“Could Jesus have died of natural causes?”

November 2015 – Grace & Truth Magazine

QUESTION: Would Jesus have died of natural causes if He hadn’t faced the cross, since He had not inherited Adam’s sinful nature that caused death to us all?

ANSWER: What are “natural causes”? Both the Old Testament and the New Testament give us the first and foremost natural cause:

• “The soul who sins shall die” (Ezek. 18:20 NKJV).
• “The wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23).

The rest of God’s Word is in full accord with this principle – without exception.

We must never forget that the Lord Jesus Christ was far more than simply a man. He had no human father and thus no sinful nature. He was God and man in one blessed person. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory” (Jn. 1:14). He was and He remains “The Christ, the Son of the living God” (Jn. 6:69). Before the birth of the Son into this world, it was announced to His mother, the young virgin Mary, by the angel Gabriel, “That Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God” (Lk. 1:35).

It is inconceivable to think that the One who is the Son of God, indeed who is God the Son, could have sinned. “You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on wickedness” (Hab. 1:13). “In Him there is no sin” (1 Jn. 3:5). “He [God] made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us” (2 Cor. 5:21). “Who committed no sin” (1 Pet. 2:22).

Since He was God, men could not kill Jesus. Yet they are guilty before God of the death of His Son: “Him ... you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death” (Acts 2:23). Pilate had offered to release Jesus, but “all the people answered and said, ‘His blood be on us and on our children’” (Mt. 27:25).

Jesus had openly stated, “Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father” (Jn. 10:17-18). And this is what He did. Where any other person would have been weak from all the suffering, bleeding, thirst and struggle to breathe, Jesus gave a triumphant shout, “It is finished!”, and dismissed His Spirit. He went into death for guilty sinners. One of my study Bibles has the following paragraph in a footnote to Matthew 27:50, the verse which reads: “And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice, and yielded up His spirit”:

The Greek phrases used here and in John 19:30 are unique in the New Testament. In fifteen other Bible verses, “breathed one’s last” or “yielded up the spirit” is used to translate a single Hebrew or Greek word meaning breathe out or expire. This is true of the description of the death of Jesus in Mark 15:37,39 and Luke 23:46. But in Matthew 27:50 and John 19:30 alone these expressions translate Greek phrases of three words, meaning give over the spirit or deliver up the spirit. The death of Jesus was different from that of any other man. No one could take His life from Him except as He was willing to permit it (Jn. 10:18). Christ chose to die so that we might live!

No, being who He is, there was no way in which Jesus could have died of natural causes. Thank God He offered up His life in death to God for us – needy lost sinners – that we might be saved from eternal damnation.

Answered by Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.