Mark's Gospel Part 28 - Christ, Our Crucified King

Mark Smithers continues this series at Immanuel Church Brentwood on Mark's Gospel.

This sermon is from Sunday 10th August 2025.

The bible reference is Mark 15v16-39

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Well, uh, let me pray uh for the preaching of God's word this morning. Jesus said, I am the good shepherd, and I lay down my life for the sheep. Father God, help us to understand the cross, what is happening as Jesus dies. Holy Spirit, soften our hearts and open our ears. Convict us of our sin. Help each of us to believe the truth of your salvation plan. Lord Jesus, as we consider your suffering, grow our love for you. And Lord God, would your name be glorified through the preaching of your word this morning? In Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Well, before I read our passage this morning, uh let me remind us all of a universal truth. And that truth is that all of us here this morning, uh, we are all in debt. Uh, we all have a bill that we must pay. Let me explain. Uh the Bible teaches us that we are all creatures and that we're created by Almighty God in his image, and we live in the world that he has created. And as his creatures, we should obey him. We should love him. As Andrew read earlier, Mark 12, it says that we should love God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and our strength. But the truth is, uh, we've all failed to love God and obey him as King of our lives. And that failure the Bible calls sin. And that sin, that rebellion, uh, means that we are all in debt to Almighty God. We are in a broken relationship with our holy creator, and that means we cannot come near to him, we can't be in his presence. Sin has created a huge chasm, a huge gap between man and God. And Jesus in the Bible clearly teaches us that there's a penalty for sin, and that's judgment, and it's death, an eternal separation from God in a place called hell. And God's right judgment on us has to be applied. The debt we owe all of us to Almighty God, the cost of our sin, it has to be paid. And this truth presents all of us with an important question this morning. Who is going to pay the debt for the cost of our sin? My sin. Your sin, everybody's sin. Can you pay the debt that you owe? Can I pay that debt? And that question is at the heart of our passage today. And you may be sitting here already thinking, gosh, Mark, this is a weighty start to the sermon. One minute in, and we are all condemned sinners facing judgment and hell. And that's true. This is weighty stuff, but I make no apology this morning. It's really important that we are all really clear on this. Because if we're not clear on sin, on every man's true state before God, then the passage we are about to read it makes no sense at all. No, it's just an 18-rated description of the depths of human barbaric behaviour towards an innocent man. It's just a sad story of a good, kind, moral teacher who upset the religious people. Without a right view of God, his holiness, sin, and the debt that we all owe, then the cross of Jesus Christ has no eternal purpose, no significance. Well, with that in mind, let's turn to God's word. So please turn with me to Mark chapter 15. That's on page 852 of the Black Bibles. And regulars that will know that we've been in Mark's Gospel for a while. We're now in the penultimate section. Last week in chapter 14, we saw Jesus rejected by the chief priests, rejected by the crowd, the Jewish people. They turn away from Jesus and they cry out for his death. The weak Roman governor Pilate releases a criminal and he condemns Jesus to death. Children, as I read this passage, see if you can spot how many times Jesus' title or his identity is mentioned by Mark. Listen out for those words, King of the Jews, Messiah, and God's Son. So, children, put your pens down for a minute and listen carefully as I read the Bible, and listen out for those titles for Jesus. So Mark chapter 15, starting at verse 16. And the soldiers led Jesus away inside the palace, that is the governor's headquarters, and they called together the whole battalion, and they clothed him in purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him, and they began to salute him. Hail, King of the Jews! And they were striking his head with a reed, and spitting on him, and kneeling down in homage to him. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak, and put his own clothes on him, and they led him out to crucify him. And they compelled a passer by Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross, and they brought him to the place called Golgotha, which means place of a skull. And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it, and they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them to decide what each should take. And it was the third hour, when they crucified him, and the inscription of the charge against him read, The King of the Jews, and with him they crucified two rubbers, one on his right and one on his left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself and come down from the cross. So also the chief priests and the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, He saved others, yet he cannot save himself. Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe. Those who are crucified with him also reviled him. And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabak Thani, which means, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And some of the bystanders hearing it said, Behold, he is calling Elijah, and someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down. And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion who stood facing him saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God. Well, thanks be to God for his word today. Well, as you if you've been regular with us, you know that as we've studied Mark, we thought about two big questions from his gospel account. The first one was, who is Jesus? And the second was why did he come? And we could summarize that as Jesus' identity and Jesus' mission, his mission. And Peter, I'm sorry, Mark clearly demonstrates that Jesus is God's Son. He was God's promised King, his Messiah, his miracles, his power, his wisdom, his authority, his teaching. Only God could do what Jesus has done. Only God could teach and forgive sins in the way that Jesus did. And today's passage we draw those two questions together: identity and mission. I've put an outline on your service sheet to help you. The big summary of our passage today: God's word is teaching us that Jesus, God's anointed King, offers himself as a sacrifice for the sins of his people, becoming the mediator to access God. Jesus, God's anointed King, offers himself as a sacrifice for the sins of his people, becoming the mediator to access God. And I've been praying this week that the familiarity of the cross wouldn't take from us the wonder and the amazement of these verses, the significance of them. I pray that we would see that all again as we look closely. And in typical Mark style, he describes the crucifixion narrative in quite a breathless sequence of events. Sometimes we're given detail, sometimes we're given no detail at all. And that first little bit I read there, verses 16 to 20, just because of our time today, I'm not going to go into that in a lot of detail. But we can see here that Jesus is crowned, and Jesus is humiliated at the hands of men. Jesus is finally given the crown that he deserves. But it's not a crown of gold, no, it's a crown of thorns. And Jesus is cruelly mocked by the people he was coming to save, and then he's led out to his crucifixion. As I said, I'm not going to speak too much on those verses. But now we come to the cross. And I'd ask you, please, to be generous with the preacher today. I have about 15 minutes to try and explore the cross. I can't cover everything. I've recommended a few books there for you to have a look at. I will fall short, so please bear with me. Well, let's look at God's word. Verse 20 says that Jesus is led away. We have some detail, but also not much. And Mark knows that the scene of a criminal being led away out of the city gates was very familiar to people living under Roman rule, so he doesn't give us much detail. Jesus was a prisoner, and he was led around the city and the longest route, and that was done for maximum exposure. It was a deterrent to the people to warn them about breaking Roman rules. Verse 26, a soldier would have would have carried that placard in front of Jesus, ready to be fixed to the cross. And it read simply, the King of the Jews. This was the charge for which Jesus is accused. Jesus was executed on the charge of blasphemy, claiming to be God's Son, claiming to be God's anointed king. And Mark tells us that a man, a man, Simon, is compelled to carry Jesus' cross. And that's most probably because Jesus was so exhausted. His back had been torn to shreds. And Jesus is offered an anesthetic drink, but he refuses. And in a moment we'll consider the cup that he willingly accepted to drink instead of that one. And in typical Mark style, verse 24, he tells us Jesus is crucified. We don't need to dwell on the process. Suffice to say, Jesus' hands and feet were secured to the wooden cross with nails or with spikes, and his cross was secured vertically in the ground, leaving him hanging in agony, bearing the weight in the nails. Crucifixion was perhaps the most brutal, painful form of execution man has ever devised. The simple aim was long, drawn-out pain and suffering. And our English word excruciating that comes from that word crucifixion. But crucifixion was also utterly humiliating. Jesus was stripped naked and he was exposed in the hot sun. Wealthy Gentiles at the time would never even mention the word cross, it was such a despised thing. And look down at verses 29 to 31. While being humiliated on the cross, Jesus was repeatedly mocked. Passers by, that crowd that had welcomed him as king in chapter 11, they now derided him. Save yourself, come down from the cross. Again, what we've seen in this long road to the cross, how prophecy and scriptures being fulfilled. That mocking is recorded back in Psalm 22. It says, He was despised by the people. All who see me mock me. And it's not only the crowd, did you see the chief priests, the scribes, the religious leaders? They're also there mocking him, calling out, he saved others, he can't save himself. And did you see their mocking confession that Jesus was who he claimed to be? They say they shout out, Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down, that we may see and believe. Well, would they have believed? I'm not so sure. You see, they've refused to believe throughout Jesus' whole ministry. They saw his teaching, they saw his miracles, and they refused to believe. And at this point, as we think about the cross, we need to think about Jesus' humanity. Jesus was God, but Jesus was fully man. He was human flesh and bone. In his humanity, God the Son, Jesus felt pain. He needed food, he needed rest. Friends, the pain and the suffering of the cross was very real for Jesus. And that brings us to our question today. Why did Jesus die? Why did he suffer? What is really happening on the cross as he's crucified? And Mark gives us helpful clues to help us understand. Remember, Mark is showing us who is Jesus and why did he come. Well, we know Jesus is God's King, so why did he come? His mission. And Mark 10, 45 is a really helpful verse. Let me remind you of that verse. The Son of Man came to give his life as a ransom for many. God's King came to give his life as a ransom. And here on the cross, Jesus was offering himself, offering up his life as a ransom. Or to put it another way, as a sacrifice. Isn't it interesting? The leaders thought they were executing Jesus. Well no, Jesus was freely offering himself up as a sacrifice. And why? He was doing that for the forgiveness of all God's people's sins, all the sins of Old and New Testament church. And the Bible word for that work is atonement. Atonement simply means to blot out an offence, to make amends for an offence. And in God's providence, Jesus' death happened at Passover, the great festival that celebrated God's great saving work of his people from Egypt. Jesus was atoning for the church's sin, its rebellion against God, their failure to love their creator God. And throughout the Old Testament we learn, don't we, that to atone for sins there had to be a sacrifice. A perfect animal without flaw had to be sacrificed by the priest. Its blood had to be shed and offered to God on behalf of God's people. And on the cross, Jesus was offering himself as a sacrifice of atonement. On the cross, Jesus drew near to the holy God, just as a Levite priest would, except he didn't bring an offering in his hand. No, his offering was his body and the shedding of his blood. He was the atoning sacrifice for his people's sins. And he is both the priest and the sacrifice. And we read of that in Hebrews 4 and 5. Jesus was paying our debt, the ransom on our head. Instead of God's people paying, Jesus paid. And in doing so, Jesus was freeing his people. And the Bible word for that is redemption. You see, Christian people are like slaves who've been bought by someone else. They've been redeemed from their old master, redeemed from a life of slavery and death, and redeemed to new life, to a life of freedom and eternal life in heaven. And Jesus was the only possible man to deal with the cost of our sin. In the law, the sacrifice for sin had to be a lamb without blemish, spot or wrinkle. He did what he what we could never do, because he was a perfect man. Jesus never sinned, therefore he was the perfect atoning sacrifice. And as we pause and consider the cross, the suffering Christ, his sacrifice of himself, we see the depth of the cost of our atonement and redemption to God the Father and God the Son. So now let's consider another question. Why did Jesus have to suffer so much? Yes, he had to die, but why the pain? Why the slow agony, the torture, the suffering, the anguish? Well, we know from the Bible and the whole of Mark's gospel, don't we? As I said at the beginning, Jesus is clear. Sin and rebellion deserves judgment, death, and hell. And hell is the place where sins are punished. Hell is a place of real, true physical suffering, eternal pain and torture. And on the cross, Jesus suffered excruciating pain, just like he was in hell. Jesus experienced all the horrors of hell. He stood in the place of suffering that his people should have stood. Well, why did he do that? He did that so his people don't have to. Friends, if you are a Christian here today, Jesus experienced suffering just like hell, so that you never have to. What a truth. I hope you feel the weight of that truth this morning. I know that I do. And here on the cross, Jesus experienced extreme isolation. We've seen that, haven't we, in the long road to the cross. Everybody has left Jesus. And hell is also a place of isolation. There's no friendship, there's no family, there's no love in hell. And it's simply not true what you've heard some folks say, Well, I don't mind going to hell, because I'll be there with all my mates. Well, no, hell is not like that. Just like the cross, it's a place of utter isolation. No, the Lord Jesus suffered alone. And he did that so that one day we, his people, his church, could be with him. In sweet fellowship with our triune God forever. What a truth. And verse 33, Mark gives us another clue about what's happening on the cross. Look down with me. At midday there was darkness over the whole land. Darkness. This was no miraculous. Sorry, this was miraculous. This was no eclipse. And darkness in the Bible is a picture of God's righteous anger. Think back to the Exodus in Egypt, where Israel was slaves. The great plague of darkness was the final plague on the Egyptians before the plague of death. On the cross in the darkness, Jesus experienced the righteous judgment and wrath of God at all of his people's sin and rebellion. He took our place, he took the punishment we deserved. And in the Bible, the wrath of God is depicted as a cup of foaming wine, the cup of God's wrath. We read of it in Isaiah 51 and Psalm 75. And Jesus himself referred to it back in the garden in Mark chapter 14. Do you remember his prayer? He prayed, if possible, that that cup could be removed from him. Even before the cross, Jesus knew the pain, the suffering that drinking of that cup would cause. But he also knew that it was God's will for him to drink it. On the cross, Jesus metaphorically drank that cup, all of it, down to the last bitter dregs, all the punishment for sins, past, present, and future, of all God's covenant people, both Old and New Testament church, were experienced by Jesus. Friends, if you're a Christian here today, all your sin, all the punishment that your sin, my sin, deserves, was poured into Jesus, into his soul that day. And that's why we can say that the cross is personal. Jesus died on that day for Moses' sins, for King David's sins, even for Andrew Gray's sins, for Mark Smithers' sins. The cross is deeply personal. And we read in scripture, Isaiah 53, a wonderful prophecy about God's suffering servant. It's really helpful. It was written many hundreds of years before Jesus. Let's just briefly turn to it. It's on page 614 of your church Bibles. I'm just going to read a couple of verses. They're very familiar verses. Psalm, sorry, Isaiah 53. Page 614. Verse 5 it says, He, Jesus, was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. He bore our grief, our sorrows. And Isaiah tells us that it was all part of God's perfect plan. Look at verse 6. The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Look down at verse 10. Yet it was the Lord's will to crush him. The crowd, the chief priests, the soldiers, in their wickedness and sin, they were merely carrying out God's good providence, his sovereign will. They were fulfilling the salvation plan that started way back in Eden, back in Genesis. So, back to Mark. And the next truth of the cross that we learn is that Jesus, the perfect man, he identified with sin. To such a degree that Paul can say, in some sense, he became sin for us. Now hear me right, Jesus never sinned, he did not sin. No, Jesus took the place of his people, he was our substitute. And the Bible says this is propitiation. Jesus propitiated God. He appeased, he satisfied God's righteous wrath. And those words are really precious. Propitiation, satisfaction, they're really important. They are precious, they're wonderful, and they're true. They tell us that Jesus' work was complete. Jesus can say on the cross, it is finished. All God's wrath, all his anger at sin, past and present, was appeased, it was satisfied 100%. The penalty is paid in full. God's people are free people. There is no more debt on our head. We are redeemed in full. If you are a believer here today, Jesus, King Jesus, drank that bitter cup, the cup of wrath, for you, so that you do not need to. So that one day you may drink a different cup with him. You will drink with him in his presence, in his glory. What a truth. And perhaps as as we close, the most difficult truth on the cross, and in your notes I've called that separation. Look down with me at verse 34. Jesus calls out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? He's again quoting Psalm 22. In those last agonizing hours on the cross, Jesus in his incarnate body, in his human nature, he was cut off from his father. In his earthly body, Jesus had known the love, the fellowship, the presence, the face of his father. Yet here for a time, the father turns his face away, as his anger, his wrath is turned on the Son. We need to be clear here, Jesus, in his divine nature, he did not stop being God. He did not stop becoming the second person of the Trinity, nor was the Trinity split asunder. And there is mystery here. But simply, the truth is, Jesus was in one sense separated from his father's love. And again, why did he do that? Well, he did that to secure us. Jesus was separated from God so that we could be adopted as sons and daughters, that we could be joined to his family. What a truth. And then very simply in verse 37, Mark tells us that Jesus dies. All the Gospels are very clear that Jesus died. This fact is so important for numbers of reasons. Jesus received the due punishment that our sin deserved, the exact penalty. Our sin deserves death. Jesus died. If Jesus had not died, then death had not been defeated or overcome, and there was no glorious resurrection to come. And Jesus' cross, his suffering and death, truly makes Christianity unique. In a world full of false religions, no other divine being has claimed to have died for his followers, for their people. The heart of Christianity is not what man does, no, it's what God has done. Truly we can say Jesus is God, and truly God died for his people. And in this sacrificial death, the depth of God's love is perfectly demonstrated, but also the cost of our forgiveness is stark. Our forgiveness costs God the death of his only son. Romans 8 32 says, He who did not spare his son. Oh what love! Oh what cost. I hope and pray you feel and understand the depth of that love today. And as we close, look down at verse 38. As Jesus dies, the curtain of the temple was torn into. That great thick curtain, it was more like a wall, was torn miraculously by God. It was torn from the top to the bottom. And that curtain symbolized a barrier between God and man. After the fall, man and God have enmity, they're enemies. And now wonderfully, in Jesus' atoning, redeeming death, the way to God is open. The torn curtain tells us there is no need now for a temple. Jesus is the way to meet with God. Through Jesus, wonderfully, there is reconciliation. Man can have access again to a holy God. Everyone who trusts in Jesus' atoning death receives his righteousness so that they can draw near through Jesus. There's so much more we could say on that, we don't have time. So as we close, how should we respond? Well, Christian people, be thankful again. And be assured this morning. Trust in the power of Jesus' atoning death. And if you're not yet a Christian, maybe this is all very new for you. Maybe you never knew that you owe God a debt for your sin. Maybe you thought that sin doesn't matter and that all good people go to heaven. Maybe you thought there's no such thing as hell. Maybe you thought this morning that you could pay for your own sin or make up for it by living a good life. Well, I would encourage you to take a gospel, there's a little pile here, freely available, and read about the Lord Jesus, read about his perfect life. For some of us today, it might be the right day to pray to the Lord Jesus. Jesus in his gospel says, Come to me. Come and admit you're a sinner who needs saving. Come and receive forgiveness. Jesus never turns away anyone who comes to him in faith. Children, today, maybe you've never come to Jesus to ask him to forgive your sin. Today is a good day to pray to Jesus. Maybe pray that in your heart in a minute, or pray that with your mum and dad today. Well, my prayer is that we would all be like the Roman soldier in verse 39. As we close, let's look at his words. This is the soldier who watched Jesus die. And he said, Truly this man was the Son of God. Well, if you did want to pray a prayer, if you're not a Christian, a simple prayer, A B C A. Admit that you're a sinner. B believe that Jesus died in your place for your sin. And C commit to following and trusting Him. As I pray in a minute, you may want to pray that prayer quietly. Or come and talk to me or Andrew at the end of our time. Well, as we close, let me pray for us now. Oh Father God, we thank you once again for the cross of Christ for giving us your Son. Help each of us here this morning to respond rightly to your free offer of forgiveness. Help each of us to believe the truth of these scriptures, to follow Jesus as the King that He is, and we pray that in His name. Amen.