Matthew chapter 27, beginning with verse 45. And from the sixth hour there was darkness over the whole earth until the ninth hour, from noon until three in the afternoon. At about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out in a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, this is my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Some of those who were there, when they heard him, said, This is Elijah. And immediately, running to one of them, he took a sponge and soaked it with vinegar, and put it on a rod, and gave it to him to drink. But the rest said, Leave it. Let us see if Elijah comes to deliver him. But Jesus, having again called out loud, gave up his spirit. And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom, and the earth trembled, and the rocks were broken, and the tombs were opened, and many bodies of saints who had fallen asleep rose up. And coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city, and many appeared. The centurion and those who were with him guarding Jesus, seeing the earthquake and the things that had been done, feared greatly and truly said, This is God's Son. And many women were there, looking from afar, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, serving Him. Among them was Mary Magdalene, the mother of Jacob and Joseph, and the mother of the children of Zebedee. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day that we can worship you. We thank you. for the joy of being your children. We recognize and we confess and we declare that this is not our work, this is the grace of God. When you rescued us from the dominion of darkness and you brought us to your own family. When you forgave all our sins. in the foundation of the death of Christ and you have given us a communion with you through the justice of your Son. You have transformed us from the inside out. You have made us new creatures in Christ Jesus. All of this is what you have done and we rejoice and our boast is only in Christ and in your work. It is a joy to be part of your family. We rejoice in knowing you, and in knowing our brothers and sisters, and having communion with them, and having unity of spirit and mind in worshiping you, Lord. We thank you for your holy word, which is alive, active, sharper than a double-edged sword. And you use your word, and you deal with us, and you penetrate deep into the depths of our hearts. to the point of dividing the intentions and thoughts of the heart. I ask you to do your work through the preaching of your word. Strengthen me, Lord, mentally and physically. Give me the power of expression that I need to please you, to do your will, to be useful to your church. And I ask you to open hearts, Lord, and to teach us in such a way that we have no doubt that we have met you. I ask this in the name of your church, the edification of my brothers and sisters in Christ, for the continuous work of God in this church, but I also pray for the lost. There is someone who listens to me this morning who does not know you yet and we pray that this is the day of salvation and we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen. The cross of our Savior is glorious for us. It was an emblem of shame in its day, but it is now an emblem of glory forever for the people of God. The message of Christ crucified and risen from the dead is the message that we believe for the salvation of our souls. It is the message that we now declare for the salvation of other souls. There is no other gospel, there is no other message by which a man or a woman can be saved. There is no other name given to men by which they can be saved, but the name of Jesus and his work on the cross is what makes salvation possible. That's our testimony. But our testimony rests on God's testimony. In fact, all we're doing is delivering God's testimony as a son. And we have seen in this section that we have been studying the crucifixion of Christ, we have seen the testimony of God in two ways. He testified in a way that was gloriously normal, that is, the providence of God. The scripture was being fulfilled, God was working through what would have been seen as something normal, ordinary activities for those who were seeing what was happening, and yet the word of God was being fulfilled, step by step. We saw it in this account, God working by his providence what he had decreed in the Old Testament. But now we are in a section where God not only did extraordinary things through ordinary means, but He was doing extraordinary things through an extraordinary testimony, through extraordinary things, testimony of His Son through miracles, supernatural activities. And we said last Sunday that we were starting to look at five ways that the Father testified of the work and person of His Son on the cross. Five ways of this supernatural testimony. I want to remind you of the first one. We saw it last Sunday. First of all, God testifies through the darkness of darkness. There was a supernatural testimony of judgment, a supernatural darkness that was on display for three hours. Jesus suffered when the sun was in its greatest power, and God turned off the light. He continued for three hours. And we noticed last week that there is nothing natural that explains this, that we could consider natural or normal. A solar eclipse cannot explain this. This is something supernatural, especially when you add everything else that happens in this story. God was working in creation to say something about what was happening with His Son. And we noted the many places in the Old Testament where the darkness speaks of God's judgment against sin and sinners, but the primary message displayed in this scene Is this the judgment of God? for the sin of the people of God in the body of His Son in the wood. Jesus experiencing the wrath of God. This is what the darkness told men. What was God doing on the cross? He was crushing His own Son to free us from our sins. It is Christ, the righteous one, suffering in the place of the unrighteous. so that we could be made the justice of God in Him. 1 Peter 3.18, because Christ also suffered only once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to lead us to God, having been, in truth, dead in flesh, but made whole in spirit. 2 Corinthians 5.21, he who did not know sin made sin for us. that we may be made righteous by God in Him. The Lord Jesus Christ, Lamb of God, our Sacrifice for sin, dying on the cross, made sin in the sense of our Sacrifice for sin, our Substitute, taking upon Himself the full payment suffering what we deserve, giving us as a gift the justice of Him to be before God forever. This message of judgment both in creation and in the cry of Christ, if we are right in what the darkness means, we must listen to the cry, the Son of God, verse 46, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Psalm 22, 1 is what is screaming in the mind of our Savior and in His mouth. What is he describing? He is describing this terrible sense of separation. As we said last week, He did not cease to be God on the cross. He did not cease to be God before the cross. There is no separation in the divine nature. He is God even when He suffers. But in terms of the communion with his father, there is something mysterious that we cannot fully understand that he is experiencing, that has to do with him serving as our carrier of sin, our sacrifice for sin. He cried out with a sense of abandonment so that we do not have to cry out abandoned for all eternity. Some thought he was calling for Elias. A similarity of sound, Eli, Eli. Some thought he was calling for Elias. Or maybe it was an insincere conclusion and they were just mocking him again. We know there was a certain mockery. Because they say, let's wait and see if Elias comes to save him. For some herudites, there was a legend that because Elias had been transported to heaven while still alive, that he would return to offer help when a righteous one would need it, especially righteous rabbis. D.A. Carson says, according to 2 Kings 2, verse 1 to 12, Elijah did not die, but went to the living heaven. A Jewish tradition, perhaps as old as the first century, said that he would come to rescue the righteous in their affliction. Will Elijah come to rescue them? He's asking Elijah to come. Verse 48 says that one of them ran and took a sponge and put it on a rod. Now, think about that. That can't be very long. The crosses have to be near the ground because this couldn't have been very long. He took a sponge and put it on a rod and gave it to him to drink. But the others said, let's see if Elijah comes to free him. This vinegar, what was this? It was a sour wine. It was vinegar wine diluted with water. It was cheap, it was the drink of the soldiers and the workers. Why is it that Matthew talks to us about this vinegar? You have the fulfillment of the word of God, the scripture. John explicitly tells us that this fulfills the scripture. What comes to mind is Psalm 69, verse 21, which says, they also gave me ice for food, and in my thirst they gave me to drink vinegar. And remember that when they're about to crucify Jesus, they offer him a sour wine, but Matthew says it was gall, it was bitter. And Mark tells us it was bitter because they had added myrrh. Jesus was willing to take it, but he tasted the bitterness and he refused it. In this case, Jesus does not reuse it. It's probably sour wine, but it doesn't have myrrh in it. So, in both cases, Scripture is fulfilled. They gave him gold and they gave him vinegar to drink. What do we have then? a supernatural testimony that the light goes out, the sun is no longer giving its light, there is darkness for three hours, and it is the testimony of God of judgment. A supernatural divine testimony of judgment, which brings us this morning to which brings us to verse 50, and the second way in which God testifies supernaturally, a supernatural testimony of authority. A supernatural testimony of authority, verse 50, plus Jesus, having once again cried out in a loud voice, and yielded up his spirit. God is working in the way that his Son dies. And that testifies to who Jesus was and who Jesus is. Jesus takes this drink to his mouth and he shouts out with a loud voice and he yields up his spirit. Now Matthew doesn't tell us what John tells us. John tells us that before they gave Jesus this drink, Jesus said that he was thirsty. And John tells us that Jesus said this consciously. aware of what he was doing, knowing that everything he had come to do had been accomplished. The three hours of darkness have come to an end. The Son of God has absorbed the wrath of God up to the point of his death, and now conscious of the fact that he has accomplished everything he has come to do in terms of his death, he then says that he is thirsty. John chapter 19, verse 28. After this, knowing Jesus that everything was consumed, he said, so that the scripture may be fulfilled, I am thirsty. And there was a vessel full of vinegar. So they soaked a sponge in vinegar, and putting a swab in it, they put it near his mouth. When Jesus had taken vinegar, he said, It is consumed. And having bowed his head, he gave the Spirit. I want you to pay attention to what Matthew says in verse 50. He gave the Spirit. John says, This is a death unlike any other death in the history of the world. Jesus died in such a way, in such a unique way, and he had spoken about his authority over his death. John chapter 10, verse 17, for this reason I love my Father, because I lay down my life to take it again. Nobody takes it away from me, but I lay it down. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I received from my Father." So here is Jesus conscious that he finished his work on the cross. So he cries out with a loud voice and then he gives his spirit. What does that mean? It means that he releases his spirit. Jesus decides to die. He has authority over his death. This is not an act, what Jesus is doing. The suffering of Christ is real in His humanity. His crucifixion, horrible. But what I want you to see is that He did not die a common death to a victim of crucifixion. One aspect of the torture of the crucifixion was that, despite all the physical suffering, death was often caused by not being able to breathe. Eventually you'd grow so weary that you couldn't lift your body up to give oxygen to your lungs. People ended up dying from asphyxia. But the crucifixion could last days. Jesus died in six hours. because they didn't want the body to be on the crosses for Saturday. They didn't want the bodies before Saturday on the crosses. So they moved to break the legs of the men so they couldn't get up and have oxygen and die. But when they got to where Jesus was to break his legs, he's already dead. And John makes the point again that this fulfills the scripture. John 19, verse 30, when Jesus had drunk the vinegar, he said, Consumed it, and having bowed his head, he gave up his spirit. Then the Jews, as it was the day of preparation for the Passover, in order that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the day of rest, because that day of rest was of great solemnity, they begged Pilate to break their legs and that they might be taken away from there. But when they came to Jesus, as they had already seen him dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers opened his side with a spear, and at once blood and water came out. And he who saw it gave testimony, and his testimony is true. And he knows that it is true, that ye also may believe. For these things happened that the writing might be fulfilled, not one person's bone will be broken. And another scripture says, they will look on whom they have trespassed. So they don't break his legs, that fulfills the scripture. They pierce his eye, they put a sword in his side, that fulfills the scripture. Mark makes the point that Pilate was shocked that Jesus was already dead. Marcos 1542, when the night came, because it was the preparation, that is, the eve of the day of rest, Joseph of Arimathea, a noble member of the council, who also awaited the kingdom of God, came and boldly entered Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Jesus has died. This righteous man wants to give Jesus a proper burial. He goes to Pilate, asks for the body. Pilate was surprised to hear that he had already died. And summoning the centurion, he had so much doubt that summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead. And when he learned from the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph. Jesus, looking back at our text, Jesus is strong enough. He has enough oxygen in his lungs to cry out, my God, my God, why has he done this to me? But he also cries out something else. Now, the point I'm making is he doesn't die the normal way that a victim of crucifixion dies. What did he cry out when he died? As John tells us, Jesus announces that his work is finished. That's unique. That particular Greek word can be used in a monetary way, to speak of a payment that has now been made complete. Perhaps that is what Jesus is saying. But it could be a word that speaks of the end of something. The work is finished. But he also announces, according to Luke, that he was delivering his spirit. He says what he's doing, Luke 23, 46. Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said, Father, into your hands I commend my spirit. And having said this, he breathed out. Do you see that his death is supernatural? that the all-powerful God is working in the Son of God, so that he dies in a way unlike any other mortal that speaks of who he is. Who has authority over his own death? Who has authority to deliver his spirit? Through the years of ministry, I have met many depressed people who know that suicide is a sin, it is self-murder, but they will talk about how they are asking the Lord to take them. People who wish to have control over their death, but they are not sovereign. Jesus not only delivers His Spirit, but He announces that He is going to deliver the Father's Spirit into your hands, I entrust my Spirit. Jesus knows that His work is finished, that the Father has accepted His work and receives His Spirit in death. Do you hear the testimony of God? God testifying supernaturally through the darkness of His judgment, God testifying through the death of His Son, the acceptance of the offering of His Son, and His love for His Son. what leads us to the third supernatural testimony that the Father gives his Son. Testimony of judgment, testimony of authority, third place, a supernatural testimony of forgiveness. But having once again cried out in a loud voice, Jesus delivered the Spirit, and behold, behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, and the earth trembled, and the rocks were broken. The veil in the temple. the veil that separated the holy place from the rest of the temple. The holy place where only the High Priest could enter once a year on the day of the expiation. A day away from everyone else. The message was, there is no access to God except by blood. And that blood that is offered by the High Priest once a year, no one else can enter here. That place is now exposed to everyone through the tearing of the curtain. Don't think it was a light curtain. This was something thick. Some have testified that with great force it was not possible to tear this veil. And it was torn in two, from top to bottom. What does this signify? Well, first of all, it's torn completely. But it also means, when he speaks from top to bottom, that it was torn divinely. This is not the result of a human tearing it apart. No, this is God doing this, this tearing. And what is the meaning of this? Matthew says, here there is meaning in this. The veil of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The writer to the Hebrews gives us the answer. What is it that God declares through this miracle? Let's go to Hebrews chapter 9 so that you can see it with your eyes. Go to Hebrews chapter 9 from verse 1. The writer of Hebrews says, Hebrews 9.1, because the tabernacle was arranged like this. In the first part, called the holy place, was the candelabrum, the table, and the breads of the proposal. After the second veil was the part of the tabernacle called the most holy place, which had a golden incense and the ark of the covenant, covered with gold everywhere, in which was a golden urn containing the manna, the rod of Aaron, which greened, and the tablets of the covenant. Above it were the cherubim of glory, which covered the propitiatory. Of which things cannot be spoken in detail now. And so, after these things, in the first part of the tabernacle, the priests enter continually to fulfill the duties of worship. But in the second part, only the High Priest once a year, not without blood, which he offers for himself and for the sins of ignorance of the people. Now let's go to chapter 10, Hebrews, verse 19. Therefore, brethren, having liberty to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus Christ, by the new and living way that he has opened for us through his flesh, and having a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a sincere heart, in full certainty of faith, purified the hearts of evil conscience, and washed the bodies with pure water." The writer of Hebrews says, Believer, look at what Jesus has done and apply it to your conscience. You don't know now that you can walk just to the presence of God through the veil, which is the body of Christ himself. When Jesus died, paying for our sins, and the veil is torn from top to bottom, and the way is opened, and this would have happened even when the other priests were making their daily sacrifices in the holy place. That veil is opened. and many priests came to the faith in Christ Jesus and wrote the book of Acts. And you have to ask yourself, what impact would it have on them to see that veil torn from top to bottom when they were working, doing their work in the temple? The message is, the path now to God is open. The one that was talked about through that annual sacrifice on the day of the exaltation had arrived. The first was symbolic, now it's the real substance. He has now come, the Lamb of God has come and has given his life once and for all. There is only one mediator to have access to God, not an earthly priest, but a great high priest, the Lord Jesus Christ. The sacrificial system of the Old Testament was no longer needed. The priesthood of the Old Testament was no longer needed. The temple was no longer needed. The offering of Jesus Christ has been accepted by the Father. The veil has been torn from top to bottom. The path to God has been opened. This is what Jesus meant when he said, Consumed is. And what he said, now God, supernaturally, proves it. Indeed, it has been consumed. The way has now been opened. The payment for sins has been accepted. There is nothing more than trusting in Him, trusting in Jesus, and you will have communion with God. Reject Jesus and you will answer for your sins. J.C. Ryle comments on all the wonderful signs that accompanied the death of our Lord. None were more significant than this. The thunderstorms at noon for three hours would have been an incredible event. The earthquake that broke the rocks must have been a tremendous blow. But there was a meaning in the tearing of the veil from top to bottom that must have penetrated the heart of any intelligent Jew. The conscience of Caiaphas, the High Priest, had to have been very hard. If, upon hearing that the veil had been torn, he did not faint. In the way the veil was torn, it proclaimed the termination of the ceremonial law. It was a sign that the old dispensation of the sacrifices and ordinances was no longer needed. His work was finished. in the moment that Christ died. There was no longer a need for an earthly priest, for a propitiator, to shed blood, to offer incense on the day of exaltation. The true High Priest had appeared. The true Lamb of God had been revealed. The true propitiatory had been revealed. The symbols and the shadows were no longer needed. Let us remember this. To have an altar, a sacrifice, a priesthood now is to have a candle lit, a candle lit at noon. What an offense it is in view of what Jesus has done and has finished. Jesus is the propitiator, Jesus is the sacrifice, Jesus is the High Priest. Why would you want to light a candle in the middle of a sunny day? We'll come back tonight and see the other ways that God has testified to his Son. But I want to finish by saying that we have a testimony of judgment, a testimony of authority, a testimony of forgiveness. The way is now open to God and the way is Jesus. And I want to ask you, have you believed God's testimony? Our testimony is simply the verbal expression of God's testimony. We have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our sins have been forgiven. We have been reconciled with God. We have been made new creatures in Christ Jesus. And by believing in the testimony of God given to us in the Scripture, what do we do? We go to the world. with the only message that brings salvation, the only one that is the Savior, the only way that one can be saved by God, and that is faith. We are not saved by works, we are saved by faith, only by faith, just faith, just faith, in Jesus, as the Savior. You don't make him Lord. You simply see him for who he is. What takes us to the nature of saving faith is not only something intellectual. You can intellectually agree with the facts of the gospel and be in hell one day. The question is, have you believed in such a way that your eyes have been opened, that you see yourself as the sinner that you are, and you understand what you deserve as the result of your sin, and you know that you can't save yourself, because you can't fix that problem. If you try to solve your sin problem, you will die if you seek the solution in yourself. God has supplied the solution. So the saving faith is to take the word of God, the testimony of God, and have a supernatural response because it's God's supernatural work in us. It's a regeneration response, the result of the new birth. It's God giving you eyes to see and ears to hear. God giving you love for your son that you didn't know before you embraced your son, his son. so that you will move away from your life of sin and embrace your new life in Christ. You are willing to leave everything you ever trusted before to trust only in Jesus Christ. Salvation is only by grace, yes, only by faith, yes, but it is in Christ only that leads us to genuine faith. Jesus is the Lord. This is the faith and the trust and the confession of the Christian. Jesus is Lord. The question is, Jesus is your Lord. You can't divide his person. You can't receive his saving work and not receive his authority. You can't use Jesus as a ticket to heaven and reuse his yoke. Deseándose reconciliado con Dios, te has vuelto de tu pecado y abrazado al Hijo de Dios por quien Él es, de tal manera que Él toma tu vida. He gives you a new life. And now you say to the apostle Paul, because for me, to live is Christ. To live is Christ. And to die is gain. To live is Christ. What is your life? To live as Christ. What is the priority of your life? To live as Christ. standard for your life, to live, is Christ. What you're aiming for in your life, to live, is Christ. And if you can say, well, to live is Christ, and you can finish the sentence, and die, is what? Is gain. For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. The one who is sovereign over your life, and over your death, is the one who sovereignly gave up his spirit in the hands of his Father and died in your place, taking the judgment your sins deserved upon themselves. The veil, so to speak, the very presence of God was torn, so that when you look to Jesus, you are saved forever. You have placed your trust in the Son of God, and if you have not done so, I exhort you along with every believer in this room, I exhort you to place your faith in the Son of God today. And this is the wonder, we do not just deliver the good news. We pray for you to receive the Good News. We pray for you to receive it. We care about where you will be for all eternity. And without Christ you will die, but with Christ you will live forever. So the good news is Jesus, and we pray that you reconcile with God when you see Jesus. Amen. Let's pray together, Heavenly Father. Thank you for your testimony about your Son. Thank you for bringing us to the place of believing in Him. That is your work in every believer here. You have given us eyes to see, a heart to believe, a heart of flesh and not of stone. You have given us repentance and faith. You have made us your people, and now you have entrusted to us the word of reconciliation. This is the way in which men and women reconcile with you. I pray that you would grant us with that confidence that we have the truth. The boldness that we need to tell the world around us that the only one who can save is Jesus Christ and tell them at the same time that when they receive him they receive a new life and as a result they receive a new standard of authority. We do not live our lives according to this world, according to the point of view of this world, but according to Scripture. You sanctify your people in the truth, and your word is the truth. So, Lord, you've made us a people of the book, and I ask you to fill us with the boldness we need to declare the truth as it is in Christ Jesus and found in Scripture. This is your church, the pillar, and the pillar of truth in this world. We ask for this in the name of Jesus. Amen. See the destined day arise. See a willing sacrifice. Jesus, to redeem our loss, hangs upon the shackled cross. Jesus, who but you could bear, wrestled great and just to spare. ♪ Every pain and bitter toll ♪ Finishing your life of old ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ Lamb of God, for sin's sake ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ Jesus Christ ♪ True but Christ had dared to dread ♪ ♪ Steeped in blood a cup of death ♪ ♪ And with tender body bare ♪ ♪ Thorns and nails and piercing stare ♪ ♪ Slain for us the water flowed ♪ ♪ Mingled from your side with blood ♪ ♪ Sign to all the testifying ♪ ♪ Of the great sacrifice ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Lamb of God, for sin is slain ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah, Jesus Christ is born ♪ Holy Jesus, grant us grace in that sacrifice to grace. All our trust, the life we knew. Pardon, save, and promise true. Lent us grace to sing your praise. ♪ Round your throne through endless days ♪ ♪ Ever with the sons of God ♪ ♪ Blessing, honor, glory, might ♪ ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah ♪ ♪ Lamb of God, for sinners slain ♪ Hallelujah, hallelujah, Jesus Christ, we praise your name. Hallelujah, hallelujah, Lamb of God for sinners slain. Hallelujah, hallelujah, Jesus Christ, we praise your name. The author of Hebrews writes, chapter 13, verse 20, says, now may the God of peace Hebrews 13 says that the God of peace resurrected the dead to Jesus Christ. May you do His will by working in us what pleases Him for Jesus Christ. May it be glory forever. Amen. You may go in His peace.