Done and Dusted

 

I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do.      --John 17:4

If you are a fan of British television, as my wife and I are, then you are familiar with the phrase, "Done and dusted." It is a phrase used to express that a task or situation has been fully completed.  It means that something is completely finished, finalized, or decided, with no further action needed. The phrase indicates total completion. It is commonly used in both formal and informal contexts to show that a project, deal, or task is fully wrapped up. Dictionaries define it as "finished or decided, with nothing more to be said or done." The expression likely originated in Britain, possibly linked to dusting powder used to finish documents (by drying the ink), symbolizing a final touch.

This is the meaning of the Greek word tetelestai, which Jesus shouted triumphantly from the cross as He drew His final breath. We will speak more of this in a moment, but in the beginning of today's Scripture passage, there appears to be some unfinished business that Jesus needs to be taking care of.

Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, "Woman, behold your son!" Then He said to the disciple, "Behold your mother!" And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home. After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, "I thirst!" Now a vessel full of sour wine was sitting there; and they filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a hyssop, and put it to His mouth. Wo when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished!" And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit (John 19:25-30).

Four women stood at the foot of the cross. One was Mary the mother of Jesus. The unnamed woman is identified in the other Gospels as Salome, wife of Zebedee, and mother of James and John (who were cousins of Jesus). Very little is known of the third woman, identified as Mary the wife of Clopas; this is the one and only time she is mentioned, unless she is the "other Mary" who brought spices to prepare the body of Jesus for burial. The fourth woman mentioned is Mary Magdalene, whom we know as a close follower of Jesus after He had delivered her from seven demons (Mark 16:9; Luke 8:2).

As Mary's firstborn, Jesus felt a responsibility for the welfare of His mother. "The first time we meet Mary in the gospel of John, she is attending a wedding (2:1-11); now she is preparing for a burial. The hour had come! She was experiencing 'the sword' that had been predicted years before (Luke 2:35)" (Warren Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary).

William Barclay writes, "In this passage there is something which is surely one of the loveliest things in all the gospel story. When Jesus saw His mother, He could not but think of the days ahead. He could not commit her to the care of His brothers, for they did not believe in Him yet (John 7:5). And, after all, John had a double qualification for the service Jesus entrusted to him--he was Jesus' cousin, being Salome's son, and he was the disciple whom Jesus loved."

Having tied up the loose end of how His mother would be taken care of, Jesus then turned His attention to fulfilling prophecy. Psalm 22:15 says, "My tongue clings to My jaws; You have brought Me to the dust of death." The Jewish leaders would be thinking of this passage because Jesus had already quoted from this Psalm when He said, "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me." Another Messianic Psalm is Psalm 49, and we see in verse 21, "They gave Me gall for My food, and for My thirst they gave Me vinegar to drink."

So Jesus fulfilled this Scripture when He said, "I thirst." 

One commentary I read gave a completely different take on this passage, one that gives us pause. In the New Cambridge Bible Commentary, John Neyrey writes that when Jesus said "I thirst," He was not speaking to the crowds or to His disciples or even to the soldiers who tried to give Him drink. He was praying to God.

Just as the bystanders utterly misunderstood Jesus' statement "My God, my God..." and thought that He called Elijah to rescue Him, so, too, the soldiers here take Jesus' words literally and offer Him a drink. The meaning, however, lies elsewhere. One should link Jesus' "thirst" with His claim that others who drink of His water will never thirst again (4:13-14; 6:35; 7:37); just as "drink" has a literal and spiritual meaning, so, too, does "thirst." The "cup" He drinks, we are told, is that presented by the Father (18:11). If so, it expresses Jesus' full obedience to drink that cup, obey the divine will, and achieve the work for which He was sent.

In other words, when Salome, the mother of James and John, asked Jesus to allow the sons of Zebedee to sit at His right hand and His left in His kingdom, what did He ask them? "Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?" He went on to say that they would in fact drink that same cup, which symbolizes the suffering and trials that that God may bring upon them. Therefore, it could be interpreted that when Jesus said, "I thirst," He was acknowledging that He was ready, willing, and able to drink of the cup that the Father had ordained for Him to drink. Even though He Himself knew no sin, He was willing to suffer and die for the sins of others.

In John's gospel, you find a number of pictures of our Lord's death: the slaying of the lamb (1:29); the destroying of the temple (2:19); the lifting up of the serpent (3:14); the shepherd laying down his life for the sheep (10:11-18); and the planting of the seed in the ground (12:20-25). These pictures make it clear that Jesus' death was not an accident; it was divine appointment. He was not murdered in the strictest sense: He willingly gave His life for us. His death was an atonement, not just an example. He actually accomplished the work of redemption on the cross (Wiersbe).

(Here) is another of John's hidden things. He tells us that it was on a hyssop reed that they put the sponge containing the vinegar. Now a hyssop reed is an unlikely thing to use for such a purpose, for it was only a stalk, like strong grass, and at the most two feet long. So unlikely is it that some scholars have thought that it is a mistake for a very similar word that means lance or spear. But it was hyssop which John wrote and hyssop which John meant. When we go centuries back to the first Passover when the children of Israel left their slavery in Egypt, we remember how the angel of death was to walk abroad that night and to slay every first-born son of the Egyptians. We remember how the Israelites were to slay the Passover lamb and were to smear the doorposts of their houses with its blood so that the avenging angel of death would pass over their houses. And the ancient instruction was: "Take a bunch of hyssop and dip it in the blood which is in the basin and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood which is in the basin" (Exodus 12:22). It was the blood of the Passover lamb which saved the people of God; it was the blood of Jesus which was to save the world from sin. The very mention of hyssop would take the thoughts of any Jew back to the saving blood of the Passover lamb; and this was John's way of saying that Jesus was the great Passover Lamb of God whose death was to save the whole world from sin (Barclay).

After accomplishing all this, Jesus gave a triumphant shout. "IT IS FINISHED."  NT Wright, who is British and would have used the phrase "done and dusted" many times in his life, wrote in his commentary John for Everyone:

Jesus gives one last cry. "It's finished." "It's all done." "It's complete!" He has finished the work that the Father had given Him to do (17:4). He has loved "to the very end" His own who were in the world (13:1). He has accomplished the full and final task. The word translated "It's all done!" is actually a single word in the original language. It's the word that people would write on a bill after it had been paid. The bill is dealt with. It's finished. The price has been paid. Yes, says John: and Jesus' work is now complete, in that sense as in every other. It is upon this finished, complete work that His people from that day to this can stake their lives.

Bible scholar David Guzik writes, "A single word can change everything. 'Not guilty' in a court of law changes everything. 'Fair' on the playing field changes everything. When a woman says 'Yes' to a marriage proposal it changes everything. 'Goodbye' can change everything. Yet, there has never been a single word said that has impacted history than what Jesus said in John 19:30." Spurgeon said, “It was a Conqueror’s cry; it was uttered with a loud voice. There is nothing of anguish about it, there is no wailing in it. It is the cry of One who has completed a tremendous labor.”

It was all finished, paid in full, accomplished.

• >The types, promises, and prophecies were finished.
• >The sacrifices and ceremonies of the priesthood were finished.
• >His perfect obedience was finished.
• >The satisfaction of God’s justice was finished.
• >The power of Satan, sin, and death was finished.

When Jesus tasted death, as all men must do, He did so with the peaceful confidence of obedience to the Father, and the full knowledge that He had accomplished all that He was sent to do.