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Welcome to part three of Walking With Jesus: A Journey to the Cross as we continue our series with Major Dr. Terry Masango and move closer to the heart of Easter.
In our first two episodes, we’ve seen Jesus seeking the lost sheep and redefining what it means to be a neighbor through the Good Samaritan. Today, we arrive at Calvary itself—the place of the crucifixion—where we witness one of the most powerful conversations in Scripture: the exchange between Jesus and the thief on the cross.
“Jesus, remember me.” These three simple words, spoken by a dying criminal, contain within them the essence of our faith journey. As we near Holy Week, Major Masango invites us to consider which of the two thieves we identify with—the one who demanded physical salvation or the one who recognized his need for spiritual redemption.
His message opens with a remarkable story of a woman ministering in a prison, where an inmate confesses, “I’m an awful, terrible, horrible sinner.” To his surprise, she responds, “Thank God.” Her response wasn’t dismissive but recognized a profound truth: acknowledging our brokenness is the first step toward healing.
It’s a message that speaks directly to those of us who feel unworthy, invisible, or beyond redemption. It reminds us that even at the worst points in our lives—even in our final moments like the thief on the cross—we can turn to Jesus and simply ask, “Remember me.” And his answer remains the same: “Today you will be with me in paradise.”
If you haven’t yet downloaded the Holy Week Art Journal, now is the perfect time as this week we mark Palm Sunday—the beginning of Holy Week, when Jesus entered Jerusalem waving palm branches. Visit caringmagazine.org/journey or follow the link in our show notes to get your free copy and join the many families preparing their hearts for Easter Sunday.
Now, listen in as Major Dr. Terry Masango explores the transformative power of those three words: “Jesus, remember me.”
Listen and subscribe to The Do Gooders Podcast now. Below is a transcript of the episode, edited for readability. For more information on the people and ideas in the episode, see the links at the bottom of this post.
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Years ago, I heard of a woman who was doing work in a jail service. She was preaching and ministering and sharing with prisoners behind bars. One man came to her, came up close, and put his face right there against the jail bars, and he said, “Lady, can you please help me?”
He said, “I’m an awful, terrible, horrible sinner.”
She answered, “Thank God.”
He said, “No, you didn’t understand what I said. I’m an awful, terrible, horrible sinner.”
She said again, “Thank God.”
He said, “Lady, please don’t make fun of me. Don’t ridicule me.”
She said, “I’m not making fun of you. I’m not ridiculing you. I thank God you have confessed that you’re a sinner because you can now be saved.”
Listen, this is a faithful saying that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.
Today’s Scripture is coming from Luke 23. I’ll read from verses 39 to 43.
One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”
But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.”
Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”
Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
As we prepare for Easter, I want to talk today about the message, “Jesus, remember me.”
You see, the cross was designed to be a punishment that is both humiliating and painful.
It strips the person of honor and permits people to abuse them. It is the ultimate punishment reserved by Rome for the worst offenders.
Throughout his ministry, Jesus identified with sinners, and their quality has steadily spiraled downward from ordinary crowds. And at the beginning, to a prostitute in the middle of the story, and thieves being crucified at the end, his purpose was to save people of every stripe who were in need of saving.
In Luke, we read so many times of Jesus spending time with those people who were regarded as sinners, people who were regarded as people who are not worth being with. But here, Luke is showing us that even right before Jesus’ death, He was still engaged in the lives of those who are regarded as sinners.
In particular, as Jesus was crucified, he was in between two sinners, two robbers, and these robbers also needed saving. The first robber said, “Well, aren’t you the one who said you are the Christ? Why don’t you save us and save yourself too?”
It’s a good question to ask. He’s asking, “Since you have all this power, why don’t you exercise your power and physically save us and save yourself?”
While this may sound like a good thing to say, it wasn’t good because he missed the picture. They’re facing death. Jesus is facing death. They’re facing death. All he cared about was his physical salvation. “Can you save us?”
Then there’s a second robber. So Jesus is in the middle, and they are speaking over Jesus between themselves. So the second one says, “Don’t you fear God? Can’t you tell that you and I deserve to be where we are? We are the sinners. We are suffering. We’re being punished for what we did. But this man has done nothing wrong, yet he’s being punished together with us.”
Then he turns to Jesus and says, “Will you remember me? Jesus, please remember me when you get into your glory.”
Now, there is a revelation from this second robber, the revelation being that he has seen that while the first one is seeking physical salvation from that cross, the second one is seeking spiritual salvation from the Savior on the cross.
So he says, “Do you not fear God? We deserve our punishment, but this man is innocent. He has done nothing wrong.” In that very moment, the first robber loses it. The second robber gains it. The first robber is seeking physical salvation that is temporary. The second robber is seeking spiritual salvation that is eternal.
So Jesus’ answer was to the first robber who wanted physical salvation, but to the one who says, “My spirit needs to be with you. Will you remember me?”
So this passage teaches us the value of firstly knowing who Jesus is but also of seeking the spiritual over the physical. He also acknowledges his own sins. It’s important for us to know that there’s no salvation without accepting that we are sinners. But the question you could ask is, what then is sin?
Sin is an immoral act against God. We live in a culture where the concept of sin is taken lightly. Others just call it a mistake. Others will call it an error or a misjudgment or nothing at all.
“It’s my life. I live whatever I want.”
But it’s important for us to say, even though we live in a world where everything is relative, it’s important to say that it doesn’t change the fact that there is right and wrong. There’s good and bad. There’s God, and there’s the devil. There is sin, and there’s righteousness. Most of us, when we are asked what sin is, we think about the 10 Commandments and the violation thereof. Most of us, when we are asked to define sin, we talk about actions that are good.. that are bad or actions that are good, but they’re not done.
But the Bible would define sin as missing the mark. When we read in Romans 3:23, it says, All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God.
All means all, everybody, no matter how good they are, if they have not accepted Jesus, they still have fallen short of the Glory of God. They’re still missing the mark.
After having sinned, King David, in Psalm 51:5, says, “Behold, I was brought forth in sin, and in sin, my mother conceived me.”
Ephesians 2:2 says that, All people who are not in Christ are children of disobedience.
Ephesians 2:3 says, By nature, we are children of wrath.
This means that wherever we are, if we don’t have Jesus, God looks at us as sinners. And this robber on the cross recognized that everything he had done deserved punishment. He was a sinner. So, by any measure, the statement, “Remember me,” is remarkable.
Jesus’ disciples, by this time when he was the cross, had fled. One fled naked. The crowds had left in sadness and disappointment. All hope was gone. Jesus was dead. Their hopelessness is echoed by the men on the Road to Emmaus recorded in the next chapter, in chapter 24. They said, “They crucified him, but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel.”
I can almost see them with their heads hung down, and they’re just saying, “There’s no more hope. He was crucified. We hoped he would save Israel, but nothing is going to happen because he’s dead.”
You see, on that Friday, a blanket of evil covered the earth, dark clouds of defeat hovered in the skies. It was a sad, gloomy Friday. An air of loneliness encircled the three crucified beings on the crosses, one either side of Jesus, the first one criticizing him, the other one accepting his sin and asking for his soul to be saved.
Somehow, he understood that Jesus is not an imposter, that he will still receive the Kingdom of God as the Messiah. Something was different between these two. The repentant robber fixed his gaze on Jesus and directly addressed him. It reminds me of the song we sing in church, “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” [by Helen Lemmel].
It starts by saying:
O soul, are you weary and troubled?
No light in the darkness you see?
There’s light for a look at the Savior,
And life more abundant and free!
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.
Thro’ death into life everlasting,
He passed, and we follow Him there;
O’er us sin no more hath dominion–
For more than conqu’rors we are!
Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.
That thief knew if he looked straight in Jesus’ eyes, the things of earth will not matter anymore. The salvation of physical beings would not matter anymore, but the light and the glory that comes is more important.
“Jesus, remember me.”
What a wonderful faith-filled request.
He’s hanging on the cross, laboring to breathe, knowing death is soon to come, and yet his eyes have been open to see that the person being crucified next to him is the righteous Son of God, sinless Son of God who can save him.
What is the thief doing in this verse? Clearly, he moves from the awareness of his sinful condition to an awareness of the sinless condition of Jesus. This led him to ask for forgiveness from the Savior. Maybe earlier on, he remembered he had heard Jesus repeatedly say these words, “Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they’re doing.”
Now, he was asking for that same forgiveness for himself. This man’s faith had shown itself when he rebuked the other thief. He hoped to be with Jesus sometime in the future. Remember it’s a thief’s plea for Jesus to call him to mind. As Jesus was about to enter into Heaven, he says, “Please don’t forget me. Remember me.”
For him to even think, to make such a request presupposes that he believes that Jesus will be in a different place in the future, and when he’s there, the thief pleads that, “You should keep him in mind.” He saw his sin. He saw the sinless Savior, and he repented.
He said, “Jesus, remember me. Salvation is not for them, for others, for the religious, but it is for me. Jesus, remember me.”
You see, Christ died for sin.
Believers die to sin, but unbelievers die in sin. We don’t need to die in sin. We all need to say, “Jesus. Remember me.”
And Jesus’ answer was truly, “I say to you today, you’ll be with me in paradise.”
In Romans 10:11-13, it says, Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame for there is no difference between Jew and Gentile. The same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him.
Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
So if you are thinking about your life, if you were one of those robbers crucified together with Jesus, will you be the one that says, “Jesus, you are a powerful man. Why don’t you save yourself and save me too so I can return to my family? I can go back to my work. I can go back to my schedule. I can get going with my life here on earth.”
Or do you identify with the other one that says, “Jesus is sinless, has done nothing wrong? I’ve done all the sin. I deserve to be punished, but Jesus remember me.”
That means a statement like that is saying, “Jesus, I know you are the Savior. Remember me. As you save others, save me too.”
This means the day of salvation can be even the day when you are on the cross, when you are in pain when you are suffering, and you’re facing death, you can be saved. No matter how difficult your life is today, you can be saved. You can say, “Jesus, remember me. As you save this whole world, as you save all the planet, save me.”
Cry out to Jesus and say, “Remember me.”
This message is for those who are sick and tired of others making fun of God.
This message is for those who have come face to face with their sin.
This message is for those who say, “I accept I’ve made a mess of my life.”
This message is for those who say, “I’m a nobody. I’m insignificant. I’m not worthy. I’m not good enough. I don’t deserve to be saved.”
This message is for those who say, “I’ve done so much. I don’t even know if God can forgive me.”
This message is for those who say, “I’ve kept secrets that nobody knows about.”
This message is for those who say, “Nobody cares. Nobody sees me. If I were no longer here, no one would miss me. No one would even notice.”
This message is for you who are suffering in silence, for you who are struggling with addiction, overwhelmed by depression.
You have to acknowledge Jesus is your Savior. You need to say, “Jesus, remember me. Be in remembrance of me when you enter heaven because I want to be with you. Jesus, remember me, a sinner.”
You need to say, “Jesus, remember me. I used to walk with you. My faith has now gone cold. Jesus, remember me. I am suffering. Jesus, remember me. I am addicted to drugs. Jesus, remember me. I’m struggling with loneliness. I feel unloved, unseen.”
You need to say, “Jesus, remember me. Life is not going well. I’m broke. I’m hurting. I’m struggling.”
You need to say, “Jesus, remember me because life just simply hurts right now. Jesus, remember me. I just got diagnosed with a terminal illness. Jesus, remember me. I just lost a loved one, and my faith is shaky. Jesus, remember me. My mind is plagued with doubts. Jesus, remember me. My child is going wild. Drugs have enslaved him. Jesus, remember me. I’m stuck. I keep going back to the same sin over and over again. Jesus, remember me when you return to take us home. Jesus, remember me when I stand in front of your Father.”
“Jesus, remember me.”
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