Why Christ Had To Die

Frank Sheed, Theology and Sanity, on why Jesus had to die.

[B]ecause He was a man with a true human nature, he could offer a true human act in expiation of human sin, an act of total love to balance humanity's self-love; and because He was God, the human act He offered was of infinite value and so could satisfy and more than satisfy for the sins of men.

But all things are in the power of God. Why, we may ask in all reverence, did the divine plan include the death of the Redeemer?

The two answers that instantly spring to mind are that nothing could show the love of God so overpoweringly as His willingness to die for us, and nothing could show the horror of sin so clearly as that it needed His death to expiate it.

There must certainly have been something in what Our Lord had to do which made His dying the best way to do it.

Although he was Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and being made perfect he became the source of salvation to all who obey him. Heb 5:8-9