John 19:31-37 – Christ died for us

The terms “a high day” is referring to the Sabbath day. And Jesus died on the eve of a high day, the Sabbath. This eve was a day of preparation for the observation of the Sabbath. The Jews would not want any dead body to remain on the cross on a Sabbath, so they came to Pilate to request for the legs of Jesus to be broken. This was to hasten or ensure that He was really dead and be taken down for the burial. Bear in mind that the Lord had earlier said that He would remain buried in the grave for three days. Hence, this would mean that He had to be buried on the very day of His death. This, plus the fact that they presumed that Pilate might want the body of Jesus to remain on the cross for a few more days, made the request of the Jews necessary. Without realizing it, they were actually collaborating with the will and plan of God unconsciously.  

Pilate complied with the request, so the soldiers went forward, wanting to break the legs of Jesus. They first broke the legs of those two people hanging beside Jesus. And when they came to the Lord, they realized that He was already dead. So they did not break His leg, thereby fulfilling Psalm 34:20 that said, “Not a bone of Him shall be broken.” Then one of the soldiers took the spear in his hand and thrust it into the side of the Savior, Who was already dead. This again fulfilled another Scripture recorded in Zechariah 12:10 that said, “They shall look on Him whom they pierced.”  When the spear pierced the side of Jesus, blood and water came gushing out. The way this was described tells us that the red blood cells of the blood in His system had already separated themselves from the plasma. This can only take place when a person had truly died. 

John’s intention here was to prove that everything Christ went through fit into the minute details of given prophecies concerning His death. This would debunk the lies that suggest Jesus only fainted on the cross, and in the coldness of the tomb, He woke up and came back to Himself. John wants us, the readers of his Gospel, to know that the whole death of Jesus is not a myth. It is a historical moment. We were there in His death. He died for us!