Luke 23:50-56 | The Burial of Jesus

Preacher: Scott Hollingshead

Text: Luke 23:50-56

Big Idea: The burial of Jesus leaves no doubt who Jesus is and what He’s done. 

What does Christ’s burial “leaving no doubt” bring out?  

1. Courage in a faith that goes public (vv. 50-52)  

2. Care in an honoring that fulfills Scripture (v. 53)

3. Continuing in a quiet obedience (vv. 54-56)

Transcript

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Church, so good to be in the house of the Lord with you today. As we go to the Lord in prayer, I'm gonna come out of Psalm chapter 16. Would you join me as we bow our heads in a word of prayer? Father, I sense that even in this first line, preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge, that you are doing that even as we gather as your people to worship. You are preserving us, Lord. We confess to you in this moment that you are our God. And here it is, Lord, we have no good apart from you. Father, we walk in our days and we are tempted in so many ways to believe there is good apart from you, but the truth is, and we come back to reality, to truth, and say that we have no good apart from you. As for the saints, they're the excellent ones. The Lord, you are our chosen portion, you are our cup. Lord, remind us that you hold our lot, which means everything about our life you're sovereign over. Our circumstances, friendships, trials, temptations, difficulties. You're sovereign over all of it. The triumphs, the successes, the glories of getting to be in your presence, sovereign over everything, Lord, and we remind ourselves that lines have fallen for us in pleasant places. Indeed, we have a beautiful inheritance, thanks to Jesus Christ. And so we bless you, Lord, who gives counsel to your people. Even now, Lord, we set you always before us because you are at our right hand, Lord. You we will not be shaken. Therefore, therefore, gladden our hearts, Lord, and may our whole beings rejoice, our flesh also dwelling secure, for you will not abandon our souls to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption. Instead, through your holy one, you have made known to us the path of life, and it is in your presence that there is fullness of joy, and your presence is our gift through Jesus Christ. What a line. You will not abandon my soul to Sheol or let your holy one see corruption. Lord, that was ultimately fulfilled in the Lord Jesus, who died truly, was buried in reality, so that he could be raised bodily. So that his flesh would not see corruption, and in him we could have everlasting life. We could be restored to you, that your presence might fill us with joy, unending and ever increasing for all eternity. So remind us, Lord, as we sit in your presence, that at your right hand are pleasures forevermore, and may we enjoy those more today than we did before coming. Pray that your word would be more sweet, more precious to us, that we would be changed by it. That we would be have a heightened view of it. That we trust you to do what only you can do through your word, Lord. What we are not make us, what we have not give us, and what we know not teach us. We pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. And all God's people said. Amen. As we continue in worship, let me uh draw your attention to Luke chapter 23, beginning in verse 50. This is the reading of the word for today. The passage we'll be in is Luke chapter 23, beginning in verse 50, reading down to verse 56. And if you don't have a copy of God's word, I would invite you to take one. It's a gift from us to you on these side tables on the sides of the worship center. Otherwise, you can pay attention by reading along with us the verses that are on the screen. And what an appropriate text for Palm Sunday. What an appropriate time to be in the account of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. This is the word of the living God for you. Now there was a man named Joseph from the Jewish town of Arimathea. He was a member of the council, a good and righteous man who had not consented to their decision and action. And he was looking for the kingdom of God. This man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then he took it down and wrapped it in a linen shroud and laid him in a tomb cut in stone where no one had ever yet been laid. It was the day of preparation and the Sabbath was beginning. The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments. On the Sabbath, they rested according to the commandment. Love ones, this is the word of the living God for today. Trust that he will write these precious truths and the implications of them on your hearts. And with that, you can be seated. Happy Palm Sunday to all of you out there. If you have a copy of God's word, why don't you go to Luke chapter 23? That's where we're gonna be, as you know, this morning, and as you're turning there. My name is Scott. I'm the lead pastor here at Doxa Church. It's so good to have you with us and welcome. If you're new, I wanna sincerely say that uh Tony's right. I would love to meet you after the service and get to hear a little bit of your story and maybe see if there's ways that we can help bridge some gaps or answer some questions that you may have about becoming a part of Doxa Church if you are so inclined. And uh, as you're getting to your Bibles as well, I I gotta check back in, gotta see how our invites are going. I was so encouraged this week. If who's on the prayer team in here? Do you guys, anyone, I'm on the prayer team, I pray for these prayer requests. Pretty amazing to read this week how many of you are praying for or have already stepped out in boldness to ask someone, invite someone to the Easter service. So if that's you, praise God. And if that's not you, I was praying for your boldness all week long. How did that go? Are we doing it? Are we getting out there? It feels good to just risk something for Jesus, doesn't it? And it's not that much. And man, we would be delighted because think about the joy of getting to celebrate the resurrection with the people that need to hear it. And so I pray that you will continue to have that boldness. And uh, as well, uh, we've got, I think, just a few kidsmen slots remaining, which means a lot of you responded last week, but still we are not a consumer church, and so where you can participate next weekend is serving in kidsmen. We would love for you to do that. That's gonna be on the website or the app on the Easter page. You can sign up, fill those last few slots of last week. You're like, man, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to, but then I forgot, and then I went on my day, and now it's Sunday again. Well, hey, we have a few more slots to fill, and we would love if that was you, okay? So let's get those filled so we can have as many kids as possible with people to minister to them next Sunday. All right? Can we do that? We sound so encouraged this morning. Yeah. That's what I heard. I don't know. Maybe you heard something bolder. I heard like a low grunt, you know. You guys ready? Title of the message for today: The Burial of Jesus. We're just going on these really obvious titles: The Death of Jesus, The Burial of Jesus. I can't believe I haven't made a sermon already with that title, but I haven't. So there you go. The burial of Jesus. Now, if you've been around and a sports fan at all, you probably know the phrase Leave No Doubt. I'm not 100% sure, but I can probably say there's a good chance that a warm-up of one of the teams in the March Madness tournament might have something that says, leave no doubt. If you follow Notre Dame football, you realize that that was their motto for the entire year. We want to leave no doubt. When they ended up not making the playoffs, the coach actually went back to that phrase and said, Well, it's a little bit ironic because we left enough in doubt that we don't have anyone to blame but ourselves for where we are. You think about the movie Remember the Titans. I don't know if many of you have seen that. I would imagine that you have, and there's this one iconic line in that movie where the coach is getting the team fired up and he's like, I don't want them crossing the line of scrimmage. You remember this? I don't want them crossing the line of scrimmage. You make sure they remember the day they played the Titans, and then it's like, leave no doubt, and they all go out ready to play, right? I mean, this is a saying with a lot of significance. But what does it mean? You look at this phrase, leave no doubt. The definition is obvious. It means to eliminate all ambiguity. Leave no alternative explanation for why something happened. You wanna leave no doubt. I think of you go to a Bible example. Remember Elijah and the prophets of Baal? He's having this whole tiff with them and kind of dominating them in some ways with some serious confidence. But one of the things he was saying is, all right, you wanna you wanna call down fire from your gods, I'll call down fire from my gods, but my gods. But by the way, um, the way we'll do this is why don't we take the altar, we'll lay the wood on it, and we'll completely soak it with water. And then we'll do it again. And then we'll do it again. Because we want to leave no doubt if that sopping pile lights on fire, we'll know God did it, right? It eliminates all ambiguity. When the Allied forces showed up on D-Day, it eliminated all ambiguity that they were coming in merely for a negotiation. No, they were coming. Now, why do I say this? Because as you look at the burial, the account of the burial of Jesus, you could consider this account of Christ's burial as being sort of unnecessary. Sort of like overkill. Like we we know he is dead. You got there last week. Into your hands, oh Lord, I commit my spirit. We get it, he's dead. So why add? Why make such an emphasis about the burial of Jesus Christ? Why do all four gospel writers emphasize the burial of Jesus Christ? Why does Paul talk about it in the way that he does when he says, When I received the gospel, what was of first importance? He describes three things that Jesus died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures. Why do the creeds, the apostles' creed, one of the oldest creeds, the Nicene Creed, speak specifically about this? It feels like overkill, right? To say Jesus was crucified, he was dead, and he was buried. Couldn't we just say he was crucified? When you're crucified, you're gonna die. What is it with Christians and loving to make so clear that Jesus died? Because Luke and the other gospel writers want to what? Leave no doubt that Jesus really died. Let me give you the big idea for today and break this down a little bit for you. The burial of Jesus leaves no doubt who Jesus is and what he's done. That's what it's meant to do. It is meant to give you confidence, leave you with no doubt. Now I expanded to say Jesus is who he is and he's done what he's done. But it's meant to make something so clear that no room for uncertainty remains regarding the death of Jesus. Because of the burial of Jesus, we have this certainty about the death of Jesus. But I want to broaden it and say it leaves no doubt as to who he is and what he's done, because there's so many significant things about the burial of Jesus that we need to hold on to and be confident in as Christians. And before we even get into the text, I want to throw out a few that support the big idea that the burial of Jesus leaves no doubt who Jesus is and what he's done. So because of the burial of Jesus, a few things really, really important we need to understand. Very simple truths, but really important. Because of the burial of Jesus, we know he is really human. Which is important because you're really human. And you need a human to stand in the place for you. The burial of Jesus means he was really human. He had a real human body. There was real human blood. That spear was thrust through real human organs. Those nails went into real human hands and real human feet. He was really human, and because of that, here's the second thing: it means he was really dead. And of course, one of the most common false teachings was that Jesus only appeared to die. Do you know how common that is? Pretty much every false religion believes Jesus only appeared to die. The Muslims believe Jesus was hung on a cross, but he did not die on the cross. He went right from the cross to heaven in some sort of a non-dying mystical incident. The great preacher Martin Lloyd Jones, who is also a doctor, mind you, spoke into the significance of the burial of Jesus, and he said it like this. He said, You may look at a body that appears to be inanimate and dead. But if there is any doubt or query, you do not bury that body until you are absolutely certain that death has taken place. Right? His burial is absolute proof of the fact that he died in the fullest sense of the term on the cross. It was not merely a suspension of life or of animation or breathing, it was a true death. End quote. So he was really human. He really died. By the way, no death means no debt paid. No death means no atonement made for sinners. It's really important that he died. So that the third thing can be true, it means he really rose from the dead. In order to really bodily rise from the dead, he had to be really dead. We celebrate the empty tomb. We're like so excited about that, but it's only cool if the tomb once had someone in there. Where they knew where the tomb was. That had a stone that was rolled across it in front of it. It was guarded by soldiers. Means he was really human, means he was really dead, means he really rose from the dead. It means this when we think about who he is and what he's done, it means that he meets all the messianic credentials because of his being very much dead and buried, right? He meets messianic credentials. What do I mean? Isaiah 53, verse 9, and they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death. Scriptures being fulfilled, leaving us no doubt who Jesus is and what he's done. Now, as we get to the text, we turn the corner. Burial of Jesus means he was really human, he really died, he really rose, he met the messianic credentials. Last thing. It means by faith in him, the analogy holds. Meaning that because he was really dead and really buried, we who are in him are really dead. And our old self is really buried. And that is incredibly good news. You are not who you used to be. Your old self and all the shame and all the guilt and everything you carry of Jesus Christ has really died and was really buried. Your old self is really dead and really buried, and you really have been raised to newness of life. So listen, you may sin, you may succumb to sin, but it does not enslave you anymore because you are raised to newness of life. You have been buried with him in baptism. Romans 6 4, Colossians 2 12. Now, what that should do as you hear those things, is you it should inspire confidence, right? That Christ really died, gives us confidence that the message we preach is true. What Luke shows us in the burial account now is what happens when a heart registers the significance of the certainty of Christ's death. So the question we're gonna ask of the text is what does Christ's burial leaving no doubt draw out of those there? And how might we respond in kind? What does Christ's death leaving no doubt bring out of people? What do we see and how might we respond? Let me show you a few things. Number one is this Christ's death leaving no doubt brings out courage in a faith that goes public. Brings out courage in a faith that goes public. Now, where does Luke pick up this account? John 19 is helpful here because we're not quite getting all of the pieces. We're picking up the account at the actual removal of the body from the cross. That's where Luke starts. But if you go to John 19 and feel free to look there, what you begin to understand in John 19 is the fact that the Passover of all years landed on the Sabbath, made that Passover unusually special. It was kind of a high Passover. It wasn't always that the Passover landed on the Sabbath. This year it did. And as you know from reading Deuteronomy 21, they had a problem with leaving bodies on trees, right? If a man has committed a crime punishable by death, Deuteronomy 21, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile the land the Lord your God is giving to you. So with this in mind, and with the Sabbath about to begin, right? Because the Sabbath began 6 p.m. on the night Jesus was crucified. Darkness comes over the land from 12 to 3, which means we have this little period of time between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. for all this to go down. Well, if you're not gonna keep people on crosses, what did they do? They started breaking legs. Because what does that do? It starts to accelerate the process. You can't breathe because you can't lift yourself up at all. Now they start breaking legs, right? And by the way, these guys know how to break legs. Okay? It's not like inviting one of us up and be like, oh, you seem to have an anger problem. Let's get you a stick and beat these guys until they don't have workable legs, you know? These guys know what they're doing. They show up in front of Jesus, they see what's going on, and they determine no need to break his legs. Why? And guess who knows death really, really well? These guys. Like if you don't know death really, really well, you're going to lose your job. Super straightforward. By the way, stunning example of how the scriptures are fulfilled. Not a bone shall be broken, it says. Psalm 34, verse 20. Did you know, did you know, did you know that the Passover lamb was to have no broken bones? Exodus 12 46. It says in Zechariah 12 10, one of the prophecies is that they're gonna look on him whom they have pierced. Remember that where they, the soldier for good measure, takes that, sticks it right into To his heart, bursting the heart sack, right? And blood and water comes pouring out. Literally, that's where people get the idea that Jesus died of a broken heart, right? That sort of idea. That actually did happen. They did pierce him. All of that has taken place as we get to the account where Luke picks it up, okay? So here's where we're at. Now there was a man named Joseph, verse 50, from the Jewish town of Arimathea. Now there's some debate about where that is. We're not exactly sure, but here's what we know about him according to the text. He was a member of the council. Okay, what council do we know? He was a member of that supreme court, that Jewish ruling body called the Sanhedrin, which was made up of 70 individuals plus one, to break ties, right? You had the high priest. He was one of the members of this 70, Israel's Supreme Court. According to Mark 15, 43, he was a respected member, not just any member, but one well respected among the 70 plus one. Luke describes him as a good and righteous man, and I would just add the true kind of good and righteous, not the religious kind. The one that is true and righteous by grace. And evidently he had not consented to their decision and action. What decision and action is he talking about? Yeah, what they did with Jesus, right? Now, if you're like me, you're reading this, going, well, I want to know what went down. Did he like, did he stand up and have like one of those Martin Luther moments, you know? Do you remember what I'm talking about with Martin Luther? It's one of these awesome stories. So uh Martin Luther, 95 These guy, that's that's pretty much what most of us know about Martin Luther. That naive, those 95 These were basically points of contention that he had with the Roman Catholic Church, and he wanted to debate about them. That was the whole idea, so you you nailed them to the door of the church, and then you would summon this argument, uh, opportunity, and you'd have this debate back and forth. Well, it lit everything on fire, began the Reformation, all this stuff, led to his excommunication, the Holy Roman Emperor's trying to bring him in. Long story short, there's this incident called the Diet of Worms. But it's really the Diet of Verms. Okay? But when you read it, you're like, oh, a diet, like Paleo, keto, and worms. No. Verms, the city, and Diet is how they would say it. And it was basically the Holy Roman Emperor and princes and nobles and all these guys, and he thought he was coming in for a kind of debate. And so he gets in and it's like this tribunal around him, right? And he's got this table he's supposed to sit at. And I just imagine it being like this small table, and all these guys are on these big, you know, seats looking down on him. And uh they don't tell him that they've taken everything largely that he's written and laid it out on this table. And there's no debate about to happen. They just look at him and go, will you recant? Will you take back everything that you've written? I mean, and it was a massive moment because in that, not only is uh all of his relationships at stake, not only is his life at stake, not only would he be someone on the run, I mean, everything was flashing before his eyes, and so he literally says, Can I just take some time? He takes about 24 hours. He prays, he seeks the Lord, he works through all of the discouragements and fears and all this stuff. He comes back to the table on April 18th and they ask him again, Are these your books? And he says, Yes. And they say, Will you recant? And he said, Do you want an answer plain and without horns? Which is a cool old school way of saying, You want an answer without a debate? Here's what he said. Unless I am convinced by scripture and plain reason, I cannot and will not recant. My conscience is captive to the word of God. Mic drop. You ever been in one of those moments before? I mean, that is an epic story. Now, is that what happened with Joseph of Arimathea? I have no idea. We don't get what his descent looked like, we just understand this. He was not on board with what they did to Jesus. All we understand is that he was a good and righteous man and that he was looking for the kingdom of God. Now, with that being said, John gives us something interesting in chapter 19, verse 38. It says that he was a disciple of Jesus, haha, but a secret one for fear of the Jews. You know, one of those secret disciples. Catch my sarcasm? Are there secret disciples out there? Sure. Should there be? Nope. Nope. But are we at times because we're afraid? Absolutely. Is this not the time to jump on Joseph Arimathea and be like, oh, come on, man, be tougher than that. No, no, no, no, no, no. But he was a secret one for the fear of the Jews. And now all of a sudden he gets his Martin Luther moment, right? He gets that courage. He sat, he's dissented for what's gone down with Jesus, the decisions that have been made, and now we get this moment of courage. This man, in the midst of all the people that were watching. I mean, talk about his future, talk about his reputation, all of that's on the line. This man goes up to Pilate and asks for the body of Jesus. Mark 15 says that to do so, he had to gather up the courage to do it. Because you were making a stand in that moment. Something happened with Joseph of Arimathea in the sight of the certainty of Christ's death that instilled courage in him. What we're witnessing in verse 52 is that moment, maybe you've had it yourself, that moment where faith steps out of the shadows and says, I'm with him. You ever had that moment before? To know the sacrifice of Christ stirs courage. When you think about the certainty of Christ's death and you think about the reality of Christ's burial, let that confidence in his death bring you courage to go public like Joseph of Arimathea. I'm with him. So, what does that look like for you? Couple questions. Where will your love for Christ show itself courageously this week? Because of the sureness, the surety of the death of Jesus? Where will your love for Christ show itself courageously this week? If he's truly dead and we have the confidence that he is, and therefore, three days later, truly risen. Man, where are there opportunities to stand and publicly identify with Jesus the way Joseph did this week for you? Maybe it's in your home, maybe it's at work, maybe it's with your friends that you hang out with certain times of the year, maybe it's at your gym. Like, I don't know. But man, this should instill courage in us and it should be displayed in us more than that. Where are you perhaps just passively going along in your faith with Jesus? You're not consenting with the world, but your colors are not clear about the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's one of the things I find about Christians oftentimes is at some places you are very bold about your faith, and in other places it is crickets with your faith. You say nothing, you do nothing, you show nothing because you're afraid of the implications of what's maybe gonna happen. It's typically with certain people that you want to express uh you know an affinity with or want their respect or want them to uh accept you into a particular group, or or maybe it's um someone you will always wish of a family member that you know you want them to think a certain way about you, and so you don't want to be overt about your Christianity. Where do you need to let go of the secret discipleship and go, I'm with Jesus Christ? Because he truly died, and therefore we'll see truly rose, and that should give us massive confidence to step out in front of everyone, to risk our lives, something small for all that Jesus Christ has done. The burial count, let it drive you to a boldness as concrete as the death of Jesus. That's the first thing we see: a courage. Do you have, are you displaying courage? My guess is if you were honest with yourself, you would find many places in your life where by God's grace you can grow in that. Number two is this. What does Christ's burial or death leaving no doubt bring out? Number two, it brings out a care in an honoring that fulfills Scripture. Brings out a care in us, a kind of sacrifice, a kind of honoring of the Lord Jesus that costs something. Now here's what went down. You'd have these criminals, they'd be crucified on a cross, and then they would be dumped in sort of a public pit where you throw a bunch of other dead bodies. It was kind of the final last indignity that you could bring upon someone. So it's like strip them off the cross once they're dead and toss them in the pit. The Jews had their own pit outside of Jerusalem in a place called Gehenna, which you've probably heard of before. And here's Joseph of Arimathea thinking the noblest thing that he could do to honor Christ was to keep him from that final indignity. By the way, that's also how, in God's providence, that passage of Scripture from the suffering servant passage in Isaiah 53 was fulfilled, that they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death. How? Because Joseph of Arimathea was like, I cannot suffer to see Jesus Christ not at least given an honorable burial. And so we see it in verse 53 like this. Then he took it down, it being the body of Jesus. Mark 15 says, verse 46, essentially the implication is he did it himself. Now we know we got Nicodemus coming up too, right? And so there's some there's some partners in this, but he's really driving this. And I just want you to think for a second the boldness not only to say, He's with me, I'll take him from here, but also to understand that you would be the one, think about it for a second, pulling the nails out of the hands of the Lord Jesus. That's what he was doing. Taking the crown of thorns off of his head, wiping down blood. By the way, if ever there was like, oh, he's not bleeding, he's this is bizarre. What is this? You get no mention of that whatsoever. He looked really dead because he was really dead and he really bled, and they would really clean him off. They'd actually give the body an entire washing before they wrapped the body in the linens. What an overwhelming moment that must have been. They wrapped the body in a linen shroud, they laid him in a tomb cut in stone, listen, where no one had ever yet been laid. Okay? Now, the Bible tells us that this tomb was Joseph of Arimathea's tomb. This dude was loaded. Alright? How many of you have your own mausoleum? That's right, I didn't think so. Maybe, maybe a few of you do. Or could. You're like, I could, I could. Okay, okay. All right. How much are you giving here? The important question. We need a mausoleum, man. Churches used to have mausoleums, you know. Well, watch this. No one else was in it, right? What does the text say? Where no one ever had yet been laid. No one else was in it. Why is that important for us? Because you ain't getting them mixed up. This is the guy, I'm not sure. He's the only one in there. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. He's the only one who has ever been there. Alright? That's important. This isn't Andy Dufrain in Shawshank Redemption, right? Where for the next three days, it's like Jesus at superhuman speed is kind of etching through the walls and climbs out through a tunnel, right? This is not what this is. This isn't prison break. What, do you do you like that movie? I just immediately thought, what are the excuses that you can make up? This is a prison break thing, right? He's not really dead. He's he's in the tomb, and he just he finds his way out. And then he covers it up like they do in Shawshank, right? I mean, maybe that's the way. No. The point here. No one had ever been laid there. It was cut in stone. There was no getting out. That's not a count of Monte Cristo moment. Which, by the way, someone, when I mentioned that illustration a few weeks ago, said they they made this series on PBS, and so far it's been really good. Jesus did not, in the three days between his death and his resurrection, dig out of the stone tomb. And as a result, and God's providence was indeed with a rich man in his death. He was in the grave, as Matthew 12, 40, a prophecy Jesus had about himself. Three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Now, when you hear a phrase like three days and three nights, you have to understand that what they were simply saying in that day was it stood for any part of any day. It had to be a portion of three days in that grave for it to be Friday, Saturday, Sunday, fulfilled. It had to be a garden tomb, too, didn't it? It just had to be a garden tomb. John 19 says it was a garden tomb. Why is that important? Well, as you know, and I'll quote Matthew Henry because he says it better than I would. In the Garden of Eden, death and the grave first received their power, right? How fitting it is that now in a garden they're conquered, disarmed, and triumphed over. In a grave. In a garden. In a garden Christ began his passion, and from a garden he would rise and begin his exaltation. Isn't that awesome? Just as you would have thought. All the way from Genesis. There's this confidence, right? This confidence in Christ's death drives Joseph to offer Jesus something that costs him. So what is the connection for us? True love for Jesus is seen when it costs you something, right? So so think back to David, right? 2 Samuel 24, David is uh, he he takes that census of the people, right? And it says that that was not a good thing. Uh not because a census is a bad thing, but because the way he was doing it was proving he wasn't relying on God. He was relying on the numbers of his army. That's what he was trusting in. That was the problem, right? And so that that was not a good thing. And one of the things the Lord asks of him is that he make a sacrifice and he offers it on the threshing floor of this guy named Arana, right? This this individual's character named Arana. And the the character, uh, is willing to help David. He's willing to give him the floors, the materials, the land. Like, here you can have it. And David's like, I will not offer my God something that costs me what? Nothing. And this isn't to earn our way to the Lord. This isn't, this isn't, this is our gratitude. When we understand the significance of the sacrifice of Jesus, it overwhelms us under gratitude to saying, now I will live my life as a living sacrifice for Him. It's easy, it's simple. This is what I want to do. So here's some ways to think about it. When Jesus Christ looks least glorious, that's where you're invested. But we ought to be most all in when everyone else is all out on Jesus. So let me ask, do you stand with Jesus not just where people do, but where they don't? When you think about what it costs you, and it does cost us, but boy, that cost is limited. When we think about the gain of honoring the Lord Jesus Christ, the gain of the prior, the privilege of joining in, fellowship in his sufferings. When it costs you reputation or comfort or ease, what we have to begin to understand is God is too glorious and his sacrifice too significant to give him our leftovers. So the question is, man, here's Joseph Arimathea going, you can have, you need, you should have, at a cost to me, gladly, this tomb. The question to you is, do you honor him with your best? Do you honor him with your first? Man, speaking about giving, which I just joked about, there's a real problem in the church with giving, at least as I'm reading articles about it. What it sounds like giving has become is the older generation, the boomers, they give like normal, thinking tithing was a least a minimum to giving. And now, my generation and below have moved to two things. One, we tip, we don't tithe. And two, we self-autonomously give. So you no longer give to the local church. You give to whatever you want to give. You are the authority over where your money goes. And both those things are just random concerns, by the way. The question I'm saying is: with what you have, does he get your best? And does Jesus get your first? And does that show up in various places? Yes, in your giving, but also, how about in your going on mission to him or for him, you know, into your life and being a light for the gospel of Jesus Christ? One of the things that's interesting about the life of Joseph of Arimathea, I was literally reading this week, but a 17th, oh man, century leader in the Dutch Reformation who was able to do a bunch of work and track some of the first missionaries to various places. How did the gospel get here? How did the gospel get here? Joseph of Arimathea is traced back as being the first one to get the gospel to Britain. I found that fascinating. And he talked about Thomas and getting to India, and he talked about, right, every one of the disciples, but Joseph Arimathea to Britain. Like, here's a guy who went, the sacrifice of Christ, what am I gonna do to honor him with my life? What am I gonna do that actually costs me something because he is so glorious? And in the end, we know it's really nothing in comparison to the privilege it is to sacrifice to the Lord Jesus. Do you honor him with something that costs? Do you care to preserve and uphold the reputation of Jesus Christ? And then finally, this the third thing we see is what does Christ's death leaving no doubt draw out? Man, it draws out courage, it draws out this care, and it draws out this continuing and a quiet obedience. Just finishes like this. Imagine you're at the end of the day, according to the Jewish calendar. The way they told time. Friday's coming to an end. He's in the ground on Friday, right? That is, he's buried on Friday. Now, you still have this line, verse 55. The women, we saw this last week, who had come with him from Galilee, followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Okay, first of all, kudos to the ladies. Right? You go, girls. Oh, the men, the tough men, yeah, yeah, we'll do whatever. We'll follow you. We're super tough. You're nowhere. To be found. Now you get a few later on, but man, it's just like Luke makes this focus on the women who had come and followed him all the way from Galilee. Now they're seeing the tomb and they're watching how his body is laid, and you're going, kind of, I like, what do you mean? Like staring? Yeah, I think staring. It's kind of like, huh? Like taking it all in. But I think another thing that's really important about the fact that he mentions and how his body was laid was because one of the accusations that comes against the resurrection is that the women on Sunday morning went to the wrong tomb. Insert female GPS jokes right there. Right? That's just mean. Okay? That is bad, isn't it? Yeah. Right? I believe women can get their find their way around. But some jerks can. I wouldn't recommend you read them. Women went to the wrong tomb. Part of this is, man, they knew exactly where he was buried. Right? And it was multiple of them, right? So even if your wife is like, you know, turn left at the jack in the box, and then turn right when you see the trash heap, and then, right? Those kind of directions. But there's a whole bunch of them. They knew exactly where he was buried. They had seen what the men had already done. So they were going specifically to prepare spices and ointments again because the stink of the body would have been so bad. They were going to honor the Lord Jesus and offset that smell. And they were trying to rapidly finish in the little bit of time they had left because on the Sabbath, here's what it says, they rested according to the commandment. What an interesting way to finish before we read about the resurrection of Jesus. But I think there's something significant in it. What Luke highlights is they carried on when things didn't make sense in quiet obedience. When Christ seems absent, what are you to do? Carry on in a quiet obedience. It's Sunday. We go to church on Sundays. It's Monday. It's Tuesday. It's Thursday. It's Wednesday. I don't even know what days of the week. It's Wednesday. Word in prayer. Does Providence ever seem murky to you or you just don't understand what God's doing? You're like, man, I can't read this at all. When Providence seems murky, his precepts are not murky. Stick one foot in front of the other. You say, I'm having such a bad week. It's been a horrible week. Nothing you've said about the burial of resurrection. Is that anything for me? I've zoned out to everything you've said. Okay, what you need to hear is put one foot in front of the other in obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ. Leverage the law of God as your friend, because you're not under the curse of it, to guide you and how you ought to live until things become clear. This is all they do. There's nothing fancy about it. Faith follows in the dark times by obedience to Jesus when you want to quit. When you're tempted to because he feels distant, you go distant. No, no, no. You stay in the pocket and you continue to follow the Lord and fulfill and walk in obedience to his law. Why? Because the burial of Jesus leaves no doubt. He was really dead, just as he had predicted. Which means three days from this point in the text, he can really and does really rise from the dead. Jesus' burial left no doubt. It brings out of us courage, care, and a continuing and a quiet obedience. He really went to the grave to really die for sinners, who you really deserve the grave, you and I, and he goes before us to transform death, defeat death, neuter death, so that through him, by faith, should you put your faith, your trust, your confidence, should you rest in the work of Jesus Christ, then through him, even you might be granted eternal life. That your death would be an entrance into everlasting life upon your faith placed in the Lord Jesus. Let it bring what the Lord has intended to bring to us through his word. Let's pray. Father, we love you and we thank you for your word. We thank you for the account of the burial of Jesus. And we recognize the certainty that you want us to hold fast to, that should breed a courage in us. It should breed a care that we want to honor the Lord Jesus with that costs us something. It should issue forth in a quiet obedience when things aren't clear. Next thing to do, how do I walk in obedience to you, O God? How do I enjoy you in fellowship? Thank you, Lord, for your law that leads us, no longer curses us, Lord, but guides us in the way that we ought to go for our good and your glory. Lead us, we pray in it, in Jesus' name. Amen.