I have been in a few face-to-face debates with Muslims, and all of them were polite and respectful. One question from my Muslim friends kept popping up, however: “Why did Jesus have to die on the cross for our sins? If we sin, God just forgives! He does not need for someone to take our place.” Muslims have told me that this substitutionary sacrifice is actually very unfair of God. God would never let a righteous man die for the guilty. They illustrate it this way: “Would God allow an innocent baby to die for the crimes of murderers? Of course not! So, it would be immoral for God to send a righteous man to pay for others’ sins.”
The Quran states very clearly that Jesus did not die on the cross: “They declared: ‘We have put to death the Messiah, Jesus son of Mary, the apostle of God.’ They did not kill him, nor did they crucify him, but they thought they did (Surah 4:157-158).” And it says that one person cannot bear the burden of another (Surah 6:164), so a human cannot die for the sins of others. (However, elsewhere in Surah 29:12-13 it says others, such as Christians and Jews, will be punished for the sins of Muslims. So, the Quran does teach that at least some will be punished in the place of others.)
To answer this I begin with the question, “What did the Messiah come to do?” Muslims call Jesus “Isa al-Masih” (Jesus the Messiah). So, what is it about the Messiah that is different from all other prophets? What is unique about His ministry? The Hebrew prophet Isaiah predicted the ministry of the Messiah 700 years before the birth of Jesus:
He is despised and rejected by men, a Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed (Isaiah 53:3-5).
That was the ministry of the Messiah.
And then I go on to explain to my friends that we both believe that God is infinite, eternal, holy, and just (Psalm 90:2; Isaiah 6:3). We both believe that God’s Law is perfect and anyone who breaks it must incur His wrath (Romans 1:18). The result of sin is death– eternal separation from God (Romans 6:23; Matthew 25:46). But here is where the Muslim and I part ways theologically. The Bible tells us that no one is good enough to make up for our offenses against God (Romans 3:10-18, 23). The best we can offer Him is like filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).
Next Page: Why only God can save us, and how we accept that salvation.
Since all of us are helpless to measure up to God’s Law and satisfy His holy demands, the only person who is qualified to get us out of this just condemnation is God Himself. We could not work our way up to Him; instead He came down here for us. People do not go to hell for lack of sincerity. They go to hell for lack of righteousness. And the only righteousness God accepts … is His own.
How do we get it? The Bible tells us that on the cross there was a great exchange. Jesus volunteered to be cursed in our place. No one forced Him; He did it out of love. As a perfect, sinless man, He could perfectly represent the entire human race. As God, His sacrifice would have an infinite, eternal value to pay for all of mankind’s sins. All our sin was credited to Jesus on the cross, and God the Father condemned Him in our place (Romans 3:22-26). In exchange, He credits all of the righteousness of Jesus to us; to all who believe in Him.
God did what only God could do. Sin must be punished. God does not just sweep it under the rug. Jesus (who is God the Son) became a sinless man (John 1:1-14) and took upon Himself all the condemnation that we so richly deserve. God demonstrated His love for people and His justice against sin at the same time on the cross. God’s holy outrage against sin has been meted out on Jesus on the cross, and now all who believe in Jesus as their only hope are reconciled to God forever (2 Corinthians 5:17-21).
Jesus said in John 5:24 that if anyone believes in what He says, that person has eternal life: he will never ever come into condemnation, and has already passed from death to life. So, I ask my Muslim friends this Easter, do you have such a sinless Savior as Jesus? Do you know for sure that you have everlasting life right now? Do you know that you will never come into condemnation? Have you already passed from death to life? If you know this Jesus of the Bible, you have all this and more.
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