Why Did Jesus Have To Die?
The cross is at the center of Christianity, but that doesn’t mean everyone understands why it was necessary.
If God loves us and wants to forgive us, why did forgiveness have to cost that?
That was the question at the center of Pastor Mike O’Connell’s Baptism Sunday message, Why Did Jesus Have To Die? Teaching from Isaiah 53, written hundreds of years before Jesus walked the earth, Pastor Mike walked through three simple truths that help us understand the cross: we wandered, He was wounded, and He won.
The message also connected back to Acts 8, where an Ethiopian official is reading Isaiah but doesn’t understand who the passage is describing. When Philip joins him, the man asks the question that opens the door to the gospel: who is this about?
Philip’s answer was Jesus.
We Wandered
Isaiah 53 begins by naming the problem honestly: “All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own.” Isaiah 53:6
The verse starts with all of us and ends with our own. We have all wandered, even if our wandering doesn’t look the same.
Sometimes we think of being lost as ending up somewhere obviously destructive. But wandering from God can happen much more quietly than that. It can be one choice, then another. One area where we know God’s way but choose our own instead.
As Pastor Mike put it, “Lost isn’t a place. It’s a direction.”
That’s an important distinction because you can be enjoying your life, surrounded by good people, and still be slowly moving away from the Father.
Pastor Mike shared a story about briefly losing track of his young son at a fall festival. His son wasn’t upset or trying to run away. He had simply seen something exciting and followed it. He knew exactly where he was and was having a great time. The problem was that he wasn’t where his father was.
Sometimes our relationship with God can drift in the same way. It may not feel dramatic. Most of us don’t wander in miles. We wander in inches. The question isn’t only, “How far have I gone?” It’s also, “Which direction am I moving?”
He Was Wounded
Isaiah doesn’t leave us with the problem. It points us toward what Jesus came to do about it. “But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed.” Isaiah 53:5
The cross shows us that sin is serious, but it also shows us how far God was willing to go to bring us back. We wandered. Jesus stepped in. Isaiah describes an exchange: our rebellion, His wounds. Our guilt, His suffering. What belonged to us was placed on Him.
That’s what makes the cross so personal. Jesus wasn’t simply suffering near us or feeling sorry for us. He was taking our place.
Pastor Mike shared a moment with his daughter that helped illustrate this. After she had broken a rule, he chose to take the consequence himself. Her reaction wasn’t about the consequence anymore. She was overwhelmed by the fact that she had done something wrong, but her father had chosen to take what belonged to her.
That’s the picture Isaiah gives us. We were the ones who wandered, but Jesus carried the consequence. And because He carried it, we don’t have to spend the rest of our lives trying to pay Him back.
Sometimes guilt tells us we need to keep punishing ourselves for things God has already forgiven. We keep replaying the failure, carrying the shame, or trying to prove that we’re sorry enough.
But you don’t have to keep making payments on a debt Jesus already paid.
He Won
The story doesn’t end with Jesus wounded and buried. Isaiah 53 describes His death and burial, but then it begins talking about His future. “Yet when his life is made an offering for sin, he will have many descendants. He will enjoy a long life.” Isaiah 53:10
How does someone who has died enjoy a long life? Because the grave wasn’t the end. Romans 4:25 says: “He was handed over to die because of our sins, and he was raised to life to make us right with God.”
Jesus didn’t simply die for sin. He defeated it. He rose again, which means death, guilt, shame, and our past no longer get the final word. That’s why Christianity isn’t simply about becoming a slightly better version of yourself. Years ago, someone told Pastor Mike something that helped the gospel finally click for him: Jesus didn’t come to make bad people good. He came to make dead people alive.
That’s the good news. We wandered. He was wounded. He won.
The Cross Brings Us Home
In Acts 8, once Philip explains Isaiah 53, everything changes for the man sitting in that carriage. What had been confusing starts to make sense because he finally understands who the passage is about.
Jesus.
Maybe you’ve had a similar experience. You’ve heard about God, gone to church, or known pieces of the Bible, but the reason Jesus came has never fully connected for you.
The cross is where it comes together.
Jesus saw how far we had wandered and came after us. He took what we could not carry for ourselves, and He rose again so we could have new life with Him.
It wasn’t the nails that ultimately held Jesus to the cross. It was His love for us.
What Does This Mean for You?
Maybe there’s an area of your life where you’ve slowly started choosing your own way. You can bring that back to God.
Maybe there’s something in your past you’re still carrying even though Jesus has already forgiven it. You can put that weight down.
Or maybe you’re realizing for the first time what Jesus actually did for you. Isaiah 53 isn’t only a story about what happened to Jesus. It’s the story of what He did for us. We wandered. He was wounded. He won. And because He won, we can come home.
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