills that can numb the sense of despair that causes. Life comes from God and cutting off that link causes pain, just as lack of oxygen from insufficient blood flow leads to ischemic pain.
But the story of Jesus didn’t end at the Cross. He rose to life and his resurrection was witnessed by many. The matching accounts of the four Gospels are all told a little differently, as to how each of them remembered it, providing strong evidence they didn’t conspire to make up the story. Their willingness to die to proclaim their message also speaks of its truthfulness.
Certainly, if God can create this amazing, complex miracle of life to begin with, he can resurrect it. And if you think about it, being raised from the dead isn’t much more miraculous than being born. The son of God, who took on a human body and then arose after he died, is both human and divine and able to hear everyone’s prayers at the same time. He cares for each person as if they were the only person alive. His love extends to all humanity. As John 3:16 tells us, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, so that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”
Unlike raindrops, we are free to choose our path, whether to go to Christ or to go around him and keep rushing on toward self-destruction. Sadly, relatively few take the narrow way. Most run in broad rivers toward the sea, reasoning that they must be going the right way since so many others are doing the same.
But for those who choose him, he brings us into a peaceful lake of quiet beauty and golden sunsets. And that this water doesn’t end up in the sea shows how eternal life comes through Christ. After our impurities settle out, we become a crystal clear, sapphire diadem reflecting the snowy mountain image of God above.
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These excerpts are from Nautical Allegories of Scripture, now available in paperback and eBook formats on Amazon.com.