30th March 2024

The last words of Jesus from the cross: …‘Father into your hands I commit my spirit.’
This is the seventh in a series of studies for the Easter Preparation season.

Jesus called out with a loud voice, ‘Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.’ When he had said this, he breathed his last.
Luke 23:46 (NIVUK)

Jesus shouts his final statement from the cross so that all in the vicinity would not miss his dying words, which was his second quotation from the Psalms. Before him, David had said, ‘Since you are my rock and my fortress, for the sake of your name lead and guide me. Keep me free from the trap that is set for me, for you are my refuge. Into your hands I commit my spirit; deliver me, LORD, my faithful God.’ (Psalm 31:3-5, emphasis mine). Here David asserts that in the face of his many enemies, he has confidence that even in the face of death he is safe with his faithful God. 

David’s trust was in the Lord (vv. 6, 14), and in his last words, Jesus is invoking this psalm showing that he has the same trust in this faithful God in his death. Jesus adds one word to his quotation from Psalm 31: Father. Jesus wasn’t crying out to some distant deity but to his Father. Jewish mothers taught their children to pray each night as they went to bed ‘Into your hands I commit my spirit’ and so ‘Even on a cross Jesus died like a child falling asleep in his father’s arms.’ ¹

It’s a beautiful picture to contemplate as we meditate on Jesus’s death. These are words of intimacy spoken by a son to his father. Jesus prays to his Father as he did throughout his ministry and no matter how bleak the circumstances he knows his Father is present with him. These are words of trust. The word for ‘commit’ in Luke 23:46 means ‘to entrust to someone for safekeeping’, particularly, ‘to entrust someone to the care and protection of someone.’ ²

And these are words of surrender. Because of the close relationship he has with his Father and the trust he has in him, Jesus lets go of and gives up his human life into his hands, and his loving embrace.

What Jesus has provided in his final words is not only a magnificent example of how to die well but also how to live our lives. In our Christian journey, we are to let go of ourselves and give up our lives to our Father by following Jesus (Galatians 2:20), knowing that he is always with us no matter what comes our way (Hebrews 13:5) and that he will work things out for our good (Romans 8:28), because he is a faithful God (2 Thessalonians 3:3). When our evening comes, and it is time for us to go home to our Father, we can confidently fall asleep in his loving arms knowing we are safe and secure in him.

Prayer
Loving Father, thank you for your great love and faithfulness to us. When it is time for us to let go of this life, help us do it with the same kind of faith and confidence that we see in Jesus. In Jesus’s name, we pray. Amen.

Study by Barry Robinson

¹ Luke 23 – Barclay’s Daily Study Bible – Bible Commentaries – StudyLight.org
² Paratithēmi – A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature.

About the writer:
Barry Robinson is a minister in Grace Communion International and Regional Pastor for Southern England, the Midlands, and Wales

Local congregation:
Grace Communion West Hampstead
Sidings Community Centre
150 Brassey Road
West Hampstead
London
NW6 2BA

Meeting time:
Sunday 12.30 pm

Local congregational contact:
Gordon Brown
gordon.brown@gracecom.church

Word of Life contact:
wordoflife@gracecom.church