We will never understand the death of Jesus Christ if we do not understand that it was the fulfillment of a covenant made between God. God and God in the heart of the Trinity making a covenant for our salvation before there was such a thing as time or the world. We will never understand the death of the Lord Jesus Christ until we realize that He was struck, bruised by God the Father. The fact that the Jews gave Him over for trial is relatively unimportant. The fact that the Gentiles did the actual crucifying is relatively unimportant. The only factor of eternal significance is that Christ was put to death by the Father. It was God dealing with Himself. God the Father and God the Son were dealing with each other in and through the Holy Spirit, in an area that was totally beyond man. This area of salvation is outside humanity and beyond humanity. Christ on the cross was the love of God paying the ransom to the justice of God. It was the love of God incarnate in Christ paying the debt of sin to the justice of God, so that without sullying itself, it could reach through to touch us, that He might Himself be just and the justifier of him that hath faith in Christ. And all that was done there flowed down into humanity and became the way of redemption and eternal life is given to us because of that death there.
D.G. Barnhouse
