Sermon Tone Analysis

\\ *A close up of Joseph of Arimathea*

/Scriptures: Luke 23:50-54; John 19:38-42/

 

/Christianity is something which is meant to be seen.

As someone has well said, "There can be no such thing as secret discipleship, for either the secrecy destroys the discipleship, or the discipleship destroys the secrecy."

A man's Christianity should be perfectly visible to all men./

/ /

/   -- William Barclay/

 

We are beginning a sermon series today that will take us through the next five Sundays.

I believe that for some, this could be a life changing experience.

We are calling the series, ”Flirting With The Faith”.

I will be talking this week about Joseph of Arimathea, Pastor marc, next week will be looking at King Agrippa.

The following week I will be preaching about the rich your ruler.

Palm Sunday will bring us the sermon in musical and dramatic presentation, “Bow The Knee”.

And then Pastor Peter on Easter Sunday will be delivering the message as people respond to the challenge of a personal declaration of faith.

I would ask every praying person to take this to your heart and faithfully seek the Lord’s blessing as we look for folks to declare Christ publicly on Resurrection Sunday.

Today, we look at Joseph of Arimathea, the secret disciple.

Was he a good guy or a bad guy?

Does the scripture offer him to us as an example to follow or to forsake?

The challenge this Easter season is to the secret disciple, the person who has made a decision for Christ but chooses for a variety of reasons to keep their experience with God very private.

There comes a time when every person will be faced with the need to publicly declare him or herself.

*1.

** His Profile*

 

Was he painted well in the pages of scripture?

Joseph holds a special place in the scripture record.

We meet him late in each gospel record and he comes as a pleasant surprise at a critical point.

With the other disciples scattered and decimated by the death of Christ, this man who followed Christ  in the shadows, steps forward to honor the Lord by caring for his body.

I wonder what went through his mind as he offered this gesture.

Perhaps he wished that he had dared to leave his station in life and follow closely as the disciples had done?

Perhaps he rehearsed the emotional, hate-filled session in which the Sanhedrin, his chosen associates had contrived their plot to rid themselves of this disrespectful, radical, would-be rabbi.

For all his work and investment with these men over the years, he watched, powerless to change the outcome.

For all his influence he was ineffective when it came to this man.

He was ashamed perhaps of his silence and his fear that subdued his reactions to their unexplainable determination to kill a man who only wanted to love others in the name of their God.

He did so much good with so little position and so little influence and Joseph saw himself dwarfed in the shadow of the cross that held the lifeless body that now was in his care.

On one hand we judge him for his shadowy relationship that was so well guarded and secretive.

On the other hand we rejoice that at last he steps forward without regard for himself or his reputation or his safety or his friends reaction to this kindness.

Let’s look at Joesph:

 

q       He was a man of great resource

 

57 As evening approached, there came *a rich man from Arimathea*, named Joseph, who had himself become a disciple of Jesus.

58 *Going to Pilate*, he asked for Jesus’ body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him.

59 Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth,  60 and placed it in *his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock*.

He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away./*[1]*/

The scripture tells us that he was a rich man from Arimathea.

He had his own “new” tomb.

Purchased, paid for and cut out of the rock.

Sounds expensive to me in any time.

I’m not sure how much it costs to dig a hole in the ground but most likely it would have been much cheaper.

If the body of Christ had not been claimed, it would have been up to the Romans to dispose of it and that would have been handled with further indignity.

Matthew Henry’s commentary has this to say:

 

The apostles had all fled, and none of them appeared to show this respect to their Master, which the disciples of John /showed/ to him after he was beheaded, who /took up his body, and buried it,/ ch.

14:12.

The women that followed him durst not move in it; then did God stir up this good man to do it; for what work God has to do, he will find out instruments to do it.

Joseph was a fit man, for, [1.]

He had wherewithal to do it, being a /rich man./

Most of Christ’s disciples were poor men, such were most fit to go about the country to preach the gospel; but here was one that was a /rich man,/ ready to be employed in a piece of service which required /a man of estate./

Note, Worldly wealth, though it is to many an objection in religion’s way, yet, in some services to be done for Christ, it is an advantage and an opportunity, and it is well for those who have it, if withal they have a heart to use it for God’s glory.

[2.]

He was well affected to our Lord Jesus, for he was himself /his disciple,/ believed in him, though he did not openly profess it.

Note, Christ has more secret disciples than we are aware of; seven thousand in Israel, Rom.

11:4.[2]

q       He had tremendous influence.

I would imagine that few people would have the ready access to Pilate that seemed to have.

Without recorded difficulty, the scripture says:

 

58 *Going to Pilate*, he asked for Jesus’ body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him.

Mark records it this way:

 

So as evening approached,  43 Joseph of Arimathea, a *prominent member of the Council*, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, *went boldly to Pilate* and asked for Jesus’ body./*[3]*/

q       He was a disciple.

Based on the way that scripture seems to treat Joseph, it would seem that it is possible to be a follower of Christ without paying the same price as the chosen 12.

As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who had himself *become a disciple of Jesus*./*[4]*/

(Matt.

27:57)

 

q       He was a secret disciple

 

*Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus*, but secretly because he feared the Jews./*[5]*/

(John 19:38)

 

Some observations relative to secret discipleship:

 

There are times when we reason that our relationship with Christ is better downplayed – as though the whole idea of someone else coming to Christ depended upon the way that my evangelical target would respond to me personally.

So when we fail to perform perfectly we think that we have “messed up” and we either try to cover up or to excuse ourselves somehow.

Other people may come to know Christ partially due to the influence of your own life but rarely will they come to Christ exclusively at the influence of your own life.

It takes many experiences both positive and negative for a man or woman to find their way to Christ.

Most often we are just a piece of the process.

It does not depend wholly on you.

It depends on the working of God in that person’s life and their willingness to listen to what God says directly to them.

When you think that you are being most successful with another person, your success may be marginal and other times when you think that you have lost opportunity, they may be closer to God’s kingdom than you ever could imagine.

The process of life itself brings an individual closer to God and the years cause a person usually to think more seriously and carefully about their eternal destiny.

Perhaps that is why people experience mid-life crisis and depression.

The years and the voice of God are crowding them and they have to make more noise to distract themselves from eternal truths.

! *2.

** His Problem*

 

What kept him from declaring himself?

q       He was afraid of the personal consequence.

The scripture tells us that we was afraid of the Jews.

The San Hedrin was an extremely powerful organization, both religious and judicious in it’s nature:

 

*Sanhedrim — * more correctly Sanhedrin (Gr.

synedrion), meaning “a *sitting together,” or a “council*.”

This word (rendered “council,” A.V.) is frequently used in the New Testament (Matt.

5:22; 26:59; Mark 15:1, etc.) to denote *the supreme judicial and administrative council of the Jews,* which, it is said, was first instituted by Moses, and was composed of seventy men (Num.

11:16, 17).

But that seems to have been only a temporary arrangement which Moses made.

This council is with greater probability supposed to have originated among the Jews when they were under the domination of the Syrian kings in the time of the Maccabees.

The name is first employed by the Jewish historian Josephus.

This “council” is referred to simply as the “chief priests and elders of the people” (Matt.

26:3, 47, 57, 59; 27:1, 3, 12, 20, etc.), before whom Christ was tried on the charge of claiming to be the Messiah.

Peter and John were also brought before it for promulgating heresy (Acts.

4:1–23; 5:17–41); as was also Stephen on a charge of blasphemy (6:12–15), and Paul for violating a temple by-law (22:30; 23:1–10).

*The Sanhedrin is said to have consisted of seventy-one members, the high priest being president.*

They were of three classes: (1) the chief priests, or heads of the twenty-four priestly courses (1 Chr.

24), (2) the scribes, and (3) the elders.

As the highest court of judicature, “in all causes and over all persons, ecclesiastical and civil, supreme,” its decrees were binding, not only on the Jews in Palestine, but on all Jews wherever scattered abroad.

Its jurisdiction was greatly curtailed by Herod, and afterwards by the Romans.