What Was Understood When Jesus Said, ‘It Is Finished’?

Just a few weeks ago Christians around the world completed their annual observance of Holy Week, commemorating the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. However, followers of Christ understand that the significance of Good Friday and Easter has no real season. The impact of what those days represent, individually and collectively, is experienced 365 days a year.

 

I’d go so far as to say that all of humanity ultimately hinges on three small words, the last ones uttered by Jesus on the cross that gruesome yet glorious day: “It is finished” (John 19:30). That is an English translation of the Greek word tetelestai, which also can be translated “it is completed” or “paid in full.” 

 

After uttering those words, certainly in excruciating pain as the last bit of strength oozed from His body, Jesus bowed His head and died. With the benefit of historical hindsight, we now know what He meant by that simple declaration, but I wonder how those words were understood by those who heard them on that day 2,000 years ago.

 

For the Roman guards charged with nailing Jesus to the cross and then lifting it for Him to hang there for hours, they probably interpreted the meaning as what seemed obvious – He was breathing His last.

 

For the Pharisees and other religious leaders who had orchestrated the rigged trial and trumped-up charges that would justify Christ’s crucifixion, hearing “It is finished” probably meant the threat that “troublemaker” Jesus had posed to their prominence, prestige and authority had been put to an end. They must have been thinking, ”Good riddance!”

 

For Jesus’ followers, who had devoted the previous three years to joining Him in ministry and leaving behind their families and livelihoods, those words must have sounded like the crushing climax to their hopes and dreams. Their charismatic, miracle-working leader hung lifeless as blood continued to seep from His body. The great cause He had personified seemingly had come to a tragic conclusion.

 

Thankfully, they all were wrong. When Jesus declared, “It is finished,” in no way did He mean defeat or failure. Rather, He was announcing that His mission was complete. His ultimate purpose, to become the atoning sacrifice for sin and make it possible for broken, sinful people to establish personal relationships with the holy, righteous God, had been accomplished.

 

This is the message throughout the New Testament. As the apostle Paul asserted in Romans 8:1-3, “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering.”

 

In another New Testament letter, writing to believers in the ancient church of Corinth, itself a wicked, sin-infested city, Paul said, “And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for Him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Corinthians 5:14-15).

 

At times, we all have seen our own hopes and aspirations dissolve, falling short of much-desired goals. With dismay and even despair we’ve thought, “It’s over. I’m done.” And we struggled to pick ourselves up from the heap of humiliation to try again, hoping for more success the next time. 

 

But for Jesus there was no need for a “next time.” For Him, “It is finished” meant He had provided the ultimate remedy for sin’s consequences and death would be dealt its ultimate defeat. On the third day, the empty tomb would serve as vivid, tangible evidence of that. Because of that reality, we can cling to this wonderful promise: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Thank God we can live according to His perspective and not our own. For us, because of what Jesus has done,  “It is finished” means it’s only just begun.