Seven Days That Changed The World | The Day The Temple Shook | Senior Pastor Keith Stewart

SEVEN DAYS THAT CHANGED THE WORLD
THE DAY THE TEMPLE SHOOK | PART 6
Senior Pastor Keith Stewart
March 29, 2026
 
This weekend at Springcreek Church, we’re looking at one of the most powerful moments in history—when the earth shook and the temple curtain tore in two. What if the cross you’ve always heard about is more than a symbol… What if it’s an invitation? An invitation not to try harder, but to stop striving. Not to earn your way to God, but to discover that the way has already been opened. If you’ve ever wondered whether you’re enough—or if you’ve been carrying a weight you were never meant to carry—this message is for you. Join us in person or online for “The Day the Temple Shook.”

Opening / Icebreaker
 
When you hear the phrase “It is finished,” what does that mean to you personally?
 
Have you ever felt like you had to “earn” someone’s approval or acceptance? What was that like?
 
Observation (What does the text say?)
 
In 1 Corinthians 1:23, why does Paul say the cross is a “stumbling block” and “foolishness”? What specifically made it offensive in Jesus’ day?
Looking at the people surrounding the cross (Barabbas, Simon of Cyrene, the Centurion, the women, Joseph of Arimathea), what stands out to you about who is included in the story?
 
According to Matthew 27:51, what happened at the moment Jesus died, and why is the order (veil torn before the earthquake) significant?
 
Interpretation (What does it mean?)
 
Why is the true suffering of the cross deeper than just the physical suffering Jesus endured?
 
What does “tetelestai” (“It is finished” / “Paid in full”) reveal about how salvation works?
 
What messages are communicated by the tearing of the temple veil? 
(Think: what ended and what began.)
 
Which person at the cross do you most identify with right now—and why?
 
Application (What does it mean for me?)
 
In what ways do people today still try to “earn this” with God? Where do you see that in your own life?
 
The message described living with a sense of “not enough.” Where does that show up in your thinking or behavior?

What would it look like for you to start “living like the truth is true”—that Christ’s work is enough?
 
Is there an area of your life where you still feel like there’s a barrier between you and God? What is it?
 
Response (What will I do about it?)
 
The torn veil represents open access to God. What is one practical way you can step into that access this week?
 
What burden do you need to lay down because of the cross?
 
How would your daily life change if you truly believed you are fully loved, forgiven, and accepted in Christ?
 
Closing Prayer Prompt
 
Thank God for what Christ has finished on your behalf.
 
Confess any ways you’ve been trying to “earn” what has already been given.
 
Ask God to help you live in the freedom and access He has opened through the cross.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Amen. Please have a seat. Welcome to our online audience who are joining us from home and across the country and even around the world today. We're always glad when they choose to make us a special part of today. You know, uh, today's message, we've been in this series all about the seven days that changed the world, which is a focus on the Passion Week. And this message is all about the crucifixion. I think that when it comes to the most familiar stories of the Bible, especially the stories we tell around Christmas and Easter, that in the average congregation there's a high checkout factor where people just say, hey, you know, I already know this story. You're not going to tell me anything new. I'm not sure how much I need to listen or pay attention. To me, I take these messages as very challenging to preach in such a way as to engage you, to make you think about things in a new way. We're still dealing with the same timeless truth that the scripture has risen, has has lifted before us forever. But I believe in a special way today, uh, we're going to really meet with God. And I've been praying to that end. I'm going to ask you to pray with me right now that as we gather around his word, that God will just be present, not just in this room, but in our hearts and our minds in ways like any other time. Let's pray. Father, I do thank you for how you prepared my heart for this message. But God, it's more than what you've done in me, it's what you're already doing in this place. In this time of worship, our hearts and minds have been opened. We've been singing praise. We're so grateful for your presence in our life and all the good things you do. Now, God, as we look at the central act of the Christian faith, I pray, God, that you give our minds clarity, our hearts receptivity, that we would find in you everything we've hungered for but didn't ever understand. I pray, God, that you're going to meet with us now in Jesus' name. Amen. So if you were to read the biography of any great leader, whether that's Abraham Lincoln, Gandhi, Dr. King, even if their death was tragic or memorable, it'll only be a tiny part of their biography. But for Jesus, it's the opposite. The story of his death is his story. It takes up a disproportionate amount of space throughout the entire New Testament because it matters that much. In fact, you could say that the Bible is cross-obsessed. John Ortberg reminded us of this. He said, 2,000 years after it happened, Jesus' death is the most important, most remembered death in the history of the world. It's like I said when we started this series, you know, we know that Jesus' active ministry lasted for like three and a half years, which means we know he did ministry for around a thousand days. Of that thousand days that Jesus did ministry, reading the Gospels, what we know is we have an accounting of about 100 of those days. So 10% of the thousand days of act is ministry, we know a little something about. But the Passion Week, this week that's been the subject of this entire series, these seven days that changed the world, half of the Gospel of John is dedicated to just this one week. A third of the Gospel of Mark is about the Passion Week. A quarter of Matthew and Luke are about the Passion Week. So what happened in that seven days is what this series has all been about, with the culmination of the week being the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, which is today's message and then next week's message. So let me put it in perspective. Years ago, I came across this little book called What If. And it was written by a bunch of historians reflecting on the what-ifs of history, like what if something different happened in history than what actually happened? For example, uh, what if Abraham Lincoln had survived the assassination attempt? How might our country be different today? Or if Dr. King, instead of being shot in Memphis, he had lived and kept leading the civil rights movement. How might things be different? Or what if John F. Kennedy was not assassinated in Dallas, might it not have led to the Vietnam War? So those are just some of the examples of the what if of history. And this is, they call it alternative history. You can find a lot of books, a lot of movies written about it. But here's the thing: Jesus' death is not like those other deaths at all, is it? In the early church, nobody ever said, I wish Jesus would have lived to a ripe old age and died in his sleep. His death was the deliberate, intentional strategy of heaven. So much so that Jesus himself said, I did not come to be served, but to serve and to give my life as a ransom. So that's where I want to begin today with the message of the cross, why it was necessary, and what God was conveying to us through the cross. And I'm calling my first point the cross that offends. Now, if you don't understand that statement, let me explain by talking about the foolishness of the cross. Because nothing really represents our faith better than the cross. It's the most widely recognized symbol in the history of our world. It's not a naturally attractive symbol, it's actually a terrifying symbol of torture, judgment, and imperial oppression. It's why Paul wrote, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews, and foolishness to Gentiles. It's important that you and I understand that the suffering and death of Christ on the cross is the one element in the Christian message that most other religions cannot accept. In Islam, Jesus doesn't die on the cross because such a fate is considered unfitting for a prophet of Allah. For Hindus and Buddhists, Jesus is often regarded as an amazing spiritual master, but the story of his suffering and death are considered unbecoming of an enlightened sage. In Buddhism, this the the the the tr uh the truly liberated, they transcend death and suffering. They don't embrace it and submit to it like Jesus did. So the cross represents the complete opposite of what Buddhism teaches. According to Paul, the message of the cross is a stumbling block. A stumbling block in the original language meant scandal. And what Paul is saying is the message of the cross is shocking, it's offensive, it trips people up. It's scandalous to Jews, it's foolishness to non-Jews. So let me see if I can illustrate this a bit further. In Roman times, crucifixion was the ultimate penalty, the death penalty for the worst of crimes. It was reserved for the worst of the worst. As a result, educated Romans almost never talked about crucifixion. They don't write about it, they never speak about it. It was kind of an embarrassment that they would have this kind of heinous physical torture in such an enlightened group of people. They were a sophisticated society. In other words, crucifixion offended the sensibilities of decent people. So to think that somebody who was crucified might be the key to life itself, that was just absurd to the average Roman. Now we know this in history because there's a very famous piece of graffiti. It's from around 200 A.D. It's carved into the wall of a dormitory that housed imperial pages in Rome. So in a dorm on Palatine Hill, archaeologists discovered this wall carving. So this is some of the earliest uh graffiti we know about. And you'll notice on the right is kind of a pencil overlay to highlight what is carved into the wall. The drawing is intended to make fun of a boy, a Christian boy named Alexamenos. Now it shows a boy standing in an attitude of worship before the figure of a man with the head of a donkey who's hanging on a cross. Underneath are scribbled the words, Alexamenos worships his God. So get this. The Romans, his fellow students, were mocking this little boy because he worshiped someone who was crucified. And you notice that the person on the cross has the head of a donkey. That's because there was an erroneous belief in Jesus' day and some years afterwards that Jewish people and Christian people worship donkeys. So they put the head of Christ as a donkey. This is why the Romans found the idea that Christ being crucified, that this was absurd. It's a ridiculous claim to make. Jewish people, on the other hand, hated crucifixion for different reasons. In Deuteronomy 21, the law says that anybody whose body hangs on a tree is cursed by God. In fact, that's likely the reason why the Jewish religion wanted Jesus crucified. It would demonstrate to the Jewish people that Jesus, far from being the Son of God, was someone who was cursed by God. So the idea of a crucified Messiah was absolutely preposterous to Jewish people. How could he be the Messiah if he was cursed? So what I'm saying is this when you begin to talk about the cross, you have to begin by talking about it's a scandalous message. Some people find it unbelievable, other people find it unthinkable. And by the way, the message of the cross is still offensive even today because it says that you and I need something as drastic as a cross to deal with our sin condition. But let's go further than that. Let's talk about the barbarity of the cross. If you grew up in church, you probably heard many messages about the cross. Some pastors will turn Good Friday into a murder mystery. They examine all the characters who are complicit in the death of Christ: the high priest, Herod, uh Sanhedrin, Pilate. Others turn Good Friday, the day that Jesus was crucified, into CSI Jerusalem. You know I'm talking about, I mean, I'm talking about a medical detailed examination, graphic detail of what crucifixion was like and what it did to the body. Early in the ministry, I was in a church like that, and that's the way I would speak about the crucifixion. I would I would talk about the blood loss. I'd talk about the cat of nine tails that was used on Christ. I'd talk about asphyxiation that happened on the cross. Alistair McGrath described crucifixion like this. The word, which sounds neat and clinical in its precision, refers to nothing other than legalized sadism. It's probably one of the most depraved forms of execution ever devised. It is nothing other than death by slow torture. Now, many of you have seen the movie The Passion of the Christ, and you know that in the Passion of the Christ, they make a big uh play on the physical suffering of Jesus. But you just need to know that what was done to Jesus' body was the least of his suffering. Most of the suffering of Christ that he endured, you could not see with your eyes. You see, why I'm telling you, it wasn't being whipped with a cat of nine tails that was most painful. Neither was it the nails that pierced his hands and his feet, the crown of thorns beaten into his brow, or the slow suffocating death. If you think that that's the worst suffering that Christ endured, you're sadly mistaken. You know, even the Gospels don't dwell or elaborate on those things. In fact, none of them, none of the gospels emphasize the torture of the cross. Did you know that? Mark simply says this. And they crucified him. They crucified him. That's it. All the other gospels are pretty much the same way. Check it out for yourself. Remarkably brief, no embellishment, very little commentary. The single most significant act in the history of the world is told very simply in just a few verses, but none of them go into graphic detail. And that should tell us something. Why don't Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John dwell on the physical suffering of Jesus, since that seems to be what preachers only do today? Why? That's an important question to ask. Because that wasn't the primary way Christ suffered. So let's turn our attention to the true suffering of the cross. Now you might remember this statement, this cry there that Jesus makes from the cross. He said, This, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? There is sincerely no statement that Jesus ever made that's more mysterious than this one. If you can begin to understand it, you might understand something of what Jesus was going through. You know, the story is told about the great reformer, Martin Luther, who one day has his Bible opened to this particular text. And for hours, hours, he sat there, staring at his open Bible. He says nothing, he writes nothing. He just sat there in silence, pondering the words he just read, then suddenly he stood up and exclaimed, God forsaken by God, how can it be? I mean, that's the question, isn't it? How can God forsake God? How can the Father forsake his own son? What could this possibly mean? You see, that word forsaken in the original language is very strong. It means to abandon, to desert, to disown, to turn away, and to utterly forsake. So please understand, when Jesus says, why have you forsaken me? He's not saying I feel forsaken. What he's saying is, I am forsaken, literally, truly, actually abandoned by God. Christ was abandoned, the Trinity disjointed, the Godhead somehow broken. I can't explain it. I can't even comprehend how it's possible. But the fact that I have no words to explain it doesn't stop it from being true. Let it be said over and over again when Jesus cries out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He was really and truly forsaken by his Father. Now, some people try to turn that into a case of cosmic child abuse. It's only when you understand the great mystery behind this that God was in Christ, taking our condemnation, standing in our place, absorbing our pain so that we wouldn't have to, that God took our place in Christ. Let me see if I can bring this home to you. When my second daughter Carly was born, she did us a favor of being born really, really late at night. You know, so so she she she's born, and as soon as she's born, I'm thinking, you know, the next 48 hours, I'm gonna have to be everything for Brenda. So I said, honey, I'm gonna go home and just sleep two hours, and then I'll be right back up. And she said, okay, go home. And so I went home. I literally sleep two hours, I rushed back to the hospital, and so we had her down at uh uh Presby down on Walnut Hill, okay? So we live in Garland, we do that that track. And when I get back the next morning, early that morning, I walk in the room, and Carly, our baby's not with Brenda. And I said, Honey, where's where's where's Carly? And she tells me, Carly aspirated while she was being born. And um, they're trying to get her to breathe, and both of her hips were completely dislocated. And so I ran, I ran down the hall, and there's a nursery kind of at the end of the hall in the big window where you can see all the babies, and I instantly knew who Carly was because Carly had all the wires coming out of her body, had this tube down her throat trying to help her breathe, and I'm looking at my baby, and it is the most helpless and powerless I've ever felt in my entire life. I mean, I'm looking at her and seeing her suffer, and I begin to pray. And what I say is probably the most untologically precise prayer I've ever prayed in my life. But I just said, God, let it be me, not her. Do whatever you want to me, but please, God, spare my precious baby girl. Let me take her place. That's what I prayed. And folks, in that moment, I caught a tiny glimpse of what the father feels like when he looks down on us in our helplessness and sin. He's a father and he loves. And the highest love of all is the willingness to say, Let me take their place. And that's what God did in Jesus Christ. He took our place. He was forsaken so that you would never be forsaken. He was abandoned so that you would never be abandoned. Deserted so that you would not be deserted, forgotten so you'd never be forgotten. He experienced your hell so you wouldn't have to. I mean, Jesus suffered our hell because what is hell? Hell is a place of God forsakenness. It's to be completely abandoned. And that's what Christ endured. Jesus, in those few hours on the cross, went through what you and I deserved to go through on account of our sins. He bore it all. But let's go a little deeper into what's happening at the cross, the penalty paid in full at the cross. Now let me tell you, Christianity is not like every other religion in the world. Yes, in terms of the morals, we believe all religions are remarkably similar. But in terms of what it takes to be reconciled with God, the difference between what true biblical Christianity teaches and the religions of the world is stratospheric. Because Christianity is not truly a religion. Here's the problem with religion: it always leads to either pride or despair. In pride, I say I feel like I'm more than enough and I did enough. And despair means I don't think I'm ever enough and I can't do enough. Religion never leads to hope, confidence, joy, or peace because the assumption is there's always something, one more thing I need to do to make God love me. The operative word in religion is enough. I've either done enough or I feel like I've never done enough. But Jesus dies to set us free from all that. In fact, his last words on the cross, I guarantee it, listen to what he said. Jesus said, it is finished. With that, he bowed his head and he gave up his spirit. So when Jesus says phrase, it is finished, in the Greek, it's actually one word. It's the word textelestai, it is finished. But you realize that's probably not a good translation of that word. We didn't know for years what this word meant. And what ended up happening is one day some archaeologists were going through what they found was a trash pit. And oftentimes, because they didn't have papyrus and paper to write bills on, they would carve them onto pottery shards. So broken pottery, you would have your bill. Maybe it's for, you know, groceries or things that you uh had to borrow to build your house. You'd have this statement of money that you owed. And what they discovered is every one of these pottery shards had this word taytelisti written across the front. Because you see, these bills had already been paid. Their balance had been settled. They were paid in full. And so when they see the word taetelestae, they realize these are paid in full. So when Jesus dies on the cross, his last words are not, it is finished. His last words are paid in full. Your sin debt, my sin debt were paid in full by Jesus Christ. You know, it's not about being good enough, it's not about doing enough. What Christ did was more than enough. It is finished. My salvation is complete. This is what Paul reminds us of in Colossians. He said, And you who were dead in your trespasses, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by listening, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. One of the most powerful examples of this I've ever seen is in an old movie called Saving Private Ryan. Do you remember this movie? So you might recall there's an army captain by the name of John Miller. He's played by Tom Hanks. He's ordered to find a solitary prophet among thousands of displaced soldiers in the aftermath of D-Day and World War II. His mission is to return Private My Prian Private Ryan to his mother because his mother has always already lost three other sons in this same war. So three sons have died, she's had four kids, Ryan's the only surviving one. Captain Miller, small group of men, go to try to locate Ryan. When they finally locate him, they're forced to defend a strategic bridge between the enemy tanks and their troops. Captain Miller is fatally wounded at that bridge. And as he's taking his final breath, he pulls Ryan closely in, looks him in the eye, can barely utter the words, but he says, earn this. Earn this. Do you remember that? I can't imagine a more torturous message to carry for the rest of your life than earn this. And as the film concludes, because it goes from that scene on the bridge to Private Ryan as an elderly gentleman standing in the fields of Norway, uh of Normandy, where all the soldiers that have died are buried, and standing at Captain Miller's grave. And he looks at his wife and says, Tell me I'm a good man. Tell me I've done enough. Tell me that my life has been sufficient to earn the death of this man. This is a man who was not set free the day he was sent home. This is a man who's been tortured by a horrible question. Have I done enough to earn this? You see, the irony of the movie is that it's called saving private Ryan, and it should have been called damning private Ryan. 2,000 years ago, when Christ died on the cross, I thank God that his final words were not, earn this. Because that would not have been eternal life. It would have been eternal damnation. There's not a person here, there's not a person who's ever lived who could earn such a gift. Instead, when Christ dies, he cries out triumphantly, paid in full. It is finished. What needed to be done was done. There's nothing you and I have to add to the completed work of Christ. You don't earn this. You accept this. Now, for some of you, you live with the burden of a private Ryan. You constantly torture yourself as to whether you're submitting enough, doing enough good things, acting the right way, staying away from things you shouldn't do, and the list goes on ad infinitum because you're trying to earn this. You've got a bad case of religion. The good news of the crucifixion, of the cross, is that God has released us from the endless striving to measure up to his standards. Everything about the cross shows us a God who wants all people everywhere to find a home in his heart. He opens up the way at the cross. And that's what the next point is all about, the cross includes. What's fascinating to me that doesn't get much airtime in the average church are the characters that surround the cross. These characters are minor characters. We didn't even know about them before this time when Jesus is arrested and he's taken to the cross. But none of these characters are there by accident. Every single one of them sends a message through their example and through their life. And I'm going to talk to you about who these are. They're an unusual gathering of characters. The first one is somebody we call Barabbas. Notice what the Bible says. Now it was the custom at the festival to release a prisoner whom the people requested. A man called Barabbas was imprisoned with the insurrectionists who'd committed murder in the uprising. Now you remember this guy, a murderous insurrectionist in the custody of Rome, at the same time that Christ is in custody. Pilate realizes that the mob wants Jesus dead. But he also knows, and the Bible's clear, Pilate understands Jesus is innocent. This is not a guilty man. So he figured out what he considers a brilliant end-around strategy. Every year, the Romans at Passover would offer to release anybody from prison that the Jewish people wanted released. And so he makes this gesture I'll give you Jesus, or you can have Barabbas. Because he thinks, man, this is a no-brainer. Everybody knows Jesus is a good guy. Barabbas, he's a murderous, terrible insurrectionist, a brigand in every way. Nobody in the right mind is going to release Barabbas. That's what he's thinking. And what do the people choose? Give us Barabbas. What do you want me to do with Jesus? Crucify him. The unthinkable happens. I'll never forget, I was on a flight home from Chicago one time and seated next to a young man who had tattoos all over his body. And I don't judge those kind of things. I think it's fascinating, so I just start asking him because he obviously has a lot and they must mean something to him. So I said, Hey, tell me about that, that tattoo on your hand. What does that mean? And he's telling me all these really interesting stories. So we're having a great conversation. And then about halfway through the flight, he looks at me and he says, You know, I have the name Barabbas tattooed down my spine. And I said, Okay, tell me about that. And he and I'll never forget what he said. He said, Jesus died in the place of Barabbas. And I can imagine as Barabbas was being set free from the crimes for which he was guilty, he had to have looked back at Jesus and thought, Who is this man who would die in my place? And then he looks at me and he says something I didn't expect. He said, I realize in that moment I am Barabbas. And I thought, wow, that's good theology, actually. That's who we are. We're all Barabbas because I'm Barabbas. You want to know something even crazier? This name, Barabbas? You understand what it means. Bar, it's a very common suffix in the Bible. Bar means son of. The rest of his name? Abba. The most endearing name for father in all the New Testament. He's son of daddy. He's a son of a father who loves him like no other. Even Barabbas. Barabbas' story is in there to let you know that everybody's included in what Jesus is doing on that cross. He's died in the place of every Barabbas. And I wonder how many sons and daughters of Abba are in this room who've yet to understand that Christ died on your behalf. There's somebody else. So he includes Barabbas. The cross includes Barabbas, but also includes Simon of Cyrene. The Bible says a certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross. So Simon Cyrene, that means he's from North Africa. The fact that Mark mentions his two sons, Rufus and Alexander, likely means that this man and his family were well known in the early church. Now you might remember this story as Jesus is being marched to Galgotha, what the Romans would do is they would have the accused have to carry their very means of execution. Jesus was forced to carry his cross. But he collapses under the weight of that cross. He can't carry it anymore. And so the Romans conscripted a man from the crowd. You, you carry his cross from this point on. And that man was Simon. What I love most about Simon's story is the fact that you can't tell the story of Jesus without telling the story of an African man who helped Jesus in his most desperate hour. The disciples, the ones that Jesus had poured his life into for three and a half years, they're nowhere to be found. It was Simon, who was likely a black man from North Africa, who helped Jesus when he needed it the most. So Simon represents the nations, the Gentiles, those outside the Jewish faith who get drawn into the story of Jesus. There's irony in this story, too, because Simon, as he's carrying Jesus' cross, you realize Jesus is carrying Simon's cross too. Jesus is not just dying for Israel. He's dying for Africa. He's dying for the nations. He's dying for the world. He's dying for Simon. Evidently, Simon is so moved by the experience that church tradition tells us that he became a believer and leader in the church because the cross includes. It includes the worst of the worst, like Barabbas, and includes all the nations of the earth, like we see in Simon. But there's another face in the crowd that also demonstrates how inclusive the cross is. Remember, I'm telling you, these are minor characters in the story. They have a major message. This message is really important that you hear. They represent the people that Jesus is dying for. The next one is the centurion. The Bible says when the centurion, this is a man who's witnessed hundreds of executions, he stands there looking at Jesus, sees what he's like, sees how he dies, and the centurion said, Surely, this man was the Son of God. Now, like I say, this is a man, a soldier, an officer, who's used to watching criminals die. He's really the last person you'd ever expect to be affected in any way by Jesus' crucifixion. But there's something profoundly different about this one. Something about Jesus that grabs hold of this soldier. This scene is different from the hundreds of other men that he's watched die. The centurion declares that the death of Christ, surely this is the Son of God. Now you need to get the significance of what he's saying. In those days, there's a Roman imperial cult, which means they worship Caesar like God. In fact, the title of Caesar was Son of God. You can see it on every coin from the first century. Caesar Divi F, Caesar, Divine Son, Son of God. So this soldier takes the most revered name in the imperial cult and applies it to a Jewish man dying on the cross. Says, no, it's not Caesar who's a son of God. This, this man is a son of God. This is a big deal in the Gospel of Mark, because according to Mark's account, the first human witness to describe Jesus as a son of God, it's not a disciple, it's not even a Jew. The first person to describe Jesus as a son of God is a Gentile army officer with no previous connection to Jesus whatsoever. At this point in the story, the disciples still don't get it. The religious leaders, they don't get it. But this outsider, this pagan officer, this enemy of the Jew, he gets it. So this soldier is here in the story to show us that the love of God is so inclusive, it includes all these outsiders. That the love of God can save an enemy too. Even someone who participated in Jesus' execution is moved and changed and understands that Jesus is the unique Son of God. Church history tells us that the centurion not only became a believer, but eventually became a martyr for Christ himself. He laid down his life for Jesus. Next in Mark, we encounter not just a singular character, but a group of characters, an unusual one at that, and that's the women. Listen to what Mark says. Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James the Younger and of Joseph, and Salome. In Galilee, these women had followed him and cared for his needs. Many other women who'd come up with him to Jerusalem were also there. So what Scripture makes really clear is the disciples, all the male disciples, they've deserted Jesus and only the women remain, faithful to the end. They're the ones who see Jesus die. They're the ones who see Jesus' body laid in the tomb. They're the ones who first witness the resurrection. So they're the only eyewitnesses, the women, who can testify to all three realities the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. What I'm saying is the story of Jesus can't be told without women. God entrusts the most important story in the history of the world to women. In fact, they're the first evangelists of the gospel. So you see what Mark is showing us? The death of Jesus is turning everything upside down, or maybe more importantly, right side up. It's a changing of a life of a criminal held by Rome. It changes the life of a random person in the crowd as they're conscripted to carry the cross of Christ. It's an enemy who's the first to grasp that Jesus is the Son of God. It's the women who are excluded who are brought back to their rightful place at the center of the story and now entrusted with a life-changing message of Jesus Christ. All these minor characters are not accidental. Their presence is noted for a reason, because each one of them shows us how inclusive the message of the gospel really is. There's one more character Mark wants us to notice, and it's Joseph of Arimathea. He says, Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the council who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus' body. So being a member of the Jewish council means he's a part of the Sanhedrin. Sanhedrin is the body that condemned Jesus to death. He has significant social standing in Jerusalem. He risked everything in going to Pilate and asking for Jesus' body. You see, the Romans didn't like to take a body down right after it died. They loved to leave it up as an example. Leave it there till it rotted. Teach people you can't be an insurrectionist against Rome, because this is what we'll do to you. So he risked reputation, he risked life in going to Pilate and saying, hey, let me have the body. And even more importantly, he says, Let me prepare the body. To prepare a crucified corpse meant you would do the unthinkable task of number one, handling a body, but also handling blood. And that would render a person unclean by Jewish standards. Ordinarily, a religious leader like Joseph would never do something like this. By highlighting Joseph, Mark is showing us that even the ones responsible for the death of Christ are included in those for whom he died. And this to me is the best news of all, because you and I are most like Joseph. We're the ones who put him on that cross. It's our sins that nailed him there. But even though it was our sin that put him there, it was his love that kept him there. Whatever happened to Joseph, no one can be sure. But story circulated in the early church that he became an evangelist and was the first to take the gospel to Britain. And if that's true, then those of us of European descent, that means Joseph is the one who took the church to our ancestors. By highlighting the people Jesus did, Mark is showing us how inclusive, how big the love of God actually is. At the cross, Jesus changes the life of the most unusual people, people with nothing in common. And he's still doing that, isn't he? He's changing the lives of the most unlikely people, the foolish and forgotten, the religious and the non-religious, the people with power and those with none. Christ's death on the cross changes everything, and including my own life. And that leads me to this final factor about the cross, the cross that opens. The Bible says, and when Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit, so he dies. At that moment, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from the top to the bottom, the earth shook, the rocks split. Now it's interesting the order that Matthew puts out here. He doesn't say there was an earthquake and the temple tore, right? That the veil tore. He said the veil tore, and then there was an earthquake. You see, had it happened the other way around, people might have said, well, the earthquake caused that temple veil to tear. That's why it tore. But you see, God initiated that act. God tore the temple veil. We'll talk more about what that means in a minute. He does that, and then there's the earthquake, the rocks shake, the temple shakes. So what does that mean? What does it mean for the veil to rip from top to bottom? Mark mentions it, Matthew mentions it, Luke mentions it, but what does it mean? Well, inside the temple, there are two main rooms. And I have a cross section of the temple so you can get an idea of this. There's two places, there's the holy place and the most holy place. So the priest could enter the holy place only on certain times to do certain things under certain religious prescribed functions. No one just ever went into the holy place to hang out. You came in to do God's business, you left. It wasn't a place of leisure. Important work was being done there, performed by men who were set apart to God. But the other place, called the most holy place, sometimes we refer to it as the holy of holies, is the very center of all Jewish worship. If you read in Leviticus 16, the details for entering that room are very specific. One man could enter the most holy place, the Holy of Holies, and that's the high priest. He could only enter on the most holy day of the year, the day of atonement. He had to be wearing special garments to enter the room. He had to bring with him the blood of a goat. He had to sprinkle the blood on the golden mercy seat, which was the lid of the Ark of the Covenant. If anyone besides the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies, they'd be struck dead immediately. If the priest entered on any other day than the Day of Atonement, instant death. If the high priest came without the blood of the goat, again, they would die immediately. Everything about this whole system screamed, stay away, don't come near, you're not qualified to enter on your own. It was as if the temple became this giant roadblock, making sure that no one could come into God's presence uninvited. And nothing sent that message more than that presence of that curtain that divided the holy place from the holy of holies. Now, when we think curtain, we're thinking about our drapes at home. That we have this set of drapes between the holy place and the most holy place. The curtain in the temple is nothing like that. It's described in Exodus 26. It's made of blue and purple and scarlet yawn, yarn weaved together with finely twisted linen. There's cherubim that are worked into the fabric itself by skilled craftsmen. Think of it less as a curtain and more like a wall. The dimensions of the curtain are well documented. 60 feet in length, 30 feet in width, four inches thick. To put it in perspective, we're talking about a curtain about the width of the stage, twice the height of our ceiling. Okay? That's what the Bible's describing. That's the size of the curtain. That is four inches of fabric is insane. I mean, I have a two-inch blanket at home. It's mainly fluff and air in that two inches. This is thick. As thick as a man's palm is the way the Bible is the way it's described in history. As thick as a man's palm. It was said that it took 300 men to lift it up into place. This is heavy, this is massive. And standing in front of that curtain is a smack you in the face reminder: God's on the other side and you're not getting in there. That's why what happens next is so amazing. The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. Now there's two messages contained in the tearing of the temple veil, the temple curtain, and it's this the first and obvious message: the old way is over. You see, once the curtain is destroyed, it means that the offering for the sacrifice of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world has been accepted by God. It means an end to the Old Testament sacrificial system. No more lambs need to be slain at Passover. No more goats need to be offered on the Day of Atonement and in the Holy of Holies. No more goats, scapegoats, need to have their hands laid on them and sent out into the wilderness to die. There's no more need for the blood to be sprinkled on the mercy seat. No more priest or high priest to serve as an in-between, a mediator between us and God. God's demolishing his temple. Its time is over. No more feast days in Jerusalem, no more Levites, no more tribes. God is tearing up the old covenant requirements. Their time had come, and now was fulfilled in Christ, and that day is over. Listen to how the New Testament describes this. Jesus has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. There is no more need for a sacrificial system. This is why Jesus destroys the veil. And by the way, that it comes from top to bottom tells you this was God. Human beings didn't go in there. We'd have to rip from the top, from the bottom up, right? And we couldn't rip something that massive. God breaks down the veil. But there's something else. The other message in the tearing of the veil, a new way has begun. The moment that Jesus surrenders to death, God receives the offering He made as a payment for sin of humanity. So he tears down the veil that separates us from Him. A separation that was necessary before because of sin. But now those who've accepted Christ as their perfect sacrifice, we're no longer separated from God's presence by a wall. Instead, we have an all-excess pass to the throne room of grace. The writer of Hebrews really wants us to understand this imagery. And so they wrote, Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter where? The most holy place. The holy of holies. How? By the blood of Jesus. Same verse in the message Bible. So, friends, we can now without hesitation walk right up to God into the holy place. The great thing about the temple veil being torn is that we all get to be in the presence of God now. Not just a select few with the right credentials, not just the priest who had flawless skin and flawless bodies. If you've accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, He's made you acceptable in your standing. You've gone from flawed to forgiven, from broken to healed, from sinful to acceptable. God tore down the barrier that separated us from Him, and only God could tear down a barrier of this size and magnitude. Let me tell you something. Some of you know this, some of you don't. Maybe you're aware that I grew up in religious fundamentalism. I don't know why they ever called themselves fundamentalists, because they weren't very fun. And they definitely lacked on the mental side too. But in that environment, in that environment, people didn't truly and really believed in the finished work of Christ. I say that because in their minds there was always something more that you had to do to make God love you. God was never happy with you. The spiritual life was just one guilt trip after another. And anything and everything you ever did was called into question, especially if it was fun. You were constantly asked, should you be doing that? And the reason I shared with you the story of saving Private Ryan? Because that's my story. I grew up with a ninth degree black belt and beating myself up around the question, is this enough, God? Can I ever do enough to earn the sacrifice of Jesus Christ? You can't. It's an exhausting way to live. You'll never have an assurance that you're love, accepted, and cherished by God. But here's the deal: 33 years ago, my life started to unravel at the seams. I started questioning everything I'd ever been taught. Because how I was living my life, especially how I was living my spiritual life, wasn't doing anything but producing more problems for me, not less. I felt like I was on the other side of a great big wall that kept me out of the presence of God. I wanted to know God. I wanted to experience God. I wanted to be with Him, but I felt like my constant and countless imperfections were keeping me out of His holy presence. And do you know what God did for me? He took me back to the cross. He took me back to what Jesus actually died for. And he showed me how God tore down the wall and the barrier is no more. That God opened the way back to himself through what Christ did. My penalty was paid. My standing was completely changed. And I was made justified. Do you know what that word means? Justified, just as if I'd never sinned. That's what it means to be justified in the sight of God. I have been made acceptable in the eyes of God. I am more than enough in Christ. And God is satisfied with what Christ did on my behalf. So I am forgiven, I'm fully loved, I'm a fully accepted child of God, and nothing I can do can change that. Because it's not about what I do, it's about what he did. And I accepted that. And I decided, I decided I'd start living like the truth is true. And you know what? When I decided to start living like the truth is true, I never look back. Because I live with assurance. I live knowing my my position with God is. Settled. I know I have complete access to the Father. I know I'm welcomed in his presence, and my Father is very fond of me. I know that today. So the cross that offended the world is the cross that included the unlikely. And it becomes the cross that opens the way to God for all of us. Some of you are where I was. You're carrying a burden you were never meant to carry. God's already torn down the veil. That's his invitation to come be with him where he is. So I say to you, come home to the place of God's perfect acceptance. Come home to the place where endless striving ceases. Come home to the place you can finally rest, knowing that you're completely known, totally forgiven, and thoroughly loved by God. Aren't you tired of trying to earn this? You don't earn it. He did it. You accept it. That's enough. Let's pray. Father, I thank you. I thank you, God, for what the crucifixion means to me. I thank you, God, that you took me to this place to heal my own broken and manipulated and guilted and shamed heart. That you took me back to the reality of what Christ has already done for me. That it's not about what I do, if it's ever going to be enough, what Jesus did was more than enough. That I don't earn that. I just accept that. And that, God, you've opened the way to your own heart. That I have free and full and complete access to you. My standing has changed. I am no longer this wretch that I was before I came to know you. I am forgiven. I'm justified. I am made a person who lives under no condemnation because of what Christ has done. So I accepted that and I live like it's true. For anybody in this room who continues to beat themselves up because they got a bad case of religion, God help them to begin to live like the truth is true, to embrace this and to start living it because God, only the truth can set us free. And for anybody in this space who maybe for the first time on a good Friday service, that they think about what you accomplished on the cross for them, that they that Christ was abandoned so they never would be, that Christ was forgotten so that they would never be forgotten, that he took their sin debt upon himself so that they could be forgiven, fully forgiven, fully free. Help somebody to pray this simple prayer in their heart. This is not about the words, it's about our sincerity. Help them to pray, Jesus, I want you in my life. I know I'm a sinner. I know life, I've done life in a self-styled way. And so I ask you to forgive me. I ask you to do in me, through me, for me what I can't do for myself. I ask you to come into my life. I want to follow you as my Savior and my Lord. I believe you died for me. I believe you made it possible for me to know God. So as best I know how I'm giving you my life. Everything I know about my life, I'm giving it to you now, and I'm asking you now to help me to grow as a Christ follower. I pray it all in Jesus' name. Amen. God bless you.