Easter 2023
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Why did the Easter Bunny go to the Barber? Bad Hare day
Found Stir Fry all over my bed this morning… mustve been sleep woking
I want to read a little bit of the Easter story, and I want to teach you something today that I myself had preached incorrectly. And I believe it is life altering once we know the truth of it.
This morning I want to focus on one scripture in Matthew 27 that I know I have preached incorrectly… I want to show you what it means… and correct my previous teaching and I want to make sure you can see how life altering this is as I have now been able to see… I want to do that by looking at the first and last words of Jesus as he hung on the cross… the first
46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).
And the last
30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
So why are these verses so important? because it is thoroughly important to be able to see what is going on the be able to understand what verse 46 of Matthew 27 means
Alfred Edersheim was an Jewish convert to Christianity in the 1800’s and was well versed in first century Judaism. He talks about how most first century Jews would have memorized a great deal of scripture and the one way that Jews would have recalled their attention to a piece of scripture is by reciting the first and the last line and it would have had them remember that and everything in between… So Jesus was trying in those final moments to draw his hearers minds to Psalm 22… and I want to walk you through some of those similarities and what it means for us today
1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
Lets start reading through Matthew 27
.
1 Early in the morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people made their plans how to have Jesus executed.
2 So they bound him, led him away and handed him over to Pilate the governor.
3 When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders.
11 Meanwhile Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, “Are you the king of the Jews?” “You have said so,” Jesus replied.
12 When he was accused by the chief priests and the elders, he gave no answer.
13 Then Pilate asked him, “Don’t you hear the testimony they are bringing against you?”
14 But Jesus made no reply, not even to a single charge—to the great amazement of the governor.
15 Now it was the governor’s custom at the festival to release a prisoner chosen by the crowd.
Talk about how this may not have been a Jewish custom, but a roman one..
16 At that time they had a well-known prisoner whose name was Jesus Barabbas.
17 So when the crowd had gathered, Pilate asked them, “Which one do you want me to release to you: Jesus Barabbas, or Jesus who is called the Messiah?”
18 For he knew it was out of self-interest that they had handed Jesus over to him.
19 While Pilate was sitting on the judge’s seat, his wife sent him this message: “Don’t have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him.”
Just think about this, Pilate is already trying to get away from doing anything to Jesus because he believes he is an innocent man
20 But the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus executed.
21 “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?” asked the governor. “Barabbas,” they answered.
22 “What shall I do, then, with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” Pilate asked. They all answered, “Crucify him!”
23 “Why? What crime has he committed?” asked Pilate. But they shouted all the louder, “Crucify him!”
Just days prior they had been yelling… Hosanna Hosanna… and now they are screaming to crucify him… how quickly life can change...
27 Then the governor’s soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him.
28 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him,
29 and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand. Then they knelt in front of him and mocked him. “Hail, king of the Jews!” they said.
And remember we quoted verse
7 All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads.
33 They came to a place called Golgotha (which means “the place of the skull”).
34 There they offered Jesus wine to drink, mixed with gall; but after tasting it, he refused to drink it.
35 When they had crucified him, they divided up his clothes by casting lots.
36 And sitting down, they kept watch over him there.
37 Above his head they placed the written charge against him: this is jesus, the king of the jews.
38 Two rebels were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left.
39 Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads
And again back to Psalm22:7-9
7 All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads.
8 “He trusts in the Lord,” they say, “let the Lord rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he delights in him.”
9 Yet you brought me out of the womb; you made me trust in you, even at my mother’s breast.
39 Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads
40 and saying, “You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!”
41 In the same way the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders mocked him.
42 “He saved others,” they said, “but he can’t save himself! He’s the king of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.
43 He trusts in God. Let God rescue him now if he wants him, for he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’ ”
44 In the same way the rebels who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him.
Look at these similarities…
and it goes on in
45 From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land.
46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).
immediately it would have fired…psalm 22:11-18
And here we get to the verse that we are going to rest on today....
I must admit, I had preached this wrong myself, and I want to make sure I get it right… there are a few ways I have heard this preached...
God cannot look at sin. He had to turn his back.
Jesus had to be forsaken for just a moment so we wouldn’t have to be forsaken.
God cannot look at sin. He had to turn his back.
13 Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrongdoing. Why then do you tolerate the treacherous? Why are you silent while the wicked swallow up those more righteous than themselves?
This is where this idea came from most likely.... but here’s the thing, we know this cannot be true. God CAN and does look at sin all the time… what does he do keep his eyes closed?
But what you see here is an ancient way the Hebrews would write… they would ask a question that no one would ever agree to, to create tension… and then they would explain it in the following verses…
Look at the verse again in Psalm 22:1
1 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning?
Why aren’t you helping me, why are you so far away, why am I all alone? See, its a ridiculous question, no Jew would think that God had turned their back on them and left them alone.., so he is creating this tension… and he’s going to answer… and you see from some of the verses we’ve already shared David walking through some of the problem and what he sees…
So l when we go back to Habakkuk knew that God could look upon sin… he knew that God had watched sin from the very beginning… he had watched what happened with the garden of eden… he had watched what was going on in Noah’s time and chose Noah to be a man that would be saved from his wrath
And if it goes even further than that…we know that God looked upon sin, as he had Satan in his presence in Job 1.
In fact, what we would have to realize, is that believing that God cannot look upon sin, would actually break down the idea that Jesus was fully God.
Just follow me for a moment… when Jesus came to the earth did he stay away from the sinners and only hang out with the “good” people? Of course not, he hung out with all the sinners and the dirty people, he hung out with the tax collectors and the prostitutes, in fact he was around sinners so much that people thought he was one of them… if God could not look at sin.. then JESUS who we believe is God would not have been able to look at the people he came to save...
And it goes even further than that… Paul tells us in 2 Cor 5:21
21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
HE BECAME SIN>>> GOD DIDNT JUST LOOK at it, he became it…
13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.”
So here we are… we know that it cannot be that God cannot look upon sin… God can most definitely look at sin… and he does so every moment that we sin… he sees it all, but as he looks upon our sin he knows our need for a redeemer which is why he sent Jesus..
Not only that, but we know that He looks upon our sin as he draws us through the holy spirit… as he draws the lost to himself
Jesus had to be forsaken for just a moment so we wouldn’t have to be forsaken.
The idea here is that Jesus had to be forsaken for a moment so you and I would not be forsaken for eternity. And I think this idea comes as we try to explain away something that most people have a hard time understanding...
we read Hebrews 13:5-6
5 Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said,
“Never will I leave you;
never will I forsake you.”
6 So we say with confidence,
“The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid.
What can mere mortals do to me?”
And we cannot wrap our minds around these verses… so we see this scripture and think what is going on… Jesus can’t possibly be going against scripture the scripture has to line up, so the thing that is going on is Jesus is being forsaken so we never have to be… there is only one problem with that… it ignores the immutability of God… that is that God never changes.... and the bible is FULL of scripture that backs this point...
6 “I the Lord do not change. So you, the descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed.
19 God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?
29 He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.”
And even the NT
17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
So what this means is that God, cannot change… he cannot forsake only Jesus but no one else… he is ALWAYS the same....
So that begs the question… what is going on here… why did Jesus say this? What does it all mean it goes back to understanding the context and understanding what is going on
What we first need to understand is the method of ancient Hebrew writing… much like we talked about in the Habakkuk verse these ancient Hebrew writers would ask a crazy question that no one would believe just to bring tension and make question… so Jesus is throwing his hearers back to these passages so they can realize what he wants them to see....
So what happens next...
Matthew 27:47 (NIV)
47 When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “He’s calling Elijah.”
And here they think he is calling out to Elijah because they recognize Psalm 22 as what it is… a victory psalm… and they are waiting for elijah to mark Jesus as the Messiah...
48 Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink.
49 The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”
50 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.
51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split
52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.
53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.
54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”
So the question then is, what was the answer to the Psalmist question in Psalm 22
19 But you, Lord, do not be far from me. You are my strength; come quickly to help me.
20 Deliver me from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dogs.
21 Rescue me from the mouth of the lions; save me from the horns of the wild oxen.
22 I will declare your name to my people; in the assembly I will praise you.
23 You who fear the Lord, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, honor him! Revere him, all you descendants of Israel!
24 For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help.
25 From you comes the theme of my praise in the great assembly; before those who fear you I will fulfill my vows.
26 The poor will eat and be satisfied; those who seek the Lord will praise him— may your hearts live forever!
27 All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him,
28 for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations.
29 All the rich of the earth will feast and worship; all who go down to the dust will kneel before him— those who cannot keep themselves alive.
30 Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord.
31 They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it!
He has done it The Victory has been won… he has completed it all, he is the ruler over all the nations… everyone shall bow down before him and he will bless them all… My friends that is what was done in the work on the cross… God never forsook Jesus… no indeed… as alfred Edersheim had said, even 400 years before crucification was a thing, God gave hope to those who were there through a psalm.... and that same hope we can have today.
Altar call
There are some of you that are standing here this morning and you think there is no way that God could want to save you, that your sin is too great that God could never love you… and here is the great news, that on the Cross, The God of the universe became every sin you have ever committed and every sin that you will commit, and he never looked away… He has already seen it, he has already counted it, it has already been measured, and he has already died for it and all of that sin does not compete with the blood of Christ and what he has done! You have never been too far away, you could never be too far away, God did not forsake his son on the cross for the sin of ALL MANKIND and he is immutable and he will not forsake you!
