He can’t save himself.
—Matthew 27:42
“The chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders mocked him. ‘He saved others,’ they said, ‘but he can’t save himself . . . Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him’” (Mt 27:41–42).
“He saved others, but he can’t save himself,” they sneered. They spoke the truth without realizing it—if he was to save others, he couldn’t save himself.
Jesus said he could ask his Father, and he would dispatch more than 72,000 angels to rescue him. But Jesus didn’t ask for them. For our sake, he rejected rescue.
The religious bigwigs said they would believe he was the Son of God if he came down from the cross. We believe he is the Son of God because he didn’t come down from the cross.
Because he stayed on the cross,
we have an eternity to thank him.