Deicide!

(Arthur Pink, "Beholding the Crucified Christ")

"They kept shouting—Crucify Him! Crucify Him!" Luke 23:21

The Word of Truth declares that "the carnal mind is enmity against God" (Romans 8:7). Men do not believe it—in fact most of them pretend the very opposite. Nevertheless, at Calvary—they gave proof of their hatred of God.

Not only was Christ unwelcome here—but men hated Him—and that "without a cause" (John 15:25). He gave them every reason to admire and adore Him—but they had an inveterate detestation of Him!

Multitudes go through the form of paying homage to God—but it is a "god" of their own imagination. They hate the true and living God, and were it possible—they would rid the universe of His existence! This is clear from their treatment of Christ, for He was none other than "God manifest in flesh" (1 Timothy 3:16). They hated and hounded Him to death—and nothing short of His cruel death by crucifixion would appease them!

Here at Calvary the real character of man was revealed, and the desperate wickedness of his heart was laid bare. There it was shown, that man was capable of the blackest of all crimes!

As evil as man had shown himself all through his history—the coming of Immanuel to this earth brought sin to such a head—that all that which had gone before, was relatively but a trifling thing—when compared with the monstrous wickedness which was done against Love incarnate! In the treatment which the Son of God received at the hands of men—we see sin in its true colors, stripped of a disguise, exposed in its hideous reality; revealed in its true nature as contempt of God, and rebellion against Him. Here at Calvary we behold the climax of sin—and the fearful and horrible lengths to which sin is capable of going! That sin which germinated in Eden—culminated in the crucifixion! Here at Calvary, we see sin at it's apex—Deicide—in the slaying of the Lord of Glory!

"They kept shouting—Crucify Him! Crucify Him!" Luke 23:21