It's found in the first nine
verses of Mark chapter 14. There's four things that I want
to point out in these verses. He first talks about the Passover.
And then he talks about, or at least exposes, the ignorance
of men concerning the Word of God. Then he shows us something of
God's absolute sovereignty and man's responsibility. And then he shows to us a trophy
of God's mercy and grace. I don't have time this morning
to read all these verses for you, but I hope you will read
through them here in Mark 14. And I'll point out some things
as I go. So the first thing we encounter
in verse one is the feast of the Passover and of unleavened
bread. What is the feast of the Passover? What does that mean? What is
he talking about? Well, when Israel was in Egypt,
God sent a man to them to proclaim God's particular redemption. He told Pharaoh, he said, God
told me to tell you Let my people go. Not his people, God's people. Let my people go. And with no more than a shepherd's
staff in his hands, Moses looked that man right in the face and
declared to him the will of God, the sovereign will of God. Can you imagine? And in his presence. And then
after many plagues and a lot of crawfishing on Pharaoh's part,
it came down to the end of the warnings. And Moses said, thus
saith the Lord, about midnight will I go out into the midst
of Egypt. And all the firstborn in the
land of Egypt shall die. From the firstborn of Pharaoh
that sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the
maidservant that's behind the mill, and all the firstborn of
beasts, they're all gonna die. This is Exodus chapter 12. Then Moses spoke to Israel and
said, on the 10th day of this month, they shall take to them
every man a lamb. According to the house of their
fathers, a lamb for a house. And this lamb must be carefully
observed. You have to pin it up. You have
to watch it, observe it, look at it every day. And he must
be found to be without blemish. And it was to be a male of the
first year. Then they were to kill that lamb
and take its blood and strike it on the two side posts of the
door of their house and upon the lintel. And that night they were to roast
that lamb whole. Now listen, this is the word
of God. Listen to this. He's gonna roast his lamb whole
with its head and its legs and the pertinence thereof. He said you eat it all. Isn't
that the way it is with Christ? You eat it all. And you eat it
as God has purposed the preparation of Christ. That's how you're
gonna eat it. God said you eat this lamb roasted. Don't you
eat it raw and don't you boil it. Not sodden with water, not
raw. Roast it. Why'd they have to
eat it roasted? Because God said so. That's why. And you're to eat it, he said,
with unliving bread and bitter herbs. And then as the Lord passed
through that evil place, he'd kill all the firstborn except
those where he saw the blood. He said, when I see the blood,
I will pass over You, that's what the Passover is all about. This day, he said, shall be unto
you a memorial, and you shall keep it as a feast to the Lord
throughout your generations, and you shall keep it a feast
by an ordinance forever. So, Beast of the Passover, what's
it all about? Well, it's typical of Christ,
whose blood was shed for our redemption, our particular redemption. And his flesh eaten through the
gospel and his blood prominently displayed in our minds and hearts
by faith. He said, when you drink that
wine, you do that in remembrance of me. This is my blood, the
blood of the New Testament. When you drink it, you remember
me. You remember what this blood
is about. His blood is typically sprinkled
upon our consciences, Hebrews 9, 13, and 14, and purges our
consciences from dead works to serve the living God. So particular
effects of redemption is pictured in that paschal lamp. And all
for whom the lamb died were delivered. In fact, they were told to eat
it with their loins girded. and their shoes on their feet,
and their staff in their hand, and eat it in haste, it is the
Lord's Passover. Don't put it off. Don't put it
off. Can you see the applications
of that to the gospel, or am I the only one that sees that? Huh? We like to hear something
and mull it over for a year or two. That's not what they were
commanded to do. You eat this lamb in haste. You
don't know when I'm coming. About midnight, he said. But
this is my Passover, and you eat it. You eat it in haste.
And you eat it ready to go. Ready to go. Don't make preparations
to stay here in Egypt. Don't make preparations just
in case it don't work out. It's going to work out. to put
your shoes on, get dressed, get your staff in your hand, get
ready to leave because I'm coming through tonight and Pharaoh,
he gonna turn you loose after this day. You remember Pharaoh
got mad and told Moses when he left, he said, I won't see you
again. And Moses said, thou shalt well
see it. You won't see me again. The Passover and the crossing
through the sea are actually connected. Did you know that? They're connected. It was a picture
of our conversion by the power and grace of God that the Holy
Ghost, through the word of his ambassador, tells us about deliverance,
brings to us deliverance from God, And it's the death of Christ
that secures our conversion. There's no way that the elect
of God are not going to be converted. It's not God's will, he says
in the book of Peter, 2 Peter, he said, it's not God's will
for any to perish. Not any in the world, but any
for whom Christ died. not God's will, and God's gonna
do his will. Isn't that right? So the death of Christ secures
our conversion, and he plainly tells us in Hebrews 10, he said
that in the volume of the book it's written of me, I come to
do thy will, O God, by the which will we are sanctified, set apart,
Through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all,
you see that? It secures our conversion, the
death of Christ, and accomplishes the redemptive will of God. And Moses stood there on that
mountainside overlooking that sea and he said, stand still
and see the salvation of the Lord. which he shall show you
today. The Lord shall fight for you,
and you shall hold your peace, not of works, lest any man should
boast. And that rod represented the
word of the gospel, and the wind, the Holy Spirit of God, and the
blood and righteousness of Christ opens and affects your way to
an everlasting salvation and a sure victory over your enemies.
So the grand and glorious picture and memorial was only two days
away. Isn't that what he says there
in Mark chapter 14, verse 1? Two days till the Passover. Two
days till this great memorial, this great picture of Christ.
Just two more days until this Passover. be the very last one to be celebrated
with an actual lamb because soon the Lamb of God would fulfill
that memorial. And a new ordinance would be
given to take its place after the fulfilling of it, the Lord's
Table. And we already have the lamb
slain without spot or blemish, and we remember him by wine and
unleavened bread. So this is the Passover that
he's talking about. Secondly, I want to point out
the ignorance of men who claim to be preachers and teachers
and priests of God. I want to show you in the scriptures
their ignorance of God. Now I guarantee you these men
knew the mechanics of the Passover. They knew the time it was to
be kept, If they caught you, this was a holy convocation,
and if they caught you doing anything on that day, anything,
except what God had commanded for the preparation of the Passover,
man, you were in trouble. You were in big trouble. They
knew the time that it was to be kept. They knew all the mechanics
of it. They knew about the unleavened
bread. They knew about the lamb. They knew about all these things.
They knew everything except what it pictured. Isn't that amazing? I was listening to several preachers
on my way up here this morning on the radio. I couldn't stand
to listen to one very long, but I was kind of flipping through.
I just wanted to hear their comments and stuff. And it's amazing how
much they know about the mechanics of the Bible. But they don't
know the message of it. Totally ignorant of it. They were totally ignorant of
why it was there and what significance it played in their faith. They
had no spiritual understanding of the ordinance at all. Well,
how do I know that? Look there in Mark 14, verse
1. The feast is only two days away. And rather than preparing
their hearts for worship, the chief priests, these weren't
common priests, these were the chief priests. They were at the
very top of the priesthood. And the scribes, these were men
who hand transcribed the scriptures. They copied it word for word. They knew where all the commas
went. What was to be capitalized and what wasn't, they were experts
on the word of God. The chief priest and the scribes
sought how they might take him by craft and put him to death. Here was the centerpiece of the
Passover standing right before them, standing in their presence. You'd think they'd be rejoicing. But they weren't. They kinda
went like that and said, hey, we're gonna have a business meeting
here in a little bit, and we're gonna figure out how to kill
him and still have favor with the people. My friend, that's sin. That's
sin. False religion, worldly approval,
and acceptable religion always ignores the Lamb and follows
their own agenda. That's true all the time. Though
they pretend to honor the Word of God, they're not instructed
by it. I heard a man this morning talking
about how important the Word of God was. The Word was the
foundation of faith. And he went on and on and on
talking about the Word of God. And then he left and went to
his preeminent subject, which was the free will of man. They pretend to honor the word
of God, but they're not instructed by it, nor can you reprove one
by it. He'll say, that's your opinion.
And you're just reading to them. You're just reading it right
out of the book. That old deacon told Henry that
morning. Henry, the air was so thick you could cut it with a
knife and so much tension. And Henry said, I decided in
the Sunday school I'm just going to read Ephesians chapter one.
And he started reading. He got about halfway through
it. The old deacon stood up and said, that's enough. And he said,
what do you mean that's enough? He said, that's enough. He said,
I know what you're trying to teach. He said, I'm not trying
to teach anything. Oh, yes you are. And he said,
well, what am I trying to teach? He said, election. Predestination. He said, is that what you got
out of this? Because all I'm doing is reading the scriptures.
Is that what you got out of this? He said, that's what I got out
of it, too, because that's what it says. They're not going to
be reproved by the word of God. They're not going to be instructed
by the word of God. And they're not going to be corrected
by it. They devised their own system of religion and wrote
their own confessions and covenants, and that's what they go to. But
worst of all, they do what they do to manipulate their hearers,
and then they compromise whenever it's necessary. If they could
have, They would just took a knife and slit his throat. They tried
on several occasions. One time they tried to throw
him over the brow of the hill, and he just walked through them
because his time was not yet. And how many times did they take
up stones to stone him? But God prevented it. And many times they wanted to
kill him, but they feared the people. They must pretend to be servants,
to keep their support, yet cunningly and deceitfully rule. My friend,
the word of God sets a sharp contrast between the God of the
Bible and the gods of men. And one of these contrasts is
that the God of the Bible never wants to do anything. You hear
me? A man starts telling you what
God wants to do, turn him off. God doesn't want to do anything.
He does what he wills. He don't desire to do a certain
thing. He wills to do it. He said, I'm not like these other
gods. That's what he said through his
prophet Moses. He said, I declare the end from the beginning. And
from ancient times the things that are not yet done saying
my counsel, my counsel will stand and I will do all my pleasure. The living God does what he wills
to do. God himself said my counsel shall
stand and I'll do all my pleasure. And David said our God's in the
heavens. He hath done whatsoever he had
pleased. God's never frustrated, he's
never disappointed or even hindered in his will. I used to listen
to Arminian evangelists stand in the pulpit and just start
crying about how Christ's sacrifice was gonna be in vain if you didn't
believe. And I thought, that's nuts. That's insane to think that his death was gonna
be for naught. Our text is a prime example of
this very fact. Religion had a business meeting
to kill the Son of God in such a way as to make the people think
they were doing God a service. Can you imagine these tiny little
twisted brains trying to outwit omniscience? We're going to get together and
we're going to find this crafty way. Are you kidding me? God who knows All? Only men ignorant of God would
even attempt to do such a thing. But they just could not and would
not acknowledge that Jesus of Nazareth was God. And thirdly, and I'll try to
be a little more brief, In our text, I see manifested both the
absolute sovereignty of God over all things and yet man responsible
to God for his actions. There was a young couple that
came here for a while and two or three times he met me back
at the door and his comments was always the same. Well, isn't
man responsible to God? Yes, he's responsible to God. Well, you're taking his responsibility
away when you preach the sovereignty of God. No, I'm establishing it. It is the eternal purpose
of God and his revealed will that Jesus Christ should be judged,
found guilty, and die on a cross. God purposed that. That's no
accident. God purposed that. And as our
substitute, he must be lifted up as a cursed man whose death
was according to the law. He was judged. In Proverbs 17
and verse 15 or 16, it says, he that justifies the wicked
and he that condemns the just, even they both are abomination
to the Lord. Sin must be paid for and justice
satisfied and thusly righteousness is established. And all of this
is accomplished in the death of Christ. So then what Mark
is showing us is while men were plotting and planning the death
of Christ for all the wrong reasons, they were yet doing what God's
hand and God's counsel determined before to be done. Now if you
want to read that in the scriptures, you can read it for yourself
in Acts chapter four, verses 27 and 28. Everybody involved
in his death, were doing exactly what they wanted to do, and yet
they were doing what God's hand and God's counsel determined
before to be done. We say, where's man's responsibility
in that? Well, look over here at Acts
2, verse 23. Him being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and by wicked
hands have crucified and slain." Huh? God's absolute sovereignty
over all things and man's responsibility to God. Both things are so. And then fourthly, let me show
you a true trophy of God's grace. I cannot in just a minute or
two show you why But I honestly believe that Mary, the sister
of Martha, and Mary Magdalena are the same person. I believe
they're the same person. But be that what it will, this
woman came into the house of Simon the leper with an alabaster
box. And it was filled with spiked
nard. And it's my understanding that
nard is a tree. And it has spikes on it, and
when those spikes are broken or crushed, inside is this perfume. It produces a wonderful aroma. And
in this box, Mary had a pound of it. No telling what it was
worth. And she poured it on his head,
and then she washed his feet with her tears, Dried him with
her hair and anointed his feet also with this sphagnum. And
being ignorant of his death, Judas was just filled with indignation. What a waste. And all the apostles
followed Judas in this, by the way. All of them followed Judas. They was all filled with it.
That's right, that's right. That could have been sold and
given to the poor. You read John's account, you
know what John said? This is what the Lord said. Judas
didn't say that because he cared for the poor. He said that because
he was a thief and he carried the box. That was money out of
his pocket. Why'd the rest of them follow
him? Because they were deceived. They were deceived. All that should have been sold
and given to the poor. But Mary was not ignorant. The
scriptures mention Mary. Now listen to me. In four different
situations, each time she was totally misunderstood by the
people around her, But the Lord commended her. All four times. It's amazing. First at the feet
of Christ, just drinking in every word. And Martha was in the kitchen
and fixing and doing and looking there at her sister. And she
was just sitting there at the feet of Christ and said, I got to
do it all. She ain't doing it. She's just
sitting there. Just sitting there. The Lord said, she's chosen a
good thing. Yeah, the Lord commended her. Things that'll never be taken
away from her. She heard my words. And then secondly, we see her
after the death of her brother, and she's just destroyed. But
she didn't run to blame the Lord. She came in humble submission
and looked to Him for comfort, fell down at His feet, and looked
to Him for comfort. He commended her for it. And here in our text, anointing
the Lord for his burial. She was condemned for what she
did, but she was commended of the Lord. Said, she's anointing
me for my burying. Leave her alone. And then lastly, did you know
Mary was the first one to the tomb? Got up. ran out there to that
town and the stone was rolled back. I honestly believe she
went out there to see him rise from the dead. And she got there
a little late. He was already risen. She was
the first one at the grave. Now listen to me. She was the
first one who was told that the Lord was risen and she was the
first one to declare that he was risen. Isn't that something? And nobody believed her. Nobody
believed her. She was criticized, and her faith
was put in question, yet each of these times she was commended
by the Lord. And Brother Don Fortner made
this comment concerning Mary. He said, if you're committed
to Christ and inclined to do something for Him, something
just for His honor, just for his glory, something for the
interest of his kingdom and the furtherance of his gospel. And
you're doing it because you love him. You're doing it out of a
deep sense of overwhelming gratitude. Do not expect the approval of
the world or of religious hypocrites, or
for that fact, even other believers. In fact, those who serve the
Lord Jesus Christ with the most ardent, self-sacrificing devotion
are often criticized and ridiculed by the very people who ought
to imitate their example. The very thing that everyone
in the house condemned, the Lord approved, He highly esteemed,
and He commended her for it. And then our Lord said this,
verily I say unto you, wheresoever this gospel shall be preached
throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall
be spoken of for a memorial for her. I think that's all. Oh, may God give us the faith
of his elect. All right, thank you.