Rick Warren - The Word of Humanity - Part One

Thanks for joining us here today on Pastor Rick's Daily Hope,

the audio broadcast ministry of Pastor Rick Warren. Today we

continue in a series called the Seven Greatest Words of Love.

There are seven.

Words, in particular that Jesus spoke during his final hours

on the Cross that hold the keys for finding fulfillment

in your life, relationships, and even your career. Right now,

here's Pastor Rick with part one of a message called

the Word of Humanity.

You know your body is about sixty percent water.

I don't know if you knew that.

In fact, if you weigh one hundred and fifty pounds,

you're actually caring about twelve pounds of water in your body.

Some of us are carrying a little bit more than that.

But you can't live without water.

In fact, people don't realize how bad dehydration is for you.

When you're get dehydrated, you get headaches, you get muscle cramps,

your brain just shuts down. Your brain has to have

water to think. And in fact, most people don't realize this.

The number one cause of fatigue. When you're fatigued, you

need a drink of water. Dehydration is the number one

cause of fatigue because you're not getting enough water, and

your body runs on water and you become lethargic and

you can't think clearly, and it shuts down. If you've

ever had surgery, you know what I'm talking about when

I tell you that the least fun part to me

is after the surgery. You know, they put that tube

down your throat while you're sleeping, and when you wake

up from the anesthesia and your throat is sore and

your mouth is parched and your lips are dry, and

they won't give you anything to drink. They give you

a little glycerine swab. They go, are you kidding me?

I want a big gulp, you know, because when you're thirsty,

you're thirsty. Now we come to the fifth word of

Jesus on the cross. Now, the first four words were

in the first three hours on the cross. He's now

been on the cross for six hours. Jesus hung on

the cross for six hours, which actually isn't long because

sometimes crucifixion would take days before somebody would die. It's

a very foul form of torture. But Jesus gave up

his body, gave up his life, and he's in the

final moments and in the final seconds of his hanging

on the cross, he makes three more statements, and this

one I call the word of humanity. It's simply the

fifth word is I'm thirsty. And Jesus says this after

hanging on the cross for six hours. Now, Jesus said

a lot of things in life that only God could say.

And we couldn't say him. But this is.

Something you say all the time. I'm thirsty. I'm thirsty.

Everybody says that I'm thirsty. And so this is what

I call the word of humanity because anybody could say

this one. Not everybody could say, you know, you're gonna

be today with me in paradise, but anybody could say

I'm thirsty. And so this is actually the word of humanity.

And actually, in the Greek and the original translation, it's

only one word. It's dip s dif so o means

I'm thirsty.

I'm thirsty.

Simple word, but literally packed with significance.

And we're going to unpack that today.

John nineteen tells us the context John nineteen, verse twenty eight,

twenty nine. Jesus is hanging on the cross here, it says,

after this, we'll come back to that minute, after what

After this, Jesus knew that everything had been completed, so

so that the scriptures would come true, he said, I thirsty.

Now there was a jar full of vinegar there at

the foot of the cross, so the soldiers soaked a

sponge in it, put the sponge on a branch of

a hissup plant and lifted it to Jesus' mouth. Now

here's an interesting thing about this. Here Jesus says at

the end of six hours, he says, I'm thirsty. Earlier,

actually earlier in the cross, the Roman soldiers had offered

him something to drink and he turned it down. So

what's going on here? What's going why is he doing?

Let me show your verse on the screen. In Mark

fifteen twenty three, it says this. This is after they

immediately put him out the cross. The soldiers tried to

give Jesus wine mixed with Mrr to drink, but he

refused it. This is six hours earlier he refused wine

mixed with mr to drink.

Now why did.

Jesus refuse it? Well, because what was in the drink?

And it was that that spice called mr. Murr is

a narcotic. Murr is a painkiller and remember when Jesus

was born and the wise men came and they brought gold,

Frankenson's and muhr. Yeah, and each of those were predicting

that he would be a king, and he would be

a priest and he would die because murr was what.

You gave to people as they were dying in pain.

There was no advil, there was no narcotics, you know,

no vicodin, no OxyContin or anything else, and so people

would mix muhr, a narcotic with.

Wine and give it to people who were in pain.

Now, why in the world with the Roman executioners offer

a drug to Jesus hanging on the cross, Well, it

certainly wasn't out of humanitarian effort. They weren't trying to

ease his pain. Here was the real reason. Crucifixion was excruciating,

and it often went hours and hours and hours and

often days, and they had to stay there until the

guy died. And often the criminal who was being hung

on the cross would scream for hours. They didn't want

to hear the screams, and so they offer Jesus when

they nail him to the cross, they offer him a drug.

So he won't scream. It's not for his benefit. It's

for their benefit.

They just don't want to hear Jesus screaming for hours

in the agony of the Cross. It was long and

drawn out. Now, why did Jesus refuse it? Because Jesus

wanted to feel the full impact of the pain of

carrying the sins of mankind. He was not going to

go into his dying for the world to drug. He

was going to go into it with his full faculties.

He was gonna feel every ounce of physical and emotional pain.

So he refuses a.

Drink that is drugged at the beginning, But now at

the end, he's in a final moments. Now he says,

I'm thirsty. It says now, notice on your outline, it says,

after this circle, after this, after what well, after he

had finished paying for our sins, after the needs of

all humanity had been met, after God's justice had been satisfied,

after the scripture had been fulfilled. He's paid for the

sins of mankind now and he's been separated from God. Remember,

my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

We looked at that last week. You know.

One of the Christian creeds of classic Christianity says he died,

was buried in the ground, went to Hell, and then

rose again. Well, there's not really anything in scripture that

talks about Jesus going to Hell.

He didn't need to go to Hell.

He went through Hell on the cross, and he experienced

all the judgment and all the separation from God on

the cross, not needing to go to Hell because he

experienced it there.

Why have you forsaken me?

When he cries out, I thirst, that's the word of

somebody who's gone through hell. You see, the Bible says

that in heaven.

There's a river.

The Bible says there's a river in heaven, but there's

no water in hell. There's no water in hell. And

he's been going through how hell for these many many hours,

and he now knows everything has been completed, and so

he says the word of humanity, I thirst. Now what

I want to do this weekend is quickly do three things.

What does this mean about Jesus? What does this mean

about the people around you? And what does it mean

to you? What does it mean about Jesus saying I thirst?

What does it mean about the people around you who

are thirsty spiritually? And what does it tell you about

your own spiritual thirst and your hunger for fulfillment and

unsatisfaction and cravings in your own life. Let's look at

these three things. First, what do we learn from this

statement when Jesus that I thirst? What do we learned

about Jesus? Well, the thirst of Jesus shows us three things.

Write these down.

You see, by the way, this is the only statement

Jesus makes about his pain.

Now think about this. Jesus was beaten, he was tortured.

They took made a crown of thorns and crushed it

into his skull, and those thorns are going into his head.

They spit on him. The Bible says, they plucked his beard.

The Bible says he was scourged, which means you get

whipped forty times with the cat of nine tails. That's

three hundred and sixty lacerations on your back before you

even go to the cross. His back is a bloody

pulp even before he hadn't even gone the cross. Yet,

he's been beaten, he's been gone twelve hours without water,

he's dehydrated, he's had a loss of blood. He hadn't

been asleep in twenty four hours. And so there's a

why does he say I thirst, Well, there's a couple reasons.

There's a practical reason, and that is he wanted to

have enough energy to say the final words coming up

in the next two weeks. He wanted to be able

to shout out his last two words. But there's also

a theological reason, and there's a prophetic reason, and there's

a personal reason.

Here are the three reasons. Number one.

First thing happens when Jesus says I thirst is it

showed Jesus was truly human. It showed that Jesus was

truly human. Now some people think, actually that Jesus was

not really human. He was just God with human skin on.

But he wasn't really fully human. Some people think he

was like half human and half God. No, he was

not half human and half God. He was one hundred

percent human and one hundred percent God at the same time,

and so he fully experienced the pain. The Bible says

this in Philippians chapter two. Jesus gave up his place

with God and he made himself nothing.

He was born to be a man, and he became

a servant.

And when he was living as a man, he humbled

himself and was full obedient to God, even when that

caused his death on the cross. Now, this word i

thirst counters a false belief. In ancient times, it was

called docetism, and dosetism was the idea that jesus body

was just an illusion that it.

Was, that he wasn't really a man.

And the doset comes from the Greek word which means

to seem. He appeared to be human being, but he

wasn't really a human being because God would never become

a man. And that idea was called docetism. Well, this

is obviously disproving because Jesus was a man with real thirst,

real desires. Now today nobody even hears about dosetism. But

there's another belief that believes that Jesus, that God would never.

Become a man. It's called Islam. Anybody heard of that one?

Yeah, Islam teaches the same truth as dosetism. In fact,

let me read it to you from the Koran quote

Suruh for one fifty seven.

Quote. This is from the Koran.

They say, indeed, we have killed the Messiah, Jesus, the

son of Mary, the messenger of Allah. But they did

not kill him, nor did they crucify him. But it

was an another person who was made to resemble him

to them. And indeed those who differ over it are

in doubt about it. They have no knowledge of it

except the following assumption. And they did not kill him,

that's for certain. That's what the Koran says. Okay, the

Koran does. Koran believes that Jesus existed, and they believe

he was a prophet. But they do not believe that

God would ever become a human being, and God would

never die in across. So they say that when the

cross happened, that they switched bodies and somebody, a fake,

took Jesus place. That's what Islam believes. Two thousand years ago.

It was called docetism. Today it's one of the beliefs

of Islam. But Jesus clearly was human being. He says,

I thirst, I thirst. If he wasn't fully man, he

couldn't have died. If he wasn't fully man, he couldn't

have gotten thirsty. He say, well, God can't die. Well,

God can't die, but a human being can die. And

it's just as what I'm trying to teach you is this,

It's just as wrong to deny Jesus humanity as it

is to deny Jesus divinity.

Does that make sense.

Jesus was both fully God and he was fully man

at the same time. All right, so it shows that

Jesus is human. Second thing we learned from this phrase,

I thirst is it showed he was the promised savior.

It showed that he was the promised Savior. And verse

twenty eight John nineteen says, so that the scripture would

be fulfilled, Jesus.

Said, I am thirsty. What's that all about?

In the Old Testament, fors of years, God had been

telling humanity, I'm going to send a savior. I'm going

to send a Messiah. I'm going to send the anointed one.

I'm going to send the savior of the world. And

in those thousands of years, and they're all in the

Old Testament, there are over three hundred and eighty predictions

about what the Messiah would be, and what he would do,

where he'd be born, and all these different things. Three

hundred and eighty predictions. And this was so people would

know this is the guy, because there were lots of

people who claimed to be the son of God. But

how did you know it really was him? Well, there

were three hundred and eighty prophecies, and you had to

fulfill every one of them. For instance, you know that

the Bible says he would be born in Bethlehem. It's

kind of hard to pick your birthplace, Okay, he had

no control over that.

They said he would.

Be taken to Egypt as a young baby, and he was.

They said that he will be raised in Nazareth. They said,

the prophecy said he'll do miracles, he'll raise the dead.

And there were prophecies in the Old Testament that say

he'll be betrayed by a friend, he'll be falsely accused,

but he'll be innocent. And then there's prophecies that he'll

be hung on a cross.

Now here's a problem.

That prediction in the Bible was a thousand years before

the Romans invented crucifixion.

Nobody had even heard of it.

What's a cross? And so for hundreds of years nobody

would even know what that meant. But it was predicted

he will die on a cross. They said the tortures

will gamble for his clothes, which they did. They said

his bones will not be broken, which they weren't.

Why would he.

Say that, because often to hasten a person's death on

the cross, they would nail your hands against cross, venerly

knees a little bit, and nail your feet's cross, because

in this position you can breathe in, but you can't

breathe out. So you have to pull yourself up to

stand up on your feet that are nailed across to

breathe out. And you hold that position till you can't

stand it anymore, and then you let yourself down again,

and then you hold it to the pain in your

lungs is unbearable, and you stand up again. And the

death of the Cross was up and down and up

and down, and often took hours. It was a vile

form of torture. When the Romans wanted to end it quickly,

they'd break the legs because you couldn't stand up anymore,

and you'd suffocate. But Jesus didn't have any bones broken,

because he died sooner than they expected him to die.

The Bible says he will be buried in a rich

man's tomb that's never been used. Wh's true, and he

will come back to life three days later. That's the

hard one, and he did. Now at this point, Jesus

is dying on the cross. There's still a couple of

prophecies or predictions to be fulfilled, and one of them

was He'll say in his dying moments, I'm thirsty, And

so that's just another signs there's an interesting little thing

here that you may not know about that I need

explain to you, and will come to it in a minute.

On how they used the hissop. Notice a thousand years

before Psalm sixty nine. Look at this on the screen.

He says, when I was thirsty, they offered me vinegar.

That would be one of the predictions. What in the

world is a jar of vinegar doing at an execution site?

Isn't that kind of a wild, out of the way prediction?

He will He'll be He'll be giving vinegar to drink

in his final moments. What is that jar vinegar doing there? Well,

let me explain it to you. They didn't understand that

thousands of years earlier. But what Jesus was offered by

the soldiers was commonly known as posca posca pasca. Pasca

was the drink of poor people for three hundred years

in the Roman Empire. The Greeks drank it and the

Romans drank it. And what pasca was is It was

sour wine, wine that had gone spoiled, and they would

mix it with herbs and water and they would drink it.

It was the common canteen drink of the Roman legion.

Now it was a very popular drink because it was cheap,

and it was a standard canteen drink, as I said,

in Greece and Rome.

And people liked it for a couple of reasons.

One, it used wine that had gone bad, wine that

had gone sour, that had spoiled, was turning acidic and vinegary.

They would dilute it with water and they would put

herbs in it.

And there are actually some benefits in this.

The sourness hid the bad taste of water because water

wasn't as purified as the kind of water we drink today.

And that sourness actually quenched thirst for a soldier better

than water did, because it had that sleeking up thing

to it. And there are actually other benefits they know

at the time, but they're actually the acid and the

in pasca killed harmful bacterias inside of you.

Now they didn't know that then, but we know it now.

Now here's the important part.

It says that when Jesus says, I thirst. They took

a hissop stick, they put a sponge on it, they

dipped it in the pasca, this vinegary water, and they

hold it to his lips so he can slay his

thirst and cool his parched lips. Now, what is the

significance of a hissup stick? Any Jew standing around the

cross would know the meaning.

Of that, because fifteen.

Hundred years earlier, when Moses led the children of Israel

out of Egypt and they had the passovernight, and remember

all the firstborn were going to die in Egypt, and

God said, I want you to take a lamb, and

I want you to go, and I want you to

spread the blood on the doors of every Jewish family,

and then we'll pass over. That's where the word passover

comes from. Will pass over these homes and they'll go free,

and they won't be touched by the death and the destruction.

And in Exodus twelve, this is fifteen hundred years earlier.

Here's what it says.

God tells Moses, and Moses tells the people take a

branch of the hissip plant, same plant, dip it into

the bowl filled with blood, and then wipe the blood

on the sides and top of the door frames, and

that's the symbol. This is not an Egyptian family, this

is a Jewish family. This is a believing family. They're

the ones that are going free and they get passed

over from the death and destruction. Now when the Roman

soldiers do this, they don't have any idea the symbolism's

going on. But they take the same hissop stick, dip

it in the water, and when they hold it to

Jesus's mouth, every jew around the cross knew what that meant.

It was a fulfillment, another symbol. It was another metaphor

that the passover lamb who saved the lives many years

before because of its blood, Jesus blood was going to

save them with a very powerful symbol. So through these

two words I thirst, we know Jesus is truly a man.

And to second, we know Jesus is truly God. He's

the Messiah. He's then anointed one. He's the one that

all these three hundred and eighty predictions, even that one

comes down to being fulfilled in the last seconds.

But there's a third one. This is important.

It shows how much Jesus loves me. It shows how

much Jesus loves me. That Jesus Christ would go through

all of this pain for me is an amazing thing.

Have you ever gone thirsty to save the life of

somebody else? I kind of doubt that, but Jesus did.

And Jesus what he's doing here, the suffering he's going

through on the cross is called redemptive suffering.

That was such an encouraging message from Pastor Rick. And

now to encourage us more, here's Rick with a letter

from one of our listeners.

Hi, everybody, today, I'm going to share with you a

special testimony from Delia. Delia says that Daily Hope has

helped her with deep anxiety, but then she also shared

about what happened as she began to share Daily Hope

with her parents. She writes this, Pastor Rick, a couple

of years ago, I found myself pretty lost. My company

had a merger and all the senior management were changed overnight,

and I was among them. At the same time, my

long term relationship ended. Then a couple months later, my

father was diagnosed with colon cancer. I was in shock

and I fell into a deep depression from all these changes.

In fact, every day I experienced a panic attack. But

then I found your teaching on Daily Hope and it

just seemed that you understood every emotion that I was

going through, emotions that I didn't even know how to

verbalize to other people. But it was Daily Hope that

helped me get out of bed every morning and gave

me the strength to get through each day. Through your

teaching on Daily Hope pastorrect, I was able to experience

God's love.

And power like never before. You know.

I even translated the Daily Hope devotional for my parents

who don't speak English, and they accepted Jesus too.

That's amazing, Delia.

I am so grateful for you and the team at

Daily Hope because it has become the morning routine that

I can't live without now. Delia, you have been through

more pain than I can possibly imagine, some very very

challenging times that I'm sorry, I really am.

I'm sorry.

Sometimes we experience multiple traumas at the same time, and

when that happens, that's when we really need the Hope

of Jesus Christ. And I'm so glad you experienced that,

that you found God's love and found God's power, And

what a blessing that you translated the Daily Hope devotionals

for your parents and then they accepted Christ.

What that's amazing.

I am celebrating with you that they are now in

the family of God.

Did you know that you can start every day with

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