Into Your Hands

3 min readApr 20, 2019

“Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit” (Luke 23:46). Christians often struggle with the humanity of Jesus. His humanity — Him being fully human — challenges the divine Superman we often want to make Him. Because of this, we do not usually think about Him having faith, a trust in God.

When Jesus faced His death, as He hung on the cross and suffered, He did so as a man facing the same fears that each of us faces when confronted with death. Yet, He was also convinced of a just God who would vindicate Him. In the midst of His suffering, pain, and death on the cross, Jesus believed that His death would not be the end, that God would not let His death be the final word.

“In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to Him who was able to save Him from death, and He was heard for His godly fear. Although He was a son, He learned obedience through what He suffered; and being made perfect He became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey Him” (Hebrews 5:7–9).

Jesus was not Superman, a being that looked like us but immune to the struggles, pains, and fears of human existence. Jesus was a man and faced His life and death as such. This gives poignancy to His statement on the cross: “Father, into Your hands I commit My Spirit.” It’s a statement in the face of life’s final, greatest journey of profound faith.

Often Jewish sages, like Jesus, cited part of a biblical verse as a way to refer to the entire verse. Jesus’ statement on the cross-cited the first part of Psalm 31:5: “Into Your hands, I commit my spirit; You redeemed me, faithful God.” As Jesus breathed His last, He communicated His profound confidence in a Father who would not abandon Him. The circumstances of His death were very real and final, as was the pain and suffering. But, God did not abandon Jesus to the grave (see Acts 2:29–36).

Even in His death, Jesus demonstrated for us the ability to trust His Father when confronted with an unknown and uncertain future. God is faithful regardless of the circumstances, and He will not abandon us. The circumstances may be very real, even life-threatening; but we can trust God when confronted with such circumstances. “Father into Your hands I commit my spirit; You redeemed me, faithful God.”