Was Jesus Killed Or Did He Willingly Give Up His Life?

In John 10:14-18 Jesus said, “I am the Good Shepherd. I know my own and my own know Me. Just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So, there will be one flock, one Shepherd. For this reason, the Father loves Me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have the authority to lay it down, and I have the authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.”

Jesus declared in several passages that He would be killed by His enemies (Matthew 16:22; 17:23; Mark 8:31; Luke 9:22).

So, which is true? Jesus laying down His life or was He killed? The answer is both. Jesus was killed because he laid down His life. It was according to the Father’s will – to lay down His life and take it up again. Generally speaking, people that are killed are not laying down their lives willingly unless they are sacrificing it for the benefit of another; like a loved one, or like brave soldiers in war.

I point this matter out to defend against anyone that would say Jesus is contradicting Himself. Jesus was not confused when He said no one takes My life from Me. There were several occasions when the religious leaders wanted to kill Him, but each time He would escape. Why? Because His time had not yet come (Luke 4:24-30; John 7:30; 8:58-59).

Jesus’ time came in John 17 when He prays to the Father. He gives thanks to God for allowing Him to fulfill His mission on earth.

The very end of His mission is when He is crucified and requests the Father receive His spirit (John 19:30). Jesus declares, “It is finished.” Meaning sin’s debt had been fully paid through His blood.

If it Is the will of God how can man be culpable?

 Perhaps the greatest dynamic in the world and heaven is the interplay between the sovereignty of God and the free will of man. The prophet Isaiah tells us this, “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things not yet done, saying ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose’, calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.”’

These two verses tell us that God is in complete control of everything that ever happens in this world from beginning to end. Now on the surface that seems like a complete contradiction at best, and a flat out lie at worst. Why? Well look around you! Mankind is getting worse and worse every day! It is not a lie because God said He is in control. The problem is man is out of control due to his evil. It appears God is nowhere to be found in the melodrama here on earth. He does not appear to care, at all. You see, God gave man an incredible gift; the gift of free will- the ability to choose good or evil. And because God never violates the will of man, he allows them to make wicked, heartbreaking choices, even to their own destruction.

Amazingly somehow these tragic decisions are interwoven into the sovereign plan of God. Man does not get off the hook for them, but God uses the wickedness of man to fulfill His will in the earth. In this way, God is glorified because He makes all things turn out for good (Romans 8:28). At the same time man is punished for his wickedness. As Numbers 32:23 says, “Your sin will find you out!”

A couple of examples of God’s sovereignty and the will of man appears in Genesis 50:19-20. Joseph is the Prime Minister of Egypt. The time in history would be approximately 1859 B.C. Their Father Israel (Jacob) has died. Joseph’s older brothers are afraid that Joseph will take revenge on them for the evil they did to him earlier when he was a boy. Joseph told them, “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring about that many people should be kept alive as they are today.”

The second account appears in the NT. Peter on the Day of Pentecost, the birth of the Church said this, “This Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men” (Acts 2:23).

In both of these accounts, men meant evil in what they did, but God meant good. The ones committing the evil had no idea that God’s will was being fulfilled through their evil hence they are culpable for their actions. Why? Their sole intent for doing what they did was based on their evil hearts.

God has pre-planned all of history from beginning to end. For reasons that are His alone, He decided to sovereignly fulfill his will in the earth through what we do – good and bad. That is God’s providence. In the end times God will personally deal with man in a series of eschatological judgments described in the Book of Revelation.