[0:00] We'll be looking at a number of verses with one another this morning as we just continue our mini-series on Behold the Lamb. I'm going to read once again from Isaiah 53, but then I will ask you to go ahead and begin marking.
[0:16] Turn to Matthew chapter 26. You go ahead, we're going to start in verse 57 in just a moment, but I want you to listen with me, if you will, again to Isaiah 53 because it is so applicable to our text, it is so applicable to the season that we are in.
[0:32] We also want to be mindful as we get together this morning around the word of God that we have some that are recovering from surgery, some that are in rehab.
[0:42] Ms. Sarah Reynolds wanted me to extend a heartfelt appreciation to you for your prayers and your concerns as she continues to rehab, but we also have some that are on the mission field. Robert and Robert, I know, very busy already on the mission field sharing the gospel.
[0:55] We want to continue to be in prayer for those, and we have others that are anticipating going to the mission field. So we have a lot that is going on around us, but we also have the grand opportunity and the grand privilege of opening up the word of God with one another this morning.
[1:09] Isaiah 53, Isaiah writes this as God leads him to look down through the portals of history. It is not our text this morning, but it is the background to our text because I believe we always want to see these things in light of their proper context.
[1:25] Isaiah writes, He says,
[2:55] We are going to stop right there in verse 10.
[3:12] Now, if you are physically able and desire to do so, would you join with me as we stand together? There is going to be a number of verses found in Matthew 26 and Matthew 27. I'll give you the verses as we move through them, okay?
[3:26] We are going to start in the 26th chapter, starting in verse 57. This picks up right where we left off last week. Those who had seized Jesus led him away to Caiaphas, the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were gathered together.
[3:41] But Peter was following him in a distance as far as the courtyard of the high priest and entered in and sat down with the officers to see the outcome. Now, the chief priest and the whole council kept trying to obtain false testimony against Jesus so that they might put him to death.
[3:56] They did not find any, even though many false witnesses came forward. But later on, two came forward and said, This man stated, I am able to destroy the temple of God and to rebuild it in three days. The high priest stood up and said to him, Do you not answer?
[4:09] What is it that these men are crucifying against you? But Jesus kept silent. And the high priest said to him, I adjure you by the living God that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God.
[4:22] And Jesus said to him, You have said it yourself. Nevertheless, I tell you hereafter, you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his robes and said, He has blasphemed.
[4:36] What further need do we have of witnesses? Behold, you have now heard the blasphemy. What do you think? They answered, He deserves death. Then they spat in his face and beat him with their fist.
[4:48] And others slapped him and said, Prophesy to us, you Christ, who is the one who hit you? Go down with me to chapter 27, verses 1 and 2. Now when morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people conferred together against Jesus to put him to death.
[5:04] And they bound him and led him away and delivered him to Pilate the governor. Go down to verse 11. Now Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor questioned him, saying, Are you the king of the Jews?
[5:17] And Jesus said to him, It is as you say. And while he was being accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, Do you not hear how many things they testify against you?
[5:27] And he did not answer him with regard to even a single charge. So the governor was quite amazed. Now at the feast, the governor was accustomed to release for the people any one prisoner whom they wanted. And at that time, they were holding a notorious prisoner called Barabbas.
[5:40] So when the people gathered together, Pilate said to them, Whom do you want me to release for you, Barabbas or Jesus, who is called Christ? For he knew that because of envy they had handed him over.
[5:51] And while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent him a message saying, Have nothing to do with that righteous man. For last night I suffered greatly in a dream because of him. But the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to put Jesus to death.
[6:04] But the governor said to him, Which of the two do you want me to release for you? And they said, Barabbas. Pilate said to them, Then what shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ? They all said, Crucify him.
[6:16] And he said, Why? What evil has he done? But they kept shouting all the more, saying, Crucify him. And when Pilate saw that he was accomplishing nothing but rather that a riot was starting, behold, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd, saying, I am innocent of this man's blood.
[6:32] See to that yourselves. And all the people said, His blood shall be on us and on our children. Then he released Barabbas for them. But after having Jesus scourged, he handed him over to be crucified.
[6:44] Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium and gathered the whole Roman cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him.
[6:55] And after twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head. And with a reed in his right hand, they knelt down before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews.
[7:08] They sped on him and took the reed and began to beat him on the head. And after they had mocked him, they took the scarlet robe off him and put his own garments back on him and led him away to crucify him.
[7:19] As they were coming out, they found a man of serene named Simon, whom they pressed into service to bear his cross. And when they came to the place called Golgotha, which means place of a skull, they gave him wine to drink mixed with gall.
[7:33] And after tasting it, he was unwilling to drink. And when they had crucified him, they divided up his garments among themselves by casting lots and sitting down, they began to keep watch over him there. And above his head, they put the charge against him, which read, This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.
[7:48] At that time, two robbers were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left. And those passing by were hurling abuse at him, wagging their heads and saying, You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself.
[8:01] If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross. In the same way, the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him and saying, He saved others, He cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel.
[8:12] Let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe in him. He trusts in God. Let God rescue him now, if he delights in him. For he said, I am the Son of God.
[8:22] The robbers who had been crucified with him were also insulting him with the same words. Now from the sixth hour, darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour. About the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, that is, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
[8:41] And some of those who were standing there, when they heard it, began saying, This man is calling for Elijah. Immediately, one of them ran and taking a sponge, he filled it with sour wine and put it on a reed and gave him a drink.
[8:53] And the rest of them said, Let us see whether Elijah will come to save him. And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit. And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, and the earth shook and the rocks were split, and the tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised.
[9:10] And coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many. Last verse. Now the centurion and those who were with him, keeping guard over Jesus, when they saw the earthquake and the things that were happening, became very frightened and said, Truly, this was the Son of God.
[9:26] Let's pray. God, I thank you so much for this day. God, I thank you for your word. And pray, God, that your word would speak to our hearts, it would speak to our minds, and it would bypass any distraction or any hindrance to it.
[9:40] And we ask it all in Christ's name. Amen. You may be seated. So thankful for your patience. I know that was a number of verses, but I believe the amount of verses is necessary that we may understand exactly what it is.
[9:53] I believe we should look at this morning. As last week, when we began to look at our series of Behold the Lamb, there are so many other aspects that are going on at the same time.
[10:04] There are things that are transpiring in unison with the events which we have read, but these are things of which we are not going to concern ourselves with today. Just as when we saw Jesus' surrender, we noticed that during his surrender, he was silent.
[10:19] There was a lot going on. There was a lot going on around the table of the Last Supper in the upper room. There was a lot going on in the Garden of Gethsemane. There was a lot going on with each individual there, but we made it our aim and our focus and our ambition to look at the Lamb alone.
[10:35] This is the Lamb. This is the man whom John the Baptist pointed to and said, Behold the Lamb, the Lamb of God, which will take away the sin of the world.
[10:45] And then the second time he saw him the very next day, he said, Behold the Lamb. And they left and followed him. This is the Lamb that we meet in the book of Revelations. That is the Lamb that was slain before the foundation of the world.
[10:58] The Lamb that was slain yet lives. This is the Lamb that has the power to open up the scroll. This is the Lamb that has the one and is deserving of all worship and all adoration. And this is the one we want to focus on.
[11:10] Surely we can find great many applications in the account of Peter and his denial. We can find application in Judas' mournful, being upset, his mournfulness, yet not repenting.
[11:21] We can find so much going on with the two criminals that are also crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. But our focus and our desire this morning is to see the Lamb and the Lamb alone.
[11:31] And as we have seen the Lamb's surrender this morning, I want you to see the Lamb's suffering. We're going somewhere with this, by the way. Today is the day of suffering.
[11:43] Oh, next week's the good week, right? I'm not going to give it to you. I told my wife as we were going along, I said, I can't wait to get to the sunrise service and into the regular service, because today we focus on suffering.
[11:57] Next week we focus on his success and his salvation. But this morning we must focus on the Lamb's suffering. As Isaiah had prophesied in Isaiah 53, Jesus was silenced and he willingly surrendered himself as the Lamb of God.
[12:16] It was a willing surrender. If you remember last week when we were gathered together, we were so moved by the reality that no one had the authority to accomplish anything but with the permissive will of Jesus himself.
[12:28] It was in the garden where they came out with so much authority and so much power and so much display of ability that it could not take Jesus until it said, I told you that I'm him, take me. We have seen that everything laid within his control, that he had the ability and even the authority to call so much to his aid and could have at any moment relieved himself of the suffering that was awaiting him, yet he did not.
[12:53] Yet what we have found is now that we move from this time of surrender, we will inevitably see the suffering. And there's a number of things that I want you to understand about this suffering. Number one, this is an ordained suffering.
[13:06] This suffering of the Lamb was ordained. When Isaiah is moved to pen his book, I love the book of Isaiah not only because of all of its application, but I love the book of Isaiah because he doesn't just speak of the suffering servant, though there are the suffering servant passages found there in Isaiah 53 and following for the next few chapters.
[13:30] What Isaiah is prophesying to is the coming king, right? Isaiah is the prophet of the coming king, and before we get to the coming king, we have to see the suffering servant. And Isaiah is always pointing on the other side of the cross.
[13:43] Yet as we see in the book of Isaiah, this suffering is something that was foretold well in advance. As a matter of fact, we can go all the way back to the Garden of Eden, and we can see in this what we call the proto-evangelium, the very first mentioning of the gospel, that the seed of a woman would crush the head of the Satan, but that Satan would bruise the heel of the seed of a woman.
[14:04] We have seen all throughout the Old Testament that this suffering was an ordained event. But yet we are not just captivated by what it says in the Old Testament. We are captivated by the reality of what Jesus himself says in the writings of the New Testament.
[14:20] If you were just to go to Matthew chapter 16, Matthew 16 is a great passage, by the way, because in Matthew 16, we have the first mentioning of the church, right? In Matthew 16, we have the profession of Peter when Jesus asked the question, who do man say that I am?
[14:35] And they gave all the answers. And then he takes it even further and says, but who do you say that I am? And Peter gives the great confession. It says, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. And upon this confession, Jesus says, I will build my church.
[14:46] And he begins speaking of the church and the church that will be on the offensive, the church that would take the message to the world, that would push back the gates of hell and darkness. And then in the midst of that passage, in the 21st verse and following, Matthew 16, 21 and following, it says, from that moment on, that is, from the moment that they understood correctly who Jesus Christ was, he began to tell them of his suffering.
[15:11] Because the suffering is really astounding only in light of the reality of who he is. If he is just another man, the suffering means little. But since we know who he is, he is the son of God, his suffering takes on a brand new measure.
[15:25] And it says, from that moment on, he began to declare to them that he would be handed over. Now, if you go to Matthew 16, 21, what Jesus declares is that he will be handed over to a very peculiar group of people, the religious leaders, the elders and the scribes, and that he would suffer at the hands of many.
[15:44] And then when we come to our passage in Matthew 26, we are told that the crowd that gathers him up in the Garden of Gethsemane and carries him to the locale, that they bring him to the religious leaders, the elders and the scribes.
[16:00] That is, the very people whom Jesus had said he would suffer at the hands of, he is now present before. And we see that Jesus is now here to the place that he has declared.
[16:11] Now, we are reminded of this because when we stop for just a moment and we understand the suffering which he endures, we need to comprehend the reality that this suffering is ordained of God.
[16:23] That is, no one has the authority over Christ at any moment during these events. I mean, we just need to settle that matter. No one is stronger than him. No one is greater than him.
[16:35] No one is mightier than him. No one can overcome him. Friend, listen to me. If death, hell, and the grave could not hold him, how could the ropes that they have tied him with bind him? No one has authority over him.
[16:49] Yet in his surrender, he submitted to the ordained suffering. As Isaiah says, God was pleased to lay upon him our chastisement.
[17:02] Not pleased that he would suffer, but the outcome of that suffering would be pleasing in the sight of God. This was something that followed well within the realms of Almighty God.
[17:16] The suffering that comes upon him is ordained and appointed by the Lord God Almighty. We need to grasp that.
[17:27] We need to understand that. Because until we understand that, the second point doesn't matter. This was ordained. Number two, this was our suffering.
[17:41] This was our suffering. When we read the text, we see the mocking, the ridiculing, the spitting upon, the being slapped in the face.
[17:55] It tells us in other Isaiah passages that he is beaten beyond recognition, that the hair of his face is plucked out, the stripes upon his back, the nails in his hands and feet, the crown of thorns that is placed upon his head.
[18:13] All of these things, all this mocking and this ridicule and this pain and this misery, this is ours. This is ours. Isaiah rightly declares that our misery was laid upon him.
[18:31] Our suffering was laid upon him. Our pain was laid upon him. We are reminded all throughout Scripture that Jesus is sinless and therefore has no payment to pay for his own sins.
[18:46] But Paul declares in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, Paul makes this great declaration in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 21, that God made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf.
[19:01] That is, he laid our sin upon him. Everything that is being done is what we deserve. We have a way of painting ourselves as better than we are.
[19:15] We have a way of seeing things in a brighter light. We have a way of seeing things as not being as bad as what the Bible declares them to be because we compare ourselves to everyone else.
[19:27] But he who knew no sin bore our sin. The perfect, sinless, matchless one of all of eternity took upon himself our suffering, our pain, our misery, everything which we deserve for the wages of sin is death, right?
[19:42] But the punishment of sin is deserving. God is a holy and righteous and just God. Is he loving? Yes. But his love never overrules his righteousness, right?
[19:53] Being loving, he is a God who loves us so much that he bore the pain and misery of our suffering. Being righteous, he declares that there must be a penalty paid for the wrong that has been done.
[20:04] And all of us have wandered away. Everyone has fallen short of the glory of God. Every man has fallen short and walked in sin. We understand that. So the suffering which Christ endures is our suffering.
[20:15] It's not his. I know you know that. I know you've heard that. We understand that. But oh, how mindful it is to captivate that. This is our suffering. What does Isaiah say?
[20:28] The pain needed for our well-being. I love the New American Standard says our well-being. What was needed for our well-being. The word well-being literally can be translated from the Hebrew language to peace.
[20:39] That is, the misery that must be endured that was required for our peace fell upon him. Because none of us could ever suffer.
[20:50] The book of Proverbs says that no man can pay for his own sins let alone the sins of his brother. No man could bear the penalty of sin. No man could bear that price and endure and live and all these things.
[21:03] But we know that our suffering, our pain fell upon his shoulders, upon his back, upon his being. We understand this. And we know it because we're told there that during the crucifixion, I know these messages are a little bit different because we don't take as much time to go through each passage.
[21:23] But it tells us there that when Jesus is on the cross that darkness fell upon the land from the sixth hour until about the ninth hour. Scientists have tried to explain it away.
[21:34] People have tried to tell you how it happened. I don't believe that we're looking at anything other than a supernatural darkness. This is a darkness that can be felt, that fell upon the land.
[21:47] Henry Morris reminds us that there's no gospel record, no account whatsoever of anything being said or done during that time of darkness. It's just dark. But we know that it is at that moment that the weight of the sins of the world rests upon the Son of God who hangs on the cross.
[22:03] And then it says at the ninth hour. Now the ninth hour ought to pique your interest a little bit because the ninth hour means something to the Jewish people. Right? The ninth hour is the hour of prayer. It was at the ninth hour where on the showdown on Mount Carmel, Elijah builds the altar and calls out to God at the ninth hour and God answers at that hour of prayer.
[22:22] It's at the ninth hour where Peter and John were going up to the temple for it was the hour of prayer and they met the man begging for alms and they said we can't give you alms but we can give you arms. You remember that man? Right? The man that could stand up and walk and leap and enjoy all those other things.
[22:34] It was at the ninth hour and you see all these people whose prayers are heard at the time of prayer and scripture is rapid with people praying at the ninth hour and their prayers are heard and yet we see the Son of God praying at the ninth hour and we have no answer.
[22:49] My God, my God why have you forsaken me? And there's no answer because this is our suffering.
[23:01] The weight of our sin resting upon him and the holy God turning his face from him and not looking upon our misery. It wasn't Jesus that was offensive to God.
[23:12] It's our sin that's offensive to holy God. And it's that darkness of our sin and the darkness of our misery and the darkness of our pain and the darkness of our rebellion and he bears that.
[23:26] May it not ever be lost upon you my friend that he whom they put the crown of thorns and pressed it into his brow will one day be the one that everybody throws their crowns at his feet.
[23:38] The one who bore the crown of thorns will someday be the one who has the crowns of many thrown at his feet in praise and worship and adoration. This is him bearing our sin.
[23:52] Third, the suffering was observed. When we look at the Lamb of God, there's so much about Jesus that we don't know.
[24:06] As a matter of fact, we don't know the first 30 years of his life other than he grew in wisdom and saturn with favor and God and man. That's all we know. We know a lot about his birth. We know a lot about the advent.
[24:17] We know about his temple presentation. We know about him when he's about 12 years old hanging out and teaching at the temple. We don't know anything else until about age 30. The scripture says when he was about 30.
[24:28] So we know a little bit about his three and a half years of public ministry. But even there, we're very limited in scope of three and a half years of public ministry. John says in his gospel, near the end of his gospel, that if books were written that accounted and recorded every miraculous deed which Jesus did while walking the face of the earth, John testifies that he didn't think the world could contain the books.
[24:50] So that's so much, that's how much we don't know about Jesus, right? But John says, but these have been written so that you may know and believe. So John had chosen what should be seven testimonial signs in the gospel of John.
[25:01] But he said that there's so much that are recorded there that the world couldn't contain it. But there's so much we don't know. But the one thing that we know a lot about when it comes to the Lamb of God is that last Passion Week in that time of suffering, right?
[25:17] Now the silence of the garden has been transferred to the busyness and the crowdedness of the city. This was Passover time where the crowds would have came in large droves.
[25:27] Every Jewish male would have been required to go back to Jerusalem to observe the Passover. All the people would have been there. The crowds had been thrown in. I've read, and you'll have to forgive me because I can't remember the estimation of the number of people that were probably there well beyond.
[25:42] I mean, almost ten times the capacity of the city. People there, people living on top of one another. And now Jesus has been brought in. And we see every bit of his suffering is an observed suffering.
[25:52] That is, it's not done in silence or secrecy or over here behind the door. It's put on very, very public display. As a matter of fact, the very first encounter we have of his suffering is he is standing before the religious leaders, the elders, and the scribes.
[26:07] They had this mockery of a trial. There's this blasphemy that's being declared. And then we have to go to Mark to see the fact that they blindfold him. And after blindfolding him, they take time striking him in the face. As this crowd is around him and they're beating him in a very public fashion, we know that there are also other people there because Peter's out in the courtyard and he is observing this that is going on.
[26:27] We know that there's a multitude of people watching this mockery that is going on as they say to him, prophesy to us who hit you. Prophesy to us who hit you. And they sped up on his face and they did it in a very public fashion.
[26:38] The next morning, they take him before the Sanhedrin, but not the whole Sanhedrin because Nicodemus wasn't there, but still a multitude of people. Again, another mockery of trial where they say that he is condemned to death.
[26:49] After condemning him to death very publicly, now they bring him. By the way, they had to do it the next morning because it was illegal for Jewish trials to take place at night. So everything that had taken place the night before was an illegal activity.
[27:01] It didn't matter. It was still public. So they do it the next morning. They wait till the sun comes up to make it done right. And so then they bring him to Pilate. Pilate stands with him before a raging crowd. This crowd of people that is around him as Pilate sits there and goes, I don't see anything wrong with him.
[27:14] Don't miss the question that Pilate asked the crowd. Why? What wrong has this man done? Notice, there's no answer. The reason is because the answer to the question is nothing.
[27:24] He's done nothing wrong. Yet he's standing before this crowd and they're saying, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him. The crowd is in excitement and uproar and he's sitting there. Then they take him and they bring him to be scourged.
[27:36] We read over this so quickly and then he had him scourged and we go, okay, no, the scourging, you remember, the whippings and the beatings and the catanatis and the ruthlessness. While the Jewish people were restrained, only 39 stripes in case the 40th killed you, they couldn't go over 40.
[27:51] The Romans were not so restrained. So they scourged him and they beat him and they mocked him and it says they gathered the whole Roman cohort around him as they put the crown of thorns. That's 600 soldiers, by the way.
[28:02] They put 600 soldiers around him, beating him on the head and then they bring him back before the crowd and then they lead him down a crowded public street. Read the other gospels as the women are crying and the people are weeping and he says, weep not for me but weep for yourselves.
[28:17] He is beaten so much that a man from Cyrene named Simon has to bear his cross and he bears it to the public hill of Calvary. This isn't some backwoods war trace, right? This is on the main thoroughfare going into Jerusalem so much so that they put the charge against him, Jesus the king of the Jews in three different languages so that everybody passing by can see it.
[28:37] It has to be in three languages and there's a crowd of soldiers that are casting lives for his clothing. There's all these people around him and people are mocking him and the crowds are ridiculing him and the criminals are beside him.
[28:48] What I want you to see, friend, is these things were done publicly and yet we want to live privately. He bore our suffering on grand public display.
[29:00] He was not some behind-the-back suffering savior. He was publicly ridiculed and publicly mocked because that's what we deserve. How much more so should we live in public profession in obedience to Christ?
[29:14] Our lives should be living testimonies. We don't need to be private believers or, you know, kind of unknown.
[29:28] We need to be seen because this was observed. His suffering, which we bore, which we needed, was observed by many and yet so many, so many, and forgive me for getting so passionate, so many are so uncertain as to where we stand.
[29:51] We see this. This was observed and now, if you will allow me for my fourth point, I will step out of my alliteration because not only was it ordained, it was ours and it was observed, we want a little bit of good news.
[30:10] This was sufficient. It was sufficient. The suffering is sufficient. There's no better way of saying it, really, because it says when all these people are gathered around and everybody is watching, Jesus cries out at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer.
[30:32] God doesn't answer. Matthew records for us and then he cries out with a loud voice. John tells us what he said during that loud voice. John 19, verse 30, says that what Jesus cried out is, it is finished.
[30:46] And after he declared, it is finished, it says that he gave up his spirit. I love the accuracy of the Bible and I love the authority. Jesus didn't die, he gave it up.
[31:00] Right? He gave up his spirit. I love how John says it. John makes the declaration and says, I thirst and that's when the man takes the sour sponge and by the way, he didn't take the numbing agent at the first and this is not the numbing agent later.
[31:14] He didn't take the intoxicated drink, the gall mixed with bitter wine and all that. He didn't take that. He didn't want to numb it. He felt the misery of our soul. But he took the sour wine later and it says, I like how John says it and John says, and Jesus, knowing that all things must be accomplished, said, I thirst and they gave him a drink.
[31:31] Why? Because there's this random passage in the book of Psalms that says that he will cry out and thirst during his suffering. This is the way I like to look at it. If you want to doubt if Jesus is in control, at that moment, Jesus is hanging on the cross and in his mind, he's saying, Lord, is there anything else?
[31:48] And he's just going through, is there anything else that's unfulfilled? Oh, I thirst. And he even says in the book of Psalms what they would give him to drink. And he takes the drink and then he declares it is finished.
[32:00] In control to the last moment, it says, and then he gave up his spirit. He wasn't going to die until he quit. He gave up his spirit. And it says, and the temple was torn and the rocks were split and the graves were opened.
[32:13] Notice, though, the text is so clear, it says, and they appeared after his resurrection. Why? Because he's the first fruits of the resurrection. So the graves were laid open just for three days waiting on the resurrection. Nobody came out of the grave until Jesus stepped out of the grave.
[32:25] It says, after his resurrection they appeared. We're getting ahead of ourselves there. But the graves were open so he was making preparations for what was going to happen in three days. The temple, the veil is torn because access is now open.
[32:38] Friend, all I want you to see is that when Jesus says it is finished, he meant it is finished. All of the suffering that we deserve, all of the misery and the public shame that is rightfully ours has been paid.
[32:52] The Bible declares that he took our sins and nailed them to the cross and has removed the guilt thereof. Everything that is rightfully ours he bore.
[33:03] There's nothing else for us to do. There's no other work that must be accomplished. Scripture says that whoever believes shall receive, right?
[33:15] Other than believing that Jesus Christ paid the price of our sins and having that righteousness reckoned unto us, it's not earned by us. It's sufficient.
[33:28] It's sufficient. Sometimes I believe that the weight of our public living is overwhelmed by the weight of what we feel like we ought to be doing. And this isn't a legal matter.
[33:41] It is living in the free grace and mercy of knowing the price has been fully paid. Are we perfect? No. But in Christ we are forgiven.
[33:53] Those who have accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior and have aligned their lives to such a way know the sufficiency of the price that has been paid and now have boldness to walk forward in confident faith.
[34:05] Not because of anything we have done but because on that cross he did it all. His suffering is all that's needed. It's all that's needed.
[34:20] The only question is how we respond then to that suffering. Are we trying to add to it? Are we trying to earn it? Are we trying to build on top of it?
[34:30] Listen, what Jesus did on the cross was not the starting point it was the ending point of our sin. He's the lamb that takes away the sin of the world.
[34:44] Now the resurrection that's the beginning point of our new life. But if we have joined him in the likeness of his death we will walk with him in the likeness of his new life.
[34:57] The reality is that this is a sufficient price and my friend it's the only price that can be paid for the sin of mankind. Let's pray.
[35:08] Lord I thank you so much. Thank you for this day. God I thank you for your word and Lord I pray that our lives be aligned with it that we would live according to it.
[35:26] Lord Jesus I know that in my own weakness and my own frailty that I cannot do justice to the weight of the passage. Lord we pray that by power and presence of your spirit that you would help this to ring true within our hearts and minds.
[35:40] you would help us to understand all that took place on the cross of Calvary. May we just get a glimpse of the price that was paid so that we may live our lives according to it until you call us to yourself.
[35:58] Lord if there's one here who doesn't know you Lord may they understand that when you said it is finished you meant it is finished. The weight of their sin has been paid.
[36:13] The price of redemption is sufficient. So Lord help us to look to you and to you alone and not to our own works. And we ask it all in Jesus name. Amen.
[36:37] Amen. Amen.
[37:37] Amen. Amen.