And we're going to take a look
at a lengthy section of Scripture in Mark chapter 15. So if you would, you might just open those Bibles
up and set them right there on your lap, because we're going
to just refer to this section this morning. Mark chapter 15, beginning at
verse 15. And so Pilate, willing to contend, the people
released Barabbas unto them, and delivered Jesus, when He
had scourged him to be crucified. Verse 16, And the soldiers led
him away into the hall called Paretorium, and they called together
the whole band, and they clothed him with purple, and plaited
a crown of thorns, and put it about his head. and began to
salute Him, Hail, King of the Jews! And they smote Him on the
head with a reed, and did spit upon Him, and bowing their knees
worshipped Him. And when they had mocked Him,
they took off the purple from Him, and they put on His own
clothes on Him, and led Him out to crucify Him. And they compel
one Simon, a Cyrenean, who passed by coming out of the country,
the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross. And they bring
him unto a place, Golgotha, which is being interpreted the place
of a skull. And they gave him to drink wine
mingled with myrrh, but he received it not. And when they had crucified
Him, they parted His garments, casting lots upon them, what
every man should take. And it was the third hour, and
they crucified Him. And the subscription of His accusation
was written over the King of the Jews. And with Him they crucified
two thieves, the one on the right hand and the other on His left
hand. And the Scripture was fulfilled with Saith, and He was numbered
with the transgressors. And they that passed by railed
on Him, wagging their heads and saying, Ah, Thou that destroyest
the temple and buildest it in three days, save Thyself and
come down from the cross. Likewise also the chief priests,
mocking, said, Likewise also the chief priests,
mocking, said among themselves with the scribes, He saved others. Himself He cannot save. Let Christ
the King of Israel descend now from the cross that we may see
and believe. And they that were crucified
with Him reviled Him. And when the sixth hour was come,
there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And
at the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi,
Eloi, Lama, Shabbat Shethani, which is being interpreted, My
God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me? And some of them that stood
by when they heard it said, Behold, he calleth Elias. And one ran
and filled a sponge full of vinegar and put it on a reed and gave
him to drink, saying, Let alone, Let us see whether Elias will
come and take him down. And Jesus cried with a loud voice
and gave up the ghost. And the veil of the temple was
rent in twain from the top to the bottom. And when the centurion
which stood over against him saw that he so cried out, he
gave up the ghost. He said, truly, this man was
the Son of God. I'll tell you something, folks. If our Lord wants a donkey to
speak to somebody, He'll make him speak, won't He? We read that very thing in Scripture,
don't we? So what big deal is it for our
Lord to make men and women who know not God speak truths about
Him? They said it mockingly, yes.
But they called Him the King of the Jews. They called Him
the King of Jerusalem, didn't they? The Lord of Jerusalem. He is our Lord and we are Jerusalem. When the Lord is speaking of
Jerusalem in a spiritual sense, He's not talking about that town
over there in the Middle East. He's talking about the Jerusalem
of God. He's talking about a city that's
not made with hands. He's talking about those who
reside in that city who are the Jews, not of the flesh, but of
the Spirit. Sometimes, in our Lord's sovereignty,
in His infinite wisdom, He uses lost, unregenerate, spiritually
ignorant men to proclaim gospel truths as plainly and as powerfully
as any inspired prophet, any inspired preacher, any man that
the Lord has put in His pulpit. Men who are ignorant of the gospel
as ever, yet they become voices by which God declares His truths.
Let me give you a couple of examples of that. In John 11, verses 47-52,
Siphias the high priest was speaking and he says, Then gathered the
chief priests and the Pharisees of Cancel and said, What do we?
Now this is the high priest. This is a man who knew not God
as much as the Pope knows not God. He was the highest one in
that religion. Everybody in that religion worshipped
Him. When He walked down the streets,
they would kiss His hand just as they do the Pope. He wore
the nicest clothes. Anything spiritual, they would
go to Him. He got all the good places to sit. And He's saying,
then gathered the chief priests and the Pharisees of counsel
and said, what do we? For this man doeth many miracles.
What are we going to do? This man does all these different
miracles. If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on
him. And the Romans shall come and
take away both our place and nation. And one of them named
Sipheus, being the high priest that same year, said unto them,
You know nothing at all. Here we have a man who knows
not God, who's going to preach the gospel right here. He says,
we know nothing at all, nor consider that it is expedient for us that
one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should
perish not. They don't know. How can they
sit there and make that kind of a guess? And this spake he not of himself
of being the high priest that year. He prophesied that Jesus
should die for that nation. And not for that nation only,
but that also he should gather together in one the children
of God that were scattered abroad." What about Pilate? That one might not have been
as clear. Let's look at one. What about Pilate? Pilate says
this, and we know Pilate didn't know God. We know he wasn't a
man of God. Behold your king. That's truth, isn't it? See what
I'm talking about? See how the Lord can use a donkey
to speak truth. He can also use dead men. Balaam. In Numbers 23 verse 5, the Lord
put a word in Balaam's mouth, it says. And then in 19 through
21, Balaam said this, God is not a man that he should lie.
neither the son of man that he should repent, hath he said,
and shall he not do it?" Isn't that what we say every Sunday?
Isn't that the sovereignty that you and I speak of every Sunday?
Here's a man who knows not God, speaking the truths of God, speaking
the gospel. Going on, Behold, I received,
he says, command to bless, and he hath blessed, and I cannot
reverse it. He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath
he seen perverseness in Israel. The Lord his God is with him,
and the shout of a king is among them. Balaam spoke the truth. Saul said this, he said in 1
Samuel 26-25, Then Saul said to David, Blessed be thou, my
son David, thou shalt both do great things, and also shalt
still prevail. So David went on his way, and
Saul returned to his place. Remember, Saul was chasing after
David and trying to kill him. But at one point, the Spirit
of God moved upon this wicked man, Saul, and caused him to
prophesy truth. In our text, In the book of Mark,
15 through 39, we have several more examples of God speaking
glorious, glorious gospel truths by men who themselves knew nothing
of the things they spoke of. Repeatedly, those who mocked
the master with their jeers spoke plainly, declaring the man hanging
on the cursed tree between two thieves. Repeatedly, in mocking,
they called him the king. But even better yet, even most
distinctly, the King of Israel. We just read in verse 39, didn't
we? The centurion said, truly, this man was the Son of God. Now folks, I want to be clear
about something. The one for whom God speaks is
nothing. It's not me standing before you
that can speak to your heart. We talked about this in Bible
study. You hear me with the ears of
the head, but the ears of the heart must hear from a heart
that lives. We're born into this world with
dead hearts, wicked as can be. Our nature is sin. It takes the power of God giving
life to His people for them to hear with the heart. The one through whom God speaks
is nothing but the message God speaks. The gospel of Christ
is the power of God unto salvation. I'm a nobody, as Pastor Gene
would say often, trying to tell somebody. about the One who can
save anybody. That's all I am. John the Baptist
was a man who was in the wilderness. But what was he doing? He wasn't
saving people. He was declaring the One who
would save His people. The One who comes after Him,
but yet came before Him. The Word of God that has always
been the Word of God. That's all we do, is stand before
people and declare the One who came before us. There's another example in verse
31. In the angry, bloodthirsty, jeering mob, we hear the lost
religious leaders of the day joining. And though they spoke
with a hatred for the Son of God, these chief priests and
scribes spoke very plainly the truth of the Gospel. Look at
verse 31 with me if you would. Likewise, also the chief priests,
mocking, said among themselves of the scribes, he saved others,
himself he cannot save. Do you realize how much truth is
in that very point right there? He saved all these others. But
Himself, He could not save. Can you imagine if He could have? And if He would have? There'd be none of us going to
heaven. Not a single one. God the Father,
God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit made a covenant before
the world ever was. They made an agreement. And when
God makes an agreement, folks, it's not like you and I. I can't
tell you how often. I try not to. I really do. And
it's been a long time since I have, but I can't tell you I won't
again. But I've let a lot of people down
in my life. I can't tell you how many times
I've made agreements with my dad, Calvin Samuel Ellis. And
he went to his grave without me fulfilling those agreements. But that's not the way it is
with God. If you believe in a God who can't keep what he says he
will do, then you believe in something false. And it ain't
worth believing in. The God of scriptures does not
make a covenant and then back down on it. It's done. If he
says he'll do it, he's going to do it. If He says, all that
the Father giveth me shall come to me, that's exactly what's
going to happen, right? Because the Lord Jesus Christ
came here to save His people from their sins, because He came
to save us from the wrath of God, He could not save Himself. Plain, simple, and period. These
guys had no idea that they were talking that kind of truth. They
thought they were making fun of Him. Look at this guy. He thinks he's
God and he can't even bring himself down off the cross and save himself. Why should we believe him? I'm so thankful that he couldn't
do it. I'm so thankful that he didn't do it. I'm so thankful
that he stayed up there and fulfilled everything that he had promised
to do. Folks, this is the very essence
of the Gospel. This is the very essence of the
good news for a sinner. If God has revealed to you what
you are before Him, and He has revealed His mercy and
grace, He came here to save sinners.
God became a man to serve those that He has loved from before
the foundation of the world. He didn't have to save anybody.
He's God. He could have just created all
of everything anew and made it all perfect. But having chosen to save some,
He also cannot save any except in the manner that honors His
law and His justice. If righteousness could come in
any other way, I guess you could say the Lord
died in vain, didn't He? You could say that He's a liar
because, you know, He says, I am the way. If there is another way, if there
was another way, then that would not be the truth, would it? There's
only one way. There's only one way to come
to the Father, and that's through the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The One who is all-powerful. The one who knows and numbers
every hair on your head. The sovereign ruler of everything.
That's the only way. Are you coming another way? In Job 33 verses 23 and 24 we
read this, If there be a messenger with him, an interpreter, one
among a thousand, to show unto a man his uprightness, then he
is gracious unto him, and saith, Deliver him From going down to
the pit I have found a ransom." In Romans 3.23 we read this,
"...for all men have sinned and come short of the glory of God,
being justified freely by His grace through the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation
through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for
the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance
of God, to declare, I say at this time, His righteousness,
that He might be just and justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." The passage we just read that
is set before us, a most wondrous and glorious event in the history
of the universe. This event that we just read about,
the mocking, the scourging, the spitting, the crown of thorns. This is the reason why God created
the world in the first place. He was known as the Lamb slain
before the foundation of the world. That means God the Father looked
upon His Son and saw the blood before God the Son was ever even
born. Here's something even more amazing.
All that the Lord Jesus Christ endured in that mocking, in that
scourging, in the crucifixion, when He was made to be sin for
us, He willingly, voluntarily did it with His eyes wide open. That's what we preached on just
a couple weeks back. I was reminded of it because
I saw that report that we get It goes out now that we're on
sermon audio. It shows that for some reason
that caught a whole bunch of people's attention, and everybody
zoomed in and looked at that one. I don't know. I guess the
Lord might have used it somewhere. Who knows? Eyes wide open. Our Savior didn't go to the cross
in plan B. It was plan A from the beginning
of everything. Even when He was made to be sin,
it was by His own will. He willingly took upon Himself
our sins. He willingly went to the cross.
He willingly died the shameful, painful death of the cross. He
willingly became the object of His Father's holy wrath. The
Lord Jesus Christ willingly took the cup of wrath, and with one
tremendous draft of love, with one act of love for His people,
He drank that cup dry. He drank it dry. He paid it in
full. Here is love, the love of Christ
that patheth knowledge. God commendeth His love toward
us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Here in His love, not that we loved God, but that He loved
us and sent His Son to be a propitiation for our sins. Hereby perceive
we the love of God, because He had laid down His life for us."
Folks, I want you to simply observe this from this passage that we
read. I know it was a lot of Scriptures, but before us it's
this thing that we see is the Lord Jesus Christ suffered for
our sakes. Because He loves us. That's why He says to our hearts,
I shall never leave you nor forsake you. I know even David, a man
after God's own heart. Turn over to, hold your place
here, Mark. You know, I've just changed my mind. We're going
to look at another verse real quick. We've got some time. Turn over
to the 22nd Psalm. Psalms 22. A man after God's own heart. A man the Lord blessed over and
over again. Now, we feel it. We get it every
once in a while. Do we not feel, Lord, where are
you? Lord, where are you as this thing in my life right now is
tormenting me? this powerful pain in my heart
right now because of something that's happening in my life.
Lord, where are you? My God, my God, why hast thou
forsaken me? The words of a man who stood
before a giant and said, who are you to mock my God? The faith that this man had And
yet he stands here writing, he says, My God, my God, why hast
thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from helping
me? And from the words of my roaring?
O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not, and in
the night season am not silent. But thou art holy, O thou that
inhabitest the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in thee,
they trusted in thou, just as delivered them. They cried unto
thee, and were delivered, and they trusted in thee, and were
not confounded." As we think upon these things
back in our text of Mark, let us not forget, not even for a
moment, that our sins and the salvation of our souls were the
cause of His agony. I want us to simply observe from
the passage before us the things our Lord suffered with, It was hell. It was our hell
that He endured. It was our death that He died. I'm talking, my brothers and
sisters, about the blood atonement, the sin offering for our surety. In 2 Corinthians we read this,
521, For He hath made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin,
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him, Our righteousness
is in Him because He took our sin upon Himself. In 1 Peter
2.24, who His own self bear our sins in His own body on the tree,
that we, being dead to sins, should live under righteousness
by whose stripes we are healed. Again in 1 Peter 3.18, For Christ
also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that
he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but
quickened by the Spirit, he was tried as a common criminal. Mark 15.15 And so Pilate, willingly
to contend the people, released Barabbas unto them and delivered
Jesus when he had scourged him to be crucified. That's the death
of a common criminal. They treated the creator of everything
as common. Here is the one before whom one
day, soon, the whole world must stand in judgment before. the
great Judge who shall summons all men before the great white
throne in the last day. Here He is judged of men, sentenced
to death, and delivered up to be executed by the hands of wicked
men." Why? Why would God do that to Himself? It was that He might deliver
us, you and I, from the judgment, from the pit of destruction.
and the sentence of eternal death and hell that we deserve. The
Lord Jesus was made to be sinned and judged, guilty, and put to
death for His people. So that believing sinners, believing
sinners, let me say that again, believing sinners, might never be judged for their
sin. so that He, our Savior, might present all the hosts of
God's elect before the presence of His glory, holy, unblameable,
unreprovable in His sight. And Romans 4.8 reads this way,
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Or
in chapter 8, verse 1 of Romans, There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit, Or again in Romans 8 verses 33-34, Who
shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is Christ
that died, yea, rather that is risen again, who is even at the
right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Folks, they mocked Him. They
jeered Him. Look at verse 16-20, And the
soldiers led Him away into the hall called Peritoreum. And they
called together the whole band. And they clothed him with purple,
and plaited a crown of thorns, and put it about his head, and
began to salute him, and hail, King of the Jews! And they smote
him on the head with the reed, and did spit upon him, and bowing
their knees, worshipped him. And when they had mocked him,
they took off the purple from him, and put on his own clothes
on him, and led him out to crucify him. verses 29 through 22. And they
passed by, railed on him, wagging their heads and saying, Ah, thou
hast destroyed the temple and built it in three days. Save
thyself and come down from the cross. Likewise also the chief
priest, mocking, said among themselves with the scribes, He saved others,
himself he cannot save. Let Christ the King of Israel
descend now from the cross that we may see and believe. And they
that were crucified with Him reviled Him." Folks, they clothed
Him with purple cloth. They put a crown of thorns on
His head and then mockingly worshipped Him. Yeah, they bowed the knee. and every knee shall bow. But only those who have been
giving life to see Him for the true King that He is will bow
without mocking, will bow with reverence. You know, those who
go to hell, there will be gnashing of teeth. You know what that
means? Have you ever stopped to think about that? That's a
whole lot of people And wherever that place hell is, saying, wait
a minute! How dare you tell me I didn't
worship you? How dare you tell me I didn't
come to you in the way that I should? I know what I should be doing.
Gnashing their teeth against God, saying, who do you think
you are doing this to me? Me, this man who's done whatever
he's done. All the good that they have done
in the world. It doesn't matter how much good
we do in the world. Please go out and do all you
can. But that's not what's going to get you into heaven. Jesus
Christ the Lord is what gets us into heaven. It's His righteousness. And His righteousness alone that
we can stand in. They mocked Him. They hailed out, King, King of
Israel. And then they beat Him, they
spit on Him, they mocked Him. And as they led Him away to crucify
Him, He became the song of drunkards. As He was carried through the
town, as He walked through the town and they carried the cross
for Him, harlots and holy men and priests
and scribes joined in together, railing against Him. He was made
to be the filth of the world. Why? All he did was heal somebody. Exactly, Darryl. He saved men and women, brought
people back to life, but he could not save his own. He had to die
on that cross. He was stripped naked. Verse
24, and when they had crucified him, they parted his garments,
casting lots upon them, what every man should take. I heard a story about a young couple
of children who got into a little trouble. Mom and Dad thought
the best thing for them to do would be to strip them of all
their clothes and send them out into the front yard. Can you
imagine the humiliation that that would be? To be sent out
into the front yard and have all your neighbors go by and
see you standing there naked. Ooh, what did he do wrong? Ooh,
what did she do wrong? Our Lord was stripped naked so that we, we who have no righteousness of
our own, might be clothed with His perfect righteousness. It
was that we who are naked and shameful, all defiled with sin
in our lives, might wear the wedding garments of grace and
sit side by side with the angels of God, unashamed. He was reckoned
a sinner, verses 27 through 28, And with him they crucified two
thieves, the one on his right hand and the other on his left.
And the scripture was fulfilled, which says, he was numbered with
the transgressors. Numbered, meaning he was common. He was just as they were, getting what they rightfully
deserved. He who did no sin and in whose mouth was no guile was
numbered with the transgressors. Why? Why was he numbered with
the transgressors? It was because he was made to
be sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him. It was because the Holy Lamb
of God was made to be sin so that we who are altogether unholy
might be made perfectly holy forever and ever. We cannot be
in the presence of God and have sin in us. God cannot look upon
sin, He is so holy. Folks, right now, not when we
get to heaven, right now, God looks upon you
and I. Those who have been given life
by God Almighty to see the truth for who He is, what He has done,
and where He is right now are clothed in His righteousness
as perfect as our Lord and Savior is. And I know that's hard to
think of. I know that's hard to see. Well, stop looking in
the mirror at yourself and start looking to Him. Plain and simple. Stop looking
at yourself and look at Him. Because that's the only place
we're going to see any righteousness, is our Lord and Savior. Look at verses 27 through 20.
Oh no, we already read that part. He was forsaken of God. Look at verses 34. In the ninth
hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, Lama,
Shabbat Shethani. Oh, I'm going to mess that up.
I know it. Lord, help me to be a better
pronuncier of these words at times. Which is being interpreted,
my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Try to grasp this,
will you? It boggles my mind. But just
try to get a little picture of this. God forsake God. How can that be? But He did. He turned His back on His Son.
You know, the sin that was put on Him so that He would not turn
His back on us. When our surety, Jehovah's righteous
servant, was at the height of his obedience, the very pinnacle
for what he came here to do, as he was performing the crowning
work that he was commissioned of God to do, he was abandoned,
forsaken of his Father, because he was made sin. And
the Lord God Almighty cannot look upon sin. And then he was crucified and
cursed. Look at verses 22 through 26. And they bring him into the
place Golgotha, which is interpreted the place of a skull. And they
gave him a drink of wine mingled with myrrh, but he received it
not. And when they had crucified him, they parted his garments,
casting lots upon him, what every man should take. And it was the
third hour, and they crucified him. And the subscription of
his accusation was written over the king of the Jews." Now, death,
as I said a moment ago, by crucifixion was reserved only for the most
vile offenders. this shamefully horrid way. You know, I've heard it described
this way one time. They say they lay the tree down. It's out of wood, so they call
it a tree. They lay it down, and they put it all together,
and then they take you, and they tie your hands up like this,
or they nail it as they did with the Lord Jesus Christ, and then
they stand it up, and as they stand it up, it drops into a
hole. So that way it'll stay standing up. And they don't care
about how hard it drops into that hole. Could you imagine
being held on with just nails in your hands and your feet and
being dropped like that? Oh, that's a terrible way to
go. Let's just hang them. At least
that was more humane. But no, this is the way they
did it for the most vile. And they're doing it to a man
who all he did was heal people and preach righteousness. They
crucified and cursed our Lord by death through crucifixion. You see, the men hanging on that
tree were counted accursed. Scripture says, cursed is everyone
that hangeth on a tree. Even if they didn't declare it
that very day, you know they were thinking it. That's why
they hung them on the tree. Cursed is that man. Cursed are
those three men. They're hanging on a tree. That's
what our Word says. That's what our Scripture says.
Why? So that we who were born accursed. We who came into this world cursed
in the flesh might be delivered from that curse, the curse of
the law, and stand forever beside our blessed God for his son's
sake. In Galatians 3.13 we read this,
Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made
a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone that hangeth
on a tree. Now, we also said this a moment ago. His sacrifice
was a voluntary sacrifice. Look at verse 37. And Jesus cried
with a loud voice. And what? No man taketh my life from me,
He says. I lay down my life for the sheep. I lay it down and I take it up
again. It was completely voluntary.
Do you know why? In the first book of John, chapter
4, we read in verses 9 through 10, in this was manifested the
love of God towards us. Because that God sent His only
begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him,
herein is love, not that we love God, but that He loved us and
sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Now, after all of that happened,
we have a picture of something that separated us from God. See, that's what Christ going
to the cross and laying down His life for us was. It was redeeming
His people to God the Father. Removing what separated God the
Father from His people. The veil. That's what the veil
in the temple was. It was a picture. You couldn't
go into the holiest of holies. Only the one with blood could
go into the holiest of holies. But right after our Lord gave
up the ghost, what does it say in verse 38? And the veil of
the temple was rent and twain from the top to the bottom. Not
just a little bit, so we can get a little peek in there, but
it was ripped completely apart. We have full access to God the
Father. That's why you and I can go to
God right now. You can go to Him right now in
your private place and say, Lord, I need help. Lord, what do I do? You can talk
to God the Father and He will answer you. Not always the way we want the
answer to be. But that's because he's smarter
than we are. Way, way smarter. So the veil is rent. When justice was satisfied, when
sin was put away, when there was nothing left to separate
the Holy Lord God from his people, when the law of God was forever
silenced, The very symbol of separation at that time was ripped
apart. Now, I'll bring this to a close
by trying to apply what we've read so far to our own lives. Do we not have a deep sense of the debt that we owe? I get a little emotional when it comes to this, because
I know what's in myself. I know what's in here. Do you
know what's in there? Do you know what's in you? When we see what's in us, and we see the wonder and the
beauty of what our Lord did for us at Calvary, do we not have
a sense of what we owe? All that we have, all that we
are, all that we hope for can be traced back to the doing and
the dying of the Son of God for you and I. By His condemnation, you and I are acquitted. By His being made sin, You and I are made righteous.
By His sufferings, you and I have peace. We may not have peace
with the world, folks, but we have peace with God. And if you
have peace with God, what else do you need? Because everything
else is going to burn up. And it's going to be gone. It's cursed. Cursing is the ground
that you walk on. By His shame, we get glory. By His death, we have life. How willing, how anxious, how
ready the God of all grace is to save sinners. What assurance
we ought to have of Christ's great love for us. What a reasonable thing it is
for us to unceasingly present ourselves as living sacrifices
unto God. In Romans 12, 1, I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercy of God that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto
God, which is your reasonable service.