Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. And they parted his raiment, and cast lots.
Nailed to the cross at Calvary outside Jerusalem amid mockery and cruel torture, Jesus prayed to His Father to forgive those putting Him to death even while the soldiers drove the nails and divided His clothing by lot. His prayer was for His murderers, the rough soldiers, the mocking crowd, and the priests and rulers who caused and gloated over His suffering, asking pardon with no threat, curse or vengeance. He asked because they did not know what they were doing and did not recognize Him as the Redeemer, yet their ignorance did not make them guiltless because they rejected the privilege of knowing and accepting Him. That prayer embraced every sinner from beginning to end of time and in that agony earned His right to stand as Advocate, priest and intercessor pleading His pierced hands for sinners before the Father. It remains the model for His followers to forgive enemies, love sinners while hating sin, and pray for persecutors and the erring as those who do not understand what they do.
Calvary Crucifixion Setting
The prayer belongs to the march from Pilate's court to Calvary that followed the Passover supper, the agony in Gethsemane, the betrayal and flight of the disciples, the hearings before Annas, Caiaphas, Pilate and Herod, and insult, mockery and two scourgings through a night without food or drink. The cross prepared for Barabbas was laid on bruised and bleeding shoulders along with crosses for two companions of Barabbas, and in weak and suffering condition He fell fainting beneath the burden, took it again and fell again while the following crowd showed no compassion but taunted Him for not carrying it. His persecutors sought another bearer because the Jews would not carry it lest defilement keep them from the Passover and none of the mob would stoop to it. News of the condemnation spread throughout Jerusalem and people of all classes and all ranks flocked toward the place of crucifixion, and disciples and believers from the city and the surrounding region joined the throng that followed Him. They could do so because the priests and rulers were bound by promise not to molest His followers if He Himself were delivered to them.
The crucifixion took place at Calvary outside Jerusalem's gate where condemned criminals were executed. There He hung on a cross among two others as humanity's substitute, which is connected with redemption from the curse of the law. A crowd gathered below and reacted with grief and terror.
The prayer was spoken while the soldiers were doing their fearful work nailing Him to the cross, with nails driven through His hands and feet. His face was pale and serene with great drops of sweat and drops of agony on His brow, blood flowed from His wounded temples and from His hands and feet, the nail wounds gaped under the weight of His body, and His breath labored under the burden of the sins of the world. He endured acute agony with no pitying hand or sympathetic word to sustain Him, treading the wine-press alone with none with Him.
He meekly submitted to being nailed without needing to be forced, in contrast to the two thieves crucified with Him on each side who cursed their executioners. He stood serene and uncomplaining before His enemies, suffering taunts and abuse without murmur and answering none of the mocking, jeering, indignity and abuse around Him. His willing suffering in purple robe and crown of thorns shows the great cost of what He gave up for humanity and makes human self-denial for Him small by comparison. He was taken away in humiliation into the hands of wicked men with His own nation clamoring for His blood, mocked by Herod and his soldiers with crown of thorns for His sacred brow, clad in purple robe and bowed before and struck with the reed placed in His hand, scourged as the worst of criminals though expected to take His place on David's throne, with the murderous Barabbas chosen in place of the beloved Teacher, then lifted up on the cross and dying as a malefactor. His being thus taken away gave the disciples cause to mourn and fast, and tried their faith until hope and courage failed.
As He prayed the soldiers parted His raiment and cast lots, dividing His clothing and casting lots for it. The seamless garment caused a dispute, which they settled by lot, and this fulfilled the prophecy in Psalm 22. He submitted to abuse and mockery and died cruelly, enduring this so that people could trust that He fully understands every experience they face.
Forgiving Prayer Offered
While hanging in terrible suffering He prayed for His enemies, His murderers, the soldiers handling Him roughly, the priests and rulers who caused His suffering and gloated over it, and those mocking and reviling Him as He was being nailed to the cross. He breathed pardoning love and asked the Father to forgive them, with prayer and not threats or curses, calling down no curses and invoking no vengeance. Even in the agony, humiliation and apparent defeat of the cross He asserted His right and power to forgive sins.
His mind was borne from His own suffering to the crime of His persecutors and the terrible but just retribution that would be theirs, pitying them in their ignorance and guilt and thinking only of others rather than resisting or focusing only on Himself. The prayer reveals divine love, mercy and pardon, a love for people stronger than death and a concern for others in the midst of His own suffering. It shows the depth of His sin-bearing love in that He carried their sin and asked God to forgive them, a love that broke His heart under their coming woe and ingratitude and reveals the cost of redemption.
In that prayer He was earning the right to become the Advocate, priest and intercessor for man in the Father's presence, pleading with the Father for those destroying Him. He acted as priest and Advocate even while giving His life in extreme mental and bodily agony. Whenever people sin He presents His pierced hands before the Father and pleads for their forgiveness.
The prayer embraced the world, taking in every sinner who should live from the beginning until the end of time, since all share guilt in His death. The cross offers forgiveness freely to anyone who will receive it, and offers forgiveness to every sinner who repents and believes in Jesus. His pure opposition to evil did not prevent Him from pleading for those who did it.
The prayer was spoken in suffering and sorrow beyond physical pain, for His bitter cup included bearing the burden of the world's sins and suffering under the weight of the whole world's sins. That bitter cup included suffering the penalty of humanity's sin, paying the just claims of God's holy law with His life's blood to ransom His people and bring sin and Satan's power to an end. It included enduring the withdrawing of God's love and the crushing weight of sin that broke His heart and so quickly ended His life on the cross, so that His pain was more than bodily agony because the sins of the whole world were upon Him.
Ignorance Yet Guilt
Jesus asked the Father to forgive those putting Him to death because they did not know and did not understand what they were doing. They did not recognize Him as the world's Redeemer, but like the scribes and Pharisees criticized His manner of teaching and made excuses to portray Him as a pretender. Even while the nails were driven and He suffered intense agony He answered His tormentors and murderers with pardoning love rather than threats or curses.
Had they known they were putting to exquisite torture the One who had come to save the sinful race from eternal ruin, they would have been seized with horror and remorse. Their ignorance pitied by Him did not remove guilt or make their actions right. It was their privilege and opportunity to know and accept Him as Saviour, yet they rejected all evidence.
In crucifying the King of Glory they sinned against heaven, and in putting an innocent man to torturous death they sinned against the commonest feelings of humanity. They therefore stood under terrible but just retribution and judgment, even as He met their violence with pardoning love while suffering the penalty of humanity's sin. Ignorance leaves guilt upon those who had light yet refused it.
The prayer covered the Jewish leaders who induced the people to release Barabbas and crucify Christ and who called His blood upon themselves and their children. Forgiveness was freely offered to them, and some would repent and be converted. Some of those who had rejected Him and helped bring about His death were afterward sent to proclaim forgiveness and the risen Saviour to others.
Others would remain impenitent, would not be convicted, would not repent and would not be converted, making the prayer impossible of answer for them. In this pleading for His crucifiers is seen His unwearied love and mercy toward Israel during its added probation and added time of probation. His care continued after His ascension as the gospel was preached in Jerusalem and the Holy Spirit was given.
Heaven and Earthly Witnesses
The prayer was offered in the midst of terrible suffering on the cross, with blood flowing from wounded temples and brow and falling drop by drop from hands and feet, the nail wounds gaping under the weight of the body and the breath laboring and panting under the burden of the sins of the world. It was a prayer for murderers to be forgiven because they did not understand what they were doing, offered while men formed in the image of God were joining with Satan to crush out the life of God's only begotten Son and the last spark of life from Him. That prayer filled all heaven and the unfallen worlds with wonder and admiration as they beheld the closing scenes of the controversy, revealing self-sacrificing love and tender mercy and forgiveness to be read in the cross in harmony with stern justice. In that most intense agony of mind and body, placed in the midst between the thieves, He thought only of others, acting as priest and advocate with the Father, and angels beheld that infinite love with amazement.
Simon of Cyrene had been seized and compelled to carry the heavy wooden cross when Christ fell fainting beneath it, and walking close enough to hear every word from Christ's lips, the prayer for forgiveness for those putting Him to death was graven upon his soul. Together with Christ's words to John and His mother, it drew Simon's heart to Jesus so that he believed. Afterward he willingly and cheerfully took up the cross of Christ for himself.
The two thieves lifted with Him represent two classes of people, those who look to and believe in Jesus and live forever and those who refuse Him and die without hope. Jesus suffered the same physical torture as they did, yet forgave His tormentors with pity and a Godlike bearing. The penitent thief had been present with Jesus in the judgment hall and on the way to Calvary, had heard Pilate declare Jesus to be a just man, and marking that pitying forgiveness acknowledged in his heart that Jesus was the Son of God.
The prayer for His murderers spoke with powerful distinctness to the heart of Nicodemus the learned councilor while Jesus suffered the excruciating tortures of death. Nicodemus witnessed Jesus hanging on the cross like a criminal between heaven and earth praying for those killing Him, and with the darkened sun and heavens, the reeling earth, the split and shivered rocks, and the rent veil of the temple it recalled the night teaching that as Moses lifted up the serpent so the Son of man must be lifted up. The light of that teaching shining on the cross removed doubt and gave him faith, and together with Jesus' answer to the petition of the dying thief and His conquering last cry It is finished, it forever settled his faith and established his faith in Jesus' divinity.
His prayer for mercy, offered in forgetfulness of His own suffering in care for others while standing serene and uncomplaining before His enemies without murmur under taunts and abuse, remained in the minds of His enemies as evidence of His divine character and identity as the Son of God. After the frenzy of excitement passed, the memory of that prayer intruded upon the minds of the priests and pressed upon them with overpowering evidence that Jesus was the Son of God.
His prayer for His murderers is the example Stephen followed when suffering cruel death by stoning he prayed that the sin of his murderers not be held against them or charged against them. It is the example reflected in Paul's forgiving spirit and confidence at his own death which led some witnesses to accept the Saviour. It belonged with His forbearance and humility under contumely and torture surrounding His betrayal, trial and execution, His Godlike pity toward enemies, His life, teachings and miracles of healing the sick, casting out devils and raising the dead, His agony in the garden, His resurrection and ascension, and His work in heaven as Mediator for fallen man, continually recounted with quivering lips and tearful eyes as the main theme of the preaching, teaching and conversation of those first called Christians at Antioch, who preached Christ and prayed to God through Him.
Prophecy and Scripture Links
The dividing of the clothing at the cross fulfilled the prophecy in Psalm 22. The soldiers disputed over the seamless garment and settled the dispute by casting lots for it. That stripping and casting lots parallels the stripping of Joseph of his coat of many colors by his brethren.
As Joseph freely forgave his brethren when they acknowledged their sin, Christ meekly forgave His murderers without resentment while suffering the most cruel torture and dying for the guilty race. Joseph showed by acts of benevolence and love that he harbored no revenge for their cruel conduct, and in the same spirit Christ's forgiveness extends not only to His murderers but to all who confess their sins and seek pardon. The fact that God overruled the crucifixion for humanity's good did not lessen the guilt of those who carried it out.
His death at Calvary outside Jerusalem's gate, where condemned criminals were executed, was as humanity's substitute. That substitutionary death is connected with redemption from the curse of the law. While praying for forgiveness for those driving the nails through His hands, He was suffering the penalty of humanity's sin and meeting the just claims of God's holy law, giving His life's blood to ransom His people and to bring sin and Satan's power to an end.
The forgiveness spoken from the cross continues after His resurrection and ascension to His Father. Having received all power and authority, He returned to impart gifts unto men to His disciples. All who come to Him repentant and confessing their sins He receives into favor and freely pardons. If they remain true and faithful to Him, He will exalt them to His throne and make them His heirs to the inheritance purchased with His own blood.
Example For Believers
The prayer from the cross is the pattern for dealing with persecutors, asking God to forgive those who oppose the truth because they do not understand what they are doing, even while working to rescue them from error. In the agony of death He prayed for His enemies and murderers, including those reviling Him and heaping indignity and abuse upon Him, asking the Father to forgive them because they did not understand what they were doing. That pardoning love is to live in His followers as forgiveness toward others, as meekness that nurses no revenge, as humility and forbearance under wrong, and as earnest pleading for those who are guilty or in darkness. It means loving the souls of sinners while hating sin, and forgiving and helping the erring rather than rejecting or crushing them, in order to draw sinners to Christ.
His love for humanity was so great that He died to save His enemies, giving Himself for every one of them and paying the infinite price. Even while suffering on the cross He put aside concern for His own pain to pray with forgiving love for those who were persecuting and killing Him, for those He came to save. That prayer has continued through the ages as a message of hope, and it is the example of the love He commands His followers to show one another.
His example calls Christians to pray and plead for those who err and for disobedient people with the same love and patience He continues to show toward them. For He prayed for those who would not pray for themselves, interceding with the Father for sinful people who reject His love and salvation. The same appeal to pardon applies even to one who has spoken in error without knowing what he is speaking about, since forgiveness was asked because the wrongdoers did not understand what they were doing.
His willing suffering shows the great cost of what He gave up, enduring mockery and insult, the purple robe and crown of thorns, and the agony of being nailed to the cross, which makes human self-denial for Him small by comparison. Because He submitted to abuse and mockery and died cruelly while His enemies stood below and divided His garments, people can trust that He fully understands every experience they face.
Nailed to the cross at Calvary outside Jerusalem amid mockery and cruel torture, Jesus prayed to His Father to forgive those putting Him to death even while the soldiers drove the nails and divided His clothing by lot. His prayer was for His murderers, the rough soldiers, the mocking crowd, and the priests and rulers who caused and gloated over His suffering, asking pardon with no threat, curse or vengeance. He asked because they did not know what they were doing and did not recognize Him as the Redeemer, yet their ignorance did not make them guiltless because they rejected the privilege of knowing and accepting Him. That prayer embraced every sinner from beginning to end of time and in that agony earned His right to stand as Advocate, priest and intercessor pleading His pierced hands for sinners before the Father. It remains the model for His followers to forgive enemies, love sinners while hating sin, and pray for persecutors and the erring as those who do not understand what they do.
Calvary Crucifixion Setting
The prayer belongs to the march from Pilate's court to Calvary that followed the Passover supper, the agony in Gethsemane, the betrayal and flight of the disciples, the hearings before Annas, Caiaphas, Pilate and Herod, and insult, mockery and two scourgings through a night without food or drink. The cross prepared for Barabbas was laid on bruised and bleeding shoulders along with crosses for two companions of Barabbas, and in weak and suffering condition He fell fainting beneath the burden, took it again and fell again while the following crowd showed no compassion but taunted Him for not carrying it. His persecutors sought another bearer because the Jews would not carry it lest defilement keep them from the Passover and none of the mob would stoop to it. News of the condemnation spread throughout Jerusalem and people of all classes and all ranks flocked toward the place of crucifixion, and disciples and believers from the city and the surrounding region joined the throng that followed Him. They could do so because the priests and rulers were bound by promise not to molest His followers if He Himself were delivered to them.
The crucifixion took place at Calvary outside Jerusalem's gate where condemned criminals were executed. There He hung on a cross among two others as humanity's substitute, which is connected with redemption from the curse of the law. A crowd gathered below and reacted with grief and terror.
The prayer was spoken while the soldiers were doing their fearful work nailing Him to the cross, with nails driven through His hands and feet. His face was pale and serene with great drops of sweat and drops of agony on His brow, blood flowed from His wounded temples and from His hands and feet, the nail wounds gaped under the weight of His body, and His breath labored under the burden of the sins of the world. He endured acute agony with no pitying hand or sympathetic word to sustain Him, treading the wine-press alone with none with Him.
He meekly submitted to being nailed without needing to be forced, in contrast to the two thieves crucified with Him on each side who cursed their executioners. He stood serene and uncomplaining before His enemies, suffering taunts and abuse without murmur and answering none of the mocking, jeering, indignity and abuse around Him. His willing suffering in purple robe and crown of thorns shows the great cost of what He gave up for humanity and makes human self-denial for Him small by comparison. He was taken away in humiliation into the hands of wicked men with His own nation clamoring for His blood, mocked by Herod and his soldiers with crown of thorns for His sacred brow, clad in purple robe and bowed before and struck with the reed placed in His hand, scourged as the worst of criminals though expected to take His place on David's throne, with the murderous Barabbas chosen in place of the beloved Teacher, then lifted up on the cross and dying as a malefactor. His being thus taken away gave the disciples cause to mourn and fast, and tried their faith until hope and courage failed.
As He prayed the soldiers parted His raiment and cast lots, dividing His clothing and casting lots for it. The seamless garment caused a dispute, which they settled by lot, and this fulfilled the prophecy in Psalm 22. He submitted to abuse and mockery and died cruelly, enduring this so that people could trust that He fully understands every experience they face.
Forgiving Prayer Offered
While hanging in terrible suffering He prayed for His enemies, His murderers, the soldiers handling Him roughly, the priests and rulers who caused His suffering and gloated over it, and those mocking and reviling Him as He was being nailed to the cross. He breathed pardoning love and asked the Father to forgive them, with prayer and not threats or curses, calling down no curses and invoking no vengeance. Even in the agony, humiliation and apparent defeat of the cross He asserted His right and power to forgive sins.
His mind was borne from His own suffering to the crime of His persecutors and the terrible but just retribution that would be theirs, pitying them in their ignorance and guilt and thinking only of others rather than resisting or focusing only on Himself. The prayer reveals divine love, mercy and pardon, a love for people stronger than death and a concern for others in the midst of His own suffering. It shows the depth of His sin-bearing love in that He carried their sin and asked God to forgive them, a love that broke His heart under their coming woe and ingratitude and reveals the cost of redemption.
In that prayer He was earning the right to become the Advocate, priest and intercessor for man in the Father's presence, pleading with the Father for those destroying Him. He acted as priest and Advocate even while giving His life in extreme mental and bodily agony. Whenever people sin He presents His pierced hands before the Father and pleads for their forgiveness.
The prayer embraced the world, taking in every sinner who should live from the beginning until the end of time, since all share guilt in His death. The cross offers forgiveness freely to anyone who will receive it, and offers forgiveness to every sinner who repents and believes in Jesus. His pure opposition to evil did not prevent Him from pleading for those who did it.
The prayer was spoken in suffering and sorrow beyond physical pain, for His bitter cup included bearing the burden of the world's sins and suffering under the weight of the whole world's sins. That bitter cup included suffering the penalty of humanity's sin, paying the just claims of God's holy law with His life's blood to ransom His people and bring sin and Satan's power to an end. It included enduring the withdrawing of God's love and the crushing weight of sin that broke His heart and so quickly ended His life on the cross, so that His pain was more than bodily agony because the sins of the whole world were upon Him.
Ignorance Yet Guilt
Jesus asked the Father to forgive those putting Him to death because they did not know and did not understand what they were doing. They did not recognize Him as the world's Redeemer, but like the scribes and Pharisees criticized His manner of teaching and made excuses to portray Him as a pretender. Even while the nails were driven and He suffered intense agony He answered His tormentors and murderers with pardoning love rather than threats or curses.
Had they known they were putting to exquisite torture the One who had come to save the sinful race from eternal ruin, they would have been seized with horror and remorse. Their ignorance pitied by Him did not remove guilt or make their actions right. It was their privilege and opportunity to know and accept Him as Saviour, yet they rejected all evidence.
In crucifying the King of Glory they sinned against heaven, and in putting an innocent man to torturous death they sinned against the commonest feelings of humanity. They therefore stood under terrible but just retribution and judgment, even as He met their violence with pardoning love while suffering the penalty of humanity's sin. Ignorance leaves guilt upon those who had light yet refused it.
The prayer covered the Jewish leaders who induced the people to release Barabbas and crucify Christ and who called His blood upon themselves and their children. Forgiveness was freely offered to them, and some would repent and be converted. Some of those who had rejected Him and helped bring about His death were afterward sent to proclaim forgiveness and the risen Saviour to others.
Others would remain impenitent, would not be convicted, would not repent and would not be converted, making the prayer impossible of answer for them. In this pleading for His crucifiers is seen His unwearied love and mercy toward Israel during its added probation and added time of probation. His care continued after His ascension as the gospel was preached in Jerusalem and the Holy Spirit was given.
Heaven and Earthly Witnesses
The prayer was offered in the midst of terrible suffering on the cross, with blood flowing from wounded temples and brow and falling drop by drop from hands and feet, the nail wounds gaping under the weight of the body and the breath laboring and panting under the burden of the sins of the world. It was a prayer for murderers to be forgiven because they did not understand what they were doing, offered while men formed in the image of God were joining with Satan to crush out the life of God's only begotten Son and the last spark of life from Him. That prayer filled all heaven and the unfallen worlds with wonder and admiration as they beheld the closing scenes of the controversy, revealing self-sacrificing love and tender mercy and forgiveness to be read in the cross in harmony with stern justice. In that most intense agony of mind and body, placed in the midst between the thieves, He thought only of others, acting as priest and advocate with the Father, and angels beheld that infinite love with amazement.
Simon of Cyrene had been seized and compelled to carry the heavy wooden cross when Christ fell fainting beneath it, and walking close enough to hear every word from Christ's lips, the prayer for forgiveness for those putting Him to death was graven upon his soul. Together with Christ's words to John and His mother, it drew Simon's heart to Jesus so that he believed. Afterward he willingly and cheerfully took up the cross of Christ for himself.
The two thieves lifted with Him represent two classes of people, those who look to and believe in Jesus and live forever and those who refuse Him and die without hope. Jesus suffered the same physical torture as they did, yet forgave His tormentors with pity and a Godlike bearing. The penitent thief had been present with Jesus in the judgment hall and on the way to Calvary, had heard Pilate declare Jesus to be a just man, and marking that pitying forgiveness acknowledged in his heart that Jesus was the Son of God.
The prayer for His murderers spoke with powerful distinctness to the heart of Nicodemus the learned councilor while Jesus suffered the excruciating tortures of death. Nicodemus witnessed Jesus hanging on the cross like a criminal between heaven and earth praying for those killing Him, and with the darkened sun and heavens, the reeling earth, the split and shivered rocks, and the rent veil of the temple it recalled the night teaching that as Moses lifted up the serpent so the Son of man must be lifted up. The light of that teaching shining on the cross removed doubt and gave him faith, and together with Jesus' answer to the petition of the dying thief and His conquering last cry It is finished, it forever settled his faith and established his faith in Jesus' divinity.
His prayer for mercy, offered in forgetfulness of His own suffering in care for others while standing serene and uncomplaining before His enemies without murmur under taunts and abuse, remained in the minds of His enemies as evidence of His divine character and identity as the Son of God. After the frenzy of excitement passed, the memory of that prayer intruded upon the minds of the priests and pressed upon them with overpowering evidence that Jesus was the Son of God.
His prayer for His murderers is the example Stephen followed when suffering cruel death by stoning he prayed that the sin of his murderers not be held against them or charged against them. It is the example reflected in Paul's forgiving spirit and confidence at his own death which led some witnesses to accept the Saviour. It belonged with His forbearance and humility under contumely and torture surrounding His betrayal, trial and execution, His Godlike pity toward enemies, His life, teachings and miracles of healing the sick, casting out devils and raising the dead, His agony in the garden, His resurrection and ascension, and His work in heaven as Mediator for fallen man, continually recounted with quivering lips and tearful eyes as the main theme of the preaching, teaching and conversation of those first called Christians at Antioch, who preached Christ and prayed to God through Him.
Prophecy and Scripture Links
The dividing of the clothing at the cross fulfilled the prophecy in Psalm 22. The soldiers disputed over the seamless garment and settled the dispute by casting lots for it. That stripping and casting lots parallels the stripping of Joseph of his coat of many colors by his brethren.
As Joseph freely forgave his brethren when they acknowledged their sin, Christ meekly forgave His murderers without resentment while suffering the most cruel torture and dying for the guilty race. Joseph showed by acts of benevolence and love that he harbored no revenge for their cruel conduct, and in the same spirit Christ's forgiveness extends not only to His murderers but to all who confess their sins and seek pardon. The fact that God overruled the crucifixion for humanity's good did not lessen the guilt of those who carried it out.
His death at Calvary outside Jerusalem's gate, where condemned criminals were executed, was as humanity's substitute. That substitutionary death is connected with redemption from the curse of the law. While praying for forgiveness for those driving the nails through His hands, He was suffering the penalty of humanity's sin and meeting the just claims of God's holy law, giving His life's blood to ransom His people and to bring sin and Satan's power to an end.
The forgiveness spoken from the cross continues after His resurrection and ascension to His Father. Having received all power and authority, He returned to impart gifts unto men to His disciples. All who come to Him repentant and confessing their sins He receives into favor and freely pardons. If they remain true and faithful to Him, He will exalt them to His throne and make them His heirs to the inheritance purchased with His own blood.
Example For Believers
The prayer from the cross is the pattern for dealing with persecutors, asking God to forgive those who oppose the truth because they do not understand what they are doing, even while working to rescue them from error. In the agony of death He prayed for His enemies and murderers, including those reviling Him and heaping indignity and abuse upon Him, asking the Father to forgive them because they did not understand what they were doing. That pardoning love is to live in His followers as forgiveness toward others, as meekness that nurses no revenge, as humility and forbearance under wrong, and as earnest pleading for those who are guilty or in darkness. It means loving the souls of sinners while hating sin, and forgiving and helping the erring rather than rejecting or crushing them, in order to draw sinners to Christ.
His love for humanity was so great that He died to save His enemies, giving Himself for every one of them and paying the infinite price. Even while suffering on the cross He put aside concern for His own pain to pray with forgiving love for those who were persecuting and killing Him, for those He came to save. That prayer has continued through the ages as a message of hope, and it is the example of the love He commands His followers to show one another.
His example calls Christians to pray and plead for those who err and for disobedient people with the same love and patience He continues to show toward them. For He prayed for those who would not pray for themselves, interceding with the Father for sinful people who reject His love and salvation. The same appeal to pardon applies even to one who has spoken in error without knowing what he is speaking about, since forgiveness was asked because the wrongdoers did not understand what they were doing.
His willing suffering shows the great cost of what He gave up, enduring mockery and insult, the purple robe and crown of thorns, and the agony of being nailed to the cross, which makes human self-denial for Him small by comparison. Because He submitted to abuse and mockery and died cruelly while His enemies stood below and divided His garments, people can trust that He fully understands every experience they face.