The seven last words of Christ on the cross. VII: The word of contentment (A. W. Pink)

Editor’s Review

In this seventh and final word of the cross, titled “The word of contentment”, the author leads us to the final moment of the earthly life of our Lord Jesus Christ: “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit” (Luke 23:46). With this declaration, not only is the redemptive work begun in the incarnation brought to its close, but the perfect trust and rest of the Son in the Father is also revealed even in the moment of death.

This sermon presents Christ not as a defeated victim, but as the One who voluntarily gives up His spirit, demonstrating His full authority, His perfect faith, and His absolute confidence in God. Here we behold the consummation not only of His work, but also of His communion with the Father, displaying a supreme example of dependence, obedience, and peace in the midst of the deepest suffering.

Throughout this exposition, we are invited to reflect on the nature of man, on the reality of the soul and spirit, and on the glorious hope of the believer at death. This final word not only closes the cross, but opens the door to eternity, showing us how the Christian ought to face death: with confidence, with faith, and with a total surrender into the safe hands of God.

With this sermon, the series of seven sayings spoken by the Savior on the cross comes to its conclusion, which we have been presenting progressively. Each of them reveals a different facet of His person and His work, but in this final one we find the ultimate rest: the Son returning to the Father, having perfectly fulfilled everything that was entrusted to Him.

Sermon by A. W. Pink: The Word of Contentment

“And when Jesus had cried out with a loud voice, He said, Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit; and having said this, He breathed His last” (Luke 23:46). These words present to us the final act of the Savior before He expired. It was an act of contentment, of faith, of trust, and of love. The Person to whom He entrusted the precious treasure of His spirit was His own Father. Father is an encouraging and assuring title: well may a son entrust any matter, however precious, into the hands of a father, especially a Son like this into the hands of such a Father. That which was committed into the Father’s hands was His “spirit”, which was about to be separated from the body.

Scripture reveals man as a tripartite being: “spirit, soul, and body” (1 Thess. 5:23). There is a distinction between the soul and the spirit, although it is not easy to determine exactly in what they differ. The spirit seems to be the highest part of our complex being. It is that which particularly distinguishes man from the beasts, and that which links him with God. The spirit is that which God forms within us (Zech. 12:1); therefore He is called “the God of the spirits of all flesh” (Num. 16:22). At death, the spirit returns to God who gave it (Eccl. 12:7).

The act by which the Savior placed His spirit into the Father’s hands was an act of faith — “I commit”. It was a blessed act intended as a precedent for all His people. The final point to observe is the manner in which Christ performed this act: He uttered these words “with a loud voice”. He spoke so that all might hear, and so that His enemies, who judged Him forsaken and abandoned by God, might know that this was no longer so; but that He was still loved by His Father and could confidently commit His spirit into His hands.

“Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” This was the last utterance of the Savior before He expired. While hanging on the cross, seven times His lips moved in speech. Seven is the number of fullness or perfection. At Calvary, then, as everywhere else, the perfections of the Blessed One were displayed. Seven is also the number of rest in a finished work: in six days God made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh He rested, contemplating with satisfaction that which He had declared “very good”. So here with Christ: a work had been given Him to do, and that work was now done. Just as the sixth day brought the work of creation to its culmination, so the sixth word of the Savior was “It is finished”. And just as the seventh day was the day of rest and satisfaction, so the seventh word of the Savior brings Him to the place of rest — the hands of the Father.

Seven times the dying Savior spoke. Three of His utterances were related to men: to one He gave the promise that he would be with Him that day in Paradise; to another He entrusted His mother; to the multitude He mentioned His thirst. Three of His utterances were directed to God: to the Father He prayed for His murderers; to God He expressed His bitter cry; and now, into the Father’s hands He commits His spirit. In the presence of God and of men, of angels and of the devil, He had cried triumphantly: “It is finished”.

“Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” It is remarkable that this final cry of the Savior had been uttered by the spirit of prophecy many centuries before the Incarnation. In Psalm thirty-one we hear the Son and Lord of David say, in anticipation:

In connection with each of the words of Christ on the cross, a prophecy was fulfilled. First, He cried: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do”, fulfilling Isaiah 53:12 — “He made intercession for the transgressors.” Second, He promised the thief: “Today you will be with Me in Paradise”, fulfilling Matthew 1:21. Third, He said to His mother: “Woman, behold your son”, fulfilling Luke 2:35. Fourth, He cried: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”, fulfilling Psalm 22:1. Fifth, He said: “I thirst”, fulfilling Psalm 69:21. Sixth, He cried: “It is finished”, in harmony with Psalm 22. Finally, He prayed: “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit”, fulfilling Psalm 31. Oh, the wonders of the cross! We shall never reach the end of them.

1. Here we see the Savior once again in communion with the Father.

This is exceedingly precious. For a time that communion was interrupted — interrupted outwardly — when the light of God’s holy countenance was hidden from the Sin-bearer; but now the darkness had passed and ended forever. Up to the cross, there had been perfect and uninterrupted communion between the Father and the Son. It is deeply beautiful to observe how even the dreadful “cup” was accepted from the Father’s hand:

On the cross, at the beginning, the Lord Jesus is still in communion with the Father, for He had said: “Father, forgive them”. His first word was “Father,” and now His last word is also “Father.” But between these two expressions, He hung for six hours: three suffering at the hands of men and Satan, and three under the hand of God. During those last three hours, God withdrew from Him, causing the cry: “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”. But now all is finished. The cup has been drunk, the wrath has been exhausted, the darkness has passed, and the Savior is once again in communion with the Father — a communion that will never again be interrupted.

“Father.” How often this word was upon the Savior’s lips! His first recorded utterance was: “Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?”. In the Sermon on the Mount He mentions the Father seventeen times. In John 14–16, forty-five times. In John 17, six times more. And now, in His final word: “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.”

And what a blessing to know that His Father is our Father! God is my Father, then He loves me as He loves Christ (John 17:23). Then He cares for me. Then He will supply all that I need (Phil. 4:19). Then He will cause all things to work together for my good. Oh, that the children of God would live more deeply in this truth!

2. Here we see a designed contrast.

For more than twelve hours, Christ had been in the hands of men. He Himself had announced it: “The Son of Man will be delivered into the hands of men”. In Gethsemane He said: “The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners”. The angels confirmed it: “He must be delivered into the hands of sinful men”. And so it was. He gave Himself.

He could have escaped. But He did not. The hour had come. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter. He was delivered into the hands of sinners. They did their worst. They crucified Him with wicked hands. But now all is finished. Man has done his worst. The cross has been endured. The work has been accomplished.

Voluntarily the Savior had delivered Himself into the hands of sinners, and now, voluntarily, He commits His spirit into the hands of the Father. What a blessed contrast! Never again will He be in the “hands of men”. Never again will He be at the mercy of the wicked. Never again will He suffer shame. Into the Father’s hands He commits Himself, and the Father will now care for His interests. We need not dwell long on the blessed outcome. Three days later, the Father raised Him from the dead. Forty days later, the Father exalted Him far above all principality and power and every name that is named, and seated Him at His right hand in the heavens. And there He now sits on the Father’s throne (Revelation 3:21), waiting until His enemies are made His footstool. For one day, soon, the situation will be reversed.

The Father will send back the One whom the world rejected: He will send Him back in power and glory: He will send Him back to rule and reign over all the earth with a rod of iron. Then the situation will be reversed. When He was here, man dared to judge Him, but then He will sit and judge them. Once He was in their hands, then they will be in His. Once they cried “Away with Him!”, then He will say: “Depart from Me”. And meanwhile, He is in the Father’s hands, seated on His throne, waiting for His will.

3. Here we see Christ’s perfect surrender to God.

How blessedly He demonstrated it throughout His entire path! When His mother sought Him in Jerusalem as a child of twelve, He said: “Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?”. When He was hungry in the wilderness after a forty-day fast and the devil urged Him to turn stones into bread, He lived by every word of God. When the great works He had performed and the message He had proclaimed failed to move His hearers, He submitted to the One who had sent Him, saying: “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them to babes” (Matthew 11:25).

When the sisters of Lazarus sent to the Savior informing Him of their brother’s sickness, instead of hastening to Bethany, He remained two more days in the place where He was, saying: “This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God”. It was not natural affection that moved Him to act, but the glory of God. His food was to do the will of the One who sent Him. In all things He submitted to the Father. Behold Him in the morning, “rising a great while before day” (Mark 1:35), to be in the Father’s presence.

Behold Him anticipating every great crisis and preparing for it by pouring out His heart in prayer. Behold Him spending the final hour before His arrest prostrate before God. How fittingly He could say: “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart”! And as He lived, so He died — committing Himself into the hands of the Father. This was the final act of the dying Savior. And how exquisitely beautiful. How perfectly in harmony with His entire life. He manifested His perfect trust in the Father. He revealed the blessed intimacy that existed between them. He displayed His absolute dependence upon God.

Truly, in all things He has left us an example. The Savior committed His spirit into the hands of His Father in death, because He had been in the Father’s hands throughout His entire life. Is this true of you, reader? Have you, as a sinner, committed your spirit into the hands of God? If so, it is secure. Can you say with the apostle: “I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day” (2 Timothy 1:12)? And have you, as a Christian, fully surrendered your life to God? Have you heeded that word:

“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service” (Romans 12:1)? Are you living for the glory of Him who loved you and gave Himself for you? Are you walking in daily dependence upon Him, knowing that without Him you can do nothing (John 15:5), yet learning that you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you (Philippians 4:13)? If your whole life is surrendered to God, and death overtakes you before the Savior returns to receive His people, then it will be easy and natural for you to say: “Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit”. Balaam said: “Let me die the death of the righteous” (Numbers 23:10). Ah, but to die the death of the righteous, you must live the life of the righteous, and this consists in absolute submission and dependence upon God.

4. Here we see the absolute uniqueness of the Savior.

The Lord Jesus died as no one else ever has. His life was not taken from Him; He laid it down of Himself. This was His own testimony: “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” (John 10:17–18). The various proofs that Christ’s life was not taken from Him have been presented to the reader in the Introduction of this book. The most convincing evidence of all was seen in the committing of His spirit into the Father’s hands.

The Lord Jesus Himself said: “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit”, but the Holy Spirit, in describing the actual act of giving up His life, has used three different expressions which strongly emphasize the fact now under consideration, and the words used by the Spirit are most appropriate to the respective Gospels in which they are found.

In Matthew 27:50 we read: “Jesus, when He had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the spirit”. But this translation does not fully express the force of the original: the meaning of the Greek is that He “dismissed His spirit”. This expression is especially fitting in Matthew, which is the royal Gospel, presenting our Lord as the Son of David, the King of the Jews. Such a term perfectly suits the royal Gospel, for the act of the Lord implies authority, like that of a king dismissing a servant.

The word used in Mark — which presents our Lord as the perfect Servant — is the same as in our text taken from Luke, the Gospel of the perfect humanity of Christ, and it means that He “expired”. It was His passive endurance of death.

In John, which is the Gospel of the divine glory of Christ, the Holy Spirit uses yet another word: “He bowed His head and gave up His spirit” (John 19:30), or perhaps more exactly, “He delivered it”. Here the Savior does not “commit” His spirit to the Father as in the Gospel of His humanity, but, in harmony with His divine glory, as One who has full authority over it, He gives up His spirit.

Two things were necessary for propitiation: first, a complete satisfaction had to be made to the offended holiness and justice of God, and this, in the case of our Substitute, could only be accomplished by enduring the outpoured wrath of God. And this had already been done. Now only the second thing remained, and that was for the Savior to taste death. “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27). With the sinner it is death first and then judgment; with the Savior the order was reversed: He endured God’s judgment against our sins and then died.

The end had come. Perfectly self-possessed, not overcome by death, He cries out with a loud voice of unfailing strength, and delivers His spirit into the hands of His Father, and in this His uniqueness was manifested. No one else ever did this nor died in such a manner. His birth was unique. His life was unique. His death also was unique. In “giving up” His life, His death is distinguished from all others. He died by an act of His own will. Who but a divine Person could have done this? In a mere man it would have been suicide; but in Him it was a proof of His perfection and uniqueness. He died as the Prince of life!

5. Here we see the place of eternal security.

Again and again the Savior spoke of a people who had been “given” to Him (John 6:37, etc.), and at the hour of His arrest He said: “Of those whom You gave Me I have lost none” (John 18:9). Is it not then beautiful to see that at the hour of death the blessed Savior now commits them into the safe keeping of the Father? On the cross Christ hung as the representative of His people, and therefore we must regard His final act as a representative act. When the Lord Jesus committed His spirit into the hands of His Father, He also presented our spirits together with His own for the Father’s acceptance. Jesus Christ neither lived nor died for Himself, but for believers: what He did in this final act concerned them as much as Himself. We must therefore regard Christ here as gathering together all the souls of the elect and making a solemn entrustment of them, together with His own spirit, to God.

The Father’s hand is the place of eternal security. Into that hand the Savior committed His people, and there they are forever safe. Christ said, referring to the elect: “My Father, who gave them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand” (John 10:29). Here, then, is the foundation of the believer’s confidence. Here is the basis of our security. Just as nothing could harm Noah when the hand of the Lord had shut the door of the ark, so nothing can touch the spirit of the saint who is held in the hand of omnipotence. No one can pluck us from there. Weak we are in ourselves, but “kept by the power of God” is the sure declaration of Holy Scripture: “who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5).

Formal professors who seem to run well for a time may grow weary and abandon the race. Those who are moved by the carnal excitement of a “revival meeting” endure only for a time, because they have no “root in themselves.” Those who trust in the power of their own will and resolutions, who turn over a new leaf and promise to do better, often fail, and their last state is worse than the first. Many who have been persuaded by well-meaning but ignorant counselors to “join the church” and “live the Christian life” frequently fall away from the truth. But every spirit that has been born again is eternally secure in the Father’s hand.

6. Here we see the blessedness of communion with God.

What we particularly refer to is the fact that communion with God may be enjoyed independently of place or circumstances. The Savior was on the cross, surrounded by a mocking crowd, His body enduring intense agony, yet He was in communion with the Father! This is one of the sweetest truths drawn from our text. It is our privilege to enjoy communion with God at all times, regardless of outward circumstances or conditions. Communion with God is by faith, and faith is not affected by visible things.

No matter how unpleasant your outward situation may be, reader, it is your inexpressible privilege to enjoy communion with God. Just as the three Hebrews enjoyed fellowship with the Lord in the midst of the fiery furnace, as Daniel in the lions’ den, as Paul and Silas in the Philippian prison, as the Savior on the cross — so you may wherever you are! Christ’s head rested upon a crown of thorns, but underneath were the Father’s hands!

Does not our text teach very clearly the blessed truth and reality of communion with the Father at the hour of death? Why then fear it, beloved Christian? If David, under the Old Testament dispensation, could say: “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me” (Psalm 23:4), why should believers fear now, after Christ has removed the sting of death? Death may be the “king of terrors” to the unbeliever, but to the Christian, death is simply the doorway into the presence of the Beloved.

The movements of our souls in death, as in life, instinctively turn toward God. “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit” will be our cry, if we are conscious. While we dwell here, we have no rest except in the bosom of God; and when we depart from here, our expectation and our most fervent desires are to be with Him. We have directed many longing glances toward heaven, but when the soul of the saved approaches the moment of departure, then it casts itself into the arms of love, just as a river, after many windings and turns, pours itself into the ocean. Nothing but God can satisfy our spirits in this world, and none but He can satisfy us when we depart from here.

But reader, only believers have the right and encouragement to thus commit their spirits into the hands of God at the hour of death; how sad is the condition of all unbelievers who die. Their spirits will also fall into the hands of God, but this will be their misery and not their privilege. They will find that “it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God!” (Hebrews 10:31). Yes, for instead of falling into the arms of love, they will fall into the hands of justice.

7. Here we see the true refuge of the heart.

If the Savior’s final expression represents the prayer of dying Christians, it shows the great value they place upon their spirits. The inner spirit is the precious treasure, and our chief concern and care is that it be secured in safe hands. “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” These words, then, may be taken as an expression of the believer’s concern for his soul, that it be secure, regardless of what happens to the body.

The saint of God approaching death thinks little of his body, where it will be placed or how it will be disposed of; that he leaves in the hands of his friends. But just as his concern has always been his soul, so he now thinks of it, and with his last breath commits it into the care of God. It is not: “Lord Jesus, receive my body, take care of my dust”; but: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” — Lord, secure the jewel when the case is broken.

And now, a brief word of appeal in conclusion. My friend, you are in a world full of trouble. You are unable to care for yourself in life, much less will you be able to do so in death. Life has many trials and temptations. Your soul is threatened on every side. Everywhere there are dangers and snares. The world, the flesh, and the devil are united against you; they are too strong for you.

Here, then, is the lighthouse of light in the midst of the darkness. Here is the harbor of refuge against all storms. Here is the blessed shelter that protects against all the fiery darts of the wicked one. Thanks be to God, there is a refuge from the storms of life and from the terrors of death — the Father’s hand — the true refuge of the heart.

Editor’s Conclusion

The seventh word of Christ on the cross — “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit” — brings us into the final and solemn moment of His earthly life, where there is no despair, but perfect trust, rest, and surrender. After having completed the work of redemption, the Son returns to the Father in full communion, showing that death, for Him, was not defeat, but a voluntary act of surrender and triumph.

In this final declaration we behold not only the culmination of the saving work, but also the perfect model for the believer. Christ teaches us how to live and how to die: in total dependence upon God, in constant communion with the Father, and in the assurance that our lives are in His hands. What was a reality in the Savior becomes a firm hope for all who are in Him.

Thus concludes this series of the seven sayings of Christ on the cross, each revealing a glorious dimension of His person and His redemptive work. From forgiveness to completion, and finally to rest in the Father, everything points to a perfect and sufficient salvation. May these words not only be contemplated, but believed, lived, and treasured in the heart, leading us to fully trust in the One who committed His spirit into the hands of the Father and secured for us an eternal and safe destiny.