“And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us.

But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation?

And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss.

And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.

And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:39-43

Unbelief

In the gospel according to Luke, we come across the passage where Jesus is being crucified alongside two thieves, both of whom at the outset (we’re told in Matthew’s gospel) are joining the crowd in jeering at Jesus for his claim to be the Messiah.

“The thieves also, which were crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth.” (Matt 27:44)

Thieves, plural. And somewhere along the line, one of the thieves literally has a change of heart.

I must’ve read this passage I don’t know how many times in my life, but not that long ago, I noticed something new.  In my experience, when that happens to us, whether it’s with a passage, a verse, or a biblical account with which we’re already familiar, and maybe even felt we’d learned all there was to learn (but, there’s always more, isn’t there?), it’s usually a good indication that the Holy Spirit is speaking to us and ministering to our hearts, revealing some new aspect or dimension of the scriptures we never saw or noticed before. (Which – in and of itself – is not unusual because we’re told that the Word is living. It speaks to us and to all believers, just as it has for millennia, and it always speaks afresh.)

A lack of faith

What really caught my attention this time (thanks to the composite account of both Matthew and Luke’s gospels) was that as the thief is railing at Jesus – mocking Him, challenging Him, apparently without a hint of remorse or repentance in his heart – he takes it a step further with his recorded statement in verse 39:

“If thou be Christ…”

No mystery there regarding what the thief did or didn’t believe. At best he was skeptical; at worst, he didn’t believe this was The Messiah. It’s an informative contrast to the exchange Jesus had with His disciples in Matthew 16:13-16:

“When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?

And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.

He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?

And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

A change of heart

But at some point after his initial challenge to Jesus to prove he was Christ, the thief apparently has a change of heart. There is nothing in the record that reveals whether or not Jesus did anything overtly to prove He was The Christ to this man. No mention of a last minute miracle or an exposition of the Scriptures the way He did on the road to Emmaus:

“And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.” Luke 24:27

Something happened, though, that led this thief to reevaluate whether or not this was in fact the Son of God. A reevaluation and an eventual realization that apparently concerned him enough to consider where he was going to spend eternity. Whatever it was that ultimately got him to change his mind, he ended up doing a complete 180 degree turn from the man we first found in Matthew’s gospel savagely joining in and attacking The King. Here in Luke’s account, we instead find him actually coming to Jesus’ defense in verse 40:

“Dost not thou fear God…?”

If we unpack that simple statement, we’ll find a fascinating insight into where this man’s heart and head are now at – one, that he himself does fear God and two, it appears he is ascribing godhood to Jesus. In other words, he seems to be making an open acknowledgement that he now personally believes that Jesus either is God or is the Son of God, either of which evidently put the fear of God into him.

Later in verse 42, he actually, finally, as the time in his life is desperately running out, the thief makes the transition from belief in God to faith in Christ when he calls Jesus “Lord”.

I never saw that before.

I usually focused on verses 42 and 43 where the thief (dying, knowing the end is near, reaching out to the only hope any of us really have in this life, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ), the thief asks the Son of God to “remember” him into His kingdom.  (“Remember” in this context is actually a request for membership or inclusion in the Kingdom.)  And what strikes me now as I write this (see how the Spirit works?) is here is a man accused of being a thief, ostensibly tried and found guilty, now being punished for his verified crime or crimes in accordance with the law, and yet I find myself wondering, if that was the kind of life this man led… how did he know about the Kingdom?  How did he understand that Jesus could forgive him of the sin in his life and had the authority to include him in the Kingdom?  (And just to emphasize that point, earlier in the scriptures, Jesus stated, “My kingdom is not of this world…” John 18:36.)  And once again, as I’m writing this I suddenly realize just how much grace The Lord gave this man – not only absorbing his insults and disrespect, his outright unbelief, but giving him the time He knew he needed to come to faith.

Saved

In any case (to me, at least) the second thief’s conversion is amazing.  He had started out as a man bashing Jesus with his words (Matthew 27:44) And by the description, “…cast the same in his teeth”, the manner in which they were doing it suggests a venomous, spiteful, almost hateful approach – as evidenced by the first thief to speak in the passage we’re examining still doing it at about the time the second thief is coming to faith.  Now nearing the end of his life (note the self-awareness and the polar opposite reaction to that realization compared with the first thief), he’s not only defending Christ, he’s acknowledging His kingship, His lordship, His very divinity, and ultimately, the truth that salvation can only come by grace through faith in Jesus Christ.  And it’s at that point he says out loud what he now believes in his heart (and what each of us who has given our heart to Christ believes), that Jesus is his Lord and that only Jesus can remember him into His kingdom, in effect saying, “Lord, save me.”

Remarkable story.

If you’re here and you don’t know Jesus but want to, the Apostle Paul says it simply, and in many ways, said it best:

“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” Romans 10:9

Just trust that that that tug your feeling in your heart is Him, ask Him to be your Lord and Savior and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead and like the thief on the cross, one day you’ll be with Him in paradise.