The lesson this morning is about
a man named Joseph. We've been looking at the events
around the death of Christ, the crucifixion of Christ, his judgment
and his sufferings, the people involved, the prophecies concerning
his crucifixion. In a last week's study, we talked
about his death and his commending his spirit to God the Father. And having done this, the scripture
says he gave up the ghost. Hanging on the cross was the
body of Jesus of Nazareth, beaten, bloody, marred more than any man, the
Scripture says. Hanging now limp on the cross
was a dead Savior. And they were sad. They were
sad when they saw that sight. And looking on in the crowd,
there was a centurion, a Roman soldier, a centurion. And no
doubt a soldier put in charge of these crucifixions. And upon
seeing Christ yield up the ghost and having heard all that he
said, Luke 23, 47, he glorified God, saying, certainly
this was a righteous man. Now here's a man, he's not a
churchgoer, he's not a religious man, he perhaps was a moral man,
I don't know, but he was a Roman centurion, he was a soldier.
And he's looking on and being in charge of deaths, he no doubt
had seen and heard many men in their last hours on this earth. Whether or not he had a comment
about it, I don't know. But this man, this Jesus of Nazareth,
and all that he heard, and all that he saw, and in all the people
around him, and all these events, this was his summation. Surely
this was a righteous man. Then a mass of people gathered
there to see what took place, Luke 23, 48. Beholding the things which were
done, they smoked their breasts and returned. Smoked their breasts in acknowledgement
of their guilt, no doubt. They smoked their breasts in
outward evidence of their fear of what God may do to them and
their nation. They said in the height of their
the high priest running among them and getting, you know, intimidating
them and causing them to do things, they said, let his blood be on
us and upon our children and on our children's children. And
no doubt, they smoked their breaths in fear of what God may do to
them and that nation. And then they returned. They
went back to their lives and families believing that this
was the end of things. It was the end of it. And then
all his acquaintance, this was a large group of people, and
then his acquaintance, we read about them and studied them earlier
in the book of Luke, that followed him. People that knew him in
some respect and had heard him and seen his miracles, been healed
by him perhaps. These all had a personal knowledge
of Jesus of Nazareth. And then the women that followed
Him and served Him, they followed Him from Galilee.
They stood afar off beholding what took place on the cross,
weeping and sorrowful, in shock, no doubt, stunned by the events
of the day. Now with these things in mind,
let's read verses 50 through 54 together. That's our lesson
for today. And behold, that is pause and
consider. That's what he's telling us to
do. Behold, with wonder, something amazing. There came a man named Joseph,
a counselor. He wasn't a counselor like like
a school counselor that you take your troubles to, you know, a
psychiatrist or something. He was a member of the High Council
of the Jews of the Sanhedrin. Joseph, a counselor, and he was
a good man and a just man. The same had not consented to
the counsel and deed of them. He was not in agreement with
what the Sanhedrin decided to do, which was to crucify Christ. And he was from Arimathea, a
city of the Jews, who also himself waited for the kingdom of God.
This man went on to Pilate and begged the body of Jesus, and
he took it down, wrapped it in linen, laid it in a sepulcher
that was hewn in stone wherein never man before was laid. And that day was the preparation
and the Sabbath drew on. The women also, which came with
him from Galilee, followed after him, and beheld the sepulcher,
and how his body was laid. And then they returned, and prepared
spices and ointments, and rested the Sabbath day according to
the commandment." Now there's much to see in these verses,
and when we've seen what we can, we'll discover By the grace of
God, if he permits us to continue, we'll discover that much more
depth the next time we look at it. It's amazing how deep the
scriptures run. It's amazing. This is the inspired
Word of God to us. And I can't imagine how infinite
it is compared to our abilities to understand it. May the Lord
be pleased to show us what we're able to see today. When the Holy
Spirit of God inserts the word, behold, something wonderful is
about to happen. Something marvelous is about
to be revealed. Something worth pausing to consider,
something wonderful. Let's look at this man, as the
Spirit of God tells us to, and see why he calls our attention
to him with the word, Behold. Let's look first at the man himself.
John tells us that Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly
because of the Jews. He feared the Jews. He was a
member of their council. He knew what they could do. The
High Council of Israel was a frightening body. They put men to death. They didn't
like you, they'd take you out. They'd just get rid of you. With
a word from them, you could be an outcast from the nation, from
all the people. A total outcast, just by a word. Now, I like to garden. I love
being able to go out and pick fresh produce and eat things
ripened on the vine. I see that all the time in the
store, vine-ripened bologna. It's not vine-ripened. It's gassed
in a chamber and took that old green tomato and turned it red. And then, I not only like to
garden and eat the produce, but I'm fascinated by flowers and
ornamental bushes and trees. Somebody called me one time and
he said, you're a plant collector. And I guess I am. I love seeing
them. I own nearly six acres in Danville,
Kentucky, and a third of it was flower beds and gardens. But
one of the most fascinating of the flowers that I had was a
night bloomer. It bloomed at night. I had one
that, I called it a Vietnam plant because that's where it came
from. It was natural to Vietnam and the plant itself looked like
camo. It looked like the camo that
they wore over there in the jungle. That's what it looked like. And
one time a year it had a bloom. And the guy that gave it to me
warned me, he said, don't pick the bloom. He said, don't fool
with that bloom. He said, it stinks. He said,
you can't believe how awful that thing smells. But he said, it
blooms at night. I had also an evening primrose. I think people used to call them
four o'clock. They bloom in the evening and
nighttime. And there's another one that
I saw in a book called A Casablanca Lily. It's a beautiful thing.
It blooms at night. Highly sought after for night
marriages. Joseph of Arimathea was a night
bloomer. That's why I'm telling you this. He was an unusual man. He was
an unusual man. His whole life he cowered in
fear of the Jews and secretly followed after Christ. You'd
have never known that this man was a believer. Never known. He said among those Jews, those
Jews had no suspect of what he believed. He said on the council.
The only hint he ever give is he disagreed with them about
the death of Christ. As far as I know, that's the
only time. He was a night blower. Joseph of Arimathea is not mentioned
anywhere in the scriptures before or after this day. The providence
of God opened the door and Joseph walked out onto the stage of
history, performed this one deed, and then walked back into oblivion.
Isn't that something? What do we really know about
Joseph? Well, I know this, he was a rich man. He was very wealthy. Matthew 27 verse 57 says, there
came a rich man of Arimathea named Joseph. He was well off. Mark tells us that he was an
honorable counselor, a member of the high council called the
Sanhedrin, but honorable in his judgments. Luke tells us he was
a good man and a just man. And John tells us he was a disciple
of Jesus and an acquaintance of Nicodemus. And we only know
what the Spirit of God has been pleased to preserve about this
man Joseph. May have been many in the high
council that were secret disciples. I don't know. In John 8 verse
30 it says, and as he spake these words many believed on him and
he was talking to the high council. He was teaching in the treasury
and in the audience of the council. But the behold here is not so
much about a man as it is about what this man was led of God
to do. God doesn't exalt men, but He
will take a man and He'll use that man to do a marvelous work. And then that man will just disappear.
He'll disappear. This man not only set himself
in harm's way with a high council, but also with Roman authority.
This man goes to the highest authority in the land besides
Caesar and begs the body of Jesus. Now, if you'll read the account
of the death of Christ, you'll learn that Caesar despised those
Jews because those Jews were forcing him to do something he
didn't want to do. They were intimidating him, more
or less telling him, you'll do this or we'll go to Caesar and
say you prefer this king over Caesar. They put him on the spot. He was not a friend of the Jews. And yet here's a member of that
same council that intimidated him and he's coming to him asking
him for the body of this man that he was forced to crucify. Now I'm told it was a Roman custom
to leave the bodies of the convicted felons on the crosses to decompose. They didn't take them down. They
didn't bury them. They were left on the crosses
to decompose or be eaten by scavengers. There was nothing honorable about
the death of a felon under Roman rule. But Luke says he went and
begged the body of Jesus. John says he besought Pilate. And Mark said he went in boldly
and craved the body of Jesus. And then think about this. This
man Joseph must have been standing before the cross because when
he went to Pilate to crave the body of Jesus, Pilate had not
yet even heard that Jesus had died. That's how quickly Joseph
moved to ask for the body. Pilate called to the centurion
confirmed what he was hearing, Mark 15, 44. And when it was
confirmed by the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph. Oh, the providence of God, how
he works in every detail to bring his will to pass. What's being
done today? The will of God. Huh? Who's doing it? Everybody and
everything. Oh, that's hard to digest, isn't
it? Here's a man who didn't want
to be seen in public, but now he becomes the object of sight
of everybody. He worketh the Scripture saying
all things after the counsel of his own will. But I want us
to see something today that perhaps we've never seen. I've read the
accounts, I've studied these accounts for years, never seen
what I saw this past week in this. Spirit of God has allowed
me to see why this man Joseph had to get the body of Jesus,
why he had to put it into a new tomb, and what all these things
were about. In last week's message in 1 Peter
1, I talked about the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus. And I
showed you in Numbers 19 what this is talking about. It's the
red heifer. The red heifer had to be taken
and burnt. They brought this red heifer
before the priest and they slayed him and burned him into ashes. They cremated this red heifer
right before the high priest. And then his ashes was gathered
up and put in a clean vessel. And there it was stored outside
the camp until somebody unclean needed to be cleansed. And then
they went and got those ashes, mixed it with water, and sprinkled
it. And he was clean. You can read
it for yourself, Numbers 19. All the religious works he calls
dead works. This red heifer was about sprinkling
the unclean. And what he's talking about is
a sprinkling of purification. Purifying an unclean man who
was defiled by touching a dead person or anything concerning
the dead. Blankets, tent. anything you
were considered unclean. You had to go have this, this
sprinkling had to take place. And all our religious works,
he calls dead works, defiled by our deadness and the darkness
of this world. You hath he quickened who were
dead. What's that mean? That means you were unclean.
That's what that means. Unclean. You were dead. Everybody around you is dead.
Read it before you say it. Dead in trespassagency. The law reads, and a man that
is clean, not defiled by the dead, shall gather up the ashes
of the heifer, the sacrifices burnt in front of the By the
fire of God, before his eyes, he saw it alive, he saw it die,
he saw it captured, brought, held, suffering and dying. This man did. And when the ordeal
was over, he gathered what was left of the sacrifice. Jesus of Nazareth. He was set
apart for the cleansing of dead sinners. He was made to be sin
for us who knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him. And the law of the red heifer
was being fulfilled before our eyes. That's what was going on.
Joseph was a man of faith. That's the only way a man can
be good and just. Our Lord said to the rich young
ruler who called him good master, he said, why callest thou me
good? There's none good but God. He tells us in Romans 3, talking
about fallen man and our total depravity, our sin nature, he
tells us that there's none good, no not one, and none righteous. But here he says of this man,
he's a good man and a just man. The only way you can be good
and just is in Christ. So here, our Lord singled out
a good man and a just man. And he stood and he saw the heifer
under the fire of God. He saw him suffer, he saw him
bear the vengeance of God, and he saw him die. And when he gave
up the ghost, that good man gathered up what was left of the sacrifice.
And where did he take it? to a clean place. Here's a tomb,
never been used, never a body laid in the tomb. He takes this
thing to a clean place. Where was it at? Outside the
camp. Scripture says it was near to
the crucifixion. Near to the crucifixion. This was a clean man. He went
to Pilate, begged the body of Jesus, craved what was left of
the sacrifice. And this clean man, it says over
Numbers 19, shall gather up the ashes and lay them up without
the camp in a clean place, a place not defiled by the dead. Never a body was laid in this
town. John said in John 19.41, now in the place where he was
crucified, there was a garden. How is that significant? Well,
it was in a garden that we fell, wasn't it? Huh? It's in a garden
that we're redeemed. There was a tomb, so to speak,
in that garden back yonder. We died and Adam all died. By one man sin entered into the
world and death by sin. There was a cemetery back in
that garden. Death passed upon all men for
all have sinned. And there's a garden of redemption. And here it is. It's outside
the camp. The ashes were to be transported
by the clean man to this place. In this garden was a tomb. They gathered together, carried
to this clean place. Now the wording's different in
the different accounts, but here in Luke it says, verse 53, and
he took him down. Who did? Joseph. I can't imagine. I can't imagine. This had to
be an act of faith. had to be to take that bloody
barbed corpse off that cross. Who took it down? Pilate, the
centurion, Joseph. And he wrapped it in linen. That's
the dress of the priest, isn't it? The high priest. He wrapped
it in linen, and he laid it in a sepulcher where never a man
was laid, the clean place outside the camp. These ashes, when mixed
with water, was a sprinkling of purification. So how does
all this relate to us? Well, our Savior's death, mixed
with the water of His Word, cleanses us from all sin. How will you
know? about this sprinkling of the
blood of Christ. How are you going to know about
that? There's no other way to know except the Word of God.
Otherwise, it's just a man's opinion. But I'm telling you,
when I quote to you from the Word of God, now what I'm saying
has a foundation. That means something. It's not
just an opinion. And then lastly, he says in verse
54, and that day was a preparation and the Sabbath drew on. How
can a poor, unclean sinner, dead in trespasses and sins, defiled
by his nature and a falling world's influence all around him, prepare
for a day of rest? He rests in Christ. Huh? He rests in Christ. He's in Christ, presented before
God, the scripture said, holy, unblameable, unapprovable in
His sight. He that is washed, our Lord said,
needeth not to wash except His feet. It's just His walk in this
world. We need to be cleansed daily
from that, don't we? But we're clean before God. Just our walk, defiled by this
dead world. And this graveyard of sinners,
this valley of dead, dry bones, he gives us picture after picture
after picture of this world. See this man of God, defiled
by a dead body, yet able to keep the Passover. How can he do that? Because once
you touch a body, you have to go through this process of cleansing
or else you've broken the commandment of God. And the commandments
of God were being fulfilled that day. Not transgressed, they're
being fulfilled. How could this man, having touched
this dead body, worship God on the Sabbath or partake of the
Passover? It was a high day. This was a
Sabbath of Sabbaths. This was a Passover Sabbath. How could he do that? Because Christ's Passover had
been sacrificed for him. That dead body that he was carrying was sacrificed
for him. And that dead body he was handling
was not a source of his defilement, but a source of his cleansing.
That clean man was not defiled when he carried those ashes out. He wasn't defiled. And neither
was this man. The fire had gone out. It had already burnt to sacrifice. Nothing left but holy ashes.
And then he says to Peter, you remember he let down that sheet
that had all this pork and all this stuff on there, and Peter
said, no. I've never eaten anything unclean. He said, call thou not
unclean what I've cleansed. What God's cleansed is good.
He's good. What does He cleanse? He cleanses
His people. What's He cleanse them from?
Death. Death, defilement, sin, this
world, their own nature. Oh, may the Holy Spirit give
us some understanding of what we stand to tell. Thank you.