JESUS’ CROSS-Driven CONCERNS-IV
Lk. 23:33-49; Jn. 19:17-30; Mat. 27:33-54; Mk. 15:21-39
OR--CONCERNS From The CROSS
Attention:
Oblivious to the obvious
The Church & Christians can be oblivious to the obvious... that while we bicker about ‘this that or the other thing,’ that there are literally millions of people who do not know Jesus!
We can be so focused on extraneous ‘pressing’ matters that we totally miss the BIG picture!
Likewise, we can be so caught up in the sorrow, & gruesome brutality of the Crucifixion of Christ, that we miss the Cross-work of Christ!
Jesus’ 7 Words From the Cross:
“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”—Luke 23:34
“Today you will be with me in paradise.”—Luke 23:43
“Behold your son...”: “behold your mother.”—Jn. 19:26-27
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”—Mat. 27:45; Mk. 15:33-34
“I thirst”—Jn. 19:28-29
“It is finished”—Jn. 19:30
“Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.”— Lk. 23:44; Mat. 27:50; Mk. 15:36-38
Need:
To recognize those things which are of greatest significance to our lives & the lives of others.
We have found that A Cross-driven Concern of Jesus is...
1. Your FORGIVENESS(Lk. 23:34)
2. Your DESTINY/Future/Eternity(Lk. 23:43)
3. Your CARE & OBLIGATION(Jn. 19:26-27)
4—A Cross-driven Concern of Jesus is...
Your SEPARATION(Mat. 27:46; Mk. 15:34)
Explanation:(Mat. 27:46; Mk. 15:34)Separation
Mat. 27:45—“Now from the sixth hour-(12 noon)- until the ninth hour-(3pm)- there was darkness over all the land.”
Mat. 27:46—“And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
“Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?”—Is an Aramaic transliteration into Hebrew.
“This is the only sentence of any length in Aramaic preserved in Matthew, though he has Aramaic words like amen, corban, mammon, pascha, raca, Satan, Golgotha.”—RWP
Mk. 15:33—“Now when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.”
Mk. 15:34—“And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
“Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”—is the Aramaic transliteration
This is the only one of the seven sayings of Christ on the Cross given by Mark & Matthew. The other six occur in Luke & John.—RWP
*Jesus quotes from & thereby calls us to examine Psalm 22:1-31 by quoting Psalm 22:1.
That Psalm is a call from David for deliverance from his enemies, yet it is also a Messianic prophecy declared roughly 1000yrs.(~1010-970 BC) before Messiah’s arrival!
*READ Ps. 22:1-31
“Nothing from Jesus so well illustrates the depth of his suffering of soul as he felt himself regarded as sin though sinless(2Co 5:21).”—RWP
In Ps. 22, David, by the Holy Spirit, depicts the priority of trust in God(:3-5).
It depicts the hatred & ridicule Messiah would receive on the Cross(:6-8, 12-13).
It depicts Messiah’s trust in God(:9-11).
It depicts Messiah’s exhaustion, His unnatural body position, & the physical stress upon his heart(:14).
It records the dissipation of Messiah’s natural strength(:15).
It depicts Messiah’s desert-like thirst, having all moisture absent from His mouth(:15).
It describes Messiah’s hands & feet being pierced by the nails as by lions(:16).
It pictures Messiah’s emaciated body(:17).-(MNTC)-
It pre-depicts the soldier’s gambling for Messiah’s clothing(:18).
It depicts that the poor will find satisfaction(:26).
It shows that thru Messiah, all the ends of the world, both dead & living, will worship & bow before God(:27-29).
It shows that Messiah will produce a posterity & generation who will be faithful to proclaim His Good News from their generation to the next(:29-31).
Jesus’ trust of & relationship with His Heavenly Father was so intense that He experienced the abandonment as He was being judged for the sin of mankind. He experienced a separation which He had never known/experienced before or after. A personal darkness from being alone & condemned.
Rom. 8:2-3—“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin & death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh,”
Some of you live in darkness continually—that impersonal distance from God so that you cannot rightly call Him your Father or your friend or your Advocate. You do not know what it is to truly love Him nor what it is to be truly loved by Him!
*Jesus did what He did so that you would never experience that impersonal distance, & that you, by voluntarily receiving the relationship with God, would always be unnerved at the Separation which sinful flesh affords!
Amos 8:4-12—“Hear this, you who swallow up the needy, And make the poor of the land fail, Saying: “When will the New Moon be past, That we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, That we may trade wheat? Making the ephah small & the shekel large, Falsifying the scales by deceit, That we may buy the poor for silver, And the needy for a pair of sandals-- Even sell the bad wheat?” The LORD has sworn by the pride of Jacob: “Surely I will never forget any of their works. Shall the land not tremble for this, And everyone mourn who dwells in it? All of it shall swell like the River, Heave & subside Like the River of Egypt. “And it shall come to pass in that day,” says the Lord GOD, “That I will make the sun go down at noon, And I will darken the earth in broad daylight; I will turn your feasts into mourning, And all your songs into lamentation; I will bring sackcloth on every waist, And baldness on every head; I will make it like mourning for an only son, And its end like a bitter day. “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord GOD, “That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the LORD. They shall wander from sea to sea, And from north to east; They shall run to & fro, seeking the word of the LORD, But shall not find it.” Jesus’ cry was misunderstood by ‘some’ as a cry to Elijah.
In conversations, personal prejudices can cause our minds & hearts to latch onto concepts that were never intended. We can hold to certain concepts so tightly that we hear certain ‘trigger’ words, thru which our minds are allowed to immediately go to that personally refined subject. In those cases we cease to be good listeners because we hear without hearing...
Thus some heard Jesus call for Elijah rather than hearing Jesus’ actual reference to Ps. 22!
Every good Jew knows that Elijah must come before Messiah.
Mal. 4:5-6—“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great & dreadful day of the LORD. And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come & strike the earth with a curse.””
But that is all they heard!...
Mat. 27:47-49—Some of those who stood there, when they heard that, said, “This Man is calling for Elijah!” Immediately one of them ran & took a sponge, filled it with sour wine & put it on a reed, & offered it to Him to drink. The rest said, “Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah will come to save Him.”
Mk. 15:35-36—Some of those who stood by, when they heard that, said, “Look, He is calling for Elijah!” Then someone ran & filled a sponge full of sour wine, put it on a reed, & offered it to Him to drink, saying, “Let Him alone; let us see if Elijah will come to take Him down.”
Unfortunately many did not & do not recognize John the Baptist as Elijah.
Mat. 11:11-15—““Assuredly, I say to you, among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist; but he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. “And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, & the violent take it by force. “For all the prophets & the law prophesied until John. “And if you are willing to receive it, he is Elijah who is to come. “He who has ears to hear, let him hear!”
Mat. 17:10-13—“And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Why then do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?” Jesus answered & said to them, “Indeed, Elijah is coming first & will restore all things. But I say to you that Elijah has come already, & they did not know him but did to him whatever they wished. Likewise the Son of Man is also about to suffer at their hands.” Then the disciples understood that He spoke to them of John the Baptist.”
Lk. 1:16-17—““And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will also go before Him in the spirit & power of Elijah, ‘to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,’ & the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.””
Argumentation:
Isa 53:4-6, 10-12—“Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, & afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”....“Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, And the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in His hand. He shall see the labor of His soul, & be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many, For He shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great, And He shall divide the spoil with the strong, Because He poured out His soul unto death, And He was numbered with the transgressors, And He bore the sin of many, And made intercession for the transgressors.”
Rom. 3:21-26—“But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law & the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all & on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned & fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just & the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
Rom. 8:35-39—“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?.....For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
*God does not want you to be separated from Him in the slightest degree. He has provided in Christ’s moment of separation on the Cross, all that anyone needs, of any generation, to have God’s will fulfilled.
Eph. 2:8-16—“For by grace you have been saved through faith, & that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh--who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands--that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel & strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope & without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, & has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, & that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.”
Illustration:
Do any of you remember the TV sit-com ‘Gilligan’s Island?’/The crew of ‘the Minnow’ with its chartering passengers got lost during a storm & ran aground on a deserted island/The comedic aspect of the show is built around how the stranded misfits try to make the best of a bad situation—lemonade out of lemons/But in the background was always looming a desire to be home/Their SEPARATION was forced but undesirable
Consider the days before electricity, before wireless & even wired communication/People went on journeys & had no communication except by pen & paper mail—letters envelopes/SEPARATION
Your youngest daughter goes to the hospital, but you are out of town & unable to accompany her/Your heart yearns to communicate with her, but there is no mobile telephone/SEPARATION
Consider the true Church in Nazi Germany/Consider those brothers & sisters in Christ who survived under that prejudiced, oppressive, & cruel, regime which opposed Christianity/Not able to gather corporately for fear of death/SEPARATION...
Now consider what it was like for you before you knew Jesus...SEPARATION
Separation of Governmental ideals from those of our own Christian ideals/Frightening to see an enemy & hostility forming against our very core of existence/It is the splitting-tearing-dividing-rending of our country which God has blessed so greatly/Yet we are forced to send our taxes to support things that dishonor God’s will/ It is an opposition to Christ!/SEPARATION
Application:
?How does Your SEPARATION answer Jesus’ Cross-driven Concern?
?How have You acted on those matters of great significance to Jesus?
CONCLUSION:
Visualization:
Oblivious to the Obvious!
Action:
Cross-driven Concerns of Jesus are...
4. Your SEPARATION/Trust(Mat. 27:46; Mk. 15:34)
1. Your FORGIVENESS(Lk. 23:34)
2. Your DESTINY/Future/Eternity(Lk. 23:43)
3. Your CARE & OBLIGATION(Jn. 19:26-27)
Pt. 4 only! Presented 04/16/2017pm to:
FBC of Carrabelle
206 Storrs Ave. SW(SE Ave. ‘A’)
Carrabelle, FL 32322
Pts. 1-3 Presented 04/17/2011am to:
Needmore Baptist Church
1620 Mt. Vernon Rd.
Woodleaf, NC 27054
