Mark 15:33-39 | The Darkest Hours of the King

We have one more passage to read, and it begins in Mark chapter 15, verse 33.

Mark 15:33

On Sunday here at Faith, we encountered the presence of the King, his powerful, awesome entrance into his royal city of Jerusalem, only to be received with rejection and threats of death by the majority.

Days later, through the deceit of one of his own disciples, the king was led away to be tried, beaten, and crucified.

And it's there that we encounter the darkest hours of the king.

And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.

And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, Eloy, Eloi, Lamasabacthani, which means, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

And some of the bystanders, hearing it, said, Behold, he's calling Elijah.

And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed, and gave it to him to drink, saying, Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come and take him down.

And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last.

And the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, Truly, this man was the Son of God.

Our Lord Jesus, we come and we bow before the cross.

We cannot in our humanity fully understand and comprehend what you endured.

It is beyond our imaginations, even, that in the course of six hours you would pay the price for the sin of the world.

It's beyond our understanding, but please, by your word, help us to get a little bit better understanding.

And this we pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.

This text describes the last three hours of the earthly life of King Jesus.

And if you look carefully, you will see that there are two extraordinary events bookending the passage.

The end describes the tearing of the veil in the temple in a miraculous way, accompanied by the centurion's declaration about the identity of the crucified Christ.

Those two incidents are important in the flow of Mark's argument, and we're going to touch on them briefly a little bit later.

But first, I would ask you to focus your attention on the two details at the beginning of the darkest hours.

And that is the darkness itself and the cry of Jesus.

Mark separates those two events with a time designation.

The darkness came about the sixth hour.

It's about noon.

And the cry came three hours later at 3 p.m.

One event led to the other.

We are told that the darkness lasted until the ninth hour when Jesus cried out, ending the darkness.

Whether it was still dark or the light had just returned, we do not know.

But the loud cry from the one hanging on the cross was the result of three hours of darkness.

You've likely heard of the horrors of crucifixion.

It was most often a slow, agonizing death by suffocation.

Hanging in such a way demanded an unbearable effort to push yourself up to support the lungs in order to take in oxygen.

And as exhaustion gradually took over, the crucified one was rendered unable to push himself up to inhale.

It's remarkable then that after six hours of struggling to breathe, Jesus was able to cry out with a loud voice.

This wasn't the barely audible croaking of a man unable to breathe.

It was so loud, we are told, and so clear, that the bystanders could hear the cry of this dying man elevated on a cross.

Now they misunderstood the meaning of his cry.

Eloi in Aramaic sounds a lot like Elia in Hebrew.

But they heard him clearly.

After six hours on the cross, this cry was either from someone who wasn't impacted by the physical trauma of the cross, or it was from the heart of one who had experienced a horror so intense as to overcome the trauma of crucifixion.

I don't believe that it was the former.

Jesus was impacted by the cruelty of that cross.

It was just a short while later that he actually died.

And as we read earlier in the passage just before this, Mark related how Simon, a man from North Africa, was compelled to carry the crossbeam of the Lord Jesus.

We would assume, most likely, because his beatings had rendered him incapable of carrying it any longer.

He was so weakened that he was unable to muster the strength to do it himself.

No, Jesus bore the full physical impact of that cursed cross.

The reason for his cry must have been the horror of another experience.

Whatever the nature of that experience, Jesus responded with the cry of the forsaken.

Mark used a word that expresses abandonment or desertion.

And you might be able to relate.

Perhaps a spouse has abandoned you.

Maybe your father or your mother left you.

Maybe your family has rejected you.

Perhaps a friend abandoned you when you most needed him or her.

Or maybe you have even felt abandoned by God, forgotten and forsaken by the sovereign of the universe.

You have company if you are familiar with those kinds of feelings.

King David, the great king of ancient Israel, felt the same way.

These exact words heard from the cross first came from the lips of David in Psalm 22.

He said, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning?

Oh my God, I cry out to you by day, but you do not answer, by night, but you do, but I find no rest.

David looked intently at his circumstances and felt so hopeless, so defeated, so abandoned, that he cried out, God, why have you forsaken me?

So many of us have felt something similar at one time or another.

But the New Testament gospels show us that David's human emotion pictured something much more intense, much more agonizing that would be realized on the cross on that darkest of days.

We may experience the abandonment of fellow human beings.

But it's rare to be wholly abandoned as Jesus experienced on that day.

But Mark has been preparing his readers for this cry from Jesus by first demonstrating the complete and utter abandonment Jesus already faced on that day.

There was a prelude to it in Mark 14, verses 34 through 36, just hours before in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus said to his disciples, My soul is very sorrowful even to death.

Mark 14:34–36

And then he prayed to the Father, Remove this cup from me.

You can sense the weight of the burden that Jesus knew he would endure.

And immediately after that, he was forsaken by Judas, his own disciple, who led in a crowd of soldiers to arrest him.

And then as they fled, I'm sorry, as they led Jesus away, Mark wrote in chapter 14, verse 50, they all left him and fled.

All twelve disciples abandoned Jesus.

We can go on in chapter 15, verse 15.

He was forsaken in Pilate's refusal to uphold justice by surrendering Jesus to the unjust demands of a bloodthirsty crowd.

He was forsaken by his own people.

As they walked by the location of the crucifixion and wagged their fingers and their heads at him in mocking derision.

So too the religious leaders.

They abandoned him, saying he saved others, but he cannot save himself.

And if that were not enough, those who were crucified with him also reviled him.

Utterly alone.

Abandoned.

But not yet entirely forsaken.

As recorded in John's Gospel, Jesus said to his disciples, The hour is coming, indeed, it is come, and when each of you will be scattered, each to his own home, and you will leave me alone.

Yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me.

Yes, God the Father was with the Lord Jesus Christ.

But then the darkness came.

For three long, agonizing hours there were no words from the lips of Jesus.

No explanation of the strange darkness is given.

It was just there, and in some way it indicated a final, ultimate abandonment with which we cannot empathize.

It's interesting that nowhere in the biblical revelation is there anything recorded about Jesus crying out in pain.

We are not told that he wept or screamed when Roman whips shredded his skin.

We are not told that he winced in pain, as the crown of thorns mashed his tender scalp.

We are not told that he groaned in agony as the nails pierced his flesh and parted his bones.

We are not told that he complained of the lack of air as his lungs were crushed by the weight of his body sagging upon the nails.

Isaiah's prophecy tells us that he was beaten beyond recognition, but there was never a complaint except for this moment.

The abandonment of God the Father was the most excruciating pain ever experienced.

Only that agony of forsakenness caused Jesus to cry out.

You may have heard what I heard and thought for many years.

That God the Father, in his wrath against our sin being laid on the Savior, turned his back on his only begotten son, bringing on the terrible darkness and the forsaken cry.

But is that really what happened?

Did the father turn his back on his son?

Some approach this as a literary device, thinking that, oh, you know, that that little bit about the darkness was put in there to just heighten the tension of the story.

Makes it more interesting.

It's also been explained away in a naturalistic sense.

That is, some have tried to suggest that a lunar eclipse took place, or maybe storm clouds, or a dust storm blowing across the Middle Eastern landscape.

But those have all been demonstrated to be inaccurate explanations of the biblical record.

In fact, the reality is that all three synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, all three of them record this event, and they each include the little detail of the darkness.

So what happened?

Did the sun suddenly cease fusing hydrogen atoms?

What happened?

Let me assure you that this is no mistake.

The human authors of Scripture recorded exactly what God wanted written.

Now there are several possible ways to understand this.

One is that the darkness is a picture of the forces of Satan present at the cross.

Colossians tells us that Satan rules the domain of darkness.

So perhaps at this moment God has allowed all of the forces of darkness to be present surrounding the Savior on the cross.

It's a possibility.

Maybe though the darkness appeared because the light of the world was dying.

Jesus told the crowd days earlier, the light is among you for a little while longer.

Walk while you have the light, lest the darkness overtake you.

But perhaps the most popular is that the darkness was a sign of divine separation.

Based primarily on the belief that God cannot look upon sin.

Therefore, as Jesus became sin for us, God turned away from his son because he could not bear to look upon sin.

But there's a significant problem with that theory.

No passage of Scripture states that God cannot look on sin.

Some texts say that God turned his face away or hid his face in judgment on those committing rebellious sin, but we are never told that God is unable to look at sin.

Now sometimes Habakkuk 113 is used.

Habakkuk 113 says of God, you who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong.

Well, there you go, preacher.

It says God cannot look at wrong.

Well, the problem is that the context of that verse says that God cannot look on wrong or evil without responding in judgment.

Not that he is unable to keep it in view.

In fact, in Genesis chapter 6, verse 5, we read, The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth.

Genesis 6:5

He saw it.

As we think through these various interpretations, I think it's wisest to look again at the scriptures.

For in them we see what took place during those three dark hours of the Savior's life.

You know, the Bible tells us that God is light.

And in him is no darkness at all.

But God has had an interesting connection with darkness at specific points in earth history.

For example, Psalm 18.11 says, God made darkness his covering, his canopy around him.

Interesting statement, isn't it?

See, even though God is light, he can use darkness for his purposes as he sees fit.

He can even cover the brilliance of his glory with darkness.

So perhaps we can assume for the moment that God was present at the cross, God the Father was present at the cross, and he wrapped the glorious brilliance of his presence with such darkness that it obscured even the sun's light.

That sounds like a plausible proposition.

But why?

Why would God the Father be present at the cross in such darkness that even the sun could not break through?

We find the answer in a couple of Old Testament passages.

First is Genesis 15.

A man by the name of Abram had been called by God to leave his family and his country and follow God's direction to a new place that God would give him.

Then in chapter 15 of Genesis, God initiated a new covenant, a binding agreement with this man, Abram.

God made specific promises to him about land and descendants and blessing him.

But Abraham couldn't process how all of that would come to be.

And so God said, Abram, I'm going to do something for you.

I'm going to establish a covenant with you.

And this is what we read in Genesis chapter 15, beginning in verse 9.

Genesis 15 · chapter mention

God told Abram, Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.

And he brought him all these, he cut them in half, and he laid each half over against the other, but he did not cut the birds in half.

And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

And as the sun was going down a deep sleep fell on Abram.

And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him.

Then Yahweh said to Abram, Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and will be slaves there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years.

But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions.

As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace, you shall be buried in a good old age, and they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

Now when the sun had gone down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking firepot and a flaming torch passed between the pieces of the animals.

God ensured that all of his promises would come to pass by ratifying a covenant with Abram.

So he put Abram to sleep, and then behold, a terror of great darkness.

And God ratified that covenant with Abram by walking between the splayed out pieces of animal carcass while enveloped in a terrifying darkness.

Now that sounds strange, I'll admit.

But a similar event occurred again.

It occurred at Mount Sinai.

And Moses reminded the people of Israel of that event 40 years later, and we read of that reminder in Deuteronomy chapter 4 and 5.

Deuteronomy 4 · chapter mention

When the nation of Israel was at the mountain of Sinai, God God ratified a new covenant with them, giving them his laws to obey.

And as with Abram, God entered into that binding agreement with the nation.

Hear what Moses recorded for them to remember.

And you came near, and you stood at the foot of the mountain, while the mountains burned with fire to the heart of heaven, wrapped in darkness.

There's fire, but there's darkness.

Deuteronomy chapter 5, as soon as you heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness, while the mountain was still burning with fire.

Deuteronomy 5 · chapter mention

Those Old Testament covenants required blood to be shed in order to be ratified.

And both of them included the presence of God surrounded by terrible darkness.

Now, other covenants did not include God's presence in darkness, but those two did.

Now hear what the prophet Jeremiah wrote in Jeremiah 31 concerning the words of God.

Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant.

Now as we leap forward in biblical history to New Testament times, we remember the words of the Lord Jesus on the night before the crucifixion, when he was celebrating the Passover meal with his disciples.

Matthew recorded these words, and he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is given for the forgiveness of sins.

A new covenant.

So when was that new covenant ratified?

It appears to be initiated by Jesus the night before he died, but it doesn't seem to have been ratified at the Last Supper or even at his betrayal in Gethsemane.

No, that covenant, that new covenant in his blood was ratified when the blood of the Savior was shed as he hung upon a cross.

And since there are two clear and specific instances of a covenant being ratified with blood and with the presence of God in great darkness, should we be surprised that when the Lamb of God had his blood shed, that the Father Himself was present with great darkness?

Luke tells us the sun's light failed.

It failed.

Now the sun was not suddenly turned off by the power of God, but it was entirely obscured by the darkness of God's presence.

This is the only time in all of Scripture where darkness wins.

Where darkness conquers light.

We would do well to pay attention to it.

Why is there darkness at the cross?

God was ratifying a covenant in the same manner as the covenants with Abraham and the nation of Israel.

And that tells us that God the Father was very much present at the cross in order to ratify his new covenant, his promised covenant with the blood of his own unique Son.

What then took place during those three hours of incredible darkness?

Isaiah helps us out here.

God the Father was striking and smiting his son.

Yes, sinful man played a role in the death of Jesus, as did Satan and his minions, and God will hold them accountable.

But God the Father also played an incredible part in the suffering of his son.

Isaiah 53, verse 4 says that he was smitten by God.

Isaiah 53:4

Isaiah 53, 10, it was the will of the Lord to crush him.

In Zechariah chapter 13, verse 7, quoted by Jesus the night before his death, he said, I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.

Zechariah 13:7

Who is the I who does the striking?

It is God the Father striking his own Son.

For the scriptures to be fulfilled, there must be a time during the crucifixion when God the Father deliberately strikes the shepherd, where the Father crushes the Son as the sin of the world is borne by the innocent one.

In his sinlessness, the Son of God was crushed and smitten as he bore the fullness of the Father's wrath for sin not his own.

For my sin, for your sin.

That's the essence of 2 Corinthians 5.21.

He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God.

And we don't know exactly how the Father poured out the totality of his wrath against sin on his son, but we do know that it was sufficient to satisfy the wrath of God for those who believe in Jesus, who in those three dark hours suffered by bearing the Father's wrath for our sins.

Three hours of striking.

Three hours of smiting.

Three hours that were hideously dark.

Three silent hours.

And suddenly Jesus cried out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Suddenly, God the Father's presence at the cross was gone.

God the Son, the sin bearer, was left to die the death of the damned alone, utterly and completely forsaken.

No wonder Jesus prayed just hours before, if it is your will, Father, take this cup from me.

For the first time in all of eternity, the Son of God experienced separation from the love and the grace of the Father.

Inseparable from all eternity, undivided forever, but in that moment when the Son became sin, he was forsaken.

Christ Jesus suffered what everyone who dies without him will experience.

No one, not even Adam, in all of his perfection, had ever experientially known that pure, undefiled fellowship with the Father that God the Son had known from eternity past.

When Christ was conceived in Mary's womb, the Son took on physical form, but there was no robbing of the eternal fellowship between Father and Son, no wall of sin to interrupt that relationship.

Even days before this moment, Jesus had declared that his father was always with him.

But then he was cursed for us.

And in those three dark hours, he experienced the full wrath of the Holy God against our sin, followed by the total separation from the glory and the love and the fellowship of God the Father.

It was literally hell on earth.

The only time Jesus cried out in a way that indicates unbearable agony is here.

The separation of the Godhead, the forsakenness of the Son by the Father was the most unbearable aspect of the payment for my sin.

And then he died.

The payment was complete.

God's wrath was satisfied.

He became sin so that a new covenant in his blood might be ratified, by which God declares even today that anyone who comes to him through faith in the Lamb of God who gave himself in our place would become a child of God, forever exempt from his wrath.

As George Whitfield said almost 300 years ago, alas, your son is just going down, and it will leave you in eternal darkness, unless the Lord be your righteousness.

Mark tells us that the curtain in the temple was torn in two.

An act of God symbolizing that direct access to Him through Jesus the King was now open.

The centurion had a front row seat to all of this.

A hardened soldier who had undoubtedly served in numerous crucifixions observed all of this.

He experienced the strange, ominous darkness.

He heard the cry of the forsaken.

He would have felt the earth beneath his feet shake as its maker bowed his head in death.

He would have heard the gunshot like pops of the rock splitting open.

And that hardened soldier, along with the criminal hanging with Jesus, would be the first to walk by faith through the torn curtain into the Father's presence, because Jesus opened the way by enduring the forsaken darkness of God.

And so too may you, if you believe in the Lamb sacrificed for us.

F.

W.

Creumacher wrote in his book, The Suffering Savior, We know that the grave of our sins was then dug.

The handwriting that was against us was taken out of the way.

The curse that was impending over us was blotted out, and the wall which separated us from our God was removed.

Call the sight of the Redeemer weltering in his blood and in total darkness heartrending, if you will.

We know not a more delightful scene in heaven or on earth.

The man on the cross is to us the fairest star in the horizon of the world.

That star, my friend, shines brightest in the gloomy darkness of those darkest of hours.

Friend, if your heart is drawn to the cross, look to him who is upon the cross as the one who took your place in the darkness and believe in him, knowing, knowing that Friday is full of darkness because of God's judgment on sin.

But hope comes forth on Sunday morning when we stand at the empty tomb of the King.

Let's pray together.

Our Lord Jesus, we stand in awe of you.

What grace it is to have been freed from being required to endure eternally that darkness.

Because you, for three hours, took the Father's wrath for me.

That my Savior, my Lord, and my King is what makes Friday good.

And so we bow in humility, broken by what you've done for us.

And now we will stand and we will sing in awe of how great and how good you are, and tearing the veil so that we might have access to the Father.

In whose name we pray.

Amen.