Christ would not have endured the cross and despised the shame if we had not sinned. So in a very real way we are responsible for Christ going to the cross. But to say this is not to negate the sovereign purposes of God.

There can be some confusion about the question in my title. I have heard three sets of commentary on the death of Christ and who might be to blame (although others might be mentioned). Some Jewish haters of Christians have insisted that Christians murdered Jesus! I am not sure where anyone can get that nonsense from.

Secondly some Christian haters of Jews insist that Jews murdered Jesus. This is often said by obvious antisemites, but not always. And a third camp gets all bent out of shape if we say that our sins sent Jesus to the cross. So which of these three options—if any—is correct? Well, obviously the first one should be given an instant flick. There were no Christians as such around back then, just Jews—and some Gentiles—who followed Christ.

We read that the first time the term “Christian” was used was many decades after his death. In Acts 11:26 we find these words: “For a whole year they met with the church and taught a great many people. And in Antioch the disciples were first called Christians”. That was around 100 AD.

As to the second, this is often your standard Jew-hating and antisemitic line. As such we can dismiss it readily enough. The only thing that comes close to truth here is the fact that the Gospel accounts tell us that some Roman leaders and some Jewish leaders were directly and specifically behind the actual arrest, trial and crucifixion of Christ.

As to the Jews being partly responsible, see these sorts of passages:

Matthew 26:3-4
Then the chief priests and the elders of the people gathered in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, and plotted together in order to arrest Jesus by stealth and kill him.

Matthew 27:20
Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus.

As to the Roman involvement in the actual crucifixion, we have texts like Matthew 27:27-31:

When the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters, and they gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him and led him away to crucify him.

The third ‘option’ is heard from some Christians, often those in the Reformed camp. They are so focused on keeping the sovereignty of God promoted and prioritised, that they can relegate other biblical truths to secondary status. Thus they can be heard saying things like this: ‘No, Christians did not cause the death of Jesus nor send him to the cross—it was all done according to the eternal purpose and plan of God.’

As is often the case, a statement like this needs to be teased out much more. Did Jesus die for us to fulfill the purposes of God? Sure thing, and I will speak to that in a moment. But the obvious point is this: If sin had never entered the world, then there would be no reason why Jesus would come to suffer and die on a cross. So in some way at least we must speak about our role in ‘sending’ Christ to the cross.

We must know that the Bible clearly teaches these three core truths about this:

1. Sin did indeed enter the world, and we are all sinners.
2. Christ came to deal with the sin problem.
3. This is said to be part of the eternal purpose of God.

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