August 6, 2023 | Mark 15:1-37 | Pastor Chris Baker
Good morning FBC Family and guests! If you are four years old through entering the second grade, you’re dismissed to go to children’s church. The rest of us are going to be in Mark 15. We’ll begin our reading in verse 33.
Next week we will finish our summer overview of Mark’s gospel. Just to give you a heads up on where we’re headed during our morning gatherings, we’ll spend 3 weeks looking at what the Bible says about evangelism, then on September 10 we will start studying the book of James and that will carry us all the way to December. We’ll get a reading guide with the sermon schedule out to you pretty soon so that you can follow along.
For today, though, we’re reading what one commentator calls the high point of salvation history.
(Source: https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/41-82)
Let’s read it together:
Read Mark 15:33-47
Pray
I’ll never get over what Abraham did. A lot of you who have been around church will know Abraham’s story. In case you’re not familiar, you meet him in Genesis 12 and bury him in Genesis 25. God did awesome things in his life—but Genesis 22 is the part that I’ve never been able to come get over.
God tells Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, and Abraham immediately sets out to do it. And by sacrifice, I mean kill. Kill him as an offering.
It’s puzzling that God asked. It’s incomprehensible that Abraham followed through. He set out immediately to go to the place God told Him to go to. He built the altar. He tied Isaac on it. He was ready, but at the last second God intervened. He provided a ram for the sacrifice and commended Abraham’s trust. Abraham trusted God so much that he believed even if he killed Isaac everything would be okay because God’s in charge.
Abraham demonstrated amazing trust in God. As I was reading Mark 15 this week, I was reminded that God didn’t ask Abraham to do something that God Himself wasn’t prepared to do.
Texas businessman and chronic presidential candidate Ross Perot once said:
“Never ask anyone to do what you haven’t done before. . .That’s a pretty fundamental rule in leadership.”
(Source: Bits & Pieces, August, 20, 1992, p. 3)
Ross Perot would have approved of God’s leadership style—not that God ever needs human approval. Through Abraham, God was acting out the final sacrifice that would need to be offered to atone for the sins of God’s people.
As we’ve studied Mark’s gospel, we’ve seen Jesus predict His death—His own sacrifice on an altar orchestrated by His Father—on multiple occasions. He did it with great detail and Mark 15 is where much of that detail becomes reality.
There’s a sense in which the whole story has built to this moment. Back in Mark 10, we read this:
42 Jesus called them over and said to them, “You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those in high positions act as tyrants over them. 43 But it is not so among you. On the contrary, whoever wants to become great among you will be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first among you will be a slave to all. 45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
We see both the Gentile leaders—in this case Pontius Pilate—and the Jewish leaders act as tyrants as they murder an innocent man. We also see Jesus embodying the ethic of verse 45. Jesus offering Himself as a substitute sacrifice to atone for the sins of His people is the epitome of service that leads to redemption.
Mark 15 is both the greatest miscarriage of justice and the greatest act of love ever recorded. The cross represents both the greatest miscarriage of justice and the greatest act of love in history.
To serve and to save, Jesus gave His life as a ransom.
That’s the main idea and title of this morning’s sermon. I hope you’re able to see it as we move through the text together. Like we did last week, we’ll summarize the whole chapter and try to add some context that might help you understand.
Then we’ll drill down on the gravitational center of Mark 15, which I believe is found in verses 33-39. There we’ll see the setting for the ransom, the payment of the ransom, the result of the ransom, and one man’s response to the ransom.
If Mark 15 is a roadmap ending at the cross, then Pilate’s palace is the starting point. The Jewish leaders hand Jesus over to the secular government, the same Roman government they hated, just as the sun was rising.
Pilate asks a question I’m convinced is bathed in sarcasm. “Are you the king of the Jews?”
Jesus is a bloody mess. He hasn’t slept. Remember, the disciples were so exhausted they fell asleep way back at Gethsemane. This is the next morning. The rigged trial before the high priests happened in the dead of night.
Jesus had been beaten, spit on, and mocked. Pilate asks, “Are you the king of the Jews,” and Jesus answers truthfully.
Then the prosecution makes its case. Verse 3, the chief priests rehearse all the reasons they’ve cooked up for Jesus to be killed.
The defense rests—or at least its silent. Jesus doesn’t defend Himself. This is the personification of meekness. Jesus said in the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, “blessed are the humble, for they will inherit the earth.” You might have learned that verse with the word ‘meek’ there. It can be translated either way.
Meekness is humility toward God and toward others. It is having the right or the power to do something but refraining for the benefit of someone else.
Philippians 2:6–8, “[Jesus] existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross.
Being “in the very nature God,” Jesus had the right to do whatever He wanted, but, for our sake, He submitted to “death on a cross.” That is the ultimate in meekness. As part of submitting to that death, He submits to incredible humiliation.
If you’re like me, I tend to think of the physical pain Jesus endured. The physical pain was beyond anything most of us can imagine. But as we read, we see that’s not where Mark spills the most ink.
No, the Holy Spirit led Mark to make more of Jesus’s humiliation than he did His torture. He was humiliated before the Jewish authorities. He was humiliated before Pilate. Now, He’s going to be humiliated in front of all Jerusalem in verse 6.
Between verses 5-6, Pilate sent Jesus off to Herod to be humiliated as well. Luke 23 details that for us.
The Roman leaders were constantly trying to appease the Israelites. They just wanted to keep the peace, to stop people from revolting. The governors weren’t assigned here for life. They wanted to keep the unrest to a minimum and move on with their careers.
One of the things they tried in a effort to maintain peace was amnestying a prisoner at Passover. They’d pardon a Jewish criminal, maybe a political prisoner, to help the public morale.
Pilate took Barabbas in verse 7. This man is a robber. Here he is a murderer. He is a revolutionary. Luke calls him a notable prisoner. He’s notorious. Surely, he deserved crucifixion.
That middle cross may well have been measured out to fit Barabbas. Pilate thought he’d offer the choice—Barabbas or Jesus. Surely, they’d free this wandering rabbi and not the hardened revolutionary.
8 The crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do for them as was his custom. 9 Pilate answered them, “Do you want me to release the king of the Jews for you?”
Pilate thought he knew who they’d pick. He knew Jesus was innocent! Do you see it in the text? Verse 10. For he knew it was because of envy that the chief priests had handed him over.
If you’re looking for a motive here, there it is. They were jealous. They were jealous of His power, they were jealous of His popularity. They were jealous of His teaching. They hated Him and Pilate knew that. And he was sure it was the envy of the leaders that made them the way they were, and if he went to the people, it would be different because the peopl, just the Sunday before, had hailed Him as their king and their Messiah.
Listen to this: “But the chief priests stirred up the crowd so that he would release Barabbas to them instead.”
From the moment Pilate handed Jesus over to be scourged and crucified in verse 15, His treatment was entirely evil. The soldiers, part of the Roman cohort, began their mockery by dressing Him in a purple robe, a mock royal attire. They placed a twisted crown of thorns on His head, cruelly marking Him as a pretended king (Mark 15:17).
With disdain, they hailed Him as "Hail, king of the Jews.” All of this was a cruel joke, as if Jesus lacked all sense and reason. They were treating him as less than human.
It didn’t come as a surprise to Jesus. He said back in Mark 10:34 this would happen. He knew the prophet Isaiah pointed to it generations earlier: (50:6)
I gave my back to those who beat me,
and my cheeks to those who tore out my beard.
I did not hide my face from scorn and spitting.
Humiliation, torture, and disgrace all the way to the cross. More could be said about the journey to the cross. More could be said of the mockery once He’s crucified. And I’d love to dig into those things if you have questions afterward, or you can email me, text me, come by the office. Whatever suits you best.
For the sake of time, we’re going turn our attention to what happens when Jesus is on the cross.
All this mockery, all this torture, this entire grand scheme that is the greatest miscarriage of justice in human history is all part of the Father’s unfolding plan. To serve and to save, Jesus gave His life as a ransom. This had to happen as Jesus gave His life away.
Let’s see what unfolded in those final moments.
Verse 33: When it was noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon.
When Jesus had been suffering on the cross for three hours, darkness came.
Darkness is the setting for the ransom (v.34)
In the Old Testament, we find God often revealed as light. We see it manifested when God appeared to Moses on Mt. Sinai, we studied that passage last winter.
However, the Old Testament also portrays God as darkness on certain occasions, as a counterpoint to His light. This reminds us of the multifaceted nature of God’s character.
We talked about Abraham earlier. In Genesis 15, God appears to Abraham in a deep sleep and a great darkness. In Exodus 10, during the plague of darkness in Egypt, God used darkness to convey His judgment. Similarly, at Mount Sinai, when God descended upon the mountain in smoke and fire, there was a thick cloud of darkness covering the mountain.
The Day of the Lord is recurring theme in the Old Testament when God reveals Himself in wrath and judgment against sin. The Day of the Lord is depicted with cosmic and cataclysmic language, with references to quaking earth, trembling heavens, darkened sun, and the moon losing its brightness. (Isaiah 13; Joel 2; Amos 5; Zephaniah 1)
It’s a New Testament idea, too. Jesus spoke of hell as "outer darkness," a place of weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth (Matthew 8:12, Matthew 22:13, Matthew 25:30).
At the cross, during the crucifixion, a supernatural darkness descended upon the land from the sixth hour to the ninth hour. This darkness was not a mere absence of light; rather, it was the presence of God's righteous judgment being poured out upon His Son. It was a darkness that signified the weight of sin and the agony of bearing the sins of His people.
In those three hours of darkness, Jesus endured the fullness of God's wrath, experiencing the eternal hell that all who believe in Him are saved from. His capacity to bear such infinite punishment in a finite period lies in His divine nature. As the eternal Son of God, Jesus bore the sins of humanity in those dark hours, offering Himself as the perfect sacrifice to atone for our sins and reconcile us to the Father.
God’s righteous judgment and divine love met at the cross, and through the sacrifice of Jesus, God's mercy triumphed over judgment.
The darkness at Golgotha was not a sign of God's absence but rather a manifestation of His presence, as He poured out His wrath on sin and secured our salvation. It was the ultimate act of love and grace, demonstrating God's unfathomable commitment to redeeming humanity. In those three hours of darkness, the eternal plan of salvation was fulfilled, and the hope of eternal life was made available to all who would believe in Jesus as their Savior and Lord.
Darkness is the setting for the ransom. Abandonment is the cost of the ransom.
Abandonment is the cost of the ransom. (v.34-36)
"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" - These were the first words spoken by Jesus after the darkness had lifted.
It’s really hard to wrap our minds around this statement while holding tight to what we know to be true about the Trinity.
Jesus Christ is fully God and fully man. He never ceased to be fully God and fully man in his birth, death, and resurrection and He now stands in heaven as our mediator—still fully God and fully man. He will return one day as fully God and fully man.
As God, the Son cannot be separated from the Father or the Holy Spirit. So in the spiritual sense, Jesus wasn’t abandoned by the Father. We have already seen that the Father is fully present during the crucifixion in the pouring out of wrath.
Yet, I firmly believe that this cry, a quotation from Psalm 22, expresses the fact that judgment has reached its peak, and He—in His flesh—longs for the comfort of His Father.
As the full measure of God's wrath and presence was poured out, the darkness dissipated, but in that moment, it seems Jesus experienced a human sense of separation from God.
He knew that it was God's own fury that had been unleashed upon Him. He understood who was executing this judgment upon Him. And in that fleeting moment, when one might have expected comfort, compassion, and fellowship, Jesus, who had just suffered the unfathomable, incomprehensible exhaustion of enduring eternities of hell, cried out, "Where is God?"
It’s not that the Father is absent during the punishment, but rather, Jesus questions, "Where are you in my time of need?"
This is a reminder that the worst part of hell is separation from God. Hell represents the full fury of God's punishment—it will be a place with no comfort, compassion, sympathy, or relief.
Shortly after this cry, it is finished. The crowd, despite this miraculous darkness and the earthquake and other miracles recorded in Matthew’s gospel, they still don’t get it.
They mock His cry to God—asking if he’s calling down Elijah.
Despite witnessing Jesus' miracles, hearing His teachings, and experiencing His compassion, the crowd remains unchanged. Their hearts remain hardened.
The crowd had witnessed it all—His miracles, His power over demons, His raising of the dead, including Lazarus. Yet, none of this changes them. Even Jesus' teachings during the past week had left no impact on their hearts. They had seen His compassion and kindness, but witnessing His death doesn't stir any response from them.
But His death does cause a response. Look at verse 37, Jesus let out a loud cry and breathed his last. 38 Then the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.
Church, the torn curtain is the result of the ransom.
The torn curtain is the result of the ransom. (v. 37-38)
The curtain separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple. Only the high priest could enter once a year to make atonement for the nation. It symbolized the sinner's separation from God, a barrier that no one could breach.
However, at the moment Jesus died, the New Covenant of salvation was ratified. His sacrificial death paid the penalty for all who would believe, and in that very instant, the Old Covenant was abolished, rendering the temple, the priesthood, and all other sacrifices obsolete.
No one had direct access to God's presence. But in a moment, as Jesus breathed His last, the temple veil was torn in two from top to bottom. It showed the way to God was now open for everyone. Through Jesus' sacrificial death, the New Covenant of salvation was sealed and delivered. He paid the penalty for all who would believe, abolishing the need for the old sacrificial system, the temple practices, and the priesthood.
Justice may have appeared blind that day, but God was visibly active at Calvary. The darkened sky, Jesus’s statement, and the torn temple curtain all testified to something extraordinary happening.
What initially seemed like a gross injustice—the crucifixion of an innocent man—turned out to be the greatest act of love in history. God's love was so immense that He willingly offered His Son to bear the sins of the world. God followed through on that which he spared Abraham.
And He told us exactly what He’d do.
Listen to Isaiah 53:10:
Yet the Lord was pleased to crush him severely.
When you make him a guilt offering,
he will see his seed, he will prolong his days,
and by his hand, the Lord’s pleasure will be accomplished.
And that is because of what it says in Isaiah 53:10, that it pleased the Lord “to crush Him,” to put Him “to grief.” It was the will of the Father that He be treated in this manner and that He be killed. We know why, that He might be a sacrifice for sin, that He might die in the place of sinners, that He might bear the curse for us, that He might bear the punishment for our sins.
So in closing, how do we respond to this sacrifice? We get to see the right response. Verse 39:
When the centurion, who was standing opposite him, saw the way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
Confession that Jesus is Lord is the right response to the ransom (v.39)
From the beginning of Mark's gospel in chapter 1, verse 1, he declares that it's the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It's the opening chapter of the story about the Son of God—a story that has so much more to unfold. And now, in verse 39, a human voice acknowledges the truth, saying, "Truly this man was the Son of God."
I love that the Holy Spirit led Mark to record this truth declared only at the cross.
Prior to this, we heard the voice of the Father affirming Jesus as His beloved Son at His baptism in 1:11. And again at the transfiguration in chapter 9, the Father's voice resounded, confirming Jesus as His beloved Son. Not to mention the demons, who had to acknowledge His divine identity on multiple occasions in chapters 1, 3, and 5. Both heaven and hell have confessed that Jesus is the Son of God.
Yet, it's at the crucifixion, through the lips of an unexpected witness—a Gentile, a Roman soldier, and the leader of the execution squad—that these words find expression. This Roman centurion, who has seen countless deaths, has witnessed something so unique and astounding in Jesus' death that he can't help but exclaim, "Truly this man was the Son of God."
From the mouth of a man deeply acquainted with violence and death, comes the confession that Jesus is indeed the divine Son of God. It is as if the climax of the story, the pinnacle of revelation, is reached at the cross. The Roman centurion, in his declaration, echoes what the entire gospel has been leading up to—the unveiling of Jesus' true identity as the Son of God.
Heaven and hell have already borne witness to Jesus' divine nature, and now, a human voice joins the chorus. It is fitting that this revelation happens at the cross, where Jesus, the Son of God, offers Himself as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of humanity.
In this confession lies a message of hope and salvation for all. It's a reminder that the gospel is not confined to any particular people or group—it's for everyone, irrespective of their background or nationality. The Roman centurion, standing as a representative of the Gentiles, exemplifies the wide embrace of God's grace and the global reach of the gospel.
The story doesn't end here. It's only the beginning—a beginning filled with immeasurable love, self-sacrifice, and redemption. We’ll come back next week and open another chapter. For now, let’s pray.
Questions for Further Discussion & Reflection
How does the story of Abraham and Isaac's sacrifice foreshadow the events of Mark 15?
What does the concept of meekness mean in the context of Jesus' crucifixion?
Why do you think the crowd remains unchanged despite witnessing Jesus' miracles and teachings?
What does the darkness that covered the land during the crucifixion symbolize?
Why do you think Jesus cried out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" What does this reveal about the nature of Jesus' sacrifice?
Discuss the significance of the temple curtain tearing in two during Jesus' death. What does it represent?
How does the centurion's confession, "Truly this man was the Son of God," impact the overall message of the gospel?
How does the crucifixion represent both the greatest miscarriage of justice and the greatest act of love in history?
In what ways does Jesus' sacrificial death fulfill the prophecies of the Old Testament?
Reflect on the concept of God's justice and mercy meeting at the cross. How does this impact your understanding of salvation?
How can we apply the example of Jesus' sacrificial love and service to our own lives and evangelism efforts?
In Mark 15:1-37, we see multiple instances of Jesus facing mockery, abuse, and injustice. How does this portrayal of Jesus' suffering challenge our understanding of leadership and power? How can we apply these lessons to our own lives and interactions with others?
The crucifixion scene in Mark 15:21-32 involves several groups of people, each reacting differently to Jesus' death. Discuss the different responses of the soldiers, the passersby, the religious leaders, and the two criminals crucified with Jesus. What can we learn from their reactions, and how might we respond to Jesus' sacrifice today?
Mark 15:33-37 describes the darkness that covered the land while Jesus was on the cross and His final words before His death. What do you think the darkness symbolizes in this context? How does Jesus' cry, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" impact our understanding of His sacrifice?
The tearing of the temple curtain in Mark 15:38 signifies the opening of access to God for all believers. How does this act of tearing the curtain connect to the overall message of the gospel and God's plan for salvation? How does it change the way we approach God and our relationship with Him?