Services | Jesus Buried

Bulletin

Hymn # 462 “Love Lifted Me”

SCRIPTURE READING – 1 John 4:7 - 11
Giving of Selves and Our Offerings
OFFERTORY PRAYER
OFFERTORY MUSIC – Pru Hungate

Praise and Worship
“10,.000 Reasons (Bless the Lord)”
“How Great Is Your Love”
“The Stand”

Proclamation of the Word
Message by Pastor Joe
“Jesus Buried”

PRAYER TIME / Time of Reflection

“Were You There” Hymn # 108
Benediction “The Lord’s Prayer (it is Yours)”


Sermon Notes
John 19:31 & 32 The Jews want the crucifixion over to avoid being on Passover
John 19:33 & 34 Since Jesus was already dead His bones were not broken, but the soldier pierced Jesus’ side and blood and water poured out
John 19:35 John witnessed these things, they are true so that we might believe
John 19:36 & 37 No bones broken and Jesus was pierced in the side, which confirmed the Scriptures
John 19:38 – 40 Joseph and Nicodemus take Jesus’ body and care for it
John 19:41 & 42 They lay Jesus’s body in an unused tomb confirming the Scriptures
Isaiah 53:9 Messiah’s grave predicted

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Scritpures

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Transcript of Service

Why do Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah? Many people who aren't followers think, "Well, it's just blind faith." We disagree. Our faith is based on the scriptures and historic events. In a couple weeks, we'll be talking about the major event that happened that causes most people to say that's why they believe that Jesus is the Son of God. However, the scriptures told us ahead of time when Jesus would appear. They told us how we would teach and how we would be rejected by His people. It also foretold that He would be crucified in the manner of that death. It also talked about His burial. Most times people don't look at that. But the scriptures foretold the way that Jesus' body would be handled and the condition of that body and how He would be buried. They were done according to the scriptures. So we have faith based upon events that happened according to the scriptures. See how His condition of the body and His burial comported with the scriptures.

If you have your Bibles, and you should, turn to the Gospel of John, Chapter 19, and we'll be starting with Verse 31. Now, next week we're going to be taking a look at why most people decide that they're going to be believers because of that event. But let me tell you that that's not the only event that tells us that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah. Or you see, Daniel told us that He would come, the Messiah, would come at a particular time and Jesus did. Isaiah and other prophets told us that what He would teach and how the people would reject Him. And other prophets told about how He would suffer on the cross and die for us and how that death would change us from sinners to righteous, from the enemy to the children of God. But most of the time we feel bad about the crucifixion, which the crucifixion, and as Paul and others said, that Jesus died according to the scriptures. He lived according to the scriptures. He came according to the scriptures. And we usually, after we deal with the crucifixion and how we feel bad about that, because we live post-crucifixion, we jump immediately to that Sunday and the thoughts of that. But we tend to kind of rush by what we're going to spend some time on today. And that is the condition and the condition of Jesus's body and the burial, which again tells us that He is the Messiah, the Son of the living God. The situation, a lot of time people, and again, they kind of mix up scriptures with the, so they kind of get the idea that Jesus has to check off a certain number of boxes to show that He's the Messiah. No, the scripture said, this is what Jesus is going to do. It wasn't that Jesus looked back and said, what do I have to accomplish? No, the scriptures looked forward and said, this is how the Messiah will be. When you see this, you will see the Messiah.

But for those of you who said, well, he had to click off some boxes and one of the easy ones is when last week we said that Jesus said, I am thirsty and John tells us that was a quote of scripture and whatever, and yeah, Jesus quote-unquote could tick off this box. The things that are going to happen this week, unless Jesus is the Son of God, He cannot be in control of these events. So the scriptures is going to confirm to us, even when it seems that Jesus is not in control, that the scriptures are still fulfilled and He is the Messiah. And so after His crucifixion and after He had said, He gave up His Spirit and again, as I said, no one took His life. He offered it as a ransom for many. And then verse 31 says this, "Then the Jews, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies would not remain on the cross on the Sabbath, for that Sabbath was a high day, asked Pilate to break that their legs might be broken, so they might be taken away." So I find this interesting on a couple occasions. Number one, the scriptures keep telling us that the day of preparation, it was a high holy day, isn't just a regular Saturday. The day of preparation was the day before Passover. It was going to be Passover, not just a Saturday. And so they were concerned that these bodies being on their crosses would somehow make them unclean. It's interesting, they're not worded at all that the fact that they just crucified the Son of God, that that didn't make them unclean, and that didn't make them guilty of sin. It was, oh these bodies, and so they wanted their legs broken, so that it might finish them off. Now, if you're not familiar with crucifixion, I'll give you a little education. People died because of crucifixion, because of affixiation. Most of us think it's other things. Now, basically what would happen was they would nail or tie your hands to the cross, and then tie or nail your feet on the little lip, and then what the person who is being crucified would do is raise themselves up so they could breathe. And when their muscles strained from the exertion, they would drop. And when they dropped, they couldn't breathe, because the organs and everything else were pressing on the diaphragm, which would not let them breathe. And so when they could no longer bear that anymore, they would raise up and breathe and fall back and forth. So depending upon how much strength the person had would depend how long that they might live on the cross. Now, Jesus was scourged almost to the point of death, so he would have been weakened by all the blood loss and all the other things, but he died when appropriate, he died when the sacrifice of the Lamb, he died at the right time. But the two men on each side of him hadn't been treated that way and were simply being executed. And so they said, "We need to get rid of these guys, so we need to break their legs." So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first man and of the other who was crucified with him. So they were still going through the up and down motion, still being able to breathe. So once they broke the legs, you could no longer raise yourself up to breathe. So you're going to die of aphyxiation, you're going to die fairly quickly and probably very painfully. But coming to Jesus, when they saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. That's important and John's going to tell us why in just a moment. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear and immediately blood and water came out. So I want you to kind of get the picture of this. Jesus is up on the cross. The soldiers who are very familiar with death, because they kill for living and they've been assigned this execution and you don't let people get away with not being dead, knew death. But to make sure he took his spear and as we will see, he basically pierced his side from I would say here up through the lungs. And it said immediately blood and water came out. Now,

Jesus was already dead. So the blood and water came out not because his heart was bleeding, but I believe because of gravity. It said immediately blood and water came out and you'll see some who say, well, the water is probably serum like plasma and whatever. I tend to be a little more literal. It didn't say immediately blood and like water came out. So I think blood and water came out. I might be wrong. I'm not going to die on that hill. So I kind of think what happened was when they pierced his lungs, the fluid that had accumulated there, pulled out. Could be serum or whatever. There are doctors who say, well, what this says is that basically Jesus died of a broken heart. I don't know if that's true, not a doctor. I do know he died according to the scriptures and the soldier proved it. And he was, and he who has seen has testified and his testimony is true. And he knows that he is telling the truth so that you also might believe. John is taking a kind of a parenthetical and saying, I was there. I saw it. This wasn't, well, Peter told me and I'm telling you, or I heard a six or seven tan. John was there. So were the other disciples. We can tell that the Thomas was there because Thomas later will say, I got to see his hands and his feet in his side. So obviously he was there because he knew about the piercing of the side. Probably most of the disciples were there. And so was Mary, his mother and other of the ladies who had been a vital part of his ministry. But John is saying, I am an eyewitness and I'm recounting this, not so I can bravely say, Oh, see, you know, I was there, but know that you might hear my testimony and believe it as an eyewitness, not as a third party person.

For these things came to pass to fulfill the scripture, not a bone of him shall be broken.

You see again, if Jesus isn't the son of God, he couldn't be in control of these things. And the soldiers could have quite probably broken his legs. But God is in control of all things and determined for the soldiers that Jesus had already passed and there was not necessary to do that. The scripture says, so when we see the condition of his body, we see the condition of his body is not a bone was broken. And again, another scripture says, they shall look upon him whom they pierced.

And again, Jesus was not in control of that, they could have broken his bones, they could have left him for dead, or they could have, as they did, pierced him with that spear. Because the scriptures told us this is going to happen. So we know that he is the son of God, because he showed up when the Messiah was supposed to show up. He taught what the Messiah would teach. He was rejected as the Messiah would be rejected. He died according to the scriptures, as the scriptures predicted. He condition of his body, and soon we're going to see something else, again verifies who he is and was.

So it is not, all of these things are true, and what makes all of these things true is what's going to happen firstfruits, which will confirm all the other things. But all of these things could not have happened if these things didn't happen, then the firstfruits would have never happened, because it's all. And so God doesn't say, well I want you to accept blindly the thing. He's telling us the entire life, death, and burial of Jesus tells us who he is. We don't have to have our hope on one little thumbtack, but it rests from Genesis to Revelation, who he is. And after these things, Joseph of Arimathea being a disciple of Jesus, but a secret one for fear of the Jews. I love this. He didn't let anybody know he was a disciple until Jesus died. Well at least he let him know then. And that's kind of, sometimes we as well, when it's the right time to let people know we don't necessarily let them know, but there does come a time when we finally say that's enough, I will stand up and say I'm a disciple. So Joseph of Arimathea came and he asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus. And Pilate granted permission, so he came and took away his body. This is extremely important, and sometimes we just go right past it. Why is it extremely important? Because usually what Rome did with convicted criminals is throw them into city trash. In Jerusalem, that city of trash was known as Gehenna.

Jesus used Gehenna as an example of hell. So unless somebody came and said I want his body, they would have thrown Jesus's body into the trash. Kind of hard to find a dead body or to find a non-dead body in a trash heap. So there would be no empty tomb. And so God uses even secret disciples to carry out his will so that we might know that God is working. So he asked and he was granted permission and he came and took the body away. Nicodemus who had first come to him by night also came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes and about a hundred pounds weight. Now two things are happening here. These are wealthy men.

They are part of the Sanhedrin council, the council of 70. So they're influential, they're important, and they're wealthy. How is it I know that they're wealthy? Because Joseph of Arimathea had a tomb in Jerusalem in a garden. This tomb wasn't just a burial plot or an ashware, it was a hewn out tomb out of the rock. Which means you had to pay people to dig a cavern to put your body.

So it's not like you ever have the opportunity to go to Jerusalem, to go to New Orleans and you haven't, I suggest you do. You don't have to take a tour but go buy their graveyards. Because New Orleans is so low to the ground and because of the Mississippi, the water, so everybody's buried in sarcophagus is above the ground. And because there's only a certain amount, you basically rent it. And if your, well obviously you can't pay it, if your money ran out before you gave, or your family stops paying, they take and open it up, remove the bones and put in new bones. Nicodemus is rich because he just didn't have them buried in the ground. He put them in his own grave. That's what he thought of Jesus, that he was willing to give him his own tomb, that he paid large sums of money to acquire. And Nicodemus, Mer and Allos, is not and was not cheap. And it said he had a hundred pounds, which means he probably planned for his body not to stink for a very long time.

Those of you who like all the essential oils and stuff, you know how expensive Frankenstein and all that other stuff is. So it is exceptionally expensive but it's there to help prevent the body from stinking. Wasn't a pound, wasn't five pounds, it was a hundred pounds. These two men gave, I hate to say extravagant gifts, but gifts above and beyond what they would technically need to do because of the value who Jesus was. So they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen wrappings with spices and as it is the burial custom of the Jews. So they had to do this very quickly because darkness was coming. Darkness wasn't one you can't see to get the work done, but the other is it's the new day and that's a holy day and that's a Sabbath, it's Passover. So they're trying to accomplish this as quickly as they can so that they can and everyone and especially the women saying we didn't finish the job, we did it quick, we're gonna come back and do the job right on Sunday. But this is what we're gonna do. So they use these things because after three days his body is going as you remember when Jesus came to raise Lazarus from the dead and he had been gone four days, the sister said, "Well Lord he stinks." So everyone knew dead bodies start to decompose and so they did a quick job to show honor and proper burial and to avoid the stench when they came back after all of the Sabbaths. Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. It was unused, it wasn't like New Orleans. Therefore because of the Jewish day of preparation since the tomb was nearby they laid Jesus there. God is in control. If his body would have been thrown in the Behenna we couldn't say there was an empty tomb. If his body was just discarded but now we have evidence that where they placed him he isn't anymore. And even today and I'm not an I haven't been there don't know for sure but there are places that they say this is where they laid his body and Christians and others people there to see the empty tomb, to know that he's risen. But to make sure that you understand that even in this situation where again if he wasn't God he couldn't be in control, he had no control not being God where they put his body after death. But the scripture says this in Isaiah 54.9, "His grave was assigned with wicked men yet he is with a rich man in his death because he had done no violence nor was there any deceit in his mouth." The scriptures tell us that he was buried in a rich man's tomb. He wasn't as even though he was assigned as a wicked man even though they would have thrown his body in the trash heap. God being in control says I got this. You can hold on to your faith. But as I've been saying for the last several weeks and I'll continue to say our faith rests yes on the resurrection and if Jesus didn't raise from the dead the scripture says then our faith is vain. Paul comes right out and says that if Jesus did not rise from the dead then our faith is in vain. So the cornerstone is whether he rose from the dead. But our faith rests on his entire life not just one event, his entire life. As Paul says in Corinthians, he died according to the scriptures. I'm going to add a little addition to Paul and he was buried according to the scriptures and he rose again according to the scriptures and he is coming back according to the scriptures. So we can trust him because he just doesn't give us one thing to hold on to. I mean it's funny because John doesn't tell us this some of the other gospel do. His disciples even though he taught them and told them that he was going to rise from the dead and to meet him in Galilee, they were crushed and disorganized and depressed because he was dead. And yet the people who were responsible for crucifying him, the religious elders said, you know he taught his disciples he's going to raise from the dead. So we need to make sure that place is locked up. And they assigned the Roman soldiers to make it as secure as possible. So they assigned not only a rock to be placed there, they put guards there. I find it ironic that non-believers took Jesus's words more seriously than believers. But the difference is the non-believers never believed even after he raised from the dead. So instead of dealing with the fact that he rose from the dead, they paid the soldiers to say they stole the body. They refused to come up with what the truth is. His disciples,

including Thomas, saw for themselves because they saw who he was and how the Scriptures was consistent throughout his life. We're going to sing a song that asks a question. Were you there?

And that crucified him. Were you there when they laid him in the tomb? And the answer is yes, not physically, but your sins. So that he bore them and you bear them no more. You see,

the Christian faith is not just we're going to live again. It's not that we're going to live forever. Science talks about someday maybe we'll all live forever. Not in the condition of the world as today. Too much sin and evil and wickedness and craziness. The Scriptures offer us eternal life with the Son of God and of God the Father and God the Spirit. Many people, having personally experienced this, will tell people when they lose a loved one, well, they're in a better place. I

don't buy it. For instance, Libby and I, we went to St. Lucia. That was a better place in Westminster.

We were in this hotel called the Dera Ranch up a thousand feet in the mountains with two mountain peaks on each side framing the ocean with one of the world's best beaches below with a chocolate plantation on the other side of the road where we went eight almost every day except the first day because it was a chocolate plantation. That was a better place. We've gone to other really nice, I just kind of watched a little bit of the Monaco Grand Prix. I've been to Monaco. It's a better place in Westminster. Libby is not just in a better place. She's with God himself. She's with a better person. And it is not, heaven is not heaven because heaven's got gold streets. It's heaven because it's a place that God himself dwells. And he has called us to be in his presence, to be absent from the bodies, be present with the Lord.

Now I was in part of this message going to talk about what Jesus did during the time of death, but I decided not to. Didn't want to get off into that. But we are told. And whether I believe it or not, it's true. If precious in the sight of God is the death of his holy ones and that he wipes away the tears from their eyes, no longer will there be pain or sadness or death because they're all passed away because of what Jesus did. And because of who he is, we can trust God because he's been true for centuries upon centuries upon centuries. And if he takes another couple of centuries to come back, he's still true because his word is true. Whether I believe it or not, were you there? Yes. And I'll be there at his second coming. And all God's people said.