Why did Jesus have to Die?

Why the Death of Jesus Still Matters Two Thousand Years On

It is possibly the most important question in the Christian faith. Why did Jesus have to die? Not just how — the crucifixion itself is well documented — but why. What was the point of it? What did it achieve? And what, if anything, does it have to do with ordinary people trying to make sense of life in the twenty-first century?

Anna Grace, part of the Crowd Church team, takes on this question directly, walking through the account in Mark's Gospel and pulling out what she sees as the practical implications for anyone willing to listen.

Darkness Over the Whole Land

The passage in question is Mark 15:33-41, and the details are stark. "When the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'"

Those words are worth pausing on. Jesus — who Christians believe was fully God and fully human — cried out in genuine anguish. This was not a performance. Anna Grace makes the point clearly: "In this moment on the cross, Jesus was truly abandoned. He was bearing the wrath of God and the weight of our sin, and he cried out. He felt the anguish."

John Piper is quoted in the talk putting it this way: "He was amazingly fulfilling Scripture in the horror of it all, and witnessing to the perfection of the plan of salvation."

There is something raw about this scene that resists being tidied up. A man crying out to God, asking why he has been forsaken, while the sky goes dark. Whatever you believe about Jesus, the emotional weight of that moment is hard to ignore.

The Curtain That Tore

Something happened at the moment Jesus died that the talk highlights as hugely significant. The curtain in the temple — a thick, woven barrier separating ordinary people from the presence of God — tore in two from top to bottom.

To understand why this matters, you need some context. In the Jewish temple, only the high priest was allowed to enter the innermost room, known as the Holy of Holies. If you needed something from God, the priest had to go on your behalf. There was no direct access. The curtain — roughly nine centimetres thick — stood as a physical reminder that God was present but not available. Not to you, anyway.

When that curtain tore, the symbolism was unmistakable. "Now we can enter into God's presence," Anna Grace explains. "Now we have direct access to him. Now there's no separation."

That is, in practical terms, what Christians believe the death of Jesus achieved. Not a religious ritual or a theological abstraction, but a removal of the barrier between people and God. Before the cross, access was restricted. After the cross, it was open.

The Question Everyone Brings

Most people approaching the story of Jesus's death bring a version of the same question: why would God require this? Could he not have found another way?

The talk points to John 3:16 for the answer: "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life."

The word "gave" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. This was not something that happened to God. It was something God chose. The driving motivation, according to the text, was love — not obligation, not anger, not cosmic bureaucracy.

Anna Grace puts it simply: "God loved us so much that he didn't want us to die. He didn't want us to be separated from him. He wanted to spend eternity with us. So he made a way."

That framing shifts the conversation. The death of Jesus is not presented as punishment for its own sake, but as the cost of removing an obstacle. The obstacle being the gap between a perfect God and imperfect people.

It Was Always the Plan

One of the more striking points in the talk is that Jesus's death was not a surprise to God. It was prophesied throughout the Old Testament — hundreds of years before it happened.

The words Jesus cried on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me," are a direct quote from Psalm 22, written roughly a thousand years earlier. The shedding of blood for the forgiveness of sins is prefigured in Leviticus. The mocking of the crowds was prophesied. The details were not coincidental.

This matters because it addresses a common objection: that the crucifixion was a tragic accident or a plan gone wrong. According to the biblical account, it was neither. It was the central event that everything else pointed towards.

What Anna Grace Learned From Her Own Story

The talk moves from theology to testimony, and this is where it becomes personal. "I'm standing here today on testimony after testimony of how, by acknowledging Jesus's death on the cross and recognising my sin and repenting from it — making a complete one-eighty turn from who I was before I met Jesus — I have had the greatest joy, the greatest freedom, and the deepest contentment that I've ever known."

She is quick to add a caveat. "It doesn't mean that my life has been perfect, or that I haven't faced suffering, or I'm not going through hard times, or that I don't feel sad or hurt or pain. It's not that at all."

What it does mean, she says, is going through difficulty within a relationship. "I have so much peace knowing that as I suffer, as I go through hardship, I'm going through it within a very intimate relationship with a selfless, powerful, holy, loving God who's a God of miracles."

That is an honest account. No promise that faith makes everything easy. Just a claim that it changes who you are walking through the hard things with.

The Centurion Who Saw It

There is a small detail in the passage that is easy to miss. A Roman centurion — a soldier, not a disciple, not a believer — was standing facing Jesus when he died. And his response was immediate: "Truly this man was the Son of God."

This was a man trained in violence, who had presumably overseen many executions. Something about the way Jesus died was different enough to make a hardened soldier reach a conclusion that the religious leaders of the day were working overtime to deny.

The death of Jesus had an effect on the people who witnessed it. Not just the disciples. Not just the women who watched from a distance. Even the people on the wrong side of the story were moved.

Making It Real

If you have grown up with this story. Anna Grace has a direct challenge: "I really want to encourage you, to challenge you, to think about what Jesus's death means. Remind yourself of what he's done for you. I forget. I don't think about it all the time." Familiarity can drain the power from any story. Take time to sit with it fresh.

If you have never heard this before. You are welcome here, and your questions are welcome too. Anna Grace's invitation is genuine: "If you're moved by who this person is and was and you want to pursue him, please reach out."

If you are still sceptical. That is also fine. "I want to tell you that you're still welcome here, and that we welcome your questions, and that this is a safe place to be and to wrestle with things."

If you are carrying guilt or shame. The talk addresses this directly. Acknowledging past mistakes is part of the journey, but living in shame is not. "We don't have to live in that shame or guilt of who we once were, because we're now free. We're forgiven and we are completely new."

Your Next Steps

1. Read Mark 15:33-41. It is short but dense. Read it slowly. Notice what stands out to you — not what you think should stand out, but what actually does.

2. Consider the curtain. What barriers do you feel exist between you and God? The Christian claim is that those barriers have already been removed. What would it mean if that were true?

3. Sit with the cost. It is easy to move quickly past the crucifixion to the resurrection. The talk deliberately stays at the cross. Spend some time there. What does it tell you about the kind of God who would choose this?

4. Ask your question. Whatever it is — why did this have to happen, does it apply to me, what do I do now — bring it. This is not a conversation that benefits from pretending you have no doubts.

The Cross and What Comes After

The death of Jesus is not comfortable. It is not meant to be. A man dying in agony, crying out to God, while the sky goes dark — there is nothing polished about that. But the Christian claim is that in that moment, something shifted for the entire human race. A barrier was removed. Access was granted. A way was made.

So here is the question: if God went to that length to remove what stood between you and him, what is stopping you from walking through the door?