It Is Finished - Matt 27:45-50; Mark 15:33-37; Luke 23:44-46; John 19:28-30

Sometimes it’s difficult to keep the timeline straight for all the events because it is so content heavy and it’s taken me months to study the last 24 hours of Christ’s life. The IM helps us keep in mind that from when the Last Supper began until Jesus gave up the ghost was only 21 hours. Mark notes that “It was the third hour” when “they crucified him,” which the IM points out is “about 9:00 a.m.” Then Matthew tells us that “from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour.” Remembering that they are using a time system that starts at 6am, we can deduce that Jesus hung on the cross for six hours, three of which was while experiencing all the sins and sorrows of the world all over again.

I think that Jesus probably had enough on his plate already to worry about commanding all the elements in the earth to self-destruct. But thinking about it, Jesus created the earth, and everything was created spiritually before it was created physically, and the earth is alive to the point that it will be resurrected. I wonder if the elements of the earth are so in tune spiritually, that this was the reaction on a spiritual level to the death of the Savior. Or maybe it’s one of those things like we see in the movies where Zeus gets mad and throws thunder bolts down from the sky. Or perhaps it was the withdrawal of the Spirit that affected nature, I don’t know, but it’s an interesting concept to think about.
Three hours seems to be the amount of time required for Jesus to take on all the sins and pains of the world, which is really interesting if you think about it because compounding all the billions of lives lived and the billions of years of the human experience, to think that all of it can be condensed into a three hour experience. That was the length of time that it took in the Garden and it appears to be the length of time that Jesus suffered through that on the cross.
The physical torment that Jesus must have felt as his mortal mission came to a close must have been incomprehensible. John, who was there watching the whole event, says, “After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled saith, I thirst.” We talked about the various physical aspects of crucifixion and one of them was the unbearable thirst. Fluid is pulled out of the tissues in goes into the lungs, blood vessels can’t transport liquid as efficiently, leading to edema, so the body’s natural reaction is to trigger a need for water inside the brain, causing extreme thirst. It’s interesting that Jesus didn’t seek out any water while he was atoning for sins because, just like when he refused the wine and myrrh cocktail, he wanted to experience the full measure of suffering, with no outside relief. Surely if even his Father’s comforting presence couldn’t be with him, only on a spiritual, abstract level, then he definitely couldn’t have had any water to ease his suffering at this point.
The IM says, “John recorded that on several occasions, Jesus taught that He offers ‘living water’ to quench forever the spiritual thirst of all who follow Him… Elder James E. Talmage of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said of this passage, ‘John affirms that Christ uttered the exclamation, ‘I thirst,’ only when He knew ‘that all things were now accomplished’; and the apostle saw in the incident a fulfillment of prophecy.” Even until the very end, Jesus could have no relief, no aid at all. Remember how we talked about justice requiring that Satan be able to try anything that he thought could make Jesus give up? Even a drink of water was more than Satan was willing to give, and those standing around Jesus, Roman soldiers I assume, “filled a sponge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to him mouth.” He would have no relief except for death.
After receiving the vinegar to drink, “Jesus when he had cried again with a loud voice, saying, Father, it is finished, thy will is done, yielded up the ghost.” Jesus says this is a loud voice, which is a stark contrast to the short “I thirst” that he probably whispered only moments ago. And that’s it, with those last few words, Jesus Christ finished his mission on earth and saved us all. The IM says, “In the premortal world, Jesus Christ had selflessly offered to do the will of the Father for the redemption of all mankind. With His mortal death, Jesus had now fulfilled that promise.”
When Jesus closed his eyes and passed into the spirit world, I wonder what he saw. Were all the spirits from all eons of time waiting for him? Was his Father there ready to pull him into a big hug? Was Judas there? Was Joseph there waiting? It would only seem fair for Joseph to be there waiting for him. What about John the Baptist? What about the thief that he had promised he’d see in paradise? It occurs to me that Jesus had told the man on the cross next to him that they would be together in the next life, and it makes me wonder, if Jesus cared enough about that sinful man that he had just met to care for him in the spirit world, then wouldn’t Jesus also care about me enough to care for me in the spirit world? One of the hardest questions I had to ask myself was if, when we die, are we just sent out into the darkness and left up to ourselves to find people. Would those that we know and love be there waiting for us, helping us with the transition from one world to another? After I’ve thought about it for a long time, I came to the conclusion that the God that I know and love will absolutely have us be greeted by those important to us, or at least our friends and family.
The IM quotes Elder Robert D. Hales as saying, “Jesus chose not to be released from this world until He had endured to the end and completed the mission He had been sent to accomplish for mankind. Upon the cross of Calvary, Jesus commended His spirit to His Father with a simple statement, ‘It is finished.’ Having endured to the end, He was released for mortality.” The IM also quotes Elder Jeffrey R. Holland as teaching, “When the uttermost farthing had then been paid, when Christ’s determination to be faithful was as obvious as it wsa utterly invincible, finally and mercifully, it was ‘finished.’ Against all odds and with none to help or uphold Him, Jesus of Nazareth, the living Son of God, restored physical life where death had held sway and brought joyful, spiritual redemption out of sin, hellish darkness, and despair. With faith in the God He knew was there, He could say in triumph, ‘Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.’”
What does it mean that Jesus had “finished?” It seems that there were only a couple of ways that Jesus could have failed to complete the atonement. We know that he had to suffer all the pain ever to be created and endured by human kind, which was an task so large I can’t even begin to fathom it. But he had to endure the whole event, last the whole time without sinning, like becoming angry. So he could either lose his cool or he could quit. But he didn’t. He suffered through the whole thing with a good attitude. That’s something to think about, if He had a good attitude during the atonement, then what is our excuse?