The Cross

Passion Week  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented   •  1:17:32
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Scripture Intro:

Scripture Reading (“Please stand…”)
Mark 15:16 ESV
And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor’s headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion.
Mark 15:17–18 ESV
And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. And they began to salute him, “Hail, King of the Jews!”
Mark 15:19–20 ESV
And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him.
Mark 15:21–22 ESV
And they compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross. And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull).
Mark 15:23–24 ESV
And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take.
Mark 15:25–26 ESV
And it was the third hour when they crucified him. And the inscription of the charge against him read, “The King of the Jews.”
Mark 15:27 ESV
And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left.
Mark 15:29–30 ESV
And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself, and come down from the cross!”
Mark 15:31–32 ESV
So also the chief priests with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.” Those who were crucified with him also reviled him.
Mark 15:33 ESV
And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.
Mark 15:34 ESV
And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Mark 15:35–36 ESV
And some of the bystanders hearing it said, “Behold, he is calling Elijah.” And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.”
Mark 15:37–38 ESV
And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.
Mark 15:39 ESV
And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
---
Pray...

Intro:

In Nashville this week,
we heard of yet another school shooting...
6 people were killed.
Three 9-year-old children
Three adults who worked at the school.
This one hit particularly close to home for us.
It was just down the road from where Linda did her Student Teaching in college.
It is the school of a church in our denomination (PCA).
And one of the children killed that day was the daughter of the pastor of the church.
This draws to mind the shooting in Charleston (June 2015).
Where a shooter attended a Bible study at Emanuel A.M.E. church
before killing 9 people from that church.
When we start to think about such things...
tons of questions come to mind.
But today, I want to explore one subset of those questions...
What are we supposed to think about God as it relates to these tragedies?
Questions:
Is God able to stop things like this? (unable)
If he is able to stop it, did he not see it coming? (unaware)
If he is able, does he not care? (calloused to our life)
Since he didn’t stop it, is he not good?
In fairness, I am not going to fully answer those questions today.
But if we reduce the question to something like this,
“Can God be good while he allows horrific evil to occur?”
Remember Matt Gerrald’s Sunday School class on this from February.
Matt pointed us to what event as a way of understanding this question?
To the cross.
There is no greater evil perpetrated in human history than the cross.
The sinless, righteous Son of God...
God in the flesh...
crucified as a criminal and mocked as a joke.
Yet, is there any greater evil than killing God?
The Cross actually helps us orient to the terrible things in this world.
The very thing that is horrific evil...
is the thing we shout and celebrate in worship.
God’s grace to us through the worst evil ever done...
And he was the recipient of the evil.
Now that is amazing grace.
Scandal of the cross itself (from a sermon in 2013)
“May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus” (Gal. 6:14)
How was this statement received in 1st Century Roman Culture?
As absolute Nonsense.
What with the concept of the cross in that day?
The cross was a scandal.
It was despised.
Not because of Jesus,
but it was a something that was despised in Roman culture.
Crucifixion was the supreme way of putting somebody to death.
It was the utmost punishment imposed by Roman law,
But at the same time,
there was a there was a lacking of support for crucifixion in Roman society.
Josephus referred to it as the “most wretched of deaths.”
Often times the sophisticated aristocrats in the society
wouldn't even mention crucifixion in conversation.
To do so would be the height of rudeness and distaste.
It is actually rarely, if ever, mentioned as a subject in literature.
To Ancient people,
the cross is truly one of the ugliest, most heinous pictures imaginable.
It was the deepest humiliation possible for someone.
Rather than something to be boasted about…
The cross should have been an embarrassment to the church...
(at least intended to be)
Paul says that it is the very thing that we take pride in.
We boast in the very thing that is utterly unmentionable in society.
For us in the modern world, especially the American church.
The cross is a sign of beauty and
something that brings peace, something even noble.
We wear gold crosses on necklaces around our necks.
As a result, we don’t get what Paul is saying here.
ILL. Allow me to give you some decorating tips:
Hang some framed pictures of the electric chair,
Carved wood figurines of gallows for hanging (on the coffee table),
Shadow box commemorating lethal injection (in the kids’ rooms),
A magnet of a gas chambers on your refrigerator.
Wearing an electric chair on a gold chain around your neck.
You wouldn’t do it.
Why? It’s reprehensible.
That’s what the Roman world thought of Paul’s boasting in the cross
His boast is there because…
God the Son, Jesus,
Left heaven to endure the worst this world had to offer
Why?
To redeem his people
To make this world right again

His Derision, Our Salvation

SAT prep - “derision”
“ridicule or mockery”
Now, why didn’t I just use those words?
It needed a good ring to it...
Derision coupled with Salvation.
But also the same word used in v. 29 (in the ESV)...
“hurled insults” (NIV)
They give him the garments and apparel of a king...
Purely mocking.
(v. 17) “clothed him in a purple cloak”
“a crown”…
but a crown of thorns.
(v. 18) “the began to salute him”
Declared their allegiance to him...
“Hail, King of the Jews!”
Then it turned to flat out mockery...
“striking his head with a reed”
Like an animal or a slave or a criminal.
“spitting on him”
“kneeling down in homage to him”
(v. 20) “stripped him of the purple cloak”
“led him out to crucify him”
While on the cross, the mocking continues.
(v. 26) An inscription above his head...
“King of the Jews”
This was what he was charged with.
(v. 29) People walked by deriding (hurling insults) at him.
Shaking their heads (condemnation, disgust).
Two thieves on either side.
“save yourself”
(v. 31) Chief priests
“he cannot save himself”
(v. 32) “Those who were crucified with him also reviled him.”
Summary:
He was mocked incessantly throughout the cross
and the time leading up to it.
Verse 32 points to what everyone was thinking...
(v. 32) “come down now from the cross that we may see and believe”
Everyone thought that salvation would come through conquering.
Instead, salvation came by death.
Salvation came by God taking our deserved punishment.
He saved us NOT by “coming down from the cross”
He saved us by STAYING on the cross.
To drive home that Jesus is receiving this treatment...
notice the subjects of the sentences and the actions they take.
I was struck this week that in the events of the cross,
Jesus is the recipient.
It’s everyone else who is doing most of the action.
“led like a sheep to the slaughter”
We’ll pick up as the soldiers take him away.
(from v. 16)
“the soldiers led him”
“they clothed him”
“they put [the crown of thorns] on him”
“they began to salute”
“they were striking his head”
“they were spitting on him”
“they knelt down to pay homage”
“they mocked him”
“they stripped him”
“they compelled a passerby to carry his cross”
“they brought him to Golgotha”
“they offered him wine”
“he did not take it”
“they crucified him”
“they cast lots for his garments”
“those who passed by derided him”
“the chief priests and scribes mocked him”
“those crucified with him reviled him”
“They, they, they, they....”
After all of that...
Mark 15:34 ESV
And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

His Anguish, Our Joy

(v. 34) “cried out with a loud voice”
(v. 37) “uttered a loud cry” (different word)...
more of a loud noise.
(v. 23) “wine mixed with myrrh”
would have had a bitter taste but was actually a narcotic,
given to deaden the pain of crucifixion.
(v. 34) “My God, my God why...”
Jesus is quoting from Psalm 22...
a Psalm of anguish, and yet, hope.
And very similar wording of what occured on the cross.
Psalm 22:1–2 ESV
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest.
Psalm 22:3–4 ESV
Yet you are holy, enthroned on the praises of Israel. In you our fathers trusted; they trusted, and you delivered them.
Psalm 22:5–6 ESV
To you they cried and were rescued; in you they trusted and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
Psalm 22:7–8 ESV
All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads; “He trusts in the Lord; let him deliver him; let him rescue him, for he delights in him!”
---
Do you hear the anguish and the pain?
Yet, the Gospel is that Jesus endures that for his people and their salvation.
The Gospel is NOT get your act together and act like Jesus.
The Gospel is receive and rest in what Jesus did for you
(in your place, on your behalf)
So the Gospel is the Anguish of Jesus leads to Our Joy.

His Rejection, Our Access

(v. 34) “why have you forsaken me?”
It’s a question to his Father in heaven.
From Psalm 22
“abandoned to his enemies” (Ps 22:13ff.)
God “remained far off” (verses 12, 20),
The root word often having the sense,
“to be left defenseless in the hands of an enemy.”
“he breathed his last”
Mark 15:38 ESV
And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.
From “top to bottom”
An act of God.
B/c man would tear something from bottom to top.
The barrier to entry of the Holy of Holies in the temple is now open.
The area where one man (High Priest), once a year could go...
The area that the High Priest would always enter
carrying blood of a sacrifice...
was thrown wide open.
Access to the presence of God is now thrown open!!!
Hebrews 9:12 ESV
he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
Hebrews 9:24 ESV
For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.
Hebrews 10:19–21 ESV
Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God,
Hebrews 10:22 ESV
let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
Hebrews 10:23 ESV
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.
---

Close in Prayer

Closing Song:

“My King Forever”
You gave Your life for mine
Nailed to the cross
You crucified
All my sin and shame
It was washed by Your mercy

Benediction:

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