Well, good morning, everyone. Hope you had a good Thanksgiving and aren't still too full of turkey. If you would open your Bibles with me to Mark chapter 15. Mark chapter 15.

Before we begin, let's go to our Lord in prayer. Our Father, how thankful we are to be able to come into your presence before your throne of grace, confident that You'll accept us, that you'll hear our praise, our thanksgiving, our petitions, because of your son, our Lord Jesus Christ. And Father, we only dare come to you in the person of Christ our Savior, pleading his obedience as all of our righteousness, pleading his blood as the only hope we have of the forgiveness of our sin. And Father, we pray that you would hear us for Christ's sake, and that this morning you might, by your spirit, be pleased to enable us to worship you in spirit and in truth.

Father, I beg of you that you not allow us to meet here alone this morning in the power of the flesh and the wisdom of the flesh and the oratory of the flesh, but Father, that you would enable us to open your word And as your word is preached, that your spirit would be pleased to apply the word to our hearts, enable us to hear and believe on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Enable us to see him and worship him, to be taken up with him. Let his name be preeminent in everything that is said and done here this morning. And Father, put us in the dust. Cause the flesh to to not be seen or heard, and Father, put us in the dust on our faces before our Lord Jesus Christ, the place where we can find mercy and forgiveness of our sins.

And while we pray for ourselves, Father, we pray for your people, wherever they're meeting together today. Father, I pray you'd cause your word to go forth in power, to reveal the glory of your son to your people, wherever they're meeting together today, Father, we especially pray this blessing on our children's class that you would use this time to teach them the scriptures that one day that we could say of them what Paul said of young Timothy, that from a child they've known the holy scriptures, which are able to make them wise unto salvation.

Father, we thank you for the many blessings of this life, how you've blessed us. Oh, how thankful we are knowing We don't have anything because we deserve it or earn it. It's all because of your free grace that you've given us every blessing that we have. And Father, I pray that you'd give us the wisdom and the grace to use these things wisely and generously. And Father, I beg your forgiveness for how often we find ourselves murmuring and complaining after all of your good providence and grace to us. Father, forgive us for Christ's sake, we pray.

All these things we ask, and we give thanks in that name which is above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, amen.

Now I titled the lesson this morning, The Scriptures Fulfilled. Verse 28 says that all this was done, and the scripture was fulfilled. Now I thought, what scriptures are fulfilled in our text? And there's several of them, And I want us to see what these scriptures are, what scriptures were fulfilled. But more, I don't want just an intellectual exercise. I want us to see why these scriptures were fulfilled.

So let's go back up to verse 22 where our lesson begins. And they bring him unto the place called Gotha, which is being interpreted the place of a skull. Now we don't exactly know why that this is called the place of the skull. Some people think that You know they crucified so many people on top of this hill and they didn't give them a proper burial or if they did bury them maybe they buried them in a real shallow grave and animals came and dug up the bones and they say there were skulls laying all around on the ground. I don't know if that's true or not. Other people say that this mountain was kind of shaped like a skull. So people call it the shape of the skull. I don't know what reason, which of those is true, but I do know this.

This is what everybody knew about Golgotha. It was a place of suffering. It was the place where you took the guilty to suffer the judgment that they deserved. And that's where they took our Lord. That's where they took our savior. They took him to the place that was reserved for the worst criminals to suffer justice. And so here's the first scripture we find that is fulfilled here in our text. It was fulfilled in our Lord's drink.

Verse 23, and they gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh, but he received it not. Now wine mingled with myrrh, and that day they used it for a mild sedative to reduce suffering for the sick or something. But apparently they also used it for victims of crucifixion. It would dull their senses mentally. It would dull their nervous system physically so they didn't feel so much pain or whatever. But if you look back at Psalm 69, here's the scripture that was fulfilled. They didn't offer the Lord wine mixed with myrrh for no particular reason. It was to fulfill the scriptures.

And you would think, or this crossed my mind, these people were so bloodthirsty. They were so out to see Jesus crucified, to see him die. The crowd said, destroy him. The Jews were so angry at him. They just frothing at the mouth to see him put to death. And it made me wonder, then why did they try to give him something to drink that would dull the pain? You'd think. that they'd want him to feel as much pain as possible, but they went against what would be our normal instinct and offered him this mild sedative to fulfill the scriptures.

In Psalm 69, verse 19, here's the scripture that was fulfilled. and for comforters, and I found none." Now this is obviously Christ speaking from the cross. In verse 21, they gave me also gall for my meat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. They gave him this myrrh mixed with wine to fulfill the scriptures. Now not just to prove that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, but to show us when they offered him this mild sedative that would have dulled some of his pain, that would have dulled some of his senses so he wouldn't have been so focused on the pain and the humiliation and the things that were going on. Our Savior did not take that sedative because God's justice must be satisfied by Christ suffering everything our sin deserves. And he didn't take something that would have lessened his suffering. He was gonna suffer everything, fully and completely, for his people.

And we know the Savior was thirsty. He cried, I thirst from the cross. But when they gave, offered him something to drink, he wouldn't take it. He's gonna feel every stroke of justice for the sin of his people so that they never will. You see, the price for sin must be fully paid. And Christ is determined he's going to pay that price in full. He's going to suffer everything that sin deserves and he's not going to dodge any of it. He's going to take it all upon himself so that not one drop of that wrath falls on his people. He wouldn't reduce his physical suffering. Now we don't know a lot about hell and quite honestly I don't want to know a lot about it. We know some of what scripture says about it. But surely there must be some physical suffering. Kind of sounds like that from the description of hell, doesn't it? There's some physical suffering there. Christ took all of the physical suffering that his people deserve so that they never will. He didn't try to reduce his physical suffering.

Certainly in hell, it must involve Mental suffering to know and feel the guilt of sin. To know it and feel it like we don't know it now. If we really knew the guilt and the shame of sin, we'd run to Christ. But those people in hell, they have a mental suffering in feeling the guilt and the shame of sin. Our Savior would not reduce his mental suffering by taking something that would cloud his mind. He's suffering hell in every aspect for his people. Physically, mentally, and most importantly, spiritually.

He suffered being separated from his father. Now, we say that the Savior was separated from his father, but he wasn't completely separated from him, was he? No, the father was there and our Savior felt the full presence of his father's justice. His father pouring out his wrath against the sin of his people. The son was separated from the father in this way. There was no smile of love and mercy and grace from the father while Christ was on the cross. It was all wrath. He suffered until the father's wrath against the sin of his people was gone. That is the worst part of hell. I don't care if the fire and flames of hell is real or not. The worst bit of suffering is separation from God, that there's no mercy, no way to come to Him accepted anymore. And our Savior suffered that, that worst of hell, so that His people never will. And He did it willingly. He did it willingly to save His people from the condemnation of sin. If Christ suffered for you, you'll never suffer condemnation for your sin. And one day he'll deliver you from even the presence of sin because he put it away by his suffering on the cross. And he showed how fully he did it by refusing to take this mild sedative.

All right, the second scripture that was fulfilled involves the parting of our Lord's garments. Look back here, Mark 15, verse 24. And when they had crucified him, they parted his garments, casting lots upon them, what every man should take.

Now, if you look back at Psalm 22, here's the scripture that was fulfilled that day. You know, normally, the soldiers, that part of, I guess, of their pay of being the executioner, is they would get to take the garments of the person who was crucified. And sounds like what they would do a lot of times is tear them at the seam and, you know, you get this part of it, I get this part of it.

But our Lord wore a solid robe. It was a woven garment. It was all one piece. It had anti-seams to it. So if they tried to tear this garment into pieces, everybody's just going to get tattered strings. It's just all going to fall apart because it's one woven piece. So what they decided to do, Wonder why they decided to do this. Let's cast lots for his garment. So at least one of us will get the whole piece and it'll be useful to at least one of us. And here's our solution. We'll cast lots for it.

Now why'd they decide to do that? Psalm 22 verse 18. They part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture. This thought came to these men's mind to cast lots for the Lord's clothing to fulfill the scriptures.

And again, this wasn't done to prove that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, that he's fulfilling all these scriptures. All these scriptures are being fulfilled to show us, to show God's people that the cross was an act of God. This is the eternal will and purpose of God being carried out on the cross to accomplish the salvation of God's people.

And they didn't tear and separate the robe that our Savior wore as a picture of the perfect robe of righteousness that our Lord Jesus Christ worked out for his people. The righteousness of Christ, the righteousness of Jesus Christ, it's perfect and it's complete because he was born as a man. The lawgiver was born as a man. The Son of God was born as a man, made under the law. And as a man, the Lord Jesus perfectly obeyed God's law. He obeyed God's law in every jot and tittle. He obeyed God's law in ways that the scribes may not have even realized as part of the law. But he did, and he obeyed it perfectly. And not just outwardly, but inwardly.

Have you ever been in a situation and somebody asks you a question about something that you've done, you're guilty, and you think, you know, I could just tell them a lie and they'd never know the difference. But no, I better not lie. Better tell them the truth. Even thinking, if I tell them a lie, I'll get out of this, is sin. Our Savior never one time did that. I mean, that's something you and I can't understand because we have a sin nature. He never even wanted to sin. He never even thought about it because he doesn't have a sin nature. He obeyed God's law perfectly, outwardly and inwardly in the heart. And do you know that obedience is the obedience of his people. He's our representative. And when he obeyed the law, all of his people obeyed the law in him. When he established a perfect righteousness, because he obeyed the law perfectly, all of his people were made perfectly righteous too. Made the righteousness of God in him.

Just like every one of us, we were made sinners. We were made unrighteous when our father Adam, our first representative, when he disobeyed the law, we did too, and we became unrighteous. We became sinners. The reason all of us sin and do what we do is because Adam made us that way. In the exact same way, Christ made his people righteous by obeying the law for them. And God's people are perfectly righteous. And just like this road, it'll never be torn. It'll never be tattered. It'll never have a worn spot in it. It'll never be stained with sin again. We're perfect. Everyone in Christ is perfect. And the Father accepts us. The Father accepts his people. as his son, as his son. That's the righteousness of God's people. That's why that scripture was fulfilled. To assure God's people, you have a perfect righteousness in Christ. When I look at myself, I don't see it. And you don't either. But when I look at Christ, I see it. That's it.

All right, look back at our text, verse 26. Here's the third scripture that was fulfilled. The king died for his people. Verse 25 says, and it was the third hour and they crucified him. And a superscription of his accusation was written over the king of the Jews. Now this was the charge. This is why they decided they're going to crucify him as the worst of criminals, because he says he's the king of the Jews. And you know that charge is true, isn't it? He's the king. He's everybody's king. He's the king of the Jews. He's the king of the Gentiles. He's everyone's king, whether we know it, whether we willingly accept it or not, he's our king. And most especially, he's king of the Jews, of the spiritual Jews. You know, he's not a Jew, which is one outwardly, but one inwardly, one who's been born again. He's king of his people. And all of his people are willing subjects to our king, aren't they?

But they didn't know that. That's not why they wrote this charge over his head. They wrote this charge, Pilate wrote this charge over his head because if he says he's a king, he's the enemy of Caesar. And this is my excuse for putting him to death. He's guilty of insurrection against Rome and that can't stand. So that was his charge.

but Christ died as the king of his people. He said, I'm king. Now this is a true charge. I'm king. I have a kingdom, but it's not of this world. It's a spiritual kingdom. The Lord Jesus Christ is king. This is what the scripture says. He came preaching the gospel of the kingdom, that he's the king. He has a kingdom. He has subjects that live in his kingdom. And let me tell you how those people get into that kingdom. That's the gospel of the kingdom. and the king, who is our Lord and our master. He is over us in every way. He determines everything that will ever happen to us. He determines the gifts that we have or the gifts that we don't have. He determines where we live and who we interact with. You just can't take this too far. Everything that happens to us is the will of the king.

And the king, you know why he came to town? To die, to suffer and die for his people. Let me show you that in Zechariah. Zechariah chapter nine. Next to the last book in the Old Testament, Zechariah chapter nine. Verse nine. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem. Behold, thy King, capital K. This is a proper name. This is the name of someone. This is the name of Christ. Thy King cometh unto thee. He is just, and having salvation, lowly and riding upon an ass, and upon a colt, the foal of an ass.

Now, who fulfilled that scripture? Our Lord Jesus did, didn't he? And what we call, what they called the first Palm Sunday. He came riding into Jerusalem and people were throwing palm branches on the ground and they put their clothes as a saddle on this ass and just, I don't know, they may have thrown their, I don't remember all the details, they threw the clothes in the street and he's just, you know, all these palm branches. And you know what they were shouting? Blessed be the king. that cometh in the name of the Lord. This is a prophecy of Jesus of Nazareth, who came riding into town as king.

And why did he come to town? Why did he come to town on that day for this week? He came to suffer and die. Before he ever came to town, he told his disciples, I'm going there to be crucified. I'm gonna be delivered into the hands of the Jews and the Gentiles, and they're gonna Treat me awful. They're going to crucify me and put me to death, but I'll rise again the third day. That's why he came to town, the king.

You know, being Americans, we don't really have a full understanding of what it is to be under a sovereign. I mean, you can do whatever he wants to us, and there's no court of appeals. He says, off with your head. I mean, in the next five minutes, your head's coming off, and nobody can say anything about it. This is the king. He can do whatever he wills with us and whatever he does is right. And you know what he did? He came to suffer and die for the sins of his people. What a king. I want to be in that kingdom, don't you?

Look back at Psalm 2. Here's another prophecy telling us Jesus of Nazareth is king. Verse one, Psalm two. Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord. Now you know that this is a prophecy, speaking of the rulers of both Rome and Israel, of the Jews, gathering together against the Lord Jesus. Gather together against the Messiah, And look what it says at the end of verse two, and against his anointed, his anointed. Who is it that's anointed? The king. He's been anointed king.

Look at verse six. Yet, despite all this that they're gonna do to my son, yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion. The Lord Jesus Christ is king. And when he suffered, he came to town and he suffered and died for the sins of his people. He bought eternal redemption for all of them. There is no way anyone for whom Christ died can ever perish.

Look at verse six or verse seven. I will declare the, or where am I at here? Let me find where I'm at in my notes. Verse eight. Well, let's read verse seven. I will declare the decree The Lord has said unto me, thou art my son. This day have I begotten thee, ask of me. And I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

Now I think, what an inheritance. You know, if you wanted to inherit something, you'd think you'd want to inherit something of value, or something that had sentimental value to you, or something that you'd like. The father tells the son, I'm gonna give you the heathen. for your inheritance. Christ died for sinners. He died for the heathen and he purchased them all. He cleansed them all from all of their sin by his precious blood. He made them righteous. And the father said, I'm going to give this sorry lot to you, my son. And you're going to make them holy and spotless, unblameable in my sight so that they'll be with you forever.

Our savior is King. The king suffered and died for his people. They buried him and he rose again. And when he ascended back to the father, where did he sit down? On the throne of heaven. Our savior right now is on the throne of heaven, sovereignly ruling everything that goes on in his creation. And he's doing that for this purpose, one purpose, to ensure the salvation of the people. that the father gave him to die for. That's what he's, the king is ruling to guarantee the salvation of his people. That's who I want to be my king. How about you?

Then here's the fourth scripture that was fulfilled. He was numbered with the transgressors. Verse 27, back in our text. And with him, they crucified two thieves, the one on his right hand, the other on his left, And the scripture was fulfilled, which saith, and he was numbered with the transgressors. Our savior was numbered or he was crucified between two violent transgressors of the law. I mean, these were bad, bad men. And they had three of them that day that they were going to crucify. Now, how did they decide somebody is going to be in the middle, aren't they? Somebody's gonna be on the left, somebody's gonna be in the middle, somebody's gonna be on the right. How did they decide to put Jesus of Nazareth in the middle? I've heard people say, well, that's the reserve for the worst criminal. I don't know if that's true or not. But I do know why they decided to crucify him in the middle, to fulfill the scriptures. Look back at Isaiah chapter 53. Isaiah chapter 53. Verse 12. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out his soul into death. And he was numbered with the transgressors, and he bare the sin of many, and he made intercession for the transgressors.

Christ died between those two violent, well-known criminals, to show us he was numbered with the transgressors. Now that's what the Romans decided to do, to have him numbered with the transgressors. But that was done. They decided to do that, not to prove to us that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ because he fulfilled the scriptures. It's to show us that this was done for a specific reason, for the instruction and the comfort of God's people. He was numbered with the transgressors to show us that the Lord Jesus Christ completely bore the transgression of his people away from them forever. He took it all. And if Christ bore your transgressions away from you, he was condemned for it. He was put to death for it. If he was condemned for your transgressions, you can never be condemned for them too. That's why this was done.

I think this is a very important point, I guess, for us to understand, that he was numbered with the transgressors. That word numbered that Mark uses means counted. It means imputed. It means reckoned. Now to say that you're counted with the transgressors, that you're imputed with the transgressors, that you're reckoned with the transgressors, doesn't mean that you're reckoned with the transgressors, but you're not one of them. That's not what that means. I know a lot of times people use this word imputed. Well, you know, sin was imputed to Christ, but he was never made guilty. That Christ was numbered with the transgressors, but he wasn't one of them. This word means numbered, counted, reckoned, imputed. It means in reality, it means in reality, Christ was numbered. He was with the transgressors. And this is an exact calculation that Christ was numbered with the transgressors.

And let me show you that in Romans chapter eight. Romans chapter eight. This is a scripture. I bet everybody here knows exactly what this verse says. and what it means. Romans eight verse 18, for I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory, which shall be revealed in us. And everybody knows this word. What reckoned is a, it's a, uh, accounting term. It's an accounting term. Paul weighed the pluses and the minuses. And he says, the glory that awaits us can't be compared to what we're going through here on earth. Every believer here believes that with all of your heart, don't you? And you know that's not pie-in-the-sky thinking. That's like, well, I'm thinking that the glory of being with Christ in heaven can't be compared to what I suffered down here on earth. You know that's real. You know that's real. As much as you know anything, you know that's real, don't you?

That word reckon, for I reckon, is the exact same word translated number back in Mark, where Christ was numbered with the transgressors. This is an exact calculation. I'll tell you what this word means, reckon. I can only reckon, I can only impute, I can only count on my checkbook ledger $1,000. If I've already deposited $1,000 into my checking account, If I write down, I got $1,000 in my checking account, but I didn't deposit any money in it. I start writing checks, I got a problem on my hands, don't I?

Christ was reckoned with the transgressors because the Father had made him guilty. Now, he wasn't a transgressor in that he ever is the one that actually committed sin. Christ never committed a sin, but he was guilty. He was guilty of all of the sin of his people. He wasn't a transgressor, but he was numbered with the transgressors because he'd been made guilty of all of the sin of all of his people.

Christ was numbered with the transgressors because I'm a transgressor, because all of his people are transgressors, and he took their sin away from them and took it into his own body on the tree as our substitute. as our sacrifice, and then he paid the full penalty. That's where we started the lesson. He paid the full penalty for the sin of his people. He suffered and he died, because that's what the law demands. Where there's sin, there must be death.

Christ died for the sin of his people, and his blood blotted their sin out, washed them white as snow. When he offered his blood on the altar before the Father, It's the only sacrifice that pleased the justice of God. And if Christ died for you, if he was numbered with the transgressors for you, you can never, ever, ever be condemned for your sin too.

Now, why don't you come to him? Why don't you believe him? Why don't you trust your soul to him? His death put the sin of his people away forever. and the fact that he was numbered with the transgressors. That's the assurance and the comfort of the salvation of other transgressors. Transgressors like you and me. That Christ was numbered with people like me. Not the thieves, me. So that he could put my sin away. That's all I need to hear in order to trust him.

How about you?

All right, Lord bless you.