FBCWest 607 | Jesus Died According to the Scriptures
Recorded On: 05/19/2024
Bulletin
Hymn # 158 “Nothing bu the Blood”
SCRIPTURE READING – Ephesians 1:7
Giving of Selves and Our Offerings
OFFERTORY PRAYER
OFFERTORY MUSIC – Pru Hungate
Praise and Worship
“Forever Holy”
“Raise a Hallelujah”
“Behold the Lamb”
Proclamation of the Word
Message by Pastor Joe
“Jesus Died According to the Scriptures”
PRAYER TIME / Time of Reflection
“At the Cross (Love Ran Red)”
Benediction “The Lord’s Prayer (it is Yours)”
Sermon Notes
John 19:17 Jesus bears His own cross
John 19:18 He was crucified between two men
John 19:19 – 22 Pilate has an inscription written and the Jews object, but Pilate leaves it
John 19:23 – 25a The soldiers gamble for Jesus’ clothing – according to the Scriptures
John 19:25b – 27 Even while being crucified He makes sure His mother is cared for
John 19:28 & 29 Jesus says “I am thirsty” – according to the Scriptures
John 19:30 Jesus gives up His Spirit, it is not taken from Him
1 Corinthians 15:3 Jesus died for our sins according to the Scriptures
Scritpures
Transcript of Service
The Roman Empire crucified thousands of people. They also were involved in the crucifixion of Jesus. But the crucifixion of Jesus was different in many ways. I invite you to come and listen to this message on how the crucifixion of Jesus was different and how it impacts you.
And we've got to the point where
Pilate trying to find a way to not condemn Jesus to death had him scourged.
And that compromise didn't work because the Jewish leaders and the people still wanted him and yelled out "Crucify him!" And put pressure on Pilate to say that if he didn't crucify Jesus that he was no friend of Caesar.
And so that's where we are now in this context. And so in verse 19 it says this, "They took Jesus therefore and he went out bearing his own cross to the place called the Place of the Skull, which is called in Hebrew, G-d-gotha."
So we see here after Pilate having condemned Jesus to crucifixion, he was required now to carry his own cross.
Which will remind us those who have Old Testament readers, which we will discuss later, a similar situation.
"And they crucified him with and with him two other men, one on either side and Jesus in between."
So we have the scene of three men at this point on the day of preparation,
the day before the Passover, that they are doing all they can to conduct their execution. And so two other men are being crucified with Jesus at the same time.
And Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross, and it was written, "Jesus the Nazarene, the King of the Jews."
Therefore many of the Jews read this inscription for the place where Jesus was crucified, was near the city, and it was written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek. So Pilate wanted to make sure everybody who traveled to Jerusalem would know no matter what language they spoke, whether it was in Hebrew or Latin or in Greek, that the crime that Jesus is being crucified for is that he is the King of the Jews.
Now it's interesting that the chief priests and the others got what they wanted, but as you know most people are never satisfied with getting what they want. And so the chief priests of the Jews were saying to Pilate, "Do not write the King of the Jews, but that he said, "I am the King of the Jews." They don't want to acknowledge what is in fact true, that Jesus is the King of the Jews, but not only that, he's the King of kings and Lord of lords. So Pilate only wrote only partially what is true, but this wasn't good enough. They wanted only for the claim to be that he claimed to be the King of the Jews. And Pilate answered, finally Pilate gets a backbone. "What I have written, I have written." That's it. I've had it with you guys. You wanted his crucifixion. You're getting his crucifixion. I wrote what I wrote. Leave me alone.
"Then the soldiers when they had crucified Jesus took his outer garments and made four parts, made part to every soldier and also the tunic. Now the tunic was seamless woven in one piece. So they said to one another, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to decide whose it shall be." This was to fulfill the scripture. "They divided my outer garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots."
Now I want you to see something here.
Jesus is being crucified according to the scriptures.
John does not write.
I believe Matthew writes some of Jesus' last words. I believe John will include about four of them. But Matthew tells us that Jesus cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
Which was a clue to all those standing there and to us.
That Jesus is dying according to the scriptures. Because the very first line of Psalms 22 is, "My God, my God, why have you forgotten me?" In Psalm 22, you will see the crucifixion playing out and you will see how these soldiers gambled for Jesus' clothing.
How they divided it and they gambled for it.
The scriptures foretold how Jesus would die and the situation. We're also told in Isaiah 53 about the suffering servant, and we see his death in that situation. The scriptures provided more and more information. And so how is it that we know that Jesus is the Messiah?
Yes, in a few days we will see confirmation, but he died according to the scriptures.
You see, we live by faith, but faith is not blind faith. It is a response to what God said. So we know that Jesus is the Messiah before the rest of the story ever plays out, because he is dying according to the scriptures.
Therefore the soldiers did these things, but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother's sister Mary, the wife of Clophis, and Mary Magdalene.
And when Jesus then saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, "Woman, behold your son."
Now, in our day, we kind of somewhat take offense to when we call somebody woman.
I remember being angry at my wife one time, and I called her woman. Well, that was not a good day.
But Jesus is not saying the term of disrespect.
It is essential. She's not.
She's his mother. So he's saying, directing to her, "Behold your son." Now, there is a division in thought who he's talking to. Is he saying to Mary, "Behold your son,"
or is he saying, "Behold your son,"
because he's going to follow up. And then he said to the disciple, "Behold your mother."
I find it very interesting
that while Jesus is suffering on the cross,
well, basically the whole world is against him.
And while he's undergoing the pain of that death,
he's concerned about his mother
and is making sure that she's provided for after this.
And he takes the disciple whom he loves, so everybody says it's John, and I don't have any reason to doubt that it's John.
Now, I do kind of wonder why he picked a disciple, because he did have brothers and sisters, and so they could have well taken care of him. But he makes sure that she is provided for from that moment on, and he puts John in trust of his mother, which meant he must have trusted John exceedingly well.
But he's concerned about his mother's well-being, even on the cross.
See, this just shows another portion of who Jesus is.
In today's world, we're always concerned about us and about our suffering and about what's happening to us, and whether it's fair or right or whatever, in the midst of being truly, truly treated and unjustly treated, Jesus still cares for his mother.
And so it says, "From that hour, the disciple took her into his own household."
He didn't wait for another moment. He didn't wait for something to happen. He started taking care of her then, because she needed to be taken care of. Because even if Jesus wasn't the Son of God, can you imagine how you would feel seeing your son on the cross?
The woman who bore him,
the woman who helped with Joseph to raise him,
who knew that he was the Son of God because of his beginning, she was there suffering.
And yet, John understood and cared for at that very hour.
And after this, Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, to fulfill the Scripture, said, "I am thirsty."
So am I.
So in response, a jar full of sour wine was standing there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine upon a branch of hyssop and brought it up to his mouth.
And again, this statement is found in the Scriptures,
letting us know that again, this is the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of the Living God, the Lamb of God. We can express our faith because we understand who he is by what the Scriptures say. There's going to be another one in the future who will also claim to be the Christ, the Messiah.
And he will also suffer a head wound according to the Scriptures. That tells us he's the Antichrist. The Scriptures tell us Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. And so therefore, we can trust this.
I want to talk about a few other Scriptures.
God had told Abraham that he would have a son,
a son of promise, a son to be born after Abraham and Sarah had been long past childbearing age.
And Abraham so disbelieved that he laughed, and so did Sarah.
So God being God said, you laughed, okay, we're going to name the new child Isaac, which means laughter.
So that every time you call him, you'll remember that you laughed when saying he's coming.
After Isaac grew to a certain age, God told Abraham, I want you to take your son, your only son, Isaac who you love, and I want you to sacrifice him on a burnt offering,
which means basically he's to kill Isaac and burn him up.
This is the son of the promise.
And so Isaac and Abraham head to where God tells them to go. And they go to a particular hill,
and Abraham tells his servants to wait there while Isaac and he carry on.
And Abraham places the wood of the burnt offering on Isaac,
and Isaac carries it up the hill.
I think that this hill that Isaac is walking up, we now call Calvary or Mount Golgotha, the same place.
And as they're traveling up, Isaac goes, Father, I see the wood,
and I see the fire, where's the lamb?
Because this is not the first time Isaac has seen a burnt offering.
And God had instructed Abraham to basically kill his son, and Abraham had no thought that God would have him do anything other than that. But he made this statement, he said, God himself will provide the lamb.
And then Isaac allows him to, Abraham to bind Isaac up, and to place him on that wood, that offering place.
And Abraham raised his knife to plunge it onto Isaac. And again, the Scriptures tell us that Abraham never thought that God would stop him. He believed that God was able to raise Isaac out of the ashes,
because he was the son of promise. But then God stopped him and told Abraham, now I know that you will not withhold anything.
And there was found a ram, not a lamb, in the thicket, and they used that.
Because I believe when Abraham told Isaac that God himself will provide the lamb, that God himself provided the lamb, which was the son of God, the lamb of God.
And throughout the Scriptures, you will see the Scriptures confirming who Jesus is by what they say in advance.
The last prophet who didn't write a book was called John, and his common name is John the Baptist. I call him John the Testifier.
And he said, "Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world."
The last prophet spoke of who Jesus is.
So we can trust who he is because of what the Scriptures said about him. And we can rely.
Therefore, when Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, "It is finished." And he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. Now I want you to see this, that Jesus bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
No one took it from him. He gave it up.
He wasn't crucified because he lacked authority or power.
He was crucified because that was the plan of God, that he submitted to the plan of God as an obedient child, just as Isaac submitted himself to the Father. And so we see now that Jesus has died.
Paul will say in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verse 3, "For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures."
Now you see, the Roman Empire, executed by crucifixion, thousands upon thousands of people.
Jesus' crucifixion was different from every other one.
It wasn't different because Jesus was an innocent man, though he was, and he had no guilt. There are people even today who suffer punishment in our justice or injustice system who are wrongly accused and wrongly convicted. And yes, Jesus, as Pilate made it very clear, he found no guilt in him. But that's not why it's different.
It's different because he died according to the Scriptures, and according to the Scriptures, he took away our sins.
That makes him different because he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
You see, John wrote these things, and he tells us, which we looked at when we first started the book of John,
that he wrote this that we might come to faith, that we might come to belief. And John is sharing these things because he witnessed them, and he heard what Jesus said, and he understood that the Scriptures confirmed what Jesus said and confirmed what the Scripture said about who he is and what he did.
We live in a post-crucifixion world.
Almost every song that we sing about the crucifixion always adds a verse about the resurrection.
But it's interesting when Paul writes about taking communion.
He says we're to do it to remember his death.
You see, we're uncomfortable with his death because we're responsible.
He didn't die because the Roman army determined that he ought to be crucified. He didn't die because Pilate sends him to execution, because Jesus himself told Pilate, "You have no authority unless it was given to you under heaven."
He didn't die because a bunch of religious fanatics and Jews and whatever yelled for his crucifixion.
He died on the cross to forgive our sins, and it's personal.
And we should feel uncomfortable, because as I've shared before, and I'll continue to share, if every single person that had ever lived, and every single person who's alive, and every single person who's going to be born until he comes again,
were to become believers, would not be sufficient for the sacrifice that he gave,
because he is the Son of God. He is the Lamb of God. And the fact that God sent his Son, his only Son, that we might be forgiven,
that we might avoid the wrath of God, that we might receive the peace of God, that we might receive being called the children of the living God.
What an exchange my sins for his righteousness, my disobedience for his obedience,
my being a slave to sin to a child of God.
Oh, brother and sister, yes, we walk by faith, but it is not blind.
It is the fact that we see what the Scriptures wrote, and we see who Jesus is and was and what he did.
And there should never go a single day, even a single moment, but we don't recognize at the cross. We know that God loves me.
One person say, "Well, how much has God loved me this much?"
That the scars on his hands say so. And I find something interesting with this, I'll close.
If you read Revelation, and you should, even though he is the King of kings and Lord of lords,
you would think that that would be the primary song we're going to sing in heaven.
But it's worthy are you the Lamb of God, because the only reason you and I, and those who have gone before us and those who will go after us, can stand in the presence of the living God is what happened on this hill called Mount Calvary. And it still has an impact today. It will hand back tomorrow, because not only have my past sins been forgiven, but my current and my future ones, because of what he did on that hill, and all God's people said.