Jesus In The Dark - Mark 15:33-34 Series

Mark 15:33 At the sixth hour darkness came upon the whole land until the ninth hour. 34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"--which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"

Darkness

God Has His Say

We’re studying the crucifixion account in Mark 15 and we left off last time at the half way point. Jesus was on the cross 6 hours; we covered the first three, which puts us right at high noon. And at noon, everything changes.

The first half of those six hours were full of mockery. Everybody wanted to get in on it, and it was a loud, raucous three hours. But then came high noon.

Mark 15:33 At the sixth hour (that’s noon ) darkness came upon the whole land until the ninth hour.

That’s everything Mark has to say about those three hours. What were the soldiers do-ing? We don’t know. What about the crowds, the chief priests, the other criminals? What was Jesus saying? Not a word about any of that. For Mark, the only thing that mattered during those three hours was the darkness.

Mark divides Jesus’ time on the cross in half. The first half, man had his say. The sec-ond half, God has his say. But God doesn’t use words. He has his say by turning off the sun.

It wasn’t an eclipse. No eclipse lasts 3 hours, and you can’t even have a solar eclipse at Passover, because Passover is always at the time of the full moon. It wasn’t a storm, it wasn’t cloudy—it’s an awesome, terrifying, supernatural darkness. And it rattled the peo-ple.

Luke 23:48 When all the people who had gathered to witness this sight saw what took place, they beat their breasts and went away.

God shut the mockers’ mouths.

Darkness Means Judgment

Now, if that darkness is the only thing that mattered, we need to think carefully about what it meant, right? So that’s all we’re going to do tonight is try to take a peek into that darkness and see what it means. And I’ll tell you right now, it’s loaded with meaning. This will take us two sessions.

What is the significance of the darkness? Well, it doesn’t take a Bible expert to figure out that if you’re doing something and the sky goes black in the middle of the day, God’s not happy with you. Darkness in the middle of the day would be interpreted as a sign of divine wrath by Jews, pagans, polytheists—pick your religion.

And that interpretation is confirmed throughout the Old Testament. For example, in Dt.28 where God describes what it’s like to come under his judgment.

Deuteronomy 28:29 At midday you will grope about like a blind man in the dark.

That’s one of many examples. So generally speaking, darkness indicates judgment.

Judgment on the Powers

So it was a sign of judgment—judgment on whom? What has Mark said about the sun going dark? Back in ch.13, when Jesus preached on the end times, he said that in between the tribulation and his glorious Second Coming, the sky would go dark.

Mark 13:24 "But in those days, following that distress, "'the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; 25 the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.'

When we studied that, we found the powers of the heavens are rebellious spiritual be-ings—the gods who are worshipped by the nations. And generally speaking, all the lights in the heavens—sun, moon, and stars, are associated with those powers.

So Jesus had previously spoken of Judgment Day when those powers would be judged. And now, when Jesus is dying on the cross, we get a preview of that. The sun goes dark. Mark is showing us that this moment is a model of judgment day, and the evil powers, who were orchestrating all the evil behavior of the people, were under God’s judgment. Listen to how Paul described what Jesus was doing on the cross.

Colossians 2:15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public specta-cle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

The day Jesus died was a very bad day for the powers of the heavens who were in re-bellion.

Judgment on the People

The Judgment of Blindness

So the heavens going dark implied judgment going on in the heavens. But that’s not the most important aspect. The part Mark emphasizes is the judgment down on the ground.

Mark 15:33 At the sixth hour darkness came upon the whole land until the ninth hour.

So it’s not just a judgment in the heavens; it’s a sign of judgment on the people mur-dering Jesus. So back to our question—what is the meaning of darkness in the book of Mark?