"Read the following words concerning Christ. He hung on the cross: “And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost.” Mark 15:37.
The words “gave up the ghost” are from a single Greek word (ekpneo), meaning literally to breathe out, to expire.
The word “expire,” a common synonym of “die,” is a compound Latin word meaning to breathe out.
Jesus breathed out His life upon the cross.
It was not forcibly taken from Him,
but He laid it down voluntarily,
and laid it down on purpose that He might take it again
as He had the ability to lay it down and take it again. John 10:17,18.
Jesus tasted death for every man. Heb. 2:9.
“With His stripes we are healed.” Isaiah 53:6.
Through His death we receive life.
“We have redemption through His blood.” Ephesians 1:7.
Now let us state the case in this simple way: (1) Christ died to give life to the world;
(2) To die is to expire, to breathe out;
(3) Man has life by breathing in the life of God;
(4) Therefore Christ breathed out His life on the cross, that we might breathe it in;
(5) Thus we see that the cross was simply the revelation of the Creator at work, and in the cross we see God creating man, and breathing into his nostrils the breath of life.
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature,” or, “there is a new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17), just as it was in the beginning; and we see clearly that the power of the cross is identical with the power by which man was created in the beginning, and by which mankind still lives.
That which is technically known by the cross, is that by which all creatures live, and by which the worlds were made."
E.J. Waggoner