Inland Empire: Riverside
The Passion and the Son of God - Audio
[music] And you could be turning over to Mark 15, and we're excited. We're going to be looking at the Passion and the Son of God today, so that's pretty amazing. As much as you would think, as a minister that I have preached a million sermons on the Passion and the Cross, that's not true. I can think of one other one that I've done that a whole thing has been on the Cross, so maybe a few in 30 years. So anyway, we're due. We are due for this chapter. It is here, so welcome if you're here with us. We have been going through the Book of Mark for most of this year, and this is the second to last week. So next week is it, but it's been an amazing run here. I have a picture to show you, although there was a last minute snafu, but this was going to be Ezra Kim's first service today. There he is. He's a cute, cute guy here, so he was born a few months ago, and hopefully we'll see him next week. They're probably watching online, hi guys. So he's going to debut, but he's making a grand entrance, so he's making a suite another week here. We'll be happy next week to welcome him here. And so as we're finishing the book, it's amazing to me and Mark just how everything that we've been talking about just comes together in this one chapter in a powerful way. And so much of somebody's reading their Bible out loud. I'm going to get to the Bible in a minute. So much of what Mark is about is really seeing Jesus and understanding who he is, not just hearing him, but understanding and connecting, not just identifying him as the Messiah, but identifying him as the right kind of Messiah. And so there's these kind of parables throughout the book of Mark of people that are blind that Jesus heals. And one of them, he heals them and he half sees and then he can fully see, and that's maybe a lot of us, right? We can half see Jesus, but we want to see him more. And we don't always see. And there was one person, Bartimaeus, in his request of Jesus when he said, "What do you want?" And he said, "I want to see." And really that's contrasted with so many people who you would think would see Jesus, but don't. Like the religious leaders tend to really not see Jesus, or they tend to be even offended at Jesus, except for one that we're going to look at later today. The disciples, they started out so amazing, they left their boats and their father, and they saw the opportunity to follow Jesus, and they jumped on it. And pretty much the last half of the book, they're afraid, they're not sure, they're uncertain, they're struggling, and they're betraying even Jesus. And so that's kind of an intense thing. And then, so last week we talked about Passover and the Lord's Table, and we went through Jesus in the garden right after he broke the cup with them and said, "This is my body." And then they come to get him and his words were, "Why are you coming out with swords and clubs?" I was in the temple courts all the time. I'm not trying to overthrow anything, I'm just trying to call you back to the Lord. And my favorite line last week was when the Jewish leaders were interrogating him, and they asked him, "Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?" And he answered, "I am, and you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the mighty one, and coming in clouds of glory." And that is an amazing statement of just, "Yeah, I'm going to let you do this, but if you only knew who I am," and it was kind of like he opened up the veil for a minute so you could see who he was. Well, the only thing that he responded to was his identity, right there as the Son of Man, and he responded to Pilate as the king of the Jews. You know, in so many times when we're going through whatever, we feel like we have to have the perfect answer, right? And we're going to look at this in a minute that, or let's read it first, here we go. Mark 4, 15, starting in verse 16, and we're going to read through the end of the chapter. The soldiers led Jesus away into the palace, that is the Praetorium, and called together the whole company of soldiers. They put a purple robe on him, then twisted a crown of thorns and set it on him. And they began to call out to him, "Hail king of the Jews!" Again and again, they struck him on the head with a staff and spit on him. Falling on their knees, they pay homage to him, and when they had mocked him, they took off the purple robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him out to crucify him. A certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross. They brought Jesus to a place called Golgotha, which means the place of the skull. There they offered him wine mixed with mer, but he did not take it, and they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get. It was nine in the morning when they crucified him. The written charge, the written notice of the charge against him read, "The king of the Jews." They crucified two rebels with him, one on his right and one on his left. Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads, and saying, "So you who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days." Come down from the cross and save yourself. In the same way, the chief priests and the teachers of the law mocked him among themselves. He saved others, they said, but he can't save himself. Let this Messiah, this king of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe. Those crucified with him also heaped insults on him. At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. At three in the afternoon, Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloy, Eloy, lemmis, sabectani." Which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" When some of those standing near heard this, they said, "Listen, he's calling Elijah." Someone ran, filled the sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a staff and offered it to Jesus to drink. "Now leave him alone, let's see if Elijah comes to take him down," he said. With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last. The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion who had stood in front of Jesus saw how he died, he said, "Surely this man was the son of God." That's probably the climax of the entire book was that proclamation by this centurion. Some women were watching him from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the Younger, and of Joseph and Salome. In Galilee, these women had followed him and cared for his needs. Many other women who had come with him to Jerusalem were also there. It was preparation day that is the day before the Sabbath. So as evening approached 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. Pilate was surprised to hear that he was already dead. So summoning the centurion, he asked him if Jesus had already died. When he learned from the centurion that it was so, he gave up the body to Joseph. So Joseph bought some linen cloth, took down the body, wrapped it in the linen, and placed it in the tomb cut out of the rock. Then he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joseph saw where he was laid. The Passion of the Christ goes into the darkest day that has ever been. And so many of us, when we hear this, we associate it with our own lives, even in our tradition, and many other traditions with our own sin. We're kind of seeing Jesus, and that's us. We're responsible for this. And I think that's true, and we need to feel that. But I don't know that all the Christians, when they read this letter, felt that. Most of the people reading this didn't actually see Jesus themselves, kind of like us. They heard about it, and they heard that he died and was risen. And if you think about the way we can feel about the cross, it can feel kind of like depressing or difficult, and it is. But we tend to feel like the cross is up here, and the resurrection is up here. I don't think that they felt that way because they were living in the resurrection. He was dead for three days. Why do we feel that the most? And we tend to shy away from the resurrection and the power. And so my hope, and even as I was doing this lesson, was that we could kind of even that out at least, right, that this was Jesus' entrance into glory. This was him establishing the reign of God in the universe. And yes, it's horrible, and we're going to talk about that. It's also glorious and powerful because he didn't stay dead, right? If he would have stayed dead, then he can be depressed. But the fact that he didn't stay dead, even in the letters to the churches, he says we don't mourn like the world does because Jesus isn't dead. And I think that even as we, you know what they were more thinking about? The people that were hearing this for the first time, that here's what was going through their mind, I think, that's going to happen to us. They weren't so worried that Jesus has taken their place. They were more worried like, guess what? We're next. And in chapter 13, he even highlights that. He says, let the reader understand. Let you understand that you're going to be persecuted. You're going to be beaten. You're going to be disowned by your family, and you're going to be killed. And so, well, we take it one way. They were taking a different way like, oh, wow, do I really want to do this? You know, am I going to be bold and followed Jesus into this? And that was kind of more of their challenge. So you could think about that as we go along here. But I just want to highlight a few things that happen here. And, you know, the king of the Jews is a term that's used like six times in this chapter by Pilate, by the guards. And really, that's who Jesus was. He was the king of the Jews, right? He was the Messiah. He was the son of God. And Mark is doing that to help us to recognize Jesus for who he really is. And to give him that, that when we, that we stand with him as this king that was killed, we stand with him. And crucifixion was reserved only for enemies of the state, right? They didn't just crucify anybody. Just because you murdered someone, that doesn't mean you were going to be crucified. But if you oppose Rome, that's when you were crucified. And they would put you in public places and even do it early in the morning so people could see you. And you could be up there for days as a way that even though Jesus the whole time was saying, I'm not trying to take over, that's still what people were charging him with. It says that they, um, Simon, there's three people that are kind of like the ideal disciples that we see here, and none of them are part of the twelve. One is Simon of Sirene. He's walking in. He's a God-ferer coming in for this festival. And they grab him and make him carry the cross. And they say that he forced him to carry the cross. That doesn't necessarily mean that he wasn't willing. But just that's the time that they lived in, that he literally, that word carry the cross, is the same word that they used earlier when he says if you want to follow me, you have to take up your cross. And now he's taking up Jesus' cross. And most people think that he would have to walk behind Jesus as they went to Golgotha. So literally he was carrying the cross following Jesus kind of as a parable for us. That we're going to carry our cross, and we're going to follow Jesus, and where's that going to lead? To pain, difficulty, and sorrow, but we're also going to enter into this glory that Jesus brought about. Amen? And so the, again, he talks, it says that they gave him wine mixed with myrrh. And maybe that was out of compassion, but they would tend to give this to the crucifixion victims, so they wouldn't pass out, so they would suffer more. Right, so they're giving him like opioids, so they would stay awake and be able to suffer more. And sometimes that would last, like I said, for days, and it only lasted not that long for Jesus. Amen, for that. And then he goes through, and there's everyone that's hurling insults at Jesus. And from the rebels to the chief priests, to just the general crowd that they're just hurling insults at him, and it gives you that picture, even there was one thief on the right and one on the left. It reminds you of James and John, like, "Hey, I want to be on your right and your left." And he's like, "Really? Do you really want to be there? I don't think you do." But you may be anyway. So it gives you that vision about the cup that Jesus was talking about. As I was thinking about this, I'm not doing anything. As I was thinking about this, you know, when you kind of wake up in the morning and you're kind of like half awake, but your eyes are still closed and you're not sure what's happening. I woke up this morning and I was having this conversation with myself, like, "Why would you want to suffer for Jesus?" Like, "Why would you want to take on all of this hardship and following Christ?" As I was just thinking about this sermon, I guess, in my sleep, it was coming to me. And the word that came to my mind was peace. Even though we're suffering and we go through hardships and this world is full of pain, we have this peace that we get from Jesus that gives us calm in the storm. It gives us strength. It gives us perspective. It gives us even a chance to see heaven, to see beyond this life. And some of us are wondering, "Do I really want to do this? Do I really want to follow this Jesus that carried his cross like this and now we're called to do the same?" And don't forget that God is with us through it. That He brings glory out of pain, that He brings beauty out of ashes. And ultimately, we get to be with Him as we read earlier out of revelation, to be a part of that great choir singing "Holy, Holy, Holy" than Him. Save yourself. Can you imagine saying that to Jesus? Hey Jesus, save yourself. And Him thinking, "Are you kidding me?" I came all the way to earth for this moment and I'm going to save myself. You know, you ever try to get somebody to do something that they didn't want to do? Maybe you're thinking of your spouse right now, your children right now, your parents, whatever. But you can imagine this whole ministry, everyone's trying to get Jesus to be this revolutionary. And Him just like, "No way, never." You know when you're talking to your person that you were thinking of and you realize, "You know what? I could talk for days and they're never going to change their mind." That was Jesus. And His resolve because of His humility and love for us and obedience to God. He's like, "There is nothing that's going to keep me away from this moment." He didn't even take the drink to lessen it. And the next part, it says, "At noon darkness came over the whole land and many of us have learned that as separation from God." And I think that's good. That's a good way to see that. Sin came into the world and God turned away. There's another part of it that is actually judgment over the land. Darkness comes over the world while He's dying. And then after He dies, the temple curtain is torn, which means that we have access. Everyone has access now, but it's also a judgment on the temple that the temple is over. He already cursed the fig tree. He already turned over the table. He already shut it down and that was just another judgment that was bought by God that this temple is officially done because the new temple is Jesus. And the soon-to-be temple is His church, that that old temple is gone. And even in Amos 9, I mean 8 verse 9, it says, "In that day declares the Lord, I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight." And that was in the middle of Amos proclaiming judgment on God's people. And here Jesus is, and God is proclaiming judgment on the sin in this world. And Jesus laments, if there's ever a day to lament, this was it. If there was ever a dark day, when you feel like all is lost, evil is won, my hopes are gone, I'm depressed, this was it. And Jesus was all alone on the cross, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me so far from my cries of anguish? It continues in Psalm 22. You know, in so many ways, we don't like to lament. And we've talked about this over the last few years. That there's a lot of different barriers to us and really feeling evil or darkness or pain. You know, I think one of them is that we were brought up on the Scripture, rejoice in the Lord always. I'll say it again, rejoice, right? That means you never can be sad, you can never be in anguish. And you just look at Jesus and He's weeping and He's a man of sorrows and He's in the garden like Father, take this cup from me. It's not rejoicing in that moment. You know, I think for me, sometimes I don't want to lament because I want to somehow represent Christians as strong and always happy, right? So it's like a marketing thing for God, right? We're like, we don't want to look weak, we don't want to be sad because Christians aren't allowed to be sad, right? You're supposed to be happy all the time. Even when other people are down trying to speak, no, that's not Jesus either. That's America. That's the West. That's us. Maybe that's our pride too, that I don't want to be weak in my own version of what weak is. And I had one other reason why we don't lament. It will come to me here. But in Psalm 22 where it continues on and there's some amazing prophecies there that I know you guys are familiar with. I just want to read them again. In verse 7 and 8 says, "All who see me mock me, they hurl insults, shaking their heads. He trusts in the Lord, let the Lord rescue him, let him deliver him, since he delights in him." That's like an exact quote practically of what was happening. In verse 17 and 18 it says, "All my bones are on display. People stare and gloat over me. They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment." The last reason we don't lament is that we don't want to feel like we're putting, it was in my notes I just got to it, we don't want to feel like we're charging God with doing something wrong. If we feel like, "God, this is horrible," then our immediate response is, "Oh my gosh, you better take a step back or you're going to get it." You're not allowed to do that. That's not where do you get that from? That's probably more us being afraid of our parents than it is about who God is. I found these two Psalms this week, the first one in Psalm 12 it says, "Help Lord, for no one is faithful anymore. Those who are loyal have vanished from the human race." I remember taking a pause at that moment and going, "Wow, that hit home." Not because it wasn't true, but because it was true. Then I was thinking, "I wonder who am I going to share that verse with? There is no one faithful in the world." Loyalty has vanished from the human race. I thought of two people that I could share that with and then not take it wrong or take it like that's an insult. Psalm 13 says, "How long, Lord, will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face for me?" That was probably about what Jesus was feeling. How long is this going to go on? I pray that we can grow to be more human, to be more trusting in God and our humanity. Some of us are better at this than others and not worry that God is going to kick us out if we complain. When you read through the Psalms, that's what I've been doing. You see people there complaining all the time and yet they're coming back to this trusting God, but there's an honesty there that's kind of raw that we probably need. Amen. Because our world is broken. When we talk about how broken the world is to God, he doesn't go, "Oh, you're not being very positive," he goes, "Yeah, I know. This isn't how it's supposed to be. I didn't want my people treated that way. I didn't want them ripped off. I didn't want them abused. I didn't want this to happen. Someday it's going to be better." So we're kind of joining in that anticipation of, "Yeah, I want it to be better someday too. I want this thing to be revamped. God to redo the whole thing." Guess what? He's going to. And when we lament, we are identifying with Christ in his desire to make the world a flourishing place again. And yeah, there's a lot of things that glimpses of that we get and yeah, don't lament all the time or people won't want to be around you. I'll give you that. I talked about the curtain already. The highlight of the book, "The Centurion," surely this was the Son of God. He wasn't supposed to be able to see Jesus like that, right? He never read the Bible. He never went to temple, he didn't have Hebrew school or anything. He just saw Jesus die and said, "Man, this is the Son of God." I was thinking about him that he just went to work that day. I'm going to go crucify some people, that's his job, that's what he does every day, okay? And his whole world has changed, right, because he could see Christ in that moment, in that moment of pain, he saw glory when no one else did. Then he was questioned by pilot. Is he dead? He said, "Yeah, I can imagine him thinking like, 'Man, you should have seen it. This guy's something special.'" And then he highlights a lot of the women that have followed him, that had come along. He doesn't talk about a lot of the other disciples in the gospels, mostly the 12, and here he's just showing, "Hey, there's a lot of other people with Jesus, and these people are at a distance too, though," right, like Peter warmed himself at a distance, all the disciples are gone, these women that have been there for him, they're kind of backing off at this moment, like everyone, right, that it's a time where Jesus is alone. And then this man, Joseph of Arimathea, the one person on the council, at least who wasn't Nicodemus, probably two, so at least two. So he comes and he boldly asks for Jesus' body, that's a weird request, can you imagine that? He was so moved, he had so much faith that he's like, "You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to go to pilot and I'm going to get the body." Can you imagine that? I mean his wife thought he was crazy, his kid's like, "What? You're going to go and ask him for the body? Yep, that's what I'm doing." So he goes and he takes the body and wraps it and puts it in the tomb and destroys his reputation and puts his life on the line so that he could be close to the body of Christ. When everyone else is running the other way, he's running towards Jesus, that's our call to be associated with the body of Christ, the body of here, to be associated with the cross of Christ and the suffering of Christ and the aloneness and humility of Christ and the trust of Christ. As we take our communion to think about, "Man, I'm drawing myself into the body of Christ. I'm not running away from it, I'm not pushing away from it, I'm not going at a distance. I'm seeing this for what it really is, life and light and glory. And I'm seeing and I'm acknowledging Christ as the Son of God. And I'm getting my identity from him, that I don't have to be great as a Christian. I don't have to do all these amazing things and have all these amazing answers. I just need to identify myself with the body of Christ. That's our job. To boldly identify ourselves with the body of Christ at the sake of ourselves. As we take communion, I'm going to say a prayer here that was written by Timothy Gombus and then I'm going to continue into a little more prayer and then we'll take our communion. Later we hate that this world is broken and we confess that we are broken too. Our hearts break at the brokenness of this neighborhood and valley and our own inadequacy to fix any of it. How long, oh Lord, will you let your people suffer and let those created in your image bear with fear, rejection, abuse, imprisonment, addiction, poverty and relentless sorrow. Come and save us, come and restore us, heal our hearts. We look to you and without you we are completely lost. Father, I thank you that we have this moment to come near the body and blood of Christ and even this chapter that draws us near to Jesus and carrying our cross behind Him and associating ourselves with your body and not shrinking back but being bold because of you. Thank you that you love us, thank you that you are everything for us. Thank you that even as we're here that there's angels and everyone in heaven saying holy, holy, holy. Father we love you, we thank you for the love and the grace that you've given us. I pray that you can fill us up today in Jesus' name, amen. [BLANK_AUDIO]
Inland Empire Church of Christ