Let us open our Bibles to Matthew chapter 27. Matthew chapter 27. We're going to look at verses 45 to 56. This morning, as we continue to study through the Gospel of Matthew, we will begin reading at verse 29 to remember some of the context here as well. Matthew chapter 27, beginning to read at verse 29. This is God's Word. And when they had plaited a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand, and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. And they spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. And after that they had mocked him, they took the robe off from him, and put his own raiment on him, and led him away to crucify him. And as they came out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name, him they compelled to bear his cross. And when they were come unto a place called Golgotha, that is to say, a place of a skull, they gave him vinegar to drink, mingled with gall, and when he had tasted thereof, he would not drink. And they crucified him and parted his garments, casting lots, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet. They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots. And sitting down, they watched him there, and set up over his head his accusation written, This is Jesus, the King of the Jews. Then were there two thieves crucified with him, one on the right hand and another on the left. And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads and saying, thou that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the son of God, come down from the cross. Likewise, also the chief priests, mocking him with the scribes and elders, said, he saved others, himself he cannot save. If he be the king of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him. He trusted in God, let him deliver him now, if he will have him. For he said, I am the son of God. The thieves also which were crucified with him cast the same in his teeth. Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani. That is to say, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Some of them that stood there when they heard that said, this man calleth for Elias or Elijah. And straightway one of them ran and took a sponge and filled it with vinegar and put it on a reed and gave him to drink. The rest said, let be, let us see whether Elias, Elijah will come to save him. Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. And behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom, and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent. And the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. Now when the centurion and they that were with him watching Jesus saw the earthquake and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly, this was the Son of God. And many women were there beholding afar off which followed Jesus from Galilee ministering unto him, among which was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee's children. Thus far in the reading of God's holy word. Let us pray. Our Heavenly Father, as we approach Thy throne of grace and as we seek to handle holy things for holy people this day, we pray that our hearts would be delivered from a coldness. We pray that the words that we have read, though they be read with difficulty of emotion, yet they would grip our hearts to the true meaning by the power of thy Holy Spirit. Deliver us from looking at these passages, this word, in a light manner, we pray, Lord, that thou would open up unto us its rich truths, regarding the death of our Savior. Lord, bless us in the preaching of thy word. Exalt thine only begotten Son and our Savior, we pray in Jesus' name, amen. Beloved congregation, we have read again of a very deep and serious passage which contains many, many mysteries for us, and we want to consider this morning Christ's abandonment and Christ's achievements. In many respects, there are two sermons here. There are two very rich passages. And with the Lord's help, we will try to cover the both of them this morning. We see, first of all, Christ's abandonment, his desertion. We see a darkness. that falls upon the earth after Christ has been on the cross for three hours. He is hung there already suffering considerably and then deep darkness descends and surely the whole place must have been filled with a quiet awe and reverence. It happened at midday. And whether it was God overruling the course of nature or whether it happened to be an eclipse, we don't know. In a way, it's immaterial, but we know that God brought darkness upon the earth. That's the significant thing. God brought darkness upon the earth in the midday for the space of three hours. And if you've ever been in an eclipse, it is very awesome. And they don't generally last three hours, but it's a very, very emotional experience. In this time of the darkness of the three hours, we would say symbolically Christ goes behind the veil of the temple. You remember that veil of the Old Testament that was to separate the regular duties of the priests and was to separate from the holy place another compartment or room called the Holy of Holies. And there was the Ark of the Covenant. And there were two angels or carvings of two angels facing each other, their wings touching, inside the ark was a copy of the law, the Ten Commandments, which Moses received from the hand of God. There was the rod that budded, that spoke of the government of God's church, Christ's church, even in the Old Testament, under the authority of Aaron. and setting him apart as a leader in the church. And then there was also a bowl of manna which testified to God's provision for his people as they were wandering through the desert. So here was that holy place where once in the year on the day of atonement, what today, one of the few Hebrew words you may know because you have heard of Yom Kippur, Yom Kippur, Kippur. So there on the day of atonement then the priest would enter in and not without blood, he had to bring blood into that place and make atonement for the sins of the people and there was a remembrance of sins year after year. These things are developed in the book of Hebrews we've been studying on Wednesday nights. So here the Lord Jesus then in symbolic terms goes into the veil and he makes atonement for sins. Here he is punished during these three hours of darkness. punished for the sins of his people. And as the light begins to return, as the darkness begins to dispel, we see the great evidence of the desertion of God as our Savior cries out, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani. And the gospel writers interpret that for us to mean, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? There are words clearly taken from Psalm 22. And there's some question, I've read some interesting articles about whether the Lord was quoting Psalm 22. And of course, he was not quoting them. He wrote those words in the very first place. but he is expressing his heart in the fulfillment of those words. His heart is so filled with the word of God that he responds in everything that he says and does with the word of God. And he cries out not in the Hebrew, but in the Aramaic. So here's the grief of his heart. to just express in the common language of all the people, in the common language that he normally speaks, has been speaking for the last 30 some years, he cries out for mercy. And it is a bit confusing for the people who hear it, but it is expressly translated for us. And it's given in the Aramaic. There are very few words that are given by the gospel writers of the words that Christ actually used when he was upon the earth. It's very significant that this is one of them. And it speaks of just the very expression of his heart, the very depths of his being and the anguish that's there. David writes in Psalm 37, verse 25, I have been young and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken. And here we hear Christ crying out, why have you forsaken me? Of course, he's not ultimately forsaken, just as none of us are ever ultimately forsaken who abide in Christ. But Christ expresses this word, why have you forsaken me? And whereas David says, I've not seen the righteous forsaken, here we see the holy one forsaken. We see his anguish, we read really with our hearts the loneliness that he experiences. And it is loneliness on so many levels. It is a loneliness that separates, in a way, the greatest intimacy that can possibly exist. We have to remember that there's no breaking of fellowship here between God the Father and God the Son. They're as intimate as ever. Their relationship never changes. a breaking of communication or fellowship between God the Father and God as man, the Son as man. Can you make that distinction? It's not easy, is it? It's a difficult thing for us to do. And that is what makes these verses so very mysterious. This whole passage of Christ's passion is filled with mystery. So obviously our understanding of the Trinity says there could never be any break. in the members of the Trinity. God would cease to exist. The whole universe would collapse. We would no longer be ourselves. We would not be sustained. It's impossible that anything could happen to break up the Trinity. It's completely unthinkable, and it ought to be unthinkable in your own mind. And so that's what adds to the mystery here. Then how can the Lord Jesus? Now we're talking about his human nature. And again, his human and divine natures are so melded together in a way as to be indistinguishable. You can't separate them. And yet, here there is a separation. In his humanity, as the second Adam, God must turn away from the Son. He can't bear to look on him. Why is that? because he's bearing the sins of his people. So he's filled with such, we talked about this last week, some as well, he's filled with such vile sin as is highly objectionable to a holy God. And so here we see Christ forsaken of his father because he is, as we said last week, the greatest of all sinners at this point. He is bearing the sins of his people and his father says, I have to turn away as I punish you for those sins. We have another great mystery in Isaiah 53 verse 10. What does it mean, beloved? When the prophet Isaiah says, yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to grief. And the emphasis there is on he. It's not all of the men around him, all the Romans, all the Jews that yelled crucify him. They're responsible for the death of Jesus, but it was God. Peter says that on the Pentecost. It was God who slew the Lord Jesus by his eternal decree. He hath put him to grief. We can see that, and when we believe in the sovereignty of God, the decrees of God, that our salvation and the means of your salvation has been ordained from before the foundation of the world, what does it mean then? It pleased the Lord to bruise him. Make no mistake, the word there is a word that has to do with pleasure. It's a very curious word. It's not a word that was lightly chosen. It's a word that was put there by the Holy Spirit. So the Lord has no pleasure in the death of the wicked. But he was delighted that his son fulfilled covenant, wasn't he? He's pleased that the Lord Jesus won his people. gained his church, that he did everything that he was commanded to do. And so it was God who bruised him, God who put him to death so that sinners could have eternal life. This is a remarkable thing really to think about. And there's very little I can say, because it is so unexplainable. What can I say? We can think about it, and we ought to think about it a lot, the depths. of the range of God's decrees and the fulfillment of those decrees and what it all involves and what the Lord delights in. Can you imagine that the Lord delights not only in your salvation, but he delights in the way that you are saved through the death of his son. He has a delight in his whole plan of salvation, all of it from beginning to end, from the time that Jesus was placed into the womb of Mary and right to the very end where he cries out My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? God the Father takes great delight in the fulfillment of all of his plans. And to us, it can only be mystery. And even in the midst of abandonment yet, here's the expression of God's, of Christ's hope, isn't it? My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? See, God, in a way, is not far off. He's far off socially. We would say He's far off in terms of a connection with Him, but He's still my God. Let's pause there for a moment and just think about what happens when the Lord afflicts you and puts you in a very low place. And as sinners, we so often complain about those things. But does that happen in your heart where you can say, my God, my God, why am I undergoing these things? There's a questioning. There's never a time when these things happen to us that's a good time. And when we stop, we say, why is this happening to me now? And if you stop to think about, you can't think of a better time when that should happen or a different time. You wouldn't want that any time in your life. But it has happened to you. And beloved, if it's not because of your sin, then it's because of God's providence, isn't it? If it's something foolish that you've done, you can trace it back to the consequence of a sin. But sometimes these things are purely circumstantial. And even if it is the cause of your sin, the right place to be is my God, my God. Always there's that personal aspect of God, not just the observation in a cold way that God has brought these things upon me because he's sovereign. He can do whatever he likes. And he can. We confess that and we sing about it. He can do whatever he likes. But isn't there also then that personal aspect that says, My God, my God, I still have a God. He doesn't feel near, he feels far away, but he's my God, and I have to call upon him the way that Christ called upon him in the cross. Think of the words of Job in the 13th chapter. Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. Isn't that the testimony of the Lord Jesus? Here's God. God bruised him, God put him to death. Though he slay me, yet will I trust him. That's the expression of the Lord Jesus on the cross when he says, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? There is still an expression of great hope. And beloved, this is transferred and brought to your heart by the Holy Spirit to all those who are saved by the grace of God. They understand this. Do you get a sense of this idea that I can do the same thing and that I have done the same thing? That in my terrors, I've called upon my God. We see with sadness that the crowd uses it for another occasion to mock the Lord Jesus. They respond in verse 47. Some of them that stood there when they heard that said, this man calleth for Elijah. Straightway one of them ran and took a sponge and filled it with vinegar and put it on a reed and gave him to drink. Last week we saw that he refused to drink what was mixed with gall. because it was a sedative, because it was an anesthetic that would darken his mind to the reality of what was happening. And here, there's no gall mixed with it, so he drinks it for some refreshment. And the rest then, the mocking continues in verse 49. The rest said, let be, let us see whether Elijah will come and save him. And again, he's surrounded by unbelievers. These people are not sympathetic. They're still mocking him. Let's just see what happens here. Look at him calling for Elijah, the prophet. And in the minds of the Jewish people, there is a strong connection between Elijah and the end times. Elijah, who had been taken up into heaven without dying, was going connected very much with the end times. And the Lord endorses that view in many ways. But here, they're trying to make some kind of connection. Oh, he's calling for Elijah. Look, let's just see what happens. See whether this comes to pass. And then finally, the Lord Jesus dies. Verse 50, Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. So there's Christ's abandonment. feeling lonelier than any human being has ever, ever felt on the face of the earth. Extreme loneliness and abandonment. But then in the next number of verses, we read of Christ's achievement, Christ's great achievement. There was a rending, first of all, a rending of the veil, verse 51. And behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom, and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent. So here was a mysterious event that opens up the mystery of the Holy of Holies. So here were the Jews that stood back, and not everyone could enter even into the holy place. But they would say, this is the day of atonement. This is the day when the high priest enters into the Holy of Holies. And there was a bell even attached to the high priest's garment so that if he was there doing the service on that day, if the bell stopped ringing, they'd say, God has taken displeasure with this high priest and he's fallen dead. And some people suggest that they would be able to reach in then and at least pull them out by that court because nobody else was allowed to go in there. In any case, there's great mystery. What's going on back there? has ever seen this except the high priest. He can tell what happens. He can tell what he sees, but no one has experienced it. And so there's this mystery. We know that as the Jewish congregation, we would know there's holiness there. God's presence is symbolized by the Ark of the Covenant, which means that God is not contained in that box, like the Jews tended to think from time to time, but that this is the symbol of God's presence with his people. This is the picture that God says, I am with you. I am present with you. And this is the symbol of my presence. And you have to be careful when you move the box. You can't touch it. the way Uzziah did, or Uzzah did, sorry, and you have to be very, very careful. Do everything according to my word. Great mystery. And now the veil that separates everyone from that, from that Ark of the Covenant is rent and twain. And the rending is what? From top to bottom. Right, there's no man, any man could, even any man could not tear it from bottom to top. Apparently a very thick, thick curtain. And here from the top to the bottom, this curtain is torn. And what happens here then is that every obstruction for entering into the presence of the Lord is removed. Free access is now made to the Lord of all glory. It's an indication that the ceremonial law has been fulfilled. It's not necessary anymore. All of this has been accomplished. So the Jews don't need to be involved in that anymore. So not only is the ceremonial law fulfilled, but Calvin says also an opening of heaven that God may now invite the members of his son to approach him with familiarity. So he can come readily to the throne of grace. There's atonement for sinners everywhere. And there's atonement for sinners. They don't have to go to Jerusalem. We don't have to do pilgrimage to go to a holy city and have our sins atoned for there. That was the case in the Old Covenant, under the Old Covenant, wasn't it? We don't have to do that. Wherever God now calls all men everywhere to repent of their sins, come into the presence of God with your sin, with your own blood, confessing your sins, but also with the blood of Christ to cover your sins. Here is the great evangelistic proclamation that the way is made open to everyone, to everyone in all the world. You imagine what Caiaphas might have thought. My job is done, my job is over. What am I going to do now? He must have understood something of the significance. But we saw as we were going through the book of Hebrews that so many of the Jews and so many of a lot of people want to sew up that curtain again. They want to make that curtain to be there so that access to God is difficult, so that access to God is through your works somehow, so that access to God is perhaps through a priest or through some other person. But the whole significance here is that the way has been made wide, wide open. The place of great mystery is now open to all. It still is, the whole idea of holiness is a great mystery to all of God's people particularly, but the way of access is very, very open. Caiaphas said, if I don't sew this curtain up again, I'm out of a job. But he must have understood that it was God that did it. I don't know whether he was present there or whether he was at the cross. We don't know where Caiaphas was, but in any case, it was well known that it was torn from the top to the bottom. He would have been aware of that. And still he clung, as far as we know, clung to the old ways, clung to his old religion, clung to what really denied that Christ had died for sinners. Then we have also a remarkable fact of the resurrection, the earthquake, the earth shattered. At the end of verse 51, the earth did quake and the rocks rent and the graves were opened and many bodies of the saints which slept arose and came out of the graves after his resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared unto many. So there's an earthquake here, and the timing is a little bit difficult. It says that they came out of their graves after his resurrection. But all of this, the writer, or Matthew, specifically connects with the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. That resurrection of the saints, we don't know how many or who were appointed by God to be raised up of their graves. It doesn't seem as though all of them were, but many of them were, and they went into the holy city. They were now not They're purified or cleansed from the vileness of sin or death and they could go even into the holy city. So these things testify the first fruits. Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection and here was a testimony that because Christ died that many were raised from the dead, even in that day. And again, there's lots of questions that come into your mind. If you think about these things, we won't entertain those questions this morning. But when we stick to the facts, we see that there was a great resurrecting, not only of the Lord Jesus, but also of the bodies of the saints. And then we think of the response, response of the centurion. Verse 54, now when the centurion and they that were with him watching Jesus saw the earthquake and those things that were done, they feared greatly saying, truly, this was the Son of God. We don't know in what sense this was declared. It's certainly true. What the centurion said was true. Truly, this was the Son of God. Whether he was still mocking, he may have been. He may have still been making fun, but what he said was certainly true, in spite of whatever intention he may have had. Seems as though the other people were still, in many ways, mocking. But we do have the ministering women mentioned as well. And many women were there beholding afar off which followed Jesus from Galilee ministering unto him. We have first of all mentioned Mary Magdalene from whom demons were removed in Luke 8. So she knew the great deliverance. She was there, right to the end, ministering to Christ. We have Mary, the mother of James and Joseph. We don't know very much about her, but she was one of the Marys and she was present there as well. Then we have the mother of Zebedee's children. We don't know what her name was, but we know her husband's name and her son's name, James and John. Remember how This woman was very ambitious for her sons. Said, go and tell Jesus you want to be seated on his right hand. And so they went in obedience to their mother. I'm sure they had ambition of their own. She wanted her sons to have this great honor. And who knows what she was thinking now. Her boys may not even have been present there. She was. It seems as though all of the disciples may have fled altogether, the crucifixion scene. We don't know definitely that that's the case, but here she's thinking about, what did I really want for my sons? Did I want them to be identified with this man who now is dead before me? But she's labeled as one of the ministering women. And so she has some understanding, we're sure, of what's happening here. Well, beloved, the words before us have very deep meaning and ought to strike awe into your heart. Christ's abandonment and His curious and even strange achievement upon the cross as the veil was rent from top to bottom I want to close with Christ's acclamation. Isn't it strange? Maybe we take it for granted because you've been doing it for a long time. Isn't it kind of strange that we sing about the death of the Lord Jesus? We did it this morning, we actually sang, stricken, smitten, and afflicted. We sang, I mean it's an elegy, It's a song of lamentation, it's a very sad song. But each of the songs, I have to say I haven't examined them all, but I would say that each of the songs in our hymnal under the death of, we have a whole section on the death of Christ. And each one of those songs resolves in praise. We sing about Christ's death. Once a month, we sit at the Lord's table and we remember, specifically think about not just the resurrection, but the death of the Lord Jesus Christ by his commandment. Remember my death. Remember that I died for your sins. This do as oft as ye eat it, as oft as ye drink it in remembrance of me, specifically of my death. You do show forth my death till I come. Is it a little bit strange? And maybe the reason that it doesn't seem strange to you and the reason that it shouldn't seem strange to you is for that reason, that it's also the cause of great praise. One of the... things that I wrote, one of the authors talked, and it just really got my attention that somebody would talk about delighting, looking and reading this passage and finding delight in it. Is that gross? Is that just a little bit too? Or does your soul really say, Here is Christ lay dying. Here is He expired. Here is He cried out for His heavenly Father and His abandonment. Here my sins are forgiven. Here I have pardon. Here I have peace with God because of what Christ suffered. He suffered so that I didn't have to. Is there a delight in your soul as you read of the agonies of the Lord Jesus? We find it difficult to read out loud. Even reading to yourself is difficult, isn't it? But to read it out loud, sometimes you just can't get through it. It just grips you so heavily. But beloved, it is the cause of praise, isn't it? the cause of praise to Christ's people. We're not sadomasochists. We're not strange people who get delight out of seeing people suffer, but the application of it by the Holy Spirit, beloved, is what makes you to delight and gives you maybe some insight into how God could have pleasure that it pleased the Lord. J.C. Ryle talks about this delight, this He says, first of all, that we should praise the Lord for the pardon that you realize from the cross. This is crucial to your salvation. Bishop Ryle says, let us praise God for the confidence it gives us as to the ground of our hope of pardon. Our sins may be many and great, but the payment made by our great substitute far outweighs them all. So here's pardon, so full and free we sing. And there's cause of praise. We look at the death of Christ. Beloved, does your soul need that death? Does it require that death? Because God required it. God demanded it. Christ went willingly. Does your soul take pleasure and delight that my sins are covered by that cruel, wicked death? There's a pleasure and a delight to the Lord's people. We can sing of atonement and forgiveness and reconciliation with God because Christ has endured this. Secondly, he talks about love. Ryle says, let us praise God for the view it gives us of the love of our Father in heaven. He that spared not his own son but delivered him up for us all will surely with him give us all things. When you read about the death of Christ on the cross, do you equate it with love? Do you see there that a holy God can love sinners only by this act, that on one hand seems so reprehensible, but on the other hand is the only way in which God can express his love. Isn't that true? Is that the only way that God can express his love? It is, because that's what God did. God would only do the perfect thing. This is the perfect thing. This is the way in which God has expressed his love. We see love on the cross. We see love in death. We see love in sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. And finally, he talks about praise and sympathy. Let us praise God for the view it gives us of the sympathy of Jesus with all his believing people. He can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He knows what suffering is. He is just a savior that an infirm body with a weak heart in an evil world requires. He came not to not to break the bruised reed, not to extinguish the smoking flax. He came to give life where there's weakness. In fact, to give life where there's death, Ephesians chapter two. He is the resurrection and the life. So we have a sympathizing high priest. How much we love people who made sacrifices for us. Perhaps there are people who have made sacrifices for you. We can think of, many of us can think of our mothers as a very close and endearing example. Mothers who have sacrificed so that we would have, many of us, so that we would know the Lord. Many of us, so that we would know their love and care and affection. And mothers tend to serve not for themselves but for their children. There's a very natural way in which that often happens. And we love them all the more for it, don't we? Here's the Savior who sympathetically went to the cross and who sympathizes with sinners. We don't have a high priest who's a far off. He's borne our sins. He's shown that he loved us. And he's been tempted in all ways, like as we, yet without sin. So he's sympathizing in that sense as well. He loves his people. We don't always think of everything that befalls us as being part of God's love, but that's the very thing that we ought to grow in our understanding. God loves me. Why does this happen to me? God loves me. Christ loves me. My high priest is attending to the needs of my soul. My high priest is making me holy the way he's holy. My high priest loves me. He gave His life for me. How could anything else that I receive from Him or that He withholds from me possibly be bad for me when He's given me His life? He's laid down His very life. How could anything else? If I needed something, He wouldn't withhold any good gift from me if I needed it because He loves me. And He gave me everything. We have riches in His grace because of His great gift and sacrifice. Beloved, is this your Savior? Is this the Savior who loves you, who sympathizes with you, the holy God who loves you and has pardoned your sin for Jesus' sake? What a great salvation the Lord's people have. How rich is grace and how great our delight, not only in the life and the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, but in His very death. Let us pray. O Lord, our God, We pray that we may know much of the suffering of our Saviour and how great it reveals our sin to be in Thy eyes, the eyes of Thy holiness. We pray, O Lord, that Thou wouldst grant unto us that we may also love and serve our Saviour. We ask, Lord, that Thou wouldst give us a better understanding even as we go to our homes and meditate upon these things and seek to understand the great mysteries that are here. We confess them all to be true for Thou has declared them unto us. We pray, Lord, that we may, that Thou would be pleased to make us to appreciate these wonderful mysteries and to apply them effectively to each of our souls. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.