Holy Saturday, March 31, 2018
John 19:30 When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, "It is finished," and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
IT IS FINISHED!
Wilhelm Besser wrote in The Passion Story, "They who waste their energy in labor designed to add to or complete the work of Christ, they who, instead of accepting in faith the work of God that justifies the ungodly, they create a Savior according to their own fancy who is to make the virtuous more righteous, or to make penitent sinners gradually purer. They destroy for themselves the blessed message: 'It is finished!'"
The penitent sinner, a person of flesh and blood who daily sins much, relieves his accusing conscience not by trying harder to do what he can never do or even has to do, but by simply believing "It is finished!" In so believing, the child of God respects the Word and gives Christ and His cross due honor. In this context, Luther said, "My penitent tears do not justify me. Christ alone has taken my sins away. He cast them into the sea of forgetfulness. This is my defense, a defense which rests upon: 'It is finished!'"
People who appreciate visual art do not add another brush-stroke to the finished painting of a master. It is unthinkable. Why then should the sinner for whom Jesus died--and in whose behalf He declared, "It is finished!"--even entertain the idea that the accomplishment of his salvation calls for an addition to what the Master has declared complete? "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God: Not of works ... " (Ephesians 2:8-9). Thank God!
-- From the "Lutheran Spokesman" 