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The resurrection would not have been possible without death.
Death came on the cross just six hours after being nailed to it.
In our time leading up to Resurrection Sunday celebration, we are examining those six hours on the cross.
Many prophecies were fulfilled.
That is our first examination.
Second we look at the character of God and of Jesus.
Each week we’ll end with a reflection that brings us to a place of response.
Ultimately, we will answer for how we responded to the cross.
Today is week three of this series of messages titled Jesus on the Cross.
Just as a matter of refreshing, here are the passages that talk about the crucifixion of Jesus:
Matthew 27:32-56
Mark 15:21-41
Luke 23:26-49
John 19:19-30
Initially I had planned to go through the passages in Matthew and Mark today.
With the exception of a few phrases and word choices, these two passages tell of the crucifixion from the same perspective.
Instead of looking at both passages, we’ll only look at the passage in Mark.
Last two weeks we spent time looking at Luke 23.
Next week we’ll cover most of the passage in John 19 and finish up the following week with the Luke and John passages.
I hope you have made note of these and will commit to reading and studying them over the next few weeks leading up to celebrating the Resurrection on April 4.
Let’s begin reading in Mark 15:21:
A quick side note…this Rufus mentioned here may also be the same Rufus that Paul talked about in Romans 16.
Mark likely mentions him because the audience Mark was writing to knew him.
It lends another aspect of connection to the story.
Golgotha in Greek means skull, when translating to Latin - Calvary
We talked the last few weeks about the prophecy fulfilled by these actions.
Just as a refresher, here are those verses again:
Here again is a prophecy fulfilled, the same one that was spoken over him at his birth:
Last week we talked a lot about these two guys.
Ultimately Jesus reponded to the one who had faith: “Today, you will be with me in paradise.”
As I heard of Heather Shephard’s passing, I looked at the time she passed and realized that as I was reading the words of Jesus to the criminal, Jesus was fulfilling that promise to Heather.
The phrase hurled insults is the Greek word blasphemeo, from which we get blaspheme.
Mark is making the distinction here that these people that insulted Jesus were in fact insulting God himself.
They were slandering the character and being of God.
Here is the passage that prophesied this:
Let’s continue:
This line of reasoning is similar to the testing Jesus went through in the wilderness prior to starting his ministry.
Interesting that Jesus started and ended his ministry on earth with temptation to show who he is and what he is capable of.
These religious leaders even taunt him with the statement that they would see and believe.
Certainly that would be a good thing - these religious folks believing, but Jesus was called to a greater purpose - redeeming the world.
He could have come down from the cross and a good thing would have happened, but that would have happened at the cost of the greater mission to save the world.
Mark here completes our timeline of the day Jesus hung on the cross.
The crucifixion started at 9am according to verse 25.
At noon the light goes out until 3pm.
A total of six hours.
Some have tried to explain away this phenomenon of 3 hours of darkness…perhaps an eclipse.
Impossible during passover when the moon was full.
A full moon means the moon is on the opposite side of the earth from the sun.
Perhaps a sand storm in the distance…again not possible during the rainy season in the Middle East during the spring.
There is no other explaination other than scripture fulfilled:
Let’s keep reading...
Matthew and Mark both record this quote from Jesus.
They both quote Jesus in Aramaic and then provide the translation in Greek, hence the maintaining of that format in English.
This phrase was used in Psalm 22:
Jesus is on the verge of physical death.
While he has certainly suffered up to this point, it is the weight of humanity’s sin that causes him to cry out like this.
In this moment, the guilt of sin is placed on Jesus so that when death comes, his death covers the debt of sin.
In the moment that sin comes upon him, he is overwhelmed with the lack of communion with the Father.
The Father cannot look upon or commune with someone who has the guilt of sin on them.
At this moment, Jesus and the Father are separated and it causes such anguish that he cries out.
Not only does this phrase speak to prophecy fulfilled, it also speaks to the character of God and Jesus.
Just the previous night, Jesus was in the Garden with his disciples as he prayed.
Just the chapter before recalls his prayer:
Jesus came to save.
He didn’t just come to teach some stuff, heal some people, feed some people and make the religious leaders mad at him.
He came to fulfill his purpose - the salvation of many from the depths of hell.
Certainly Jesus had the power to stop all of it at any point, but he didn’t.
He didn’t stop because of his great love for us.
He was going to see it through no matter how painful.
Separation from the Father was much more painful than any of the physical torment they put him through and he endured both for us.
We’ll talk more about Jesus’ last breath in a few weeks.
I want to end with the response of the centurion.
“Surely this man was the Son of God!”
This is the first confession of faith following the death of Christ.
It is likely this man helped put Jesus on the cross and now he comes to the realization that he just helped kill the man who was the Son of God.
We don’t hear about his guilt or anything else - just that he confessed Jesus as the Son of God.
In Luke we read that Jesus prayed:
The result of that prayer is the centurion confessing Jesus.
I’ve heard people carry around the guilt of being at least partially responsible for Jesus on the cross, but surely none is more guilty than the man who held Jesus’ hands and drove the nails.
Yet he still confessed Jesus.
We all come to the cross with different things - we’ve all had our own experiences and trials and temptations and falls.
When we approach the cross is should be with humilty and remorse, but then we leave our junk at the foot of the cross and pick up the forgiveness Jesus offers.
What do you need to bring to the cross and leave there?
What is it that the enemy continually reminds you about that you’ve already asked forgiveness for and repented of?
I’m not talking about active sin in your life…I’m talking about those things that were years ago that you’ve asked forgiveness for and yet you are still in bondage to the guilt…leave it at the cross.
Jesus paid for it already.
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