Would you take your Bibles now and turn to Mark, the 15th chapter. Our reading and our message today, along with Psalm 22, comes from Mark 15, verses 33 to 47. As God's people, let us now give attention to the reading of His Holy Word. And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, which means, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And some of the bystanders hearing it said, behold, he is calling Elijah. And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed, and gave it to him to drink, saying, Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down. Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion who stood facing him saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, truly, this man was the son of God. There were also women looking on from a distance among whom were Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joseph and Salome. When he was in Galilee, they followed him and ministered to him, and there were also many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem. And when the evening had come, since it was the day of preparation, that is the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate was surprised to hear that he should have already died. And summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the corpse to Joseph, And Joseph bought a linen shroud and wrapped him in the linen shroud and laid him in a tomb that had been cut out of the rock. And he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb. Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of Joseph, saw where he was laid. May the Lord bless this hearing as well as the reading of his holy word. You know, many doubts have been cast on the official report that there was only one shooter in Dallas when President Kennedy was assassinated. Who knows, we might find out soon enough whether that was true or not. There are still questions that roll around upon occasion as to whether Hitler actually died at the end of World War II or whether he survived. For heaven's sakes, there are people that actually still think the world is flat. That's okay. We'll let them do that. In other words, these conspiracy theorists and conspiracies upon which they are based, these things, these theories, well, they'll never be resolved, many of them, because time has passed them by. But of all the things in history that have been questioned, None, none of them have been more disputed, more questioned and doubted than the bodily death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 2,000 plus years since all of these things took place, there are many who still doubt and yet there are many who have sought to do the research and have discovered to their surprise that indeed He did. One good example of that would be Lew Wallace, an officer in the Civil War who sought to write a book disproving the bodily death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ and ended up becoming a believer as a result. Today we'll examine Mark's account, remembering that his purpose was to get into writing as soon as possible the truth about the ministry and reason for the coming of God's Son into the world. This was important because even at this early date, falsehoods were already circulating. And the only thing that was out there was what I heard from so-and-so, who heard from so-and-so, who heard from so-and-so. And so Peter, who was aging perhaps, and his follower Mark decided, as the Lord led them, that there needed to be something in print. But just think of the Roman soldiers who had been bribed to give a rumor that was not true, that the disciples had come and stolen away the body of Jesus. So Mark was not as thorough as Matthew or Luke in his relating what he wrote, but his account had a different purpose. In the light of growing misunderstandings and denials, his purpose is to get the written word out there. Because once the written word is out there, the author does not have the option to change it. So he better be writing the truth. especially if he claims it, or it can easily be disproved. So let's look then again at Mark 15, and as we study these things, understand we're not going to get into everything. For instance, from the cross, Jesus spoke several times. Whole sermon series have been preached about the words of Jesus from the cross. Aren't you glad we're not going there today? We'll be here until midnight. But we will cover only those things primarily covered by Mark in this message. Jesus spoke the first words that we have recorded in Mark, which were also the first words of Psalm 22 that we read earlier. Let's remember that that Psalm was well known to every Jew. It was written by David. It was well known, it was a popular psalm in the sense that many Jews had been exactly in a similar circumstance before. And especially those in Jerusalem that had to put up with the largest contingent, not only of Roman soldiers, but the concentration of abusive Jewish leadership as well. So, it is a psalm for those for whom any rescue seems non-existent. Put that into strictly American terms, for the psalmist, there would be no cavalry coming over the hill to rescue this person. It could have been uttered by Joseph in Pharaoh's dungeons. Or by Daniel as those who plotted against him taunted him as he was pushed into the lion's den. Many have read back into this psalm the sufferings of Jesus, and I would have no argument with doing so. Although we can see clearly other connections, what Mark recorded were the only words that Jesus spoke directly from this psalm. Now, in the psalm he talks about, you know, they pierced my hands and my feet and that they divided his garments among them and all of those things did indeed happen so we can read back through what we know of history to see the prophetic nature of Psalm 22. With all of that in mind, though, I believe that Jesus was quoting this particular psalm for several other reasons. He knew that he was being unjustly condemned to die. He knew that he would be. This was in God's plan. Yet he also knew that he was giving up his life for the salvation of God's people. He knew this. This was not an accident. This didn't take Jesus by surprise. So why then would he say what he said? Well, he desired to reveal that not only was his heavenly father turning his back on his son, but that his heavenly father was still right in all that he did. Let's talk about this word forsaken. Okay? Let's talk about that. God never stopped loving his son Jesus. God did, however, turn His back on His Son. Now, the way that my pastor, when I was growing up, explained this was simply this, that when God saw Jesus on the cross, He saw His perfect, perfect, righteous, holy Son. But laid on Jesus were the sins of all of God's people. Now, how does God respond to sin? Well, if you've ever contemplated what hell is, you will understand that hell is God's response to sin. That every one of us deserves to go to hell, because every one of us have sinned. so that our unrighteousness, our filthy rags, our sin was laid on God's perfect Son. And this is what God saw. Now, God cannot permit the presence of sin. As a matter of fact, sin makes Him angry and so He, according to His own plan, vented the full measure of His wrath against His own Son instead of us. And so in those six or so hours on the cross, Jesus suffered like we would have suffered. Jesus suffered an eternity's worth of hell on that cross. His sufferings physically were horrendous. but his sufferings spiritually in addition to all of those physical sufferings was unimaginable. That's why every Christian ought to cringe when somebody in Hollywood says, oh, I'll see you in hell. They have no clue what hell is. None whatsoever. So we need to recognize that God's plan went forward to save His people. This is what Jesus died for. This is the purpose for which Jesus came. This is why we call the day He died Good Friday. Even in the midst of the most intense agony and suffering, Jesus still thought to point sinners to His Father to give glory to God and to reveal something else about the Word of God that would be a good thing for God's people to remember. Have we thought lately about the intensity, the depth of God's love as proven by the intensity and depth, the suffering, of God's Son for us in our place. Jesus wasn't just forsaken. He was punished. It wasn't that God just turned His back on His Son. He punished His Son. I don't know about you, but whenever I punished my sons, it was because they deserved it. I even look at their children and I say, who do you think taught your daddy to spank? They look at me with these big eyes and I say, I taught them by doing it. And if I taught your daddy to spank, I'll certainly spank you and teach you how to spank. If you disobey, if you show disrespect, that's what's going to happen. But Jesus took our spanking as it were. He took our punishment. We read in Hebrews 2.17, He, speaking of Jesus, had to be made like his brothers in every respect so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service to God to make propitiation for the sins of the people. God the Father punishes only begotten Son instead of punishing us. I want you to think about that for a moment. Whatever Jesus suffered physically, we should have been there on that cross. We should have been the ones spit on. We should have been the ones whose ribs you could see. We should have been the ones who suffered, but we should have also been the ones to have suffered the eternal pains of hell, and Jesus took that for us. We also read in Nahum 1, 2, "...jealous and avenging God." The Lord is avenging and wrathful. The Lord takes vengeance on His adversaries and keeps wrath for His enemies. God takes sin seriously. And so should we. As I have read through Scriptures several times, And I've never found anywhere where the message that we are to tell the world is that God loves them. We are to tell the world that God hates sin, that they are sinners, and that God, being a merciful God, offers forgiveness of sin and eternal life. This is what is missing in the church today. This is why people think that Jesus was just like everybody else. Jesus wasn't and isn't like everybody else. Jesus took God's full wrath against sin in our place. That's what the word propitiation means. That's what Jesus did for us. And you think Jesus wants to be known among the world as, well, He's just a starter of a wonderful religion. No. He's the King of kings and Lord of lords, and He has earned the title, and He has earned our love, and He has earned our respect, and He has earned our obedience because He bought us with His own blood. No wonder He quoted Psalm 22. The one He loved and who loved Him from eternity past was punishing Him as though He were the worst of sinners. Martin Luther said that. He said, Jesus was the worst adulterer you've ever seen. He was the worst murderer you've ever seen. He was the worst liar you've ever seen. Not because He did those things. but because he took upon himself those sins that were committed by his people. Let us remember what Paul would later write in 2 Corinthians 5.21, one of my favorite verses. For our sake he made him, speaking of Jesus, to be sin who knew no sin. This is the important difference. Jesus was not a sinner but he was made to be sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. The sins of his people were laid on him and God punished him instead of us." Now, that's the sobering thing that will bring us back down to earth to realize that this Christian life is tough Because we still are sinners, but we're forgiven sinners if we've given our lives to Jesus. He has called us to salvation. But the tough part comes in living every day for Him. But take heart, because even though I cannot live today perfectly, even though I'm called to, and even though you're called to, you can't, well, look at the latter part of that same verse. so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. So let's finish this equation. God saw His perfect Son on the cross. He laid our sin on Him and punished Him like He would have us. On the other side of the equation, God sees us, sinners, and lays on us the righteousness, the perfect obedience of His Son Jesus. And then for our good in His good time and in His good way, He blesses us like He would bless His only begotten Son. If you're highly technical and a theologian, you could recognize that as double Imputation. That's exactly what it is. Think about if you're an accountant, it's a double accounting system. Okay? You can't have a credit unless you have a debit. And that's exactly what this is. We need to recognize that we are not perfect. We are told to be holy. We know we cannot be holy. But remember what we are, not what we do. We're told to be like our father. So we start from a change inside and this is what God has enabled us to do when we're born again is to be different on the inside and then it works its way out to our outside. So that we can say we are God's children but we're not perfect. No, of course not. But you can never do the right thing if the inside has never been made right. But if you've given your life to Christ, if you are born again, and you have His Holy Spirit within you, then how do you say thank you to a God that has punished somebody else instead of you? Well, Spurgeon this morning and evening basically says, we ought to be running joyfully to obey God. That's what we ought to be doing. When God says, jump, we ought to be asking, okay, Lord, how high? Halfway up. Because He's done more for us than anyone on earth could possibly have ever done. And the only response we can properly give to God is to say, thank you, Lord, let me go do what you want me to do. But we cannot do unless first we are. And this is where the problem becomes evident in the church. We have many people in the greater church today who think they're believers because they check off all the boxes. But they're not in the right place. They start from being lost, thinking that checking off the boxes makes them a Christian, and it does not. Dear ones, to check off the boxes and be counted favorable in God's eyes, we must first start with who we are before God. We must first be clothed with the righteousness of God. Our sins must be laid on Christ first. And then in response, then we go and do what He calls us to do. I believe the reason we find recorded in Mark that Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joseph and Salome witnessed not only the death, but the burial of Jesus as well, was that they might be able to testify to all who wanted to know the truth. Now women were not lit, they weren't put into the pulpit. Okay? They weren't leaders in the church. If anything, this week should have told us why they shouldn't have been. Okay? Look at what's happened in Washington where someone in a worship service, in a prayer service, used it for other than worship of God. And that's not, by the way, the only purview of women. But you see, if you compromise the Word of God in one area, you'll compromise it in other areas as well. But let's understand why We find recorded in Mark and other Gospels that these women were the ones that witnessed not only his death but his burial as well. I believe it is because women are much more influential than anybody realizes. And so the Christians, after the resurrection and ascension of the Lord, would gather together to worship, and they would start talking about the resurrection, and then they'd talk about the death and burial of Jesus, and some doubts would arise, and somebody would say, well, Mary, what do you think of that? Well, I was there. I saw it. I saw him die. I saw that soldier run that spear into his side. I heard his words. I saw his suffering. I helped wrap his body. I saw where they laid his dead body. And I also went to the tomb three days later and saw that he wasn't there. Faithful witnesses are important, especially in a day before there was such a thing as the printing press and the Internet. We read in Deuteronomy 19.15, "...a single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime or for any wrong in connection with any offense that he has committed. Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established." You know, even in his death, Jesus fulfilled the law. He wasn't charged with anything other than being a liar. And then God made sure that there were multiple witnesses, the centurion, and Joseph of Arimathea, and John, and his mother Mary, and then Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of Joseph. God provided all of those so that even in his death and burial, Jesus fulfilled all the requirements of the law. God provided the witnesses and they could readily and did readily verify everything that Mark and Matthew, and Luke, and John wrote. We mentioned at the beginning that no other historical event has been as rigorously questioned as has the bodily death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. The eyewitnesses to all are verified for the early church. The early church knew that these things had happened with a much greater certainty than we do, were faithful, these witnesses, in what they testified to. Now, they didn't have to make up anything. They didn't have to worry about whether their testimony agreed with everybody else's. The only thing they had to do was this. This is what I saw. Now, who's going to argue with that? Who's going to argue with that when 15 other people could say the same thing? I saw this. You don't have to believe me. This is what I saw. Their testimony has never been disproven. Did you know that? In 2,000 plus years, the testimony of those who witnessed The death and burial of Jesus, as well as His resurrection, has never been disproven. It has stood the test of time. It was true then, it remains true today, and it will remain true forever. And I'm going to tell you how you'll know it. When Jesus comes again, you'll know it, if you don't already. Let the same thing be said for our testimonies. Your testimony and my testimony is not about how we were so intelligent that we chose Christ. Sorry, at least in my case. It was not how I was just at the right place at just the right time and everything clicked and boy, I just chose to be on God's team. It's not it. There's one thing that all of our testimony should point to, and that is God's grace, God's mercy, God's love that called us to Himself and by His Spirit changed our hearts when we recognized our sin and our need for forgiveness. That is more about what He did, not about what we did. And that is a faithful testimony. Being a people of truth means that we say and do the things that are based on that truth. We live according to the truth. We defend the truth. We desire the truth. We love the truth. Therefore, let us be ready to tell people what we were like, what God did for us. and what He has made us since we have been forgiven of our sins." This is what will turn the church around, is the faithful testimony of God's people, where the Holy Spirit takes those testimonies and touches the hearts of those who will never open a Bible, but they will see the change in us. And when they see that change, they're going to say, what in the world happened to you? God touched me. I'm so thankful to have heard on a national scale when Pete Hegseth was asked by the Senate and later in the speech after his swearing in, He said, there are two people that I can attribute my change to. The first is Jesus Christ who changed me, who saved me. And the second is my wife who stuck with me. And I have a feeling that if you ask him further, he would have said, my wife stuck with me because she belongs to Jesus too. What about our testimony? People watching us, they know, your neighbors in particular, know whether you live by the same moral code, by the same value system as the world because they watch you. What do they see? You think it's tough being a Christian in a neighborhood? Try being a pastor in a neighborhood. Oh, you've got to watch yourself, especially when your neighbor's window looks right down onto your garage. You know, you've just got to watch yourself. Well, of course you do. We're not our own. We've been bought with a price. Our testimony is a reflection on us. It's a reflection on our Savior. In verse 43 of our passage today, we find that Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. It's interesting that Mark would put it that way. Every person has something that they're afraid of in this life. I hate closed spaces, claustrophobia. I don't like that. I hated whatever the story was from Edgar Allan Poe. It scared me half to death. Okay? Even the wealthy and the influential are afraid of something. We find that the Pharisees were afraid of the people. Joseph rightly feared Pilate. and the earthly power he wielded as a Roman governor. A Roman governor could put somebody who was not a Roman citizen to death without even anybody asking any questions. The Scripture is right when it says that the earthly authorities have the power of the sword. That doesn't mean they wield it properly to please God, but they do have the power of the sword. Yet Joseph took courage. And he went to Pilate to ask for the body of Jesus, something that was in itself unusual. Most of the time when someone died on the cross, their bodies were left until it suited the Romans that enough shame and enough horror had been spread among the populace that they wouldn't rise up again. It was a deterrent. But because the Romans had graciously allowed the Jews to take down the bodies before the Sabbath, that is why the legs of the other two on the crosses were broken so that they would die. And so Pilate was surprised, as verse 44 tells us, that Jesus, He was surprised to hear that he should already have died. Many men that were crucified remained alive for more than a day on the cross, some even lasting several days. Do you understand what was so bad about a cross? It's considered to be the very worst form of execution ever devised by man. Your feet were nailed to the cross so that when you pushed up, everything was intensely painful. Your hands were nailed to the cross so that you could not move and you could not breathe. So you relaxed to breathe. And then your feet and your legs were intensely in pain. So you push up, which increased the pain on your feet and allowed you to breathe. And it was back and forth and back and forth. And the stronger you were when you were nailed to that cross, the longer you lasted in that agony until finally, You die out of asphyxiation, or in the case of the thieves on the cross, by somebody breaking your legs and preventing you from being able to push up on those nails. But Jesus was on the cross only three to six hours. He was not a weak man, but he had been beaten severely. In addition, we read in Matthew 7 that Jesus yielded up His Spirit. And this is an important thing to realize. He gave up His own life. He said it's finished and He wasn't talking about the end of His pain. He was talking about the satisfaction of God against sinners that He chose to be His own. In other words, Jesus said the payment for God's people is complete I don't need to suffer anymore." And so he yielded up his spirit. Joseph of Arimathea, though on the Sanhedrin, knew what else would happen or could happen as a result of requesting the body of Jesus. I want you to think about this for a minute. He would no longer have a favored position among the leaders of the Jews. He was a well-respected member of the council, the Sanhedrin. He was probably the only conservative godly man there that we know of. There may have been others. We think that Nicodemus was there as well, but they may have been the only two. His secret faith would become a very public faith. So now everybody would know. Sort of like putting an American flag on your front door. Everybody knows. Do you have in your neighborhood what I have in my neighborhood? Some house that flies the pride flag? The gay pride flag? What am I supposed to think about the people that do that? They're either highly sympathetic of, defenders of, or are themselves homosexual. Everybody would know that Joseph of Arimathea was a believer, a follower, a disciple of Jesus, and it would no longer be secret. He would also then have to pay the price for associating himself publicly with Jesus in order to honor Him. It wasn't just, it wasn't enough for Joseph to have the body of Jesus taken down. Joseph of Arimathea honored the body of Jesus because it had housed Jesus for 33 years. This burial is so much different than any other burials is that we honor the vessel that God has given to us to abide in in this life. Let me just for a moment go into, and I know I'm running out of time, let me just go into a minute, just for a minute, the definition of death. You see, we think of death as being the end of life. Well, let's redefine it for a moment. I think it would be more accurate to say that death is the end of our earthly existence. But in actuality, death represents something much greater. Death, in a physical sense, is a separation of the soul from the body. That's what death is. So I want us to consider something. In all of the instances where we see, like in the transfiguration or the return of Samuel from the dead, we see that there is a cognitive ability of those who come back. Would you agree to that? Then, where is our knowledge housed? Is it in our physical brain? Because they didn't have one. You see, our knowledge is based in our soul. Our soul is what goes to heaven or hell when we die. That being the case, What is death but the separation of the soul from the body which represents ultimately the separation of the creature from the creator. So those who die outside of Christ will forever be separated from the mercy, the love, the grace of God. and are going to be the objects of His wrath forever and ever and ever. Whereas those who do belong to God through faith in Christ are going to be in heaven where they will be the subjects of His love, of His blessing, of His being pleased with us forever and ever and ever. So those who die physically in Christ will one day be raised to life Whereas those who die physically and are outside of Christ will be raised to death, eternal death. And there is no in-between. And please let us not fall for that desperate theory that when you die you simply cease to exist. You don't. Not at all. As a matter of fact, you become more cognitive of your surroundings. You become more sensitive to the things that you cannot see. The Bible says those things that are seen are transient, but those things that you cannot see are eternal. Wow! Pay attention to the concept of death. Nevertheless, Joseph, along with the women, did what was needed to be done in order to honor Jesus. The result was that they could all powerfully testify to the bodily death and burial of Jesus that they had witnessed and they themselves had performed, that they were the ones that buried Jesus. How powerful a refutation of those who would cast out to be able to say to them, I buried Jesus. I know He was dead. I wrapped His body. I felt no pulse. I got His blood on my hands. I've seen dead bodies before. Jesus was definitely dead. Powerful testimony. I believe God honors courage among His people when they stand for the truth, when they live by the truth, and when they seek to promote the truth. While men may disagree with God's truth, He is pleased and will remember when His people are guided in every aspect of their lives by His truth. Let us not forget what my mother said when I disagreed with something that was true that I didn't want to agree with and she was the authority. She said, it doesn't matter what you think. Well, that was a eye-opener. Later on she said, you know, it doesn't really matter what we think about what God says either. God's truth is God's truth because it's God's truth. Man can disagree with anything that they want, but it doesn't change God's truth. Let's not be afraid of men's opinions where the things of God and His Word are concerned, shall we? Let's also be courageous. Let's be willing to give up any of those things. So let me ask you a question in closing. Why is it important to recognize the bodily death and burial of the Lord Jesus? Why would that be important? Well, if we read in Romans 5.12, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned, well, all men need a Savior. I don't know of anybody else that came to earth for that reason. I don't know anybody else that didn't know they were coming to earth for that reason and did what Jesus did. Without a Savior, we are all lost and there is no other name given under heaven by which men must be saved. And early in Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, we've read that before, and are justified by His grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by His blood to be received by faith. We cannot earn God's salvation. We don't deserve it. We cannot earn it. We cannot even keep it. God is the one that gives it. God is the one that guarantees it. And God is the one that can make it work. Mission accomplished. Jesus did what he was sent to do. And then let me take us back to Romans 5 where we look from 8 to 10. God shows his love for us and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. How many of you had sins that predated Jesus' coming? Not a one of us. When Jesus died for our sins, all of our sins were in the future. Since therefore we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more now that we are reconciled shall we be saved by His life." That's that imputed righteousness that I spoke of earlier. Jesus made possible our reconciliation to God. No physical death and burial of Jesus. No salvation for sinners. Simple. That's why. You can't have one without the other. Take away this fundamental truth and our salvation is a fraud. What other reason would the world have for trying for over 2,000 years to prove false acclaims of the Bible regarding Jesus' death and burial? So, We have not spent much time on this. We could spend a great deal of time on the death and burial of Jesus. So, let's go back and read all the Gospels. Let's read all of those accounts. Let's make sure we have a full understanding as much as possible today about what Jesus really suffered for us, and then let us rejoice, and then let us give thanks that He did indeed die, and that He was buried, and as we will discuss next week, that He rose again. But that's not all. Not only did He rise again, He's coming again. Let's pray together. Father, thank you that your plan of salvation is indeed your plan and it works and that it moves forward with the salvation of sinners even today. Father, we admit to you that we are still sinners. Thank you that by your Spirit we can grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus. We pray, Father, that we would consider how Jesus died for us, and that thanksgiving would be in our hearts. Humility, for it is our sin that sent Him to the cross. And then, Father, let us joyfully seek to do that which is in Your will for us. According to Your Word, help us to be the people that You want us to be, that we might faithfully do the things that You've called us to do. We pray it all in that matchless and holy name of our Savior Jesus. Amen.