I am told that some flowers only
bloom at night. That certainly is the case with
Joseph of Arimathea. It would appear as far as scripture
is concerned. This man stepped in on the stage
of history on the evening of our Lord's crucifixion, took
him down from the cross, buried him in his own new tomb and stepped
off the stage. There's no record of this man
anywhere to my knowledge in the history books, no record of him
in scripture until that evening. No record of this man at any
point in time beyond that evening. He just steps in, does what God
sent him to do, and steps off the stage. Now there are lots
of fantastic legends about it. but nothing in history that I've
been able to find. Who was this man? What did he do? Why did
he live? Why did he appear when he did?
Why did he not appear sooner? Those are questions that have
gone through my mind for years as I read about Joseph of Arimathea
as he's described for us in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Tonight, I want us to look just
at Luke's account of this man's life and his work. Luke 23, verse
50. Last week when we got word that
my dad had died, Will, who has for a while asked a number of
questions about death. Every time somebody gets sick, he's
keenly aware of fear and thoughts, fearful that I might die. He's
asking, Papa, are you going to die? Am I going to die? And then
he asked the other day, when Daddy died, about death again,
concerned that he might die. And I said to him, I said, son,
I have preached funerals for a lot of people. I've preached
funerals for little boys younger than you and for men and women
older than my dad, your papa. But I want you to understand
something. Every man's life, and this is distinctly true with
regard to God's elect, those men and women chosen of God,
every person's life, no matter how brief it is or how long his
existence may be on this earth, is ordained, explained to him,
appointed, planned by God before he was born. And he will die
at exactly the right time when he has done all that God created
him to do. It's a complete life. Some of
you will leave here earlier than others, some much later, at God's
appointed time, when you've completed what God put you here to do. I don't know about you, but that's
very satisfying to me. This man, Joseph, was raised
up for a work, completed his work, and at least as far as
the book of God is concerned, he steps off the stage. So will
I. Luke 23, verse 50. And behold,
there was a man named Joseph, a counselor, a senator. The word
means senator or a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish Sanhedrin. And he was a good man, a good
man and a just. The same had not consented to
the counsel and the deed of them. He was present when Caiaphas
made that prophecy that he knew nothing about what he was saying,
but made it by the Holy Ghost that it's expedient that one
man should die for the people and not the whole nation. Joseph
was there. But he didn't consent to Caleb's
judgment, and he didn't consent to their choice and determination
to crucify the Savior. But he was a member of that religious
body. He was of Arimathea, a city of the Jews, who also himself
waited for the kingdom of God, like Simeon and Anna in Luke
chapters 1 and 2. He waited for the Lord's Christ. This man went unto Pilate and
begged the body of Jesus. Now, that's remarkable. That's
remarkable. Can you imagine what must have
gone through his mind when he goes to Pilate, a member of the
Sanhedrin, a member of the group of men, powerful, powerful religious
men with whom he was connected. And he begs to take the body
of that man they had just had crucified, identifying himself
with a man who had been put to death as an insurrectionist,
put to death as a blasphemer. He's hazarding his very life,
and he goes to Pilate. it begs the body of the Lord
Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped
it in linen, and 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. And the women also, which came
with him from Galilee, followed after and beheld the sepulcher,
and how his body was laid, And they returned and prepared spices
and ointments and rested the Sabbath day according to the
commandment." This rich man of Arimathea, Joseph, this member
of the Sanhedrin, the mob of self-righteous religious Pharisees,
that horrible Jewish court that had just maliciously and with
cunning deceit crucified the Son of God. And yet the Holy
Spirit expressly tells us in John chapter 19 that he was a
disciple of Jesus, and he adds these words, but secretly for
fear of the Jews. He was a disciple of Jesus, a
follower of the Lord Jesus, like you and me. One who had been
born of God's Spirit, called by His grace, one who believed
on the Son of God, but he kept to the secret. because he had
been afraid of the Jews. Wonder what he was afraid of?
Wonder what he was afraid of? Up to this point, he had no reason
to fear for his life, though now he did. What was he afraid
of? He was a rich man, a powerful
man, an influential man, a man well-known, highly respected,
and listened to. Now, what do you think he was
afraid of? He was afraid of losing all that he had labored for all
his life. Respect, position, power, and
prominence. You wonder how it is that politicians,
once they get into the office they've been seeking, they seek
it all their lives, and they plan, and they connive, and they
position themselves, and they groom themselves, and they finally
get the position they're going to do something. You wonder how
could they all of a sudden turn out so bad? They don't want to
lose it. Do what they're expected to do.
Do what they're told to do. Do what they know people who
put them where they are demand that they do. And if they don't,
everything's a wash, gone. He was a disciple of the Lord
Jesus, but secretly, because he was afraid of the Jews. Because
he was a member of the Sanhedrin. Because his fear of the Jews
kept him from openly confessing the Lord Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea
is commonly overlooked, overlooked at best, usually looked upon
with terrible disdain. You ask, why is that? Well, let
me answer. We all naturally imagine that
we would not have done what he did. We would not have feared
those men. We would not have kept our faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ a secret thing from those men and from
others. We would not remain a part of
any church or religious body that had just condemned the Lord
Jesus and cried for his crucifixion. Any church or religious body
that behaves so cunningly, so deceitfully, so dishonestly,
so contrary to the word of God, while pretending to worship,
honor, and serve God, we wouldn't have to be a part of that. In
fact, our proud, self-righteous hearts would cast this man aside
as a reprobate hypocrite in a flash. You would and I would. I know
we would because we do it all the time. God forgive us." Well,
he's not saved. He couldn't be saved and do that.
She couldn't be saved and be among those people. If they saved
him, they would. How sad. What a commentary on
our wicked, wicked hearts. We'd do that, we'd test him aside,
we'd say he's a lost man, hypocrite, reprobate, except for one thing. God the Holy Spirit tells us
that Joseph of Arimathea was a good man. I had to look that
word up. When God says somebody's good,
I wonder what he means. Ready. That's the word. I presume
he was using the word that meant tender, kind-hearted, charitable,
benevolent. The word means ready. Standing
back, as it were, like those Jews with their staff in their
hand when they ate the Passover, ready to leave Egypt. Ready.
Ready to go. Ready to do. One who was, as
old brother Scott Richardson used to say, sitting on ready.
Ready. That's the word. And a just,
righteous, innocent, without blame. That's the word. That
kind of messes things up, doesn't it? That messes our thoughts
up about all these things. This man was one who waited for
the kingdom of God. It messes things up only if we
are so foolish that we vainly, arrogantly, errantly imagine
that we can know the heart of another human being. You can't. I can't. We often say, well,
if I know my heart, God says, you don't know your heart. You
don't even know your own heart, much less somebody else's. Well,
I know my wife's heart. No, you don't. No, you don't.
No, you don't. All you know is what she wants
you to know. I know my husband's heart. All you know is what he
wants you to know. Be it bad or good, that's all
you know about it. God looks on the heart, not you.
I was in a preacher's house one time, mean, oh my soul, the man,
mean, rubbed off on his wife. She said to me, sit down and
tell somebody who's a Christian five minutes. I said, I sure wish
you'd tell me how to do that. It saved me a lot of trouble.
What do they look like out of that? What foolishness, what
arrogance. We have a horrible, horrible
propensity to this evil. of setting ourselves up as judges
before whom all others must stand or fall. And I'll tell you the
biggest problem with that, the biggest problem, it reveals something
about us that we really don't like to acknowledge. We pretend
that we're setting ourselves up as judges on the basis of
Scripture. I'll tell you what it always
boils down to, and we're saying, Bob, stand up here. Get on the
scales here with me. Now let's see how good you measure
up. Let's see how good you are compared with me, with what I
know, and what I do, and what I say, and what I experience.
After all, here is the standard of perfection. You're looking
at what self-righteousness, what contemptible, despicable arrogance
there is in our hearts. displayed in our attempts to
judge and censure other men and women who profess faith in our
Redeemer. Here's a man, no one around him,
nobody. I mean absolutely nobody. Not the believers, not the Pharisees,
not the religious folks, not the street folks. not his sons
and daughters if he had any, not his wife, not his brothers. No one would have suspected him
of being a disciple of the Savior. Well, if a man's a Christian,
you can see it in his life. Ask those folks around Joseph
of Arimathea. They can see religion in your life, not Christianity.
They can see self-righteousness displayed in your life, not faith
in Christ. Well, I want folks to see Jesus
in me. They didn't see Jesus in Jesus. They ain't going to see Him in
you. No, that's not possible. That's
not possible. See, this man Joseph, as religious
idiots like to say, if he had been put on trial for being a
Christian, there would have been enough evidence to convict him.
Doesn't that sound cute? Pompous, arrogant, horrible. But this man was the right man
in the right place at the right time for the right purpose, to
do the right work. No, I don't excuse his fear before
the Jews, or mine before men. I don't excuse his refusal to
identify himself with his Lord when he could have, or mine. No, I don't excuse or justify
in any way him being a member of the Sanhedrin, that Jewish
court, identifying himself with people preferring their favor
than God's because of what he might lose if he confessed Christ
or mine. And no, I don't imagine that
you would have done any better or any different than he did
had you been in his place. Or me. I'm dead sure I wouldn't
have. So I know I wouldn't do that. You know what that means? See,
Bobby asked us to do something, say something amazing. Well,
I know I'd never do that. Say what it means. That means
I know I'm a whole lot better man than you are. You sure getting right down in
our hearts, aren't you? I hope so. I hope so. That's
exactly what it is. But I don't think so. Would you
tell me what else it is? Explain such arrogance on some
other basis. Explain it to me in some other
way that makes any sense at all. Having said all that, somehow,
when this man Joseph saw his Savior, whom he dearly loved,
and he did, believers do, don't they, Doctor? So he didn't act
like it. Do you dearly love that woman? Do you dearly love that
little girl there? Excuse me, still his little girl.
Do you dearly love her? Do you always act like it? He
dearly loved him. He trusted him as his only wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. When he saw him,
the king for whom he had been looking, crucified upon the curse
tree, somehow the crucified Savior, as it were, stuck his finger
right in his heart and pulled him up close to his side. and
gave him nerve like he never dreamed he could have. Gave him
boldness like he never dreamed he might have. Gave him determination
like he never dreamed he could have. What multitudes there are
whose hearts have been emboldened just by that same grace when
suddenly Christ graciously sticks His hand in your heart and does
something you can't explain. Seems to change everything. Somebody
said, well, they're talking about a second work of grace. Man,
I don't believe in a second work of grace. I believe in thousands
of second works of grace. God doesn't stop with us when
He saves us by His grace. He continually gives us sufficient
grace. Here's Joseph now. that timid
coward, Peter, who pulled out his pocket knife and cut off
the high priest servant's ear in the garden. Now he's timid. Joseph, who had been timid, steps
forward with courage. The other disciples who had shown
so much love, and it was genuine. It was genuine. Peter said, I'll
go with you to death. He was too proud, too haughty,
too arrogant, but he did go with the Savior to death. Followed
him right up to his death. John, the beloved disciple, truly
loved the Savior, but now he's gone. Now he's gone. Where are
they? The disciples are all gone, except
two men and a few women. two timid cowards, one named
Joseph, the other Nicodemus, who now step forward with courage
like you can't imagine. They now confess Christ when
nobody else would. They now identify themselves
with Christ when nobody else would. And they step forward
because of God's purpose. Surely, surely, God the Holy
Spirit has recorded this man and this brief incident in his
life, giving us the whole biography of the man as far as God's purpose
is concerned for us to know. He's done it for specific reasons,
to teach us specific things. Let me see if I can give you
some things I've called from this, and I trust God will bless
it to your heart. constantly rules and overrules
all things for His glory in the accomplishment of His purpose
for the good of His people. And He does everything exactly
on time. I wish we could learn that. I
wish I could learn that. Everything. We're always in a
hurry. Always in a hurry. The younger
you are, the more of a hurry you're in. You get in the car
and you're driving down the road and some teenage boy whips around
you and just guns it and runs 50 yards down there, stomps,
stands on brakes and turns the corner and guns it, pulls it
in the driveway. Why is he in such a hurry? I
remember. Because he's got nowhere to go. I remember. You get a little
older and you just kind of slow up a little bit. Don't you sometimes
wish things worked like that in grace? We're getting too much
of a hurry and we think we're going to somehow twist God and
push him into our schedule. It ain't going to happen. God
does everything exactly on time. How else, how else could the
prophecy, you don't have to look at it, Isaiah 53, he was numbered
with the transgressors. There he is, reckoned with the
transgressors, crucified. But there's another part of the
prophecy, Isaiah 53, 9, and was with the rich. in his death. How else could this have come
to pass, except as God brought it to pass? Back in Numbers 19,
there is a ceremonial sacrifice, I don't know that it's ever been
kept by anyone, called the sacrifice of the red heifer. of all the ceremonial sacrifices,
perhaps even including the Passover, none surpasses that sacrifice
as being typical of our Lord Jesus Christ and his sacrifice
for us. The red heifer must be a perfectly
red heifer. There are folks still looking
for her. I found her. They're still trying to breed
cattle, get this red heifer, because they're convinced when
the red heifer comes, Messiah comes. And the Jews have thought
this throughout their history. When they find a perfect red
heifer, that's when the Messiah comes. The red heifer is the
Messiah. And that red heifer was to be
taken outside the city, slaughtered not by the priest, but by another
man before the priest, and burned outside the city. Her flesh and
her pertinence, even her dung burned with her. Our Lord Jesus
was taken by the hands of wicked men outside the city and there
slaughtered. And now he's taken by the order
of God as he's hung on the tree and consumed. in the totality
of his being, in the holy wrath of the holy God, because he's
made sin for us. Consumed in his flesh, in his
soul, in the pertinence, and the dung of our sin made his. And then, there must be a man
who is clean. A clean man must gather up the
ashes of that red heifer. and lay them in a clean place. Here's Joseph of Arimathea. If
ever you could find a clean man, ceremonially clean, it was Joseph
of Arimathea, a Pharisee, one of the Sanhedrin. He had gone
through all the rituals and ceremonies of the law, preparing himself
now for the Passover, ceremonially clean, ready to keep the feast
of the Passover. ceremonially clean, but his Redeemer
had just died in his death, consumed in the fire of God's holy wrath,
buried in his sins. Now, you know what happens to
a man when he touched a dead body in the Old Testament? He's
unclean. That means if you touch that
body, you can't eat the Passover. If you touch that body, you can't
keep this the greatest of the feasts. You touch that body,
you can't come into the temple. Touch that body, you can't mingle
among God's people until the time of your purification is
up. But Joseph comes and begs and takes the body of the Lord
Jesus, and he buries it in a clean place. He put it in his own tomb,
and the scripture tells us repeatedly, wherein never lay a dead corpse. Now if this would not have been
done, had Joseph not done it, what did the Romans do with the
crucified people? They just threw their bodies
into an open pit, just barely a pit, on top of the mound, let
the buzzards come and eat their flesh, let the sun scorch their
bones, and left them there. Buried them? No. The disciples
couldn't have buried the Lord Jesus in any tomb. They didn't
have any around there. They were from another province.
But Joseph steps forward. And he takes the dead body of
the Son of God and lays it in a rich man's clean tomb. And though he touched that dead
body, he knew full well men might call him unclean. Other folks
might look at him as unclean. But he didn't have to keep the
Passover anymore. He just buried his Passover. He didn't have to keep the purification
anymore. He's now pure. pure before God
because Christ has died in his stead. Here's the second thing.
The bodies of God's saints ought to be treated with honor and
buried. Now, I don't make much of the
difference between burial and cremation, but throughout the
scriptures there's indication that believers buried their dead. Cremation arose from pure paganism. And I'm not suggesting all who
are pagans are cremated. I don't even think it, much less
suggest it. But I am saying that when believers
die, we sometimes think, well, you shouldn't go to all the expense
and all the trouble. It's just a dead body. It is.
But it's a body fixing to rise from the dead. And they ought
to be treated with respect and honor. Our Savior was buried
as our surety. He tells us in Psalm 22 that
he was brought to the dust of death, laid in a grave just like
I'm going to be. He was buried as our surety that
he might conquer death in his resurrection for us. We bury
our brothers and sisters in Christ in the hope and expectation of
the resurrection because he died and rose again. Our Lord Jesus
was wrapped for his burial. The Scripture tells us again,
repeatedly, that Joseph, when he took the Savior off the tree,
wrapped his body in a linen garment. If you're like me, when I think
about that, immediately, because of the influence of television,
I think of that stupid shroud, folks think so mysterious. If
I could get hold of it, I'd burn it, and I wouldn't tell you where
the scattered ash is. No. Now, what does it signify, this
linen? What kind of garments did priests
wear? Anybody know? White linen garments. Joseph
wrapped his priest and buried him as his priest. Knowing full
well that he now is made a priest unto God. As we are made priest
unto God by our union with Jesus Christ our Lord. One with Him. This white linen perhaps is significant
in representing to us the righteousness of the Lord Jesus. Our Lord Jesus
is perfectly righteous, and his righteousness is described for
us as the clothing of the saints in Revelation 19. Fine linen,
clean and white, and this is the righteousness of the saints.
Here's the third thing. Children of God Now listen to
me. Please listen to me. There's
absolutely no reason for any sinner who believes on the Son
of God to have any fear of death. None whatsoever. None whatsoever. Christ came that He might deliver
us from the fear of death. Nobody's supposed to be afraid
to die. is either to misunderstand what
He teaches us in His Word or simply not to believe what He
teaches us in His Word. What causes you to fear dying? What makes you afraid of dying?
Well, my sin. What? What did you say? Well, I'm so sinful. Did Jesus
Christ put your sin away or didn't He? Well, God's righteous, and I'm
afraid I'm not righteous enough. Where's your righteousness found? You think your righteousness
is found in something you do? You think you're going to somehow
make yourself better so that you can prepare yourself in your
own goodness to stand before God in His holiness? Oh, no,
Pastor. Just exactly what do you mean
then? What is it you're talking about? Is Christ made of God
unto us righteousness, or isn't it? Well, yes. Well, if he is, I'm righteous.
If he put away sin, I don't have any. Not before God. Well, I
just can't explain it. I'm just afraid to die. I don't
know what awaits me. There shall be ministered to
us an abundant entrance into His kingdom and glory. Read 1
Peter 1. James, did he say we're going
to glory in a blaze of glory? That's what he said. He may have just been skinning
their teeth. Oh, no. We get there by the blood and
righteousness of the Son of God in a blaze of His glory. No reason to be afraid to die.
Spurgeon said, that rock-hewn cell in the garden sanctified
every part of God's acre where saints lie buried. Instead of
longing to live till Christ comes, as some do, we might rather pray
to have fellowship with Jesus in His death and burial. I want
to live till Jesus comes. I do too, till He comes to get
me, whichever way He comes. That's all. Here's the fourth
lesson. I've already hinted at it, and
I want to emphasize it. None of us has the ability to
look upon the heart of another and determine the spiritual condition
of another. If anyone professes to believe
the gospel of God's free grace revealed in this book, I'm not
suggesting you know better than to imagine. And I'm suggesting
that we embrace everybody who claims to be Christian as Christian,
call them all brethren, say, well, we just don't care, have
any distinctions among us. No, I am saying that Lindsay
Campbell professes to believe the gospel of God's free grace,
no matter what I see outwardly in Lindsay Campbell. I am to
embrace him as my brother with no question mark." Romans 14. Receive them without doubtful
despotations. Well, how can we do that? We
can't judge, but we can inspect fruit. The only fruit you can
inspect is rotten fruit because it's the only thing you know.
And you can't judge any other. You can't make any other determination. Embrace God's people with all
their faults, and all their weaknesses, and all their inconsistencies,
and all their failures, and all their bad judgment, and all their
bad association. You embrace them knowing that
they have no faults. They're good and righteous before
God Almighty, as He declares Joseph to be. Fifth, we do this
because we understand, as nobody else in the world does, salvation
is altogether the work of God's grace. I look in the faces of
you men and women. I admire you for so much. Thank
God for you. I see traits in you that I covet.
loyalty, faithfulness, dependability. I want so much to be like so
many of you in so many ways. But the reality is, those good
things that I admire in you don't count for dung before God. I mean nothing. I mean nothing. You mean nothing we do counts
for anything? Nothing you do counts for anything.
You got that just right. Even if you don't amount to anything,
don't amount to anything. Nothing. Nothing. Brother Walter
Gruber and his wife down in Mexico, what sacrifices they made. Spent
their lives down there. Spent their lives down there.
If they lived like kings down there, I'd be happy for them.
I wouldn't want to go down there and live like a king. They spent
their lives down there laboring in the gospel. You mean that's
not going to get them a brighter star in their crown? Go ask either
one of them. Nothing. Nothing. Our only righteousness
is the righteousness that God gives us by His grace in union
with His Son. We don't have any other except
Him, who is the Lord, our righteousness. And I thank God I don't want
any other. I count all my righteousnesses
filthy rags before Him." Here's the sixth lesson. The Lord God
knows the best time to bring forth His appointed servants
to do His appointed work for which He has ordained them, and
He knows the best means to secure it. Messiah must be not only numbered
with the transgressors, but with the rich in his death. The moral ceremony that typifies
him says he must be buried in a clean place. Who's going to
do that? How's that going to work? How's
that going to be accomplished? The Jews won't do it. The Romans
won't do it. The disciples can't do it. How's
it going to be accomplished? He's a ready man. Where'd he come from? God had
been preparing him all his life. A ready man at the time needed. And he steps on the scene. He,
as most rich men do, He went out and said, well, I saw a place
over yonder in the local cemetery where I believe I could set myself
a nice mausoleum. And he hired some brick masons
and some workers to go and they cut out a nice huge stone, cut
out a nice tomb, stone, huge stone. I expect that thing was
polished and shined, don't you? It would be if I made it, for
me. I mean, it'd be something else. And Joseph was preparing
his, he was preparing a place to bury him. My mother used to,
she used to pray, she'd say, she'd say, I'm not going to have
enough money to bury me when I die. Mom, three or four days after
you go, somebody's going to stick you in the ground, I promise
you. Scared to death, ain't going to happen, but here's Joseph,
he's got his tomb all fixed, he's ready. He didn't have a
clue why he was building that tomb. You ever think to yourself,
look back at something, I don't have any idea why I did that.
And then down the road, oh, now I see why they did that. God
had a use for that. God had a use for it. One more
thing. When it was all done, these women
saw what was observed. They took some spices, anointments,
and they went home and rested, because it was the Sabbath day,
according to the commandment. That's what believers do when
they understand what Christ has accomplished for them. We rest. He's our Sabbath. And we rest
in Him, holding everything in our hands as just spices and
ointments for His praise. Amen. Please take your songs to grace
book. Turn to number 98.