“Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” With these last words, Jesus entrusts his spirit, his soul, his life, and subsequently his death, to God, his Father. This passage is very special to us as Christians. God incarnate died in our stead. This is that very moment in the flow of time. That death for all deaths. That self-sacrifice of God. That death of one for the liberation of all.
The last breath of Jesus…gone.
Something spectacular and at the same time terrible is happening here with this passage. And it has to do with the word “breath.” The breath of Jesus is gone. In the original understanding, breath meant something like soul, or the person’s life force. But the word for breath meant so much more in the original language. The word used so often in the New Testament is pronounced “nooma.” It’s where we get the word pneumonia from. Breath, air, the thing that sustains life. But this word, nooma didn’t just mean breath, but wind, soul and … spirit. When Jesus yells “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit,” that word spirit is nooma. The same word used when the passage describes that Jesus took his last breath. Is Jesus entrusting God with his breath, signifying his dying, or is it something more? What is it about his spirit, his soul, that Jesus would find so important as to make that his last and final statement?
To understand the depth of what is happening here, we must look at what the word nooma is used for throughout the bible. As it turns out, it surfaces quite often. In the Greek translation of Genesis 1, Spirit, nooma, was with God at the creation of the earth. When God spoke, breathed upon the earth, creation simply WAS. In Genesis 2, God formed us from the dust of the ground and breathed into our nostrils the breath of life. Nooma – God’s breath. Even though we were formed, we did not truly exist until the breath of God entered us. This nooma is the essence of human beings. When the Lord saved Moses and the Israelites in the great Exodus, God provided a strong easterly wind, a nooma, to dry up the sea. God’s breath parted the waters. This nooma is the power of God.
Throughout the Old Testament we see the miraculous opening of the heavens so that God’s nooma, God’s spirit, God’s breath can impact human lives. Every once in awhile, God’s nooma is revealed for us to see and it signifies God reaching down, bringing the Godly essence upon us, sitting with us for a period of time and becoming part of us. But this in-breaking of heaven is revealed to us sporadically at best, and even then only for a short while, maybe only a matter of seconds.
And then, two thousand years ago there was a man named Jesus of Nazareth. Claimed by John to be the Word of God who was with God in creation, through whom all things were made, and who is, in essence, fully God. But Jesus was also fully human. Flesh and blood, born of a woman, sleeping, talking, eating, drinking, fully human. During his baptism, John the Baptist saw the spirit, the nooma of God descending upon Jesus…and remain. God’s spirit did not pass through, brush over, or swirl around Jesus – it stayed upon him. Jesus is the earthly incarnation of the breath of God. God’s very essence walking among us. Through this full endowment of the spirit, the nooma of God, the man Jesus heals the lame, cures the blind, resurrects the dead, and also washes feet. All the power, all the truth, all the comfort of God’s nooma not quickly manifesting itself on earth, but instead living upon it. The breath of God…here…in the flesh.
But some were threatened by God’s righteous power. Because sometimes the truth hurts. So again, [[vv. 44-46]].
“Father, here is your breath, here is your nooma. I give you back your Spirit. This world could not handle it.” When Jesus released his spirit, his nooma, it was not just Jesus entrusting his soul to God. It was an exhalation of the power it took to create a universe. It was the release of the breath that formed the human soul. That breath was the very same wind that parted the waters in front of Moses. That same spirit that walked the earth curing ailments, calming storms, offering forgiveness despite ourselves! Gone! His cry was our rejection of God on earth. And it was the giving back of God’s ultimate example of love, grace, and justice which we just couldn’t handle.
In his last moment on earth, Jesus gave back the breath of God.
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