Micah McCormick: Chapter 27.
Micah McCormick: As we continue on through this first gospel of our Christian New Testaments.
Micah McCormick: If you're using the Pew Bible, you can find that on page 885, Matthew chapter 27.
Micah McCormick: We'll be looking this morning at verses 45 to 56.
Micah McCormick: Matthew 27, 45 through 56.
Micah McCormick: This is God's word.
Micah McCormick: From noon until three in the afternoon, darkness came over the whole land.
Micah McCormick: About three in the afternoon, Jesus cried out with a loud voice, Eloy, Eloi, Lama Sabakhthani, that is, my God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Micah McCormick: When some of those standing there heard this, they said, He's calling for Elijah.
Micah McCormick: Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a stick, and offered him a drink.
Micah McCormick: But the rest said, Let's see if Elijah comes to save him.
Micah McCormick: But Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit.
Micah McCormick: Suddenly the curtain of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom.
Micah McCormick: The earth quaked, and the rocks were split.
Micah McCormick: The tombs were also opened, and many of the bodies who had fallen asleep were raised, and they came out of the tombs after his resurrection, entered the holy city, and appeared to many.
Micah McCormick: When the centurion and those with him who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and the things that had happened, they were terrified and said, Truly this man was the Son of God.
Micah McCormick: Many women who had followed Jesus from Galilee and looked after him were there, watching from a distance.
Micah McCormick: Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of Zebedee's sons.
Micah McCormick: Let's pray again.
Micah McCormick: Father, we're asking for you to help us today to be trusting in the work of Jesus Christ, a work that we need.
Micah McCormick: We see the weight of our own disobedient inclinations, the thoughts and attitudes of our heart that rightly calls out judgment.
Micah McCormick: And yet we see the beauty of mercy, the beauty of substitute and the sacrifice of another.
Micah McCormick: So we pray that as we even consider this passage this morning, you would help us to take confidence to know that though there is death in the world and death in some ways still at work in us, yet our Christ has accomplished all that's necessary to defeat death.
Micah McCormick: That indeed it was finished upon that cross, that we have this assurance through Scripture.
Micah McCormick: We pray these things in Jesus' name.
Micah McCormick: Amen.
Micah McCormick: In 1648, John Owen, he's a Puritan pastor, published a book called The Death of Death in the Death of Christ.
Micah McCormick: Let me, did you catch that title?
Micah McCormick: The Death of Death in the Death of Christ.
Micah McCormick: This is how he begins.
Micah McCormick: He's got a note to the reader, and he says, If you are as many in this pretending age, a title gazer, and you come into books as Cato into the theater to go out again, you have had your entertainment.
Micah McCormick: Farewell.
Micah McCormick: He wasn't really someone who was trying to pump up his sales and flatter the public.
Micah McCormick: But as he gets actually into the substance of the book, he opens with a couple of questions.
Micah McCormick: Why did the father send the son into the world?
Micah McCormick: And what did the son of God actually accomplish when he came into the world?
Micah McCormick: And then he surveys a number of passages right at the beginning of the book.
Micah McCormick: And the summary we could say from that survey, one way to summarize it would be to say that the father sent the son into the world to put death to death.
Micah McCormick: And that what Jesus actually accomplished when he came into the world was to put death to death.
Micah McCormick: Now, it's he's not the easiest person to read.
Micah McCormick: But why do I start there?
Micah McCormick: Well, I start there because the title of the sermon today is Putting Death to Death.
Micah McCormick: So if that title sounds a little bit familiar, I'm telling you, it's it's an illusion there.
Micah McCormick: Don't accuse me of plagiarism.
Micah McCormick: But even more important, much more important than John Owen warrant, we have biblical warrant.
Micah McCormick: 2 Timothy chapter 1 tells us that God saved us and called us to a holy calling.
Micah McCormick: Not because of our own works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which has now been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death.
Micah McCormick: So it's right there in Scripture.
Micah McCormick: This is what Jesus came to do.
Micah McCormick: This is what he did.
Micah McCormick: I also mentioned that book by John Owen because of the way he starts it with if you're just a title gazer and you're not ready to apply your mind, yeah, find something else.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes when we come to familiar portions of scripture, we don't really come ready to engage our whole heart and soul and strength and mind as God's people.
Micah McCormick: But these are some familiar words for those of us who know the Lord.
Micah McCormick: Come ready to listen today, come ready to hear the details of this passage and all that it tells us.
Micah McCormick: And most importantly, it's not a topical sermon, obviously, on John Owen or any book that he wrote.
Micah McCormick: It's a sermon on this passage in Matthew.
Micah McCormick: And if you look at verse number 50, right at the heart of our passage, it says that Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit.
Micah McCormick: Jesus died.
Micah McCormick: It's right there at the heart of this passage.
Micah McCormick: But what's the significance of his death?
Micah McCormick: I'm gonna argue this morning that Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: That's the big argument.
Micah McCormick: And there's a lot of clues that will point us in that direction.
Micah McCormick: So if we're willing to accept that argument that Jesus put death to death, then that demands a response from us.
Micah McCormick: And we'll come to that response at the end.
Micah McCormick: Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: Here's the first step of the argument.
Micah McCormick: First step is this Jesus truly experienced death.
Micah McCormick: Now we just saw that in verse 50.
Micah McCormick: You can look at that again.
Micah McCormick: Jesus gave up his spirit.
Micah McCormick: So he didn't just talk at death from a distance.
Micah McCormick: He didn't speak about death.
Micah McCormick: He didn't come to do kind of cosmic battle back and forth with death.
Micah McCormick: It is true.
Micah McCormick: Hebrews tells us he came to destroy the one who has the power of death, that is the devil.
Micah McCormick: So there is battle going on there.
Micah McCormick: But he entered into the deepest and darkest human experience, an experience that we're all going to have to go through one day.
Micah McCormick: And he died.
Micah McCormick: He wasn't caught off guard or taken by surprise.
Micah McCormick: As he himself said, I lay my life down, I take it up again, no one can take it from me.
Micah McCormick: So even in this very act of death, Jesus was active in giving himself over to the Father.
Micah McCormick: You hear in the book of Acts, Stephen will say when he's being stoned, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
Micah McCormick: It's a prayer.
Micah McCormick: It doesn't say that Stephen gave up his spirit, the way that Jesus did that right here.
Micah McCormick: And the gospel writers all record this testimony because they want us to know that Jesus is accomplishing something in his death.
Micah McCormick: And the reason why he has authority, even in this moment of very human weakness and staggering suffering, he's still in control because he's not merely a human being.
Micah McCormick: He's God of gods.
Micah McCormick: The creed that we recited this morning rehearsed that truth, that he's indeed begotten and God of gods from eternity past.
Micah McCormick: And if it's true that Jesus is God, we're already entering very deep and mysterious waters.
Micah McCormick: First Timothy six.
Micah McCormick: God is the blessed and only sovereign, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, who alone is immortal.
Micah McCormick: God cannot die.
Micah McCormick: That's part of what it means to be God.
Micah McCormick: So when we say Jesus is truly God, but he died, how can we fit that together?
Micah McCormick: This is already a lot of mystery here.
Micah McCormick: But remember that though Jesus was truly God from eternity past, he's also truly human.
Micah McCormick: This is a marvelous thing that he experienced death through his human nature.
Micah McCormick: We sing a song called An Can It Be.
Micah McCormick: There's a verse of that song, it's not in our hymn book, but there's a verse that begins this way Tis mystery all, the immortal dies.
Micah McCormick: Who can explore his strange design?
Micah McCormick: Now, even to be able to say that the son experienced death through his human nature, that's still so harrowing and humbling.
Micah McCormick: Why would he do that?
Micah McCormick: He did it for us.
Micah McCormick: It wasn't a parlor trick to show his ability to have two natures and one person.
Micah McCormick: He came for us and for our salvation to live and to die.
Micah McCormick: And that brings us to the next step of the argument.
Micah McCormick: So Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: He did that by experiencing death, truly experiencing death.
Micah McCormick: And in that experience of death, he bore the judgment of God.
Micah McCormick: He actually bore the judgment of God.
Micah McCormick: We know this is true from what the whole Bible says, but where do I get that from our passage here in Matthew?
Micah McCormick: Well, there are a number of clues.
Micah McCormick: So I go back to what I said at the beginning.
Micah McCormick: Keep our minds engaged with all the clues that Matthew gives us to show us through this narrative that when Jesus dies, he's bearing the judgment of God.
Micah McCormick: First, just the very fact that he died.
Micah McCormick: Now I'm repeating myself, but why do people die at all?
Micah McCormick: Why did Adam and Eve die in the beginning?
Micah McCormick: Because they had sinned and the judgment of God was coming on them.
Micah McCormick: Why did people die in the flood?
Micah McCormick: God was giving his judgment.
Micah McCormick: So the very existence of death in the world at all is a sign of God's judgment.
Micah McCormick: Romans 6 23 says, the wages of sin is death.
Micah McCormick: And the Lord rightly pays out those wages.
Micah McCormick: But there's another clue here.
Micah McCormick: The second clue that Jesus was bearing the judgment of God in his death is that it says darkness came over the whole land.
Micah McCormick: Verse 45.
Micah McCormick: Interesting detail, kind of ominous.
Micah McCormick: Yes, but it's more than that.
Micah McCormick: Exodus chapter 10 records this.
Micah McCormick: Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand toward heaven, and there will be darkness over the land of Egypt, a darkness that can be felt.
Micah McCormick: So Moses stretched out his hand toward heaven, and there was thick darkness throughout the land of Egypt for three days.
Micah McCormick: God brought darkness over the whole land of Egypt, way back in the Old Testament, as one of the plagues that was a sign of judgment against the Egyptians.
Micah McCormick: There was darkness over the whole land of Egypt, and now there's darkness over the whole land of Israel, because God is bringing judgment.
Micah McCormick: Israel is just as sinful as Egypt.
Micah McCormick: And just as Egypt and just as Israel, we too deserve the darkness of judgment.
Micah McCormick: Amos chapter 8, verses 9 and 10.
Micah McCormick: In that day, this is the declaration of the Lord God, I will make the sun go down at noon.
Micah McCormick: What did we just read about in Matthew?
Micah McCormick: It goes dark at noon.
Micah McCormick: I will darken the land in the daytime.
Micah McCormick: I will turn your feasts into mourning, Amos says, all your songs into lamentation.
Micah McCormick: I will cause everyone to wear sackcloth and every head to be shaved.
Micah McCormick: I will make that grief like mourning for an only son, and its outcome like a bitter day.
Micah McCormick: Amos takes the events of the plagues in Egypt, the darkness and the death of the firstborn son, and he says, that's a pattern.
Micah McCormick: It's a pattern, it's going to happen again.
Micah McCormick: And we see it right here in the crucifixion that there's darkness and the death, not this time the death of Egyptians' firstborn or even Israel's firstborn, the death of God's firstborn son.
Micah McCormick: A third clue Jesus is offered sour wine.
Micah McCormick: Verse 48, immediately one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a stick, and offered him a drink.
Micah McCormick: This seems like it's one of the more compassionate, small compassionate acts amidst the crucifixion.
Micah McCormick: It seems like someone's trying to help dull the pain.
Micah McCormick: Right?
Micah McCormick: Like when you watch an old western and the cowboy takes a quick swig of whiskey before he cuts the bullet out of his own leg with his pocket knife.
Micah McCormick: Seems like that's what's going on here.
Micah McCormick: But listen to Psalm 75, verse 8.
Micah McCormick: There is a cup in the Lord's hand, full of wine blended with spices, and he pours from it all the wicked of the earth will drink, drain it to the dregs.
Micah McCormick: Revelation 14, 10 says that those who worship the beast will drink the wine of his wrath, which is poured full strength into the cup of his anger.
Micah McCormick: Why is Jesus offered this sour wine?
Micah McCormick: There's judgment imagery here.
Micah McCormick: Fourth clue.
Micah McCormick: Isaiah 29, verses 5 and 6.
Micah McCormick: Your many foes will be like fine dust, and many of the ruthless like blowing chaff.
Micah McCormick: Then suddenly, in an instant, you will be punished by the Lord of armies with thunder, earthquake, and loud noise.
Micah McCormick: Jeremiah 10, 10.
Micah McCormick: But the Lord is the true God, he is the living God and eternal king.
Micah McCormick: The earth quakes at his wrath, and the nations cannot endure his fury.
Micah McCormick: So I'm not saying that every single time there's an earthquake, God is specifically judging someone, or that every single time the sky gets dark, God is specifically judging someone, or that every time you have a glass of wine, God is specifically judging.
Micah McCormick: But what I am saying is here, Matthew, under God's inspiration, is giving us all these narrative details, things that actually happened, but he's recording the details that happened in light of the scriptures that have come before it and connecting it in with other scriptures to show us that in the event of the crucifixion, when Jesus experiences death, he's bearing the judgment of God.
Micah McCormick: God is pouring out his wrath on the Son.
Micah McCormick: And that leads us to the most important and most clear clue of that.
Micah McCormick: Jesus cries out that he's abandoned by God.
Micah McCormick: Verse 46.
Micah McCormick: And Matthew records it and then even translates it into Greek for his listeners.
Micah McCormick: But this dramatic cry, Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabacthani, and then Matthew makes clear that he's saying, My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
Micah McCormick: Some of your translations use the word forsaken.
Micah McCormick: This is more than a cry of loneliness.
Micah McCormick: This is not Jesus came to earth like you know, you go to summer camp and he's just missing his heavenly home.
Micah McCormick: It's not that at all.
Micah McCormick: He's experiencing the very weight of God's wrath, and that's why he cries out.
Micah McCormick: And it's the physical pain, but it's much more than just the physical pain.
Micah McCormick: You see this here in the way that he doesn't cry out, my hands or my wrists or my head.
Micah McCormick: He cries out, my God, my God.
Micah McCormick: This is the same Jesus who said in Matthew 11 27, All things have been entrusted to me by my Father.
Micah McCormick: No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son.
Micah McCormick: In John 10 30, Jesus says, I and my father are one.
Micah McCormick: Can you can you just even imagine from all eternity a personal relationship that is pure and whole and seamless and unbroken, absolute mutuality and love, experienced not just for the seasons of our human lives with parents or spouses or children, but forever.
Micah McCormick: And now he he cries out in anguish.
Micah McCormick: What must that have been like for our Lord?
Micah McCormick: We we can't imagine.
Micah McCormick: Again, these are waters that are too deep for us.
Micah McCormick: It's a mystery still that the Son, who's one with the Father, can speak of being abandoned.
Micah McCormick: Now, Jesus didn't himself deserve judgment, but he was wounded for our transgressions.
Micah McCormick: He was crushed for our iniquities.
Micah McCormick: It pleased the Father to bruise him.
Micah McCormick: The punishment that brought peace was on him, and it's with his stripes that were healed, friends.
Micah McCormick: This is for his people.
Micah McCormick: And that brings us to the next step of this argument.
Micah McCormick: Before we turn to our response, Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: But then he also secured the covenant blessings of salvation.
Micah McCormick: So, friends, listen, this is much more than just salvation from, this is salvation to.
Micah McCormick: This is more than just salvation from the wrath of God.
Micah McCormick: This is salvation to the covenant blessings.
Micah McCormick: We get to enjoy a relationship with God.
Micah McCormick: We're not just spared from his judgment, we can actually call him our father, just as Jesus called him our father.
Micah McCormick: And we see a couple of clues for that as well here in the passage.
Micah McCormick: First, look at verse 51.
Micah McCormick: It says, suddenly the curtain of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom.
Micah McCormick: Now, wait a minute.
Micah McCormick: The crucifixion is out on a hill on Golgotha.
Micah McCormick: Where did a sanctuary and a curtain come from?
Micah McCormick: Matthew is telling us, as the narrator, inspired by God, he tells us about what's going on somewhere else.
Micah McCormick: It's like a movie where the action's going on, and then all of a sudden it flashes to something that happens in a different location.
Micah McCormick: He's telling us about what's going on in the sanctuary or the temple, as some of your translations have.
Micah McCormick: This is the temple in Jerusalem, a temple that God had first established, it had been rebuilt.
Micah McCormick: And that temple had a curtain that separated off the most holy place, the holy of holies.
Micah McCormick: This is where the Ark of the Covenant is stored, the throne room.
Micah McCormick: Of God, God's very presence.
Micah McCormick: But only the high priest could go in that room once a year.
Micah McCormick: He goes in on the Day of Atonement to offer a sacrifice.
Micah McCormick: That temple, that room, that curtain, that high priest, they were operating according to the pattern of the old covenant.
Micah McCormick: The covenant God had established.
Micah McCormick: But that's why I say that Jesus secured covenant blessings because he came to inaugurate a new covenant in his blood.
Micah McCormick: And as the curtain is torn in two, it's the end of the old covenant because the new is here.
Micah McCormick: And we see very clearly it has to be the work of God because the text tells us it's torn in two from top to bottom.
Micah McCormick: Don't think of like a shower curtain in your bathroom.
Micah McCormick: This was a curtain that was 60 feet high, seven inches thick.
Micah McCormick: For it to be, this fabric to be torn in two from top to bottom, it's clearly God's testimony that it's his activity that's taking place here.
Micah McCormick: So at the very same time that God is pouring out judgment on his son, he's affirming the reality and success of the son's work in establishing this new covenant.
Micah McCormick: And now it's not the high priest that can go in once a year, the curtain's open for all who come through Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: That's you and me.
Micah McCormick: If we come turning from our sins, trusting in Christ, we have access to the Father.
Micah McCormick: What privileges and blessings are ours through Christ?
Micah McCormick: It's amazing.
Micah McCormick: There's another clue here that Jesus secured those covenant blessings of salvation.
Micah McCormick: There's many more that you'll have to read the whole Bible to see all the covenant blessings that are secured, but just access to God is right here that I point out.
Micah McCormick: There's another clue, verses 52 and 53.
Micah McCormick: Let's look at those again.
Micah McCormick: The tombs were also opened, and then Matthew gives us this detail, interestingly.
Micah McCormick: Many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and they came out of the tombs after his resurrection, entered the holy city, and appeared to many.
Micah McCormick: When's the last time you heard those two verses for a Good Friday sermon?
Micah McCormick: We've heard the cry, Why have you forsaken me?
Micah McCormick: We've heard the curtain torn in two.
Micah McCormick: Don't usually get those verses for the Good Friday sermon.
Micah McCormick: Now, those verses bring up some questions.
Micah McCormick: I can't answer all those questions.
Micah McCormick: Who were these saints?
Micah McCormick: How many were they?
Micah McCormick: Like after they got resurrected, they have to die again, or they just get to go to heaven like Elijah did.
Micah McCormick: I don't know.
Micah McCormick: But Matthew records this event because it shows us that death has been defeated.
Micah McCormick: That when Jesus died, death's not going to have the last word.
Micah McCormick: The saints are coming to life.
Micah McCormick: And what's true of Jesus is true of his people.
Micah McCormick: He's the first fruits.
Micah McCormick: And what's true of those saints will be true of us.
Micah McCormick: Now we'll come in a couple of weeks here to Christ's own resurrection, but just note now for the present time that the covenant blessings of resurrection life have been secured through the death of Christ.
Micah McCormick: And it's stamped with the certainty of these saints' resurrection.
Micah McCormick: Death can't hold them once Christ Himself has died and defeated death.
Micah McCormick: Christ through this work, he didn't do a little bit.
Micah McCormick: He didn't try to help us along.
Micah McCormick: No, the Lord was successful in all of his work.
Micah McCormick: And that brings us finally to our response.
Micah McCormick: So Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: He did that in his experience of death.
Micah McCormick: He did that by burying the judgment of God as he died.
Micah McCormick: He secured the covenant blessings of access to God and resurrection life.
Micah McCormick: What's our response to that?
Micah McCormick: First response should be awe.
Micah McCormick: Look at verse 54.
Micah McCormick: When the centurion and those with him who were keeping watch over Jesus saw the earthquake and the things that had happened, they were terrified and said, Truly this man was the Son of God.
Micah McCormick: We sometimes see those images of Jesus hanging on a cross, and it evokes pity.
Micah McCormick: And that's an appropriate response.
Micah McCormick: Jesus was cruelly and wrongly killed.
Micah McCormick: But pity does not capture the entirety of what is going on in this momentous event.
Micah McCormick: You could translate the verse this way these soldiers were filled with fear extremely.
Micah McCormick: Holy terror is not something to avoid.
Micah McCormick: We live in a world that just always wants to make everything light.
Micah McCormick: Holy terror is not something to avoid, especially when we come to an event that has eternal and momentous weight like this event.
Micah McCormick: We should embrace holy terror and awe.
Micah McCormick: Come behold the wondrous mystery, slain by death, the God of life.
Micah McCormick: Stop and stand in awe.
Micah McCormick: Another response should be a response of trust.
Micah McCormick: You don't see this, I'll admit, explicitly in this passage.
Micah McCormick: We don't know for certain the centurion, these soldiers, did they have a true heart faith that recognized the Messiah?
Micah McCormick: Perhaps they did.
Micah McCormick: But in light of all that we've seen in the passage about the reality of what Christ accomplished, how can we not trust him?
Micah McCormick: Trusting him means that we turn from our sins.
Micah McCormick: We see the horror of what sin did to Christ.
Micah McCormick: We see the horror of what sin did in our own lives.
Micah McCormick: Isaiah that we'll come to after Matthew, and we're going to be looking at tonight, Isaiah will talk much about the horror that sin brings.
Micah McCormick: So turn and trust.
Micah McCormick: Trust means that we take what's revealed in Scripture and we lean into it.
Micah McCormick: And some of you might be saying, Well, wait a minute, Micah.
Micah McCormick: You're saying that Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: That's a nice story, but I don't see it.
Micah McCormick: I see death all around.
Micah McCormick: I see death in the world.
Micah McCormick: That's not the end of the story.
Micah McCormick: The eyes of faith seize hold of what happens here.
Micah McCormick: And it's not a blind faith.
Micah McCormick: We'll talk about Christ's resurrection as witnesses of the resurrection, but faith seizes hold of God's word above the limitations of our own experiences.
Micah McCormick: And just as there is a delay, Christ's death and resurrection, Christ's death, the resurrection of these saints, our resurrection, it has to be worked out over time.
Micah McCormick: But in God's plan, all that was necessary to defeat death has been accomplished.
Micah McCormick: And trust grabs hold of God's word and says, Yes, I want that more than what I see with my own eyes.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes as we get older, we see the effects of death in our bodies.
Micah McCormick: And we're just, we're just discouraged.
Micah McCormick: Say, well, I know, I know death is defeated, but I just don't feel it right now.
Micah McCormick: I feel like I didn't sleep last night and I want to go sleep right now.
Micah McCormick: Be encouraged that our bodies will pass through death.
Micah McCormick: And no matter what difficulties we're experiencing in our bodies, as one of our former pastors said, it's nothing a good resurrection won't fix.
Micah McCormick: Trust, friends, that the work is complete, that you have access to God, you can go in and pray to God through Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: You can be saved and find forgiveness.
Micah McCormick: The weight of that judgment that you feel in your own souls, that can be gone because of what Jesus did.
Micah McCormick: You don't need another mediator.
Micah McCormick: Trust in Christ alone.
Micah McCormick: If you think, well, I need a parent or a priest or a pastor or a politician, or if you think you need someone else to give you the good life or get you to God, that's that's the opposite of trust.
Micah McCormick: Trust grabs hold of the reality of Jesus, the crucified one, who finished the work.
Micah McCormick: Hebrews 8, 9, 12.
Micah McCormick: He entered the most holy place once for all time, not by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption.
Micah McCormick: He didn't try to obtain eternal redemption, he obtained eternal redemption.
Micah McCormick: Trust in him.
Micah McCormick: We can't supplement the work of Jesus.
Micah McCormick: Sometimes we can even think of our own faith or repentance as a kind of supplement to the work of Christ.
Micah McCormick: Like, yeah, he did a lot on the cross.
Micah McCormick: And then, you know, I got my life in order and I prayed to him.
Micah McCormick: And no, yes, God wants us to repent and trust in him, but it's not a supplement to the work of Jesus.
Micah McCormick: He did it all.
Micah McCormick: And we embrace his full work.
Micah McCormick: Venture on him, venture holy, let no other trust intrude.
Micah McCormick: Final response this morning.
Micah McCormick: A response of awe and trust, and then a response of allegiance.
Micah McCormick: Look at verse 55.
Micah McCormick: Many women who had followed Jesus from Galilee looked after him there, watching from a distance.
Micah McCormick: Don't take that watching from a distance as though they're about to abandon their faith.
Micah McCormick: It's actually just the opposite.
Micah McCormick: They have followed him consistently from Galilee, not an insignificant distance, and they've been ministering to him.
Micah McCormick: There's almost a contrast here between Peter, who watched the trial from a distance, but then he denied Christ.
Micah McCormick: And these are going to remain as close as they can to Christ.
Micah McCormick: These women who have served him, who have ministered to him.
Micah McCormick: This is the Mary who anointed Jesus with perfume, who poured it all out for her Lord.
Micah McCormick: These are women who are loyal to Christ because they stand in awe of who he is and they trust him.
Micah McCormick: True allegiance stems from awe-inspired trust.
Micah McCormick: And this is where I want to encourage all of us today, for those that know the Lord, if we're trusting in the Lord, we can minister to the Lord by simply being faithful to Him.
Micah McCormick: These women are ordinary women.
Micah McCormick: God loves that.
Micah McCormick: The Lord embraces that.
Micah McCormick: Keep trusting Him.
Micah McCormick: Don't say, Well, I can't do as much as I used to be able to do.
Micah McCormick: But you're still here.
Micah McCormick: You're still following the Savior.
Micah McCormick: And that's what we all need to encourage one another to do.
Micah McCormick: Jesus put death to death.
Micah McCormick: And we have to trust in him supremely, certainly beyond our own confidence or ability to even keep walking with him.
Micah McCormick: He put death to death, that any terror of conscience that might be in our minds, take that to the cross of Christ.
Micah McCormick: See here that judgment's been forever taken.
Micah McCormick: Any lack of service you find in yourself, realize that Christ has covered it all through his blood.
Micah McCormick: And so when we sing here in just a moment, sing with all of your heart.
Micah McCormick: We're going to sing even words that echo this passage of curtain torn in two, dead are raised to life, finish the victory cry.
Micah McCormick: All the work has been done, and it's left for us to trust and rejoice in our Savior.
Micah McCormick: Let's pray.
Micah McCormick: Lord, oh Lord, how we want to know more of Christ, how we want to worship Him more fully with our heart and soul and strength and mind.
Micah McCormick: And thank you for weaving all the events of this passage together in such harmonious ways, sobering ways, gripping ways.
Micah McCormick: Thank you that Jesus indeed put death to death.
Micah McCormick: And so we pray that as we're singing, resurrection life would be at work in us, that we're a new creation in Jesus Christ.
Micah McCormick: The old has passed and the new has come.
Micah McCormick: And so we're singing as new creatures.
Micah McCormick: We're looking back at the cross, but also walking forward in humble trust in this Savior who not only died but now lives and reigns.
Micah McCormick: So, Lord, please, as we sing through your spirit, fill our hearts with worship, we pray, this Lord's day in Jesus' name.
Micah McCormick: Amen.