That Others Might Live
Message From Rose
“No greater love has any man than this, that a man should lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13
Throughout the ages there have been stories of bravery and sacrifice. There is the story of the two friends who worked together at the WTC. One was Jewish, Abe Zelmanowitz, and the other a Christian, Ed Beyea, who was a quadriplegic and whose nurse accompanied him to work each day. After the plane hit their building (WTC 1), Abe told Ed’s nurse to leave the building. He told her he would stay with his friend. And stay he did. Both men called their families, and not long after those calls were made their building collapsed and those two friends went down with it. Abe could have made it out in time but chose a greater love.
There is another story of the woman in a wheelchair, who when the first plane hit the World Trade Center was overwhelmed when she considered how she would make it down the 68 flights of stairs before her. Fortunately for her, Michael Benfante and his co-worker John Cerqueira spotted her behind a set of glass doors. Those men carried the woman and her wheelchair down all 68 flights of stairs reaching the street just moments before the building collapsed.
On Flight 93, after the plane had been taken over, several passengers called their loved ones at home. They quickly learned about the fates of the other planes hijacked and the attack on the World Trade Center Towers and the Pentagon. It wasn’t long before several passengers decided their plane would not be used as weapon.
Jeremy Glick, one of the passengers, told his wife on the phone: “We’ve taken a vote. We’e going to do something. If he [the hijacker] is going to crash into something, well, let’s not let that happen” Flight 93 crashed into a field in Shanksville, Pa., killing the 44 on board - but no one else.
I will never forget the story a picture told. U.S. News and World Report printed a photograph of people on the stairwell evacuating the World Trade Center. All the people in the stairwell were going down the steps. Only one man, a New York firefighter, was going up the steps.
Men and women throughout the ages have shown great courage and sacrifice – exchanging their lives for others:
John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, declared after signing the Declaration with unusually large writing: “His majesty can now read my name without glasses. And he can also double the price on my head.” Many of the signers and thousands of colonists lost lives, property, families, and reputations because of their resolve to fight for a free nation.
One example is Abraham Clark. Clark was a signer from New Jersey with two sons who went on to fight in the Revolutionary War. His sons were captured by the British and put on the Jersey, a prison ship right off the shores of New York. Because of the brutality against the patriots on this ship, it was eventually referred to as the “Hell Ship.” Abraham Clark’s sons experienced extremely brutal treatment because of who their father was. One son was put into solitary confinement without food. When the war was just about over, the British made Abraham Clark an offer: Recant and come out in favor of the king, and we will release your sons. Anyone of us who are parents and love our child more than our own life can imagine how difficult it must have been for Abraham Clark to answer with a firm NO.
There are stories from more recent wars. The Dorchester was a freighter that had been converted into a troop transport. It was hit off the coast of Greenland at 1 a.m. on Feb. 3, 1943. The very first people on deck after the boat was hit were four chaplains: a Catholic priest, a Jewish rabbi and two Protestant pastors. These men immediately went to work to calm and assure the men and hand out life jackets. When there were no life jackets left, the chaplains took theirs off and gave them away. An eyewitness reported that 18 minutes after the boat was hit the four chaplains could be seen holding hands and praying as the boat went down.
I heard a story once (true story) that I can’t stop thinking about. I’m paraphrasing here; It was a story of two men serving in war. One was despised by his commander and was repeatedly treated badly. He was ordered to perform a mission that was believed by all to be a suicide mission. He expressed his concern that he would not make it out alive. There was a fellow soldier – who knew how their commander felt about the other and had seen how badly he had been treated for so long. So, this fellow soldier volunteered for the mission. He would go in the other’s place. As it would turn out – explosives went off and the one who took the other’s place was killed instantly.
He went in the other’s place… Sound familiar? Genesis 22:2: Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”
Ultimately, Abraham did not have to sacrifice his son. There was an exchange that happened instead. Much like the exchanges in the examples I mentioned in the stories above. But Abraham’s story and the stories of the others point to an even more astounding exchange. And that is the one that we celebrate at Easter. It is the greatest exchange of all time, and it is entirely impossible to replicate as it is not just the story of the Son of God taking our deserved place in death – but beyond all the other stories – He brings His Son through death. Death could not keep Him.
All of humanity is now saved from the sting of death as a result. We have been spared because Jesus went in our place.
Paul reminds us:
1 Corinthians 15:55-58 “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
There is the One and only One who can provide the ultimate exchange and that is God through His Son, His only the Son, whom He loved. He did this not because there was anything worthy in us; “while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”. God simply loves us. So much so that He made Jesus the ultimate sacrifice. And that sacrifice – accepted and embraced – we are made His children and receive everlasting life.
“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and what we will be has not yet been revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him, purifies himself, just as he is pure” (1 John 3:2-3).
This Easter recall the greatest exchange of all time. God’s Son for your sin. The ultimate gift. And with that gift – accepted and embraced – we are made His children and receive entrance to everlasting life with the One who loves us above and beyond our wildest dreams.
He is Risen!
