The four Gospels variously record Christ’s last living act on the cross as: “yielded up His spirit” (Matthew), “breathed His last” (Mark and Luke), and “gave up His spirit” (John). The words referring to spirit and breath are effectively synonymous, with the words translated “spirit” literally meaning “breath.” The distinction between the two terms may be thought of as two sides of the same reality: “spirit” referring to the life essence within a living being and “breath” referring to the physical expression of that life.
If you’re like me you have probably thought of this moment as the culmination of Christ’s torments and wounds which bled the life out of His body. And He truly did die in His humanity, but may I suggest that His death was not merely the natural consequence of crucifixion but rather a supernatural act of divine intention? Here are three reasons I think so.
First, the agonizing six or so hours Jesus spent on the cross were exceptionally brief for a torture that was intended to last for days. This leads one to wonder why He died relatively quickly and question if crucifixion was actually the cause.
Second, consider what Jesus said in John 10:18: “No one takes it (my life) from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again.” Quite plainly, Jesus declares it His unique and sovereign right to lay down and pick up His life at will, a right which no one can snatch away. This quite strongly implies that His dying was acted out rather than endured.
Third, take Genesis 2:7. “. . . then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” In this divine act it is in the means of giving life, the “breathed into”, that I see a link between the creation of man and the death of Christ, revealing the latter as a divine act in kind with the former. Here’s why.
When God created man, He breathed life into Adam by His will. According to John 1:3 and Colossians 1:16, this was done through God the Son, crediting Christ as the actor in Genesis. At Calvary, God the Son saved sinners by laying down His life and willfully breathing out His last. In this light Christ’s last breath appears as the mirror image of Adam’s first breath, the second Adam yielding the breath of life back to the Father (“Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit” Luke 23:46) to make way for the “new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17). Therefore, just as there was One who breathed life into man, so there was also One who divinely breathed out His life to redeem us from death.
Further, when Christ took up His life again in the tomb the breath of life re-entered his body to conquer death once for all. As Paul says in 1 Cor. 15:45, “The first Adam became a living being, the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.” Thus the first breath into Adam’s nostrils, Christ’s last breath on the cross, and His first breath in the tomb are all steps in the Divine creation process of making a people for Himself and, along with every breath that we receive from God, all point to the source of life, God the Father through God the Son, reminding that Jesus has stolen death’s victory once for all. As He has power and authority to give the first breath of life He has the power and authority to grant the breath of eternal life.
Truly the hymn says it profoundly, “He gave His life on Calvary to save a wretch like me.”