Greatest Death of All (Part A)

There they were staring at God on the cross.

Again, John's Gospel, chapter 12, verse 45 this time. And he who sees me, sees him who sent me. They were looking at God.

That is the manifestation of God. There certainly was more to God than what they were looking at, but God nonetheless, God the Son. And they didn't get it. They didn't want to get it. And there are those today that they don't want the Gospel to be true.

It's hard to believe. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 15, as he begins a new study called The Greatest Death of All. We are in the Gospel according to Mark, chapter 15, verses 33 through 41, the Gospel according to Mark, chapter 15, beginning at verse 33. Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani, which is translated, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Some of those who stood by when they heard that said, look, he is calling Elijah. Then someone ran and filled a sponge full of sour wine, put it on a reed and offered it to him to drink, saying, let him alone.

Let us see if Elijah will come to take him down. And Jesus cried out with a loud voice and breathed his last. Then the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, so when the centurion who stood opposite him saw that he cried out with his breath his last, he said, truly, this man was the Son of God.

There were also women looking on from afar, among whom were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the less, and Josie's, and Salome, who also followed him and ministered to him when he was in Galilee, and many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem. The greatest death of all is what we're considering. We only have four Gospels that give us the story of what happened. The others that have attempted to be Gospels flunked because of the test of truth, the integrity being absent, so we do not recognize other writings except the 27 New Testament writings we have for the New Testament and, of course, the 39 for the Old. Prior to verse 33, as Christ has been crucified and he is there on the cross, they mocked him as a prophet, as a savior, and as the king, and they had no idea, those who were against him, who he was, who they were looking at, who they were abusing. We all die, but none of us die like this. None of us die as the Christ died, and that's what we're going to consider, because of all the deaths of people, this is the greatest death of them all. Verse 33, now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. Well, in verse 32, they were asking him for a miracle, show us a miracle that we can be impressed and still not believe you. Jesus said this was the case in John's Gospel, who John records this earlier in earlier events. Jesus said, but although, John writes, but although he had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in him.

The very thing the prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 53, who has believed our report? And this is what we're up against as believers. This is what we are here to deal with as believers.

We are to deal with unbelief, not only in others, but in ourselves too, and not dismiss it. There they were staring at God on the cross. Again, John's Gospel, chapter 12, verse 45 this time, and he who sees me, sees him who sent me. They were looking at God. That is the manifestation of God. There certainly was more to God than what they were looking at, but God nonetheless, God the Son. And they didn't get it, they didn't want to get it, and there are those today that they don't want the Gospel to be true.

It's hard to believe. I remind you, if you are a Christian who is eager to share the Gospel, many times you have to do as Nehemiah had to do, remove the rubbish before you can start building. And the work of removing all of the trash and junk and clutter that's in the way, the ruins that are in the way, can be nearly overwhelming at times. In fact, it was almost that way in the days of Nehemiah. Be prepared for that.

Don't be discouraged by it. It says here now, when the sixth hour had come, noontime, halfway through the six hours on the cross that he would spend, there was darkness over the whole land, it tells us. This is a supernatural darkness, and it had to have been disturbing to the people that were witnessing this. How would you record that?

How could you capture how disturbing it was if you weren't there? Words don't do it justice, we would say. This time of darkness while he is on the cross parallels the cosmic signs that will accompany our Lord when he returns. And we read about that in chapter 13, that there would be these supernatural events as he returns. Darkness is a mark of judgment in the Scripture. Isaiah spoke of it, Joel spoke of it, Amos, Zephaniah, the New Testament speaks of it, and it is also the meaning here. It is divine judgment that is falling upon the Son of God for us, for sinners, the one whom we love so much.

Peter writes in his second letter, for if God did not spare the angels who sinned but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness to be reserved for judgment. Point is, this is very serious. We are not to just pass over this lightly. This is something that helps us stay in touch with what's going on so that we don't become those who have heard the gospel story so much it really doesn't move us anymore.

It's a risk, that's how human beings are made. Darkness, this darkness that they were experiencing, it was the darkness that you could feel. Darkness can be felt, the Bible teaches. Exodus chapter 10, this of course is when the Jews were still in Egypt and Moses was dealing with Pharaoh to get the Jews out of Egypt and the plagues were slamming into the Egyptian people because of the hard-heartedness of Pharaoh. Then the Lord said to Moses, stretch out your hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, darkness which may even be felt.

This is pretty serious. Darkness can be overwhelming, it overwhelmed Abraham, Genesis chapter 15. Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abraham.

And behold, horror and great darkness fell on him. Here's the Holy Spirit keeping the moment alive for us thousands of years later. Two thousand years later, here we are reading and he is saying to us, darkness fell on the land as your Savior hung on the cross. The work of creation was done in the light. God said in Genesis chapter 1 verse 3, then God said, let there be light. And then he began to create and the story goes on, the six days of creation. Well, the work of creation was done in the light, but the work of redemption is now being done in the dark. All creation sympathizing with the Creator as he suffered. Because as we'll get to, the earthquake, the rocks split, the darkness was present, the temple veil was torn, there was a lot of spiritual activity taking place around these events. And they would have been wasted had not somebody witnessed it and recorded it. And these recordings are not to be wasted by us.

I do believe that all the Bible is there for us to study, to investigate, to learn from, to grow from, to use is what I'm saying. This darkness is not an eclipse, it is a miracle. A lunar eclipse would not happen on a full moon and the Passover came at a full moon.

Not a solar eclipse because this lasted for three hours, not for a few minutes. This was a divine act of God. They had asked for a miracle, here it was. And they weren't getting it because unbelief is serious stuff.

Maybe you're sitting, maybe, you know, well let me put it this way. How many people, how many children are in good churches across the planet, and there are churches, there is God's remnant at the very least, and they're just, they're not moved by the things of God. Their unbelief won't let them listen to what is being said and apply it to their lives so that they could learn to grow and live their lives, pursue their future, but not without holiness or the pursuit of and the struggles that come with it. If anyone tells you that the Christian life is this beautifully, wonderfully peaceful thing, they don't know what they're talking about. The Christian life is full of conflict.

And it is conflict on multiple levels, inner and outer. There are those that we want to see saved once we have the knowledge of our Savior, but they don't get saved oftentimes, at least not very easily, and the war is on. So I'm speaking to you younger Christians. Would you rather me lie to you and tell you it's okay to dismiss the things of God? It's okay for you to come to church and wander in your mind about other things and not listen to what God might be saying to you personally? Do you think it's okay to be born in a place where you are being exposed to spiritual truths and you don't appreciate them?

I don't think that's okay, and I know you would not either. And I'm not saying this to make you feel bad. I'm saying this to stir you up and keep you stirred. Back to this darkness, God saying something to mankind through this, the ninth plague in Egypt, as I already read about. God brought three days of darkness, darkness that you could feel on the Egyptians.

That was the last plague. Well, next to the last plague, followed by, of course, the death of the firstborn, which we are seeing here, the only begotten Son of the Father. The Lamb of God was giving his life for the sins of the world. He's giving his life for my sin.

He's giving his life for me. Not only me, not only my sin, but it is for me. It is personal.

It is supposed to be personal. When you preach Christ, do you preach about what other people believe? Or do you preach about what you believe? Hopefully, it's what you believe. My thought is, in sharing the Gospel, the people that are listening to the Gospel being shared are responding to your level of excitement, enthusiasm, your belief. How would it be if you said, Yeah, Jesus is my Savior, and you know it would be good if you got saved, too.

Anyway, what's for lunch? But if you say to the Lord, He is my Savior, and I love Him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength, and I hate when I fail Him, but I love that He does not toss me away when I fail, and I fail a lot. And I want this God to be your God. I want this Savior to be your Savior. I want your sins dealt with as He has dealt with my sins. Not only has God passed over my sins, but He's willed them out of His existence. That's some serious stuff. Well, you put it like that.

We even have a phrase, and I just use it. Well, when you say it like that, because people do respond to people, otherwise the Gospel would be, you couldn't preach it with any degree of success. This darkness was a sign and a warning that judgment was coming, and men better be ready to receive the blessings or receive the curse. Josephus, the Jewish historian who lived in these days, he says that the lambs were killed from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. 3 p.m. is when Christ, of course, gave up the spirit. Darkness lasted for the three hours beginning at noon until three, the time of the evening sacrifice. Also, the Jews prayed three times a day. In Daniel 6, we read, and he knelt down on his knees three times that day and prayed, and was told as it was his custom. Peter, the apostle, we find him and John going into the temple in Acts chapter 3 at 3 p.m. for the hour of prayer, Acts chapter 3 verse 1. Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour or 3 p.m. using a different standard, using the Gentile standard rather than the Jewish time, and that would account for the discrepancy of the ninth hour versus the sixth hour, when you come across them in different times in the scriptures. No contradiction. I think I've confused everybody sufficiently there.

We can move on now. We find incidentally Peter in the book of Acts praying at some point at each interval of prayer. In Acts chapter 2, he's praying in the morning, 9 a.m. in the morning. In Acts chapter 9, it's at 12 noon, and as I just read in Acts chapter 3, it is 3 p.m. Those things mean something to us.

They're supposed to. Verse 34, And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, Eloi lama sabachthani, which is translated by God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Now it's between him and his father. Really, the first three hours of the cross was about Christ and the people around him, and the last three hours, when that darkness fell, it intensified, and it became more about the Lord and his father. And Jesus here is calling to the father from darkness. Prayer at the time of prayer, when it was dark.

We know about that, don't we? We know about, if you've been a Christian any length of time, when times are very, when they're at their darkest, praying to God, asking, What are you doing? Why are you leaving me? Why are you not with me?

Why do I feel like you have abandoned me? Here is Christ, he never sinned, and yet he has made sin, according to 2 Corinthians chapter 5, the ultimate horror that he is experiencing, that we cannot understand this in its entirety. We can just accept what's on the surface about it, but we really cannot enter into this.

This is beyond us. When he says, Eloi lama sabachthani, that is the Aramaic language, which was the vernacular of the people at that time. He's speaking in the common language, but he's still quoting scripture.

And what a lesson to us. Christ is saying, Here I am on the cross, dying for the sins of others. I'm innocent, they're guilty, I'm taking their sin. The Father has left me to feel that he has abandoned me, because the sin is on me. And yet he's still quoting scripture. He's still praying. He may feel that God has abandoned him, that's what he is expressing, and yet he is not abandoning God. Job said it very simply, Though he slay me, I will trust in him. Psalm 22 is what he is quoting, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from helping me, and from the words of my groanings? So the psalmist knew what it was like to feel that God had turned his back on him. And instead of turning, you know, being bitter and vengeful, and turning his back on God, which would be foolish as the Proverbs teach, who has hardened themselves against God and prospered?

The answer, of course, is no one. Instead of turning his back on God, he throws out more faith. As we say, he doubles down. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from helping me, and yet I'm still calling to you? It's what the righteous do. We can't live without prayer.

As frustrated as we might be with having to wait for God's processes to unfold, we cannot live without prayer, because we cannot live without God, because we have seen God in our spirit and our heart. Mark has been connecting these messianic prophecies and showing their fulfillment in Jesus' Messiah, the others too, but Mark is doing that here, when he is recording for us that Christ is quoting scripture from the cross as he is dying. These are the last recorded words of our Lord in Mark's gospel.

The others give us more. So let's review the seven statements of Christ from the cross in sequence, as compiled in the gospels. There was the first word from the cross, and this was concerning those who had nailed him to the cross. Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.

We're going to see that come back into the story. Then he said, Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise. Of course, he's saying that to one of the two outlaws who had asked to be with him, who had repented while dying on the cross, a deathbed confession.

God not only honors those, he values them. The worldling would say, What do you mean? You live a whole life and then at your deathbed you get to have it all washed away? That's not fair. Well, that's the easy response to that.

Are you kidding me? What's fair about God getting you in heaven? I mean, you want to talk fairness, you need to go to hell.

But we're not talking fairness, we're talking love. We're talking the grace and mercy of God. We're talking about a God who understands what's going on and wants you to get it too.

And if you don't get it, he'll move forward without you. There are some very serious things that belong to interacting with God. There are some very serious things that belong to being born. And this is the gospel story. The third word from the cross is Christ on behalf of Mary, his mother, to John, his disciple. Woman, behold your son. And then he said to John, Behold your mother.

And from that day forward, she began to live in the house of John. He was looking out for her and he's preaching to us. Even though I'm dying, there's still things to do. There's still work. There's still this care for others who are not at the moment dying.

He's not making it all about him when he could. And then the fourth word from the cross, which now takes it away from the interaction so much with the humans, is now he's dealing more with the Father. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? That's the fourth word from the cross. And then there was the last word of his humanity.

I thirst. And then he said, It is finished. It's done.

It's complete. And the last word from the cross, the seventh one, is Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. He gave up the spirit. So again, the first three hours, he agonized before men. And the last three hours, in darkness, he agonized before God his Father. There are lessons all over this for us when we go through darkness in this life, and we are going to face darkness from time to time in this life. Of course, of course, the bottom line is there is a resurrection of the righteous. There is a resurrection of those made just because of what Jesus did. John, Mark, he translates this Aramaic word into the Greek, which we have translated now into the English, unless maybe you're reading a Bible in a different language, which is quite possible. He says, Which is translated, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

This was important to get into the Scripture. Peter, he's going to feel this way. All of them felt this way. They didn't know what happened. It's just a short while ago, they were there dining with him, and it hadn't even been 24 hours yet.

It was just washing their feet. Suddenly, he's on the cross. And all their whole life changed, just like that. He now felt that darkness of being unloved by the one he loved. He felt what it was like to be a sinner without hope.

He was taking it all for us. One of our greatest needs as people, as human beings, is to feel loved by the one we love. God Himself seeks our love. The Bible is about loving God, loving each other. We can live without love, but we cannot live well without love. And those who are not being loved, they can become quite a problem in life or others. You know, just the indecent people becoming savage. Love is a big deal, and where it is absent, there is trouble in its place.

It becomes Satan's playground. And as you're growing up in life, you don't know these things yet, and you have to learn them. And this would account for sometimes our youth being just absolute knuckleheads in their youth. They've not yet figured these things out.

But give them some time and some instruction and love and patience. And that's ministry. This is how it is done. You don't have to like it or approve of it. It's how it is done. You do have to face it. And, you know, the feeling of wanting to retaliate against somebody, it's a natural feeling. It's just not a spiritual feeling.

It's the flesh. And we Christians, we know when we get like that, we're wrong and we work. We scramble to fix it because we believe it's worth it, because we believe Christ is worth it. Thanks for tuning in to Cross Reference Radio for this study in the Book of Mark. Cross Reference Radio is the teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia. To learn more information about this ministry, visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com. Once you're there, you'll find additional teachings from Pastor Rick. We encourage you to subscribe to our podcast. When you subscribe, you'll be notified of each new edition of Cross Reference Radio. You can search for Cross Reference Radio on your favorite podcast app. That's all we have time for today, but we hope you'll join us next time as Pastor Rick continues to teach through the Book of Mark, right here on Cross Reference Radio.