In Acts 2, verses 23 and 24,
there's a description by God concerning Jesus Christ's
death on Calvary's tree, His burial, and His resurrection.
Now generally, when you ask men about what the gospel is, they
will tell you the gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection
of Christ, but it's not. The gospel is Christ dying, Christ
being buried, and Christ raising from the grave. Paul, when he
addressed the Corinthian church, he says, I preach to you in the
gospel which by you believed and by which you're saved, how
that Christ died according to the Scriptures, how that he was
buried according to the Scriptures, how he was raised again the third
day according to the Scriptures. Now, unless you've been in a
state of a coma this week, or the last week. You've heard people
talk about terms of holy days and holy weeks. Now this day
that most of the world is celebrating today, and we are too, this is
one of the two days a year that what is called Christianity doubles
down on religion. And I know that doubling down
is a gambling term, but the testimony of many is that they go to church
and read the Bible just in case as if hedging their bets, so
it's kind of a gamble with them. Christmas and Easter are the
two biggies. For years I resisted ever preaching
a Christmas message at Christmas and Easter message at Easter
just because I was ornery and didn't want to give them the
satisfaction of me doing what they were doing. This is a day
that we rejoice in every day, the day that our Lord was raised
from the dead. Now the retailers hit advertising
hard at these two times of the year, Christmas and Easter. But
rather than gifts and toys, this holiday is more about a new outfit
for most people. That's what it's about. Little
boys in new suits and little girls in frilly finery of spring
fashion. And I well remember the Easter
that I was ushered into the southern gentry with a new seersucker
suit, white tie and pale blue tie, a white shirt and a pale
blue tie and white buckskin shoes. Little Timmy was dapper that
day at Antioch Baptist Church. And I remember he folded his
jacket over a chair carefully before he cut loose to find them
hidden eggs out there in the yard. trying to be careful not
to get grass stains on his brand new white buckskin shoes. This is also the time of the
year for what men call passion. They call this time of the year
the passion of Christ. You have plays, one over in Gatlinburg
that is called a passion play. Now what they mean by passion
is suffering, or at least an effort to suggest suffering. On the local news yesterday,
I saw some men and women toting a Roman gibbet, a cross, through
the streets of some local town. And the anchor, in a solemn voice,
dropping an octave or so, spoke of the crossbearers as stopping
along the way so folks could come up to the cross, pause,
and contemplate, and reflect. And I don't know about you, but
I was duly impressed with this. And though the solemn celebrations
are generally little more than vague attempts at appearing spiritual,
which in itself is an oxymoronic phrase, because if it's spiritual,
it doesn't appear, so you can't appear to be spiritual. Because
if you're spiritual, nobody's going to know that you are, because
it's invisible. But people try to appear spiritual. The event to which attention
is drawn, however, is a cardinal tenet. of the gospel of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Paul, in the first letter to
the church at Corinth, makes it clear that Christ rose from
the dead, 1 Corinthians 15, and if He didn't, all that we do
in the name of Jesus Christ is in vain, if He be not risen. And here in this text, the crucifixion,
the death, the burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ are plainly declared
and done so in terms of predestination. Him being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and by wicked
hands have crucified and slain, whom God hath raised up, having
loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should
be holden of it. That's the language used here. These are terms of predestination.
The word determinate, the root word is orizo, the word we get
pro-orizo from, which is predestination. And the word for knowledge here
is not having to do with knowledge of something that is knowing
ahead of time. It has to do with the word prearranged. So you
have a predetermined deliverance of Christ for a prearranged event. And the word counsel means purpose.
When Paul said, I have not shunned to you, preached unto you all
the counsel of God. He was saying all that God has
purposed is what I've preached unto you. And this passage clearly
states that Christ was delivered. That means turned over to the
will of the enemies. That's what that word actually
means. turned over to the will of the enemies by the predestinated,
prearranged purpose of God Almighty. And part of the predestinated
purpose was that on that third day after his crucifixion and
burial, he rose from the grave and had to because it was not
possible that he remain entombed lest the predestinated, prearranged
purpose of the Almighty be frustrated. And this is the language of Scripture. when you talk about the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is never pictured as an effort
or someone trying to do something or making something available
or making something on the shelf for you to grab a hold of when
you want to. It's always the determinate counsel
of God. Against thy holy child Jesus,
this is what the whole church said in Acts chapter 4. Against
thy holy child Jesus both Pontius Pilate and Herod and the Jews
and the Gentiles were to gather together for to do whatsoever
the Lord had before ordained to be done, Acts 4.28. I mean
all that was foreordained, every last drop of it. was foreordained. Our Lord said in Luke 22, And
truly the Son of Man goeth as it was determined. But woe unto
any man, or woe unto that man by whom he is betrayed. In Romans
chapter 4 verse 25, Paul said, Who was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. This all is a predestinated thing. In 1 Peter chapter 1, it says,
For as ye know, that you were not redeemed with corruptible
things as silver and gold from your own vain conversation received
by tradition from your fathers, but with precious blood of Christ
as a lamb without blemish and without spot who verily was foreordained
before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these
last times to you, who by him do believe in God that raised
him up from the dead and gave him glory that your faith and
hope might be in God. This is a predetermined thing
that happened 2,000 years ago. So here before us in this grand
display of predestinated purpose upon which the salvation of the
elect and the entire course of human history hangs, Christ was
delivered, it says, to the hands of men according to divine purpose. According to divine purpose.
Clearly we have taken delivery Haven't we? According to this
passage, He was delivered and ye have taken Him and with wicked
hands have slain Him. We've taken delivery. But the
power to take Him was derived and it was given by Christ Himself. You know the story. In John chapter
18, when the priests gathered together with their swords and
their lanterns and their armies to come and arrest God, They
were going to put God in prison, and they approached Him, and
He said, Who are you looking for? And they said, Jesus of
Nazareth. And He said, Go, I am. And they fell away backwards,
pinned to the ground as if someone was standing on them, and could
not move. And then He let them get up.
And they got up, and He asked them again, Whom do you seek?
And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. And He says, I am He. You can
have Me. Here's the catch. If you can take me, these must
be set free. And that's substitution. Because Scripture says that the
saying might be accomplished, that of all that thou hast given
me, I should lose nothing. I like it when God explains Himself
real clear like that. Why did Christ give Himself to
men? to do as they pleased. Why did He do that? First, because
their pleasure concerning Him was ordained. Their pleasure concerning Him
was ordained. Secondly, this settled once and
for all what truly men feel about God by nature. This answered
every possible question. Man does not come into this world
born of a woman and find himself in a state of limbo or precariously
hanging on a thread, swinging between good and evil to someday
when he reaches an age of accountability to make some choice which way
he wants to go. He is born from his mother's womb hating God. Hating God. You and I both were
born that way. My blessed, sweet, precious grandson
was born that way, hating God. Men naturally hate God. This is why this gibbet-toting
in this day is such a farce, a woefully sad comedy of errors,
carrying a cross is mockery. Carrying a cross
is huge error. And they have no idea. You see,
we didn't carry the cross for Christ, did we? We're not Simon
Cyrene who was bidden to carry the cross. We are the throng,
the mob of depraved miscreants that cried in bloodlust to get
rid of Him. That's what our job was. We didn't
tote around the cross. We nailed Him to the cross. That's
what we did. That's what we did. The more
accurate rendering of the season would be for folks to walk around
town wagging their tongues and shooting out their lips in mockery,
a sneer of heightened hateful happiness on their face, carrying
Roman mallets and spikes, dripping with blood and crying to the
rooftops, Crucify Him! Crucify Him! Because that's what
we did. This silliness and ridiculousness of carrying around a cross, people
don't even know what they're doing. We didn't do that. With wicked hands, you have taken
him and have slain him. His physical suffering was our
doing, though predestinated, was our doing. And listen very
carefully. His physical suffering or passion
was not our salvation. It simply was not. No man suffered
like he did. I have no doubt about that. I can't imagine the pain and
the anguish that his body went through on that tree. But all
the pain and anguish that went through on that tree physically
did not equate to our salvation. That was a revelation of what
men feel about God. The only time God allowed Himself
to be touched by a human being. This is what we did to Him. This
is how we treated God. I know men say, well, I just
love Jesus. They're liars and the truth is not in them. The
truth is not in them. His passion or His suffering
was a revelation of our hateful and awful depravity. That's what it was. ye have taken
and by wicked hands have slain. That's what it says. He was delivered
by the determinant counsel and foreknowledge of God and ye have
taken with wicked hands and have slain. Now this is an interesting
little word here and it doesn't say what it says in many ways. The word slain here has to do
with intent. has to do with intent rather
than fulfillment. We did not slay Jesus Christ. Nobody did. Nobody did. We did not kill Christ, though
we tried our best to do it, but we didn't kill Him. It was our
intention, but you know the Lord Himself taught that if a person
has murder in his heart, he's already a murderer if he hates
his brother. Already a murderer, that's why he has murder in his
heart. But when you see phrases like this in scripture, you've
killed the Son of God or such, that suggest that we killed Christ,
they have to do with our intent. Our intent. If a man hates another
man, there's murder in his heart. The fact is nobody, listen very
carefully, I'm going to say this because so much hangs here, nobody
killed Christ. Nobody killed Christ. He was
not martyred and He did not commit suicide. God punished Him for
our sins when He was made to be sin for us. And He punished
Him with the equivalent of eternal punishment. But He came out alive
on the other side of those three hours of darkness, didn't He?
He's still alive when God had poured out all His wrath and
spent Himself in vengeance against Jesus Christ. Christ came on
the other side and said, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? My God,
my God, why dost Thou forsake me? He was still alive. God didn't
kill His Son. God punished His Son for our
sin with the equivalency of an eternal damnation in a hell where
the worm doth not and the fire is not quenched. But he didn't
kill Christ. Christ, after he had finished
salvation, and said, it is finished, he gave up the ghost. He gave up the ghost. What does
that mean? I don't understand it. Can't
begin to. Because death is something that's going to happen to me.
Death is not something I control. The instrument of death is already
set in God's predestinated purpose for my life. It may happen today.
It may not. I don't know. But I have no control
over it. You say, well, what about your
will to live? I'll find out about that one
day, and so will you. Your will don't work. Your will
simply don't work. He gave up the ghost. He gave
up the ghost. by his own volition and power,
as Luke described it, the death which he should accomplish at
Jerusalem. The death which he should accomplish.
He died because that was the only way that law and justice
could be satisfied. What about eternal punishment?
That does not satisfy law and justice. You know why? How do
I know? Because it keeps on going on.
It goes on and on and on and on and is never finished. One
man said, hell is God getting what he can. And in a real sense,
that's the truth. Because your death is of no eternal
value, that's why it goes on for eternity upon eternity. The
hatred of men cannot satisfy God's justice. The wrath of eternal
punishment will not satisfy God's justice, else it would end once
satisfied. Only death can satisfy justice. So our Lord, who has the power
of life and death, who has the keys to death and hell, voluntarily
died. How did he do that? I have no
idea. He's life, and yet he was able to stop living on his own. Why? Because that was the requirement
for the law to be satisfied. The soul that sinneth, the soul
that sinneth, it shall die. When thou hast made His soul
an offering for sin, He shall see it as seed, and the Lord
shall prolong His day. Our Lord has the power of life
and death and voluntary to die. And in that moment, salvation
and redemption and sanctification was accomplished. The law was
utterly and completely satisfied, and God had no more wrath against
His people. He never had wrath against them,
but He had His wrath on Jesus Christ who bore their sin. But
He has no wrath for you if you are a child of God. Why? The
law satisfies. Do you know the law says you've
got to go free? Do you know that? The holy law of God, if it was
indeed the searchlight that men say it is, could searchlight
you from the top of your head down to the balls of your feet.
Could find no sin. And the law is not for the righteous
man, but for the unrighteous. So the law says, ain't nothing
wrong with that sinner. Let him go free. He's perfect
and pure and righteous before a holy God. The law is satisfied. That's what it took. Christ dying. Christ dying. The world celebrates
the passion, the suffering of Christ and they know nothing
about the true suffering of Christ. He suffered hell for his people
in those three hours of darkness. But they were saved by his death. That's why when we gather together,
we celebrate his death until he comes again. But you know what? He can't stay
dead. He can't stay dead. The old hymn
said death could not keep its prey. He tore the bars away. God raised him up. God loosed
the pains of death because it was not possible that he should
be holding of it. Why was it impossible? This resurrection
was predetermined by prearrangement and all according to God's counsel
and eternal purpose and grace. He got to get up. He got to get
up. Men rode the stone over the entrance
of the tomb. That stone was to them the satisfaction
that the law had been fulfilled for them and it was accomplished
for them. They had exercised their law against him and now
there was a seal on the grave. Nobody could doubt now this Jesus
of Nazareth is gone. The rock here seals it. He's gone. That rock is a picture
of the law. After three days, there's no
death in that tomb. No death in that tomb. There's life in that tomb. And
the law only has to do with death. It doesn't have to do with life. If there was a law that could
have given life, Barely righteousness would have come by the law, but
the law don't have anything to do with life. You see, the stone
has to go. Because the rock is alive. The
law is fulfilled and the stone must be retired. It can't stay
no longer. It's supposed to cover dead people. There ain't nobody
dead in this tomb. There's somebody risen in this tomb and alive
in this tomb. That rock has no function anymore. That rock is a picture of the
law. Jesus Christ is risen indeed and the old stone is but a vague
memory of a thing that served a temporary purpose but is no
longer needed or employed. That's the law. Stones go. And what's the believer's relationship
to the law? None. What. So. Ever. Because he rose with Christ.
He died with Christ. He rose with Christ. The law
is satisfied. Well, one day, all the rocks
that cover the tombs of God's people are going to roll away.
One of them is going to roll away. Salvation is complete. The elect have been justified.
They've been quickened together with Christ and we have but one
thing to say to the righteous. It shall be well with thee. Do not seek the living among
the dead. He's not on a cross. He's not
in a tomb. He is risen indeed. Father bless us for understanding.
We pray in Christ's name. Amen.