GOSPEL OF MARK: GOD’S SERVANT IN ACTION
AGONIZING CRY OF JESUS
Good morning, Family.
I am hoping and praying that everyone is well and is staying safe. Today is our third Sunday that we have NOT been able to WORSHIP together as a FAMILY. And I know it is HARD on everyone not being able to gather for worship, but, sadly, these STEPS have become necessary in an ATTEMPT to KEEP everyone SAFE and HEALTHY.
We have many MEMBERS of our church who are in the HIGH RISK category. And knowing that some of you will come to WORSHIP every time the door is open no matter what, the elders, not wanting to put anyone’s health and wellbeing in JEOPARDY, have prayerfully decided to extend the closing of the doors of our church building at least through Easter Sunday, and will decide later about the rest of April. Now, again, as we have said so often, our DOORS may be CLOSED but Garfield Christian Church is not.
We are still here praying, serving, and sharing God’s Word through the means of this video and social media. Many of you have posted INSPIRATIONAL memes, scriptures and prayers on Facebook and other media PLATFORMS. Prayer Requests are still being emailed out so that YOU Prayer Warriors can join other Prayer Warriors in lifting those concerns to our Heavenly Father. If you want someone to PRAY for you personally over the PHONE, please REACH OUT to me.
If you need groceries and cannot afford them, our Food Pantry is stocked. If you are unable to get out to buy groceries and other essentials or to pick up your medications from the Pharmacy, we have members of our church who are standing by ready and eager to help. They are just waiting to hear from you. Text or call or send me an email, and I will make sure your NEEDS are taken care of.
As you read through the Bible you will find God’s people faced with many TRIALS and TRIBULATIONS, but they remained FAITHFUL through it all and came out stronger than when they went in. And I believe that will still be true today of the church of Jesus Christ. WITH THE HELP OF GOD, WE WILL GET THROUGH THIS. AMEN?
A. We are continuing our sermon series on the Gospel of Mark, so turn to Mark 15:33-37 (READ)
ILLUSTRATION:
In Mark 14 after Jesus instituted what we know as the Lord’s Supper, He comes to a garden called Gethsemane with three of his closest friends: Peter, James, and John. He tells them to sit and wait while He goes into the garden to PRAY. Before walking away He says to His friends, “My soul is overwhelmed with SORROW to the point of DEATH. Stay here and keep watch.” He goes a little ways into the Garden and falls to the ground and prays: “Abba Father (my Dearest Father),
everything is possible for You. Take this cup from Me. Yet, not what I will, but what you will.”
Jesus then lifts Himself from the ground and walks slowly back to where He left the disciples and finds them sleeping. Jesus is so HURT. He said to Peter, “Could you not keep watch for one hour?” He returned to the garden and fell to the ground once again praying in agony, “Father, if it be your WILL, please take this cup from me.” Then SWEAT began forming on His face and fell to the ground like drops of BLOOD. For the third time he cries, “Please, Father, let this cup pass from
Me.”
While Jesus is agonizing in the garden, Judas makes his way to Gethsemane with a band of armed SOLDIERS. Upon finding Him, Judas walks up to Jesus and BETRAYS Him with a KISS.
(Why a KISS Judas? Why a gesture of AFFECTION? Why not just SLAP Him?)
ILLUSTRATION (cont.):
Throughout the night Jesus is handled like an ANIMAL—like a LAMB going to SLAUGHTER. He was ARRESTED and BOUND by the soldiers and led to Caiaphas who was the acting HIGH PRIEST that year. While in custody, FALSE WITNESSES came and testified against Him. Some began to MOCK and BEAT Him. Blindfolding Jesus, some of the SOLDIERS beat Him across the face with their FISTS saying, “Prophesy! Who is it that HIT you?” Then they BLASPHEMED Him. The very thing of which they ACCUSED Jesus they were doing—
BLASPHEMING God!
All while Jesus was being BEATEN and BLASPHEMED by His ACCUSERS, Peter was in the courtyard CURSING and DENYING that he even knew Jesus. Then Peter heard a HAUNTING sound in the night—“a ROOSTER CROWING”. At that moment he turned around and saw Jesus,
the One for whom he said he would DIE, standing near looking at him.
“Tell us if you are the Christ,” Caiaphas demanded. Jesus said, “If I tell you, you won’t believe Me.” “Are you the Son of God?” “Yes, I am!” Jesus replied. Tearing his clothes Caiaphas said, “This man BLASPHEMES. What more do we need? What shall we do with Him?”
“CRUCIFY HIM!” the men cried.
By this time the night had passed. Jesus had been the object of BEATINGS, MOCKERY, and INTERROGATION for several hours. He was BOUND and brought to Pilate the Governor to carry out the EXECUTION. After interrogating Jesus himself, Pilate finds nothing wrong with Him. Yet,
the Jews insisted that He be CRUCIFIED.
In an effort to have Jesus RELEASED, Pilate gives the Jews a choice to either have Jesus killed or Barabbas who was a MURDERER and a ROBBER. The Jews chose to release Barabbas and CRUCIFY Jesus. Jesus was then STRIPPED of His clothing and BEATEN. Some of the SOLDIERS made a CROWN out of THORNS and embedded it into Jesus’ head. Others put a purple robe on his back and reed in his hand. They then kneeled and mocked Him, “Hail the King of the
Jews.” They then SPAT upon Him and BEAT Him across the head with the REED he held.
They brought Him back to Pilate with BLOOD streaming down His face, TEARS in his EYES, and His back like HAMBURGER. Once again Pilate appeals to the Jews to let Jesus go. And they cried even louder, “CRUCIFY HIM! CRUCIFY HIM!” Finally Pilate gave into their DEMANDS: “You CRUCIFY Him! I find no wrong in Him!”
They made Jesus CARRY His CROSS until He could carry it no FARTHER. Once they arrived at Golgotha—The Place of the Skull—they laid Jesus down on the WOODEN CROSS and NAILED Roman spikes into His hands and feet and then LIFTED him up on the CROSS. There was
the Son of God hanging NAKED between two THIEVES.
For 6 agonizing hours Jesus HUNG upon the CROSS. During that time it is recorded that he uttered 7 phrases. It is the fourth phrase I want to study this morning. It’s when Jesus CRIED in a loud voice: “Eloi! Eloi! lama sabachthani?” -- “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken
me?”
Never have words carried so much HURT. Never has anyone upon this earth experienced the kind of LONELINESS that Jesus WENT through those 6 hours. This phrase tells it all. It tells of why Jesus prayed in AGONY at Gethsemane asking His Father to “remove the CUP of ANGUISH” from Him. It wasn’t because Jesus was AFRAID to DIE—He knew He would rise again. But it was because He didn’t want to experience the HELL He would go through while HANGING on that CROSS. “HELL is separation from our Heavenly Father”- 2 Thessalonians 1:9. Jesus didn’t want to go through that SEPARATION. But because “Jesus bore OUR sins in his body on the tree”-
1 Peter 2:24, God TURNED His BACK on His only begotten Son.
B. WHAT DID THE AGONIZING CRY OF JESUS MEAN?
MESSAGE:
I. A CRY OF SEPARATION
A. In Leviticus 16, we find a unique parallel, of what Jesus went through while HANGING on the cross.
1. In this chapter you will find the INSTRUCTION given to Aaron, the High Priest, on how he was
to SACRIFICE on the Day of Atonement.
COMMENT:
On this day Aaron would first sacrifice a BULL for his SINS. He would then select two GOATS. One will be SACRIFICED for the SINS of the people and the other would become a
“SCAPEGOAT.”
The High Priest would take his hands and put them on the SCAPEGOAT and symbolically PLACE on that GOAT all the SINS that the Israelites committed. Then a man would be appointed to take the GOAT to a desolate area far out into the WILDERNESS and RELEASE it. And there it would ever WONDER until it DIES.
2. What was the SIGNIFICANCE of this BANISHMENT? -- God cannot be where SIN is!
a. A HOLY God cannot FELLOWSHIP sin!
COMMENT:
When Adam and Eve sinned, part of their PUNISHMENT was banishment, because a
HOLY God cannot be near SIN!
Paul- “The wages of sin is death”- Romans 6:23. What is death? DEATH is to be CUT OFF from the source of LIFE. The “wages of sin” is not a BAD DAY or a TOUGH WEEK or a
TRYING YEAR. It is not having to deal with the AFFECTS of a PANDEMIC. It is UTTER,
NON-EXISTENCE. God CANNOT be where SIN is!
b. Isaiah 59:1-2a (READ and COMMENT)
COMMENT:
Sin SEPARATES man from God. A HOLY God cannot be near SIN and won’t be NEAR SIN, even if that SIN is born in the BODY of His own SON!
B. Jesus cried, “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken Me?”
1. God forsook His Son because of OUR SIN that He BORE!
a. 2 Corinthians 5:21- “God made Him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him
we might become the righteousness of God.”
COMMENT:
Jesus was SINLESS until He hung upon the CROSS, but then He became SIN for us. Every LIE ever told, every OBJECT ever COVETED, every PROMISE ever BROKEN, every ATROCITY COMMITTED against God and man were on the SHOULDERS of Jesus. He
became SIN.
b. GOD TURNS AWAY!
2. Can you imagine how Jesus felt?
COMMENT:
The two who were ONE were now TWO. Jesus, who had been with God from ETERNITY, is now all ALONE! The Christ, who was an EXPRESSION of God, is now ABANDONED. The GODHEAD is DISMANTLED. The UNITY is DISSOLVED! The Father to whom Jesus had PRAYED just hours before, has now turned His BACK away from His Son. When Jesus needed His Father most—He’s not there!
COMMENT (cont.):
It is more than Jesus can take. He withstood the BEATINGS and remained SILENT at the MOCK TRIALS. He watched in SILENCE as those He loved RAN AWAY. He did not RETALIATE when the INSULTS were hurled. Nor did He SCREAM when the SPIKES were POUNDED into His hands and feet, but when God turned His BACK—that was more than He could handle.
“My God!” He screamed. “Why? Why have you ABANDONED me?”
3. Why did He put Himself through this? He did it for you and He did it for me!
II. A CRY OF SUBSTITUTION
A. God HATES sin so much, and He LOVES us so much, that “He allowed His Son to become SIN for
us, so we can become RIGHTEOUS before God.”
1. God let His only begotten Son go through HELL so that you and I can LIVE!
COMMENT:
God being a HOLY God—a JUST God, cannot allow SIN to go UNPUNISHED. The choices that God had was either to DESTROY us or KILL His Son. “He LOVED us so much
that He gave His one and only Son that through Him we can have ETERNAL LIFE!”
2. 1 Corinthians 5:7b- “For Christ our PASSOVER LAMB has been SACRIFICED.”
ILLUSTRATION:
Moses had been sent by God to set His people, the Israelites, free from Egyptian slavery. God was ANGRY with Pharaoh because of the INJUSTICE he and the Egyptians committed against His people. God sent down 9 PLAGUES against those who ABUSED His people, but
they didn’t seem to do the job. So God says, “I’ve got one more.”
God said to Moses, “You go tell Pharaoh that the FIRST-B0RN children throughout the land are going to DIE. But Moses,” God said, “this is what I want you tell my people. You tell them to slay a LAMB and take the BLOOD and put it around the DOOR FRAME. And when my WRATH comes against SIN tonight, the ones who have the BLOOD of the LAMB on their DOOR POSTS will be SPARED.”
COMMENT:
Do you see the parallel between Christ our PASSOVER LAMB and the PASSOVER LAMB during Moses’ time? The LAMB was SUBSTITUDED for the LIVES of the FIRST-BORN SONS. The LAMB dies so that others could LIVE!
ILLUSTRATION:
I want you to PICTURE in your mind the morning after the ANGEL passed over Egypt. Can you hear the CRIES, the SCREAMS, the WAILING from WIVES and PARENTS and CHILDREN who WAKE UP to find the FIRST-BORN SONS in their families, DEAD?
Not a single Egyptian home was spared. But it didn’t have to be that way. Nine times Pharaoh was given an opportunity to let God’s people GO, but he REFUSED because of the HARDNESS of his heart. And, he, too, LOST his FIRST-BORN SON.
But while NO Egyptian home escaped DEATH, every Hebrew home was SPARED because they listened to God and SUBSTITUTED a LAMB for their SONS.
3. That’s what God has done. He SUBSTITUTED His Son for US—for YOU and ME.
B. The cry of Jesus is a “cry of SUBSTITUTION,” because if He didn’t make that cry, we would have.
1. We would be crying, “God, why have you forsaken me?”
COMMENT:
We are the ones who God should have FORSAKEN, not Jesus. We are the ones deserving to DIE. It’s what we EARNED because of our SIN. Instead, God sacrificed the LAMB, shedding His blood on the tree. And we are “covered by that PRECIOUS BLOOD when we are baptized into His DEATH”- Romans 6:3-7.
Even as the Israelites had to COVER their doorposts with the BLOOD of a LAMB in order to be SPARED from DEATH, so must we be COVERED by the BLOOD of the LAMB of God
through BAPTISM to be SPARED from ETERNAL DEATH.
2. Jesus is our SUBSTITUTION.
a. We are as DESERVING of DEATH as was Barabbas.
ILLUSTRATION:
Undoubtedly Barabbas was scheduled to DIE that day. Have you ever wondered why Pilate chose Barabbas above any other CRIMINAL for the Jews to choose between him and Christ?
I believe that Pilate was looking for the most VILE PRISONER he had in CUSTODY thinking that the Jews would surely choose to put him to death and let Jesus go FREE. Instead Jesus was SUBSTITUTED even for the most WICKED of people.
That’s the way it is with Christ. Even the most EVIL person who ever lived can be set free from death if he or she ACCEPTS Christ as Lord and Savior.
b. We are the GUILTY ones who should have HUNG on that CROSS!!
ILLUSTRATION:
Yet, Jesus with PARCHED lips and a BROKEN heart cries, “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken Me?” He knew it was going to happen. I’m sure He read Psalm 22 about the horrible ordeal He would experience. But He went through it anyway so that you and I would never have to!
III. A CRY OF SUBSTANTIATION (CONFIRMATION)
A. If you ever want to know how God feels about you, think about what He allowed His Son to go
through for you.
1. Most of us have had to GIVE UP someone we love dearly.
ILLUSTRATION:
I read this week of an Indianapolis couple who had been MARRIED for 51 years, who died only 6-minutes apart from the COVID-19 VIRUS. Their SON and GRANDCHILDREN were not allowed to be with them when they PASSED.
The son commented, “Just two weeks ago they were both healthy and active, and now they are gone.” He had to GIVE them UP! He can’t even hold a traditional FUNERAL for his parents.
COMMENT:
Most of us have been there where we had to GIVE UP a parent, a sibling, a child. It’s unbearable to GIVE UP someone you LOVE. But do we understand that is exactly what God did for us when He WATCHED His Son DIE in agony upon a CROSS?
2. Somehow we don’t think of God GIVING UP Jesus!
a. Romans 8:31-32- “What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but GAVE HIM UP for us all—how will he
not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?”
COMMENT:
Have you ever GIVEN UP somebody you LOVE? Has DEATH taken somebody away from you that you just weren’t ready to GIVE UP?
How did it FEEL? It HURT, didn’t it? But you had no CONTROL over it. You couldn’t STOP IT! You CLINGED to that LOVED ONE and did everything HUMANLY possible to keep from GIVING UP that person, but finally your LOVED ONE breathed his or her last.
b. It was different with God the Father—He could have STOPPED IT!
ILLUSTRATION:
When His Son prayed in AGONY in the Garden and said, “Father, please don’t allow me to be put through this NIGHTMARE! But if you ask me to, I will!”—God’s HEART must have ACHED because He could have said, “Okay, Son. You don’t have to go through this!” But He knew there was no other way.
When He saw His Son’s BACK being torn to SHREDS, His DIGNITY stripped along with His clothing, His FACE covered with SPIT and BLOOD, His HANDS and FEET nailed to the CROSS with 7- inch Roman SPIKES, God had to sit in STONY SILENCE.
When He HEARS His Son’s cry ROARING through the UNIVERSE, “My God! My God! Why have you FORSAKEN Me?” When Jesus needed Him most, God turned His BACK!
But He could have STOPPED IT! He could have sent His ANGELS to PROTECT His Son. But He didn’t! Why? Because of His great LOVE for YOU and ME!
3. Paul- “God gave His best—why should you doubt His LOVE!”
COMMENT:
IF you wonder how God feels about you, IF you ever wonder if you are WORTH much, IF you ever wonder about the INHERENT VALUE of any person LIVING or DEAD, just look what God GAVE UP to CONFIRM His LOVE!
4. Romans 5:8- “...God demonstrates His own LOVE for us in this: While we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.”
COMMENT:
Would you GIVE UP your child or grandchild to DIE in the place of someone else? No! Me neither! You know why? We don’t have that kind of LOVE! But God does. He GAVE UP His Son to PROVE IT!
AND THE CRY OF AGONY BECAME THE CRY OF SALVATION.
CONCLUSION:
PRAY, CONFESSING OUR NATIONAL SINS, SEEKING GOD’S FORGIVENESS AND ASKING FOR HIS MERCY TO BE UPON US.
