The Crucifixion of Jesus

This morning Linda and I had a great time visiting our children and grandchildren, whom we don't really get to see that often, so it was really really a nice trip.

Nobody got sick.

The only only bad thing that happened is the grandparents got really worn out.

So we've been studying the Gospel of Mark on Sunday mornings.

We're not quite finished.

We're almost there.

Today we're going to be back in Mark, chapter 15.

Mark 15 · chapter mention

If you brought a Bible, you want to turn there, and if you'd like a sermon outline or a Bible, please raise your hand.

Our restrooms would be happy to help you.

Today we're going to consider Jesus' crucifixion.

Not a pleasant topic to talk about, but there's some things we can learn here that I think will be helpful for us.

I have to give you some background here.

The death by crucifixion was one of the cruelest degrading forms of punishment ever conceived.

Even ancient Jewish and pagan writers agreed with that.

The Jewish historian Josephus described it as the most wretched of all ways to die, and even the pagan Roman, cicero, said So terrible is the ordeal of crucifixion.

The very word cross should be far removed, not only from the person who is a Roman citizen, but from his thoughts as well.

And studying this passage.

One commentator said You know, every totalitarian regime needs a terror apparatus And crucifixion was Rome's terror apparatus on steroids It was awful, i mean.

We've seen pictures and movies and so tried to depict it, but I don't think we've even come close to really understanding what really it was all about.

Our English word excruciating still reflects the horror of crucifixion, same word Last time we looked at how that began.

As Jesus has turned over to the soldiers, he experiences mocking and taunting And that mocking and taunting runs through the entire crucifixion.

But today we're going to.

We will zero in on the actual crucifixion If you want to follow along as I read the passage in Mark, chapter 15, beginning at verse 16,.

Mark 15 · chapter mention

The soldiers took Jesus away into the palace, that is the praetorium, and they called together the whole Roman Courant and dressed him in purple.

After twisting a crown of thorns, they put it on him, they began to claim him hail king of the Jews and they kept beating his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling and bowing before him.

After they mocked him, they took the purple robe off and put on his own garments and they let him out to crucify him.

They pressed into service a passerby coming from the country Simon of Cyrene, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross.

Then they brought him to the place Golgotha, which is translated place of the skull.

They tried to give him wine mixed with the myrrh, but he did not take it, which was a sedative, you know an aesthetic sort of thing.

And they crucified him and divided his garments among themselves, casting loss for them to decide what each man would take.

It was the third hour when they crucified him.

The inscription of the charge against him read the king of the Jews.

They crucified two robbers with him, one on his right, one on his left.

The scripture was fulfilled, which says and he was numbered with the transgressors.

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 and come down from the cross.

In the same way, the chief priests also, along with the scribes, were mocking him among themselves and saying he saved others, he cannot save himself.

Let this Christ, this king of Israel, now come down from the cross that we may see and believe.

Those who were crucified him were also insulting him.

I have two main points today the humiliation of Jesus and then the crucifixion of Jesus.

Picking up for where I was last time.

The Romans used crucifixion not just to kill people criminals but to shame and humiliate them as a deterrent to others.

Scourging, mocking, taunting a person in order to shame and humiliate them started before the crucifixion but lasted throughout.

Jesus was mocked, as we said last time, by four different groups of people.

The soldiers mocked Jesus, spit on him, jeered at him, stripped him naked, scourged him, put a purple robe on him, a crown of thorns on his head, and then those who passed by hurled abuse at Jesus, wagging their heads as they mocked him.

Then the chief priests and scribes were mocking Jesus among themselves, saying he saved others, he cannot save himself.

Let this Christ, the king of Israel, come down from the cross so we might see and believe.

These groups were mocking Jesus basically for two reasons.

First, it showed their absolute hostility to the claims Jesus was making.

People weren't mocking, taunting Jesus because of the sermon on the mount or his healing ministry.

They were mocking because his audacious claims to be the Son of God, the king, the Savior, the Son of Man who will return one day and judge the earth.

As we reflect on it, there's something really in all of our hearts that say I am the master of my life.

Nobody tells me how to live.

Second, the mocking shows that we don't want our God to be weak.

We'll resist it.

In fact, if we see somebody claiming to be God to be weak, we reject it.

God's not weak.

The crucifixion and abuse Jesus was enduring was a sign he was weak.

So they made fun of him.

I've got to tell you, for the early Christians to testify, that your Savior, your Messiah, was crucified by Rome was the epitome of scandals.

Ridiculous.

1 Corinthians 1.23.

Paul says But we preach Christ crucified to Jews, scandalous, gentiles, foolishness.

What kind of savior or hero is publicly humiliated, shamed and killed like this?

tortured and killed and doesn't raise a hand in defense?

Galatians 5.1.

Paul says But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, meaning the law, why am I still persecuted?

Then?

the scandal of the cross has been abolished.

This was not a friendly environment to live in.

You were looked at as weird, foolish.

What kind of hero do you have?

Well, let's consider the scandal of Jesus' crucifixion.

Let me just run through it quickly so we get the idea.

First of all, the physical pain inflicted by crucifixion was off the church.

That's scourging.

Prior to the crucifixion, ripped Jesus' flesh to ribbons.

A whip was used, called a cat of nine tails leather strips on a wooden or metal pole.

Leather strips came out and had little small pieces of metal or glass or bone attached to it.

It just ripped flesh.

They placed a crown of thorns on Jesus' head.

When I was in Israel I saw this.

I'm going to bring this back.

This is not a nice little rose, bush.

This will hurt.

Come up later and just try to put your finger on one of those points.

It's amazing.

It pierced his scalp.

It hurt.

Jesus was forced to carry the cross beam through the streets to Golgotha outside the city.

That was part of the shaming.

The crowds were laughing and mocking.

Jesus was so exhausted by all up to this point that they had to commandeer Simon of Cyrene to help him carry it.

Blood loss, exhaustion.

When they got there, the spikes that were pounded into Jesus' hands and feet penetrated nerve and bone, causing more incredible pain.

I brought a picture of an archaeologist found an ankle bone pierced with a 7-inch spike in it, right through the ankle bone.

It was discovered from the Roman era and discovered in 2017.

It was validating the nature of crucifixions they made When they lifted Jesus up on the cross.

It amplified the pain in his hands and feet as he was being put up there.

In order to breathe he had to push up against the nails to inflate his lungs and lift himself up.

Every time he did, it was excruciatingly painful.

They think that eventually, death came by sheer exhaustion.

This Gospel tells us he hung breathing whenever he could.

As he became more and more exhausted, fluid would build up in the lungs around his heart and it would just give up.

I've only just touched on a little bit of what we know about the crucifixion.

Not only was the physical pain inflicted on a person unimaginable, but so was the emotional, psychological pain.

It was intense, beginning with the mocking and taunting During shame and humiliation, one of the reasons crucifixion was so horrible, the worst really of all executions.

They weren't just killing your body, they were killing your name.

You were stripped naked.

Your dignity was totally taken away.

You became a laughingstock.

Keep in mind Jesus lived in a shame culture where your name was everything.

You did everything you could to produce a name of good reputation.

People respected you, wanted to be with you.

Your honor was everything in that culture.

Your name was one of the most important things you possessed.

It was who you were.

To have your name dishonored and destroyed was the ultimate disaster, and crucifixion destroyed your name, your credibility, your legacy.

It's over.

So when Jesus takes all this torture, shame and humiliation of suffering, he's showing us he's willing to endure weakness, which, again, it's hard for people then to get their heads around this.

And in his suffering and weakness, if we keep looking, what we see ultimately is his pure, unadulterated, loving heart and his heroic power.

Ironically, you see, the mockers weren't stupid to call out to Jesus and say hey, if you're who you say you are, well, come down from the cross, son of God, from the Holy One.

If that's you, come on down so we can believe.

Look, they were expecting what we would expect from any good story or movie we read or see.

You see, the stories the world understands are the ones where the hero gets beat up and blah, blah, blah, and he's in a bad shape and he's trapped.

Then, all of a sudden, it turns around and the hero saves the day.

That's what they're expecting.

What will he do?

He's not doing anything.

Okay, jesus, if you're the Savior, prove it, prove it to me.

Come down off that cross And see, there's our problem We don't realize just how great a hero Jesus really is.

Under him, the creator of the universe.

His greatness and heroism isn't seen coming down from the cross, it's seen when he stays on the cross.

Hebrews 12-2 encourages us to fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith.

You, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame.

He sat down then at the right hand of the throne of God.

And we need to know, as hard to understand as it is, that Jesus became weak, heroically for us.

Paul tells us in San Corinthians 13-4, for indeed, he was crucified because of weakness, yet he lives because of the power of God.

For we also are weak in him, yet we live with him because of the power of God directed toward you.

And then, 2 Corinthians 8-9, paul goes on to say for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor.

He became poor so that through his poverty you might become rich.

Jesus took the shame so we could have a new name at the expense of his own.

I like it when we come to the end in Revelation, 2, verse 17.

Revelation 2:17

It says he who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches, to him who overcomes, i will give him some of the hidden manna.

I'll give him a white stone and a new name written on the stone, which no one knows, but he receives it.

What does that mean?

It means, as far as God is concerned, it doesn't matter anymore what anybody says or thinks of you.

In Jesus, he's going to give you a name all yours, for your honor.

Jesus loves you and you have his approval if you belong to him.

When we are weak and suffering, here's the other point I'd like to make.

It's interesting.

I know all of us will.

We have a hard time with suffering.

We'll resist it, we're going to run.

But over the years I've learned to see this that when we're weak and suffering, god allows us to see our heart.

When things are going great, blah, blah, blah.

It's just the same old, same old.

But what's really in here?

That's it.

Every time you go through something very difficult and you suffer, what's in there is going to come out, like a teabag in hot water.

It's going to come out.

Can't help it.

We'll be there.

So look at it.

What do you see?

Is there anger, bitterness, selfishness, pride?

What's there?

God wants you to see it.

Sometimes, only suffering will reveal it.

Bring it to the top.

Our problem is we don't know how to deal with suffering.

It unfortunately tends to make us proud and hard We're going to say this shouldn't be happening to me.

Well, i found it interesting.

Paul found a solution.

He was just as troubled with suffering as you and I.

Why would God allow?

Well, apparently in his heart there was a lot of pride that would come up.

So, 2 Corinthians 12, you heard it earlier 7-9.

Paul says to keep me from exalting myself, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, some painful ordeal, apparently, physically.

He calls it a messenger of Satan to torment me Again, repeating it again, to keep me from being proud, exalting myself, because when you're suffering it brings you low.

Concerning this, i begged the Lord three times that it might leave me And believe me.

Paul believed in the power of prayer And here's what Jesus said to me my grace is sufficient for you, for power.

God's power is perfected in weakness of all things.

Most gladly, therefore, i will rather boast about my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

What's interesting is how did Paul keep from allowing his suffering to make him proud or bitter or hard?

Why, when suffering came to him, could he be patient and courageous and endure, joyfully boasting about it?

How could he do that?

Why did suffering soften him and make his heart more tender?

Well, notice how he describes his suffering.

He remembered Jesus' thorns, thorns There's a thorn in my flesh.

Why would he talk about thorns?

Reminded him of Jesus' suffering.

And you know, in Gethsemane, jesus also asked his father to take his thorns away.

He didn't want to go to the cross, he didn't want to get this.

Take it away, please take it away.

But his Heavenly Father wanted him to know that his power was made perfect in weakness, and only through Jesus' weakness could God's power be released into the world.

Only through our weakness can God's power be released in our lives.

It's true, this is Paul concludes.

By the way, the prophet Isaiah saw this beforehand this aspect, this courageous heart of the Messiah, this hero of the Messiah, who would endure weakness for us.

I love this passage in Isaiah 50, verses 5-7.

Isaiah 50:5–7

This is like 600-700 years before Jesus was even born, prophecy of the coming Messiah.

He says the Messiah is speaking here and the Lord God has opened my ear and I was not disobedient, nor did I turn back.

I gave my back to those who strike me in my cheeks, to those who pluck out the beard.

I did not cover my face from humiliation and spitting, for the Lord God helps me.

I am not disgraced.

Therefore, i've set my face like a flint and I know that I will not be ashamed, and he wasn't.

Listen to me.

Here's what we have.

The thing is, if Jesus holds on to his glory, we all perish, all of us, every single one of us.

If Jesus comes down from the cross, we all perish, every single one of us.

But Jesus didn't come down off the cross Heroically, lovingly.

He lived and died for a higher purpose, and this is a message for all of us.

He lived and died for a higher purpose other than himself, which is really a core Christian value.

Jesus taught on this over and over again Stop living for yourself, it's not about you.

He lived and died so we could be saved and not perish under the wrath of God for our sin.

Paul says in St Corinthians 5-21, he made him.

Jesus, who knew no sin to be sin, took our sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

The chief priests and scribes really did get it right when they said he saved others.

He can't save himself.

He comes down off that cross and we're all dead, we're all perish forever.

You can't do it.

God does forgive, reconcile, justify, redeem and save all who believe in Jesus, the Son of God.

All who call on him, the Scripture says, will be saved.

I urge you to call on him to believe in Jesus and become part of God's family through faith in him.

Let's pray Father, thank you for Jesus' greatness that he stayed on the cross.

He didn't come down and he stayed for us.

He could have come down.

He could have brain fire and brimstone on all his accusers, all his tormentors, but he didn't.

In his weakness he endured the cross, persevered with joy for us.

Thank you that Jesus gave his earthly life for us so that we could receive eternal life when we believe in him.

Help us now to live for him, who gave himself for us.

I pray in Jesus' name, amen.