SPEAKER_01: This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.
SPEAKER_00: Would you take your Bible with me this morning to the Gospel of Matthew?
SPEAKER_00: We've been working our way through Matthew's Gospel.
SPEAKER_00: And we are in chapter 17.
SPEAKER_00: If the Bible is new to you, you can just take that Bible that's in the Pew Rack in front of you and open it.
SPEAKER_00: I believe it's page 823.
SPEAKER_00: I preach from the English Standard Version, and that's the version that's in the Pew Rack in front of you.
SPEAKER_00: And that's just to be able to help us all to follow along together.
SPEAKER_00: And we do that so that we can all be aware that it's that whoever's preaching here is not just saying some words from their own mind, but is actually reading to you and preaching from the Word of God.
SPEAKER_00: And you can see that and sense that from the text in front of you.
SPEAKER_00: And this morning, we're in Matthew chapter 17, beginning in verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to cover just two verses this morning, and they're familiar to you, at least in their content, but it's good for us to be reminded of them because Jesus reminds his disciples in Matthew 17, verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: As they were gathering the disciples in Jesus in Galilee, Jesus said to them, The Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him.
SPEAKER_00: And he will be raised on the third day.
SPEAKER_00: And they were greatly distressed.
SPEAKER_00: Would you pray?
SPEAKER_00: Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We know, and we've gathered here today because we believe that you are the Son of Man who gave his life as a ransom for us.
SPEAKER_00: We've gathered today because of the hope of your life, because we we believe and we trust that you, though you were killed by the hands of men, yet you were raised on the third day.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I pray that you would you would take these words and make it real to your people in a new way.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe even if there's if there's someone among us this morning who has not placed their trust in you for their eternity, that they would be gripped by the truth of these words this morning and trust in you today.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, make your resurrection full of hope for us today.
SPEAKER_00: As we consider again what you've done for us.
SPEAKER_00: In Christ's name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever had the experience of eating a mildly spicy food that builds an intensity the more you eat it?
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are nodding yes, the rest of you are saying, Why would I do that?
SPEAKER_00: Most of us have had that kind of experience.
SPEAKER_00: It starts off sort of benign.
SPEAKER_00: And then the more you eat this spicy food, you begin to sense this tingling in your mouth, and before you know it, your throat is starting to burn, and you realize that the fire in your mouth and your throat is mocking you for thinking that you can handle the heat.
SPEAKER_00: Been there?
SPEAKER_00: Now the real question is how many of you like to return to that place?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Some of us are insane enough to do that.
SPEAKER_00: That's these two verses in a nutshell.
SPEAKER_00: You see, Matthew didn't decide to just sit down one day and record all of the things that he could remember about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't just take a bunch of memories and throw them together into a book.
SPEAKER_00: This is a carefully composed biography.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the themes that is placed at strategic areas throughout this biography is the concept of death.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just any death, but Jesus' death.
SPEAKER_00: By my account, there are at least nine times where Matthew weaves the death of Jesus into the storyline of the Gospel of Matthew.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's a veiled reference, and other times it's quite direct, but it builds.
SPEAKER_00: The intensity increases each time we see a reference to the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And as we see here, by the time Jesus' disciples are hearing it this time, they are now struggling to handle it.
SPEAKER_00: So much so that they are greatly distressed.
SPEAKER_00: This isn't just a mild bothering.
SPEAKER_00: This is that point of eating spicy food that you are beginning to wonder, can I really handle this?
SPEAKER_00: Or is this going to destroy me?
SPEAKER_00: In chapter 2, we saw that Herod sent soldiers to kill the male children around Bethlehem.
SPEAKER_00: Why did he do that?
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus had been born in Bethlehem.
SPEAKER_00: That's a veiled reference to the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: But then two chapters later in chapter 4, Satan tempts Jesus to jump off the corner of the temple.
SPEAKER_00: What happens if you jump off the corner of the temple?
SPEAKER_00: You die.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 12, we are told that the Pharisees conspired as to how to destroy Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And then Jesus responded by saying that there would be a sign given to the people, the sign of Jonah.
SPEAKER_00: That is just as Jonah spent three days in the belly of a fish, so Jesus would spend three days in the heart of the earth.
SPEAKER_00: What's that a reference to?
SPEAKER_00: Becomes clear in chapter 16, with the very first clear statement, a prophetic statement, that Jesus was going to go to Jerusalem and that he would suffer many things and be handed over to the Gentiles and to the leaders and he would be killed.
SPEAKER_00: And Peter rebukes him for it.
SPEAKER_00: Peter says, absolutely not.
SPEAKER_00: That is not going to happen to you, Jesus, over my dead body.
SPEAKER_00: Then we have this statement in chapter 17, verse 12, where the Son of Man will certainly suffer at their hands.
SPEAKER_00: Then in verse 23, they will kill him.
SPEAKER_00: There's another clear statement in chapter 20 and a fourth clear statement in chapter 26.
SPEAKER_00: All throughout the Gospel of Matthew, there are these references to the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Like shipping companies, Matthew gives us the equivalent of tracking numbers to remind us again and again and again that the life of Jesus is all about the death of Jesus to save his people from their sins.
SPEAKER_00: All throughout the gospel record are these small reminders that Jesus is headed to the cross and the death that it brings.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this text before us this morning is the second of four very clear and very pointed declarations of Jesus to that intent.
SPEAKER_00: So God thought it necessary to remind his people of this reality again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again.
SPEAKER_00: Was that nine times?
SPEAKER_00: I lost count about four.
SPEAKER_00: And like those first disciples, we should we should be ready for the reminder.
SPEAKER_00: Even though we we think we know what it means, even though we we think we don't need to hear it again, we need the reminder.
SPEAKER_00: I could tell by your singing this morning that it that it built.
SPEAKER_00: It came to a crescendo with that last song.
SPEAKER_00: Why is that?
SPEAKER_00: Because something about the death and the resurrection of Christ impacts his people.
SPEAKER_00: It's good to be reminded.
SPEAKER_00: But in our reminders, we should also be prepared for the potential increase in the intensity level in ways we don't expect.
SPEAKER_00: What is revealed to us in this reminder in verses 17, verses 22 and 23?
SPEAKER_00: Well, there are two truths, two realities, two doctrines, if you will, that are present here.
SPEAKER_00: One is a reality about God, and the other is a reality about human beings.
SPEAKER_00: These two truths only make sense when we understand them in light of what Matthew has been showing us from the very beginning.
SPEAKER_00: They only make sense if Jesus is God who came to save his people from their sins through his death and resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: We encounter the truth about God first in verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: As they were gathering in Galilee, Jesus said to them, The Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men.
SPEAKER_00: What do we see here?
SPEAKER_00: We see primarily the control of a sovereign redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew records for us that they were gathering together, they were getting together in Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus reminds them what's going to come.
SPEAKER_00: They've been in the far northern reaches of Palestine, of Israel's territory.
SPEAKER_00: Now they're returning southward, and as they return southward, Jesus tells them we're not going to stay in Galilee.
SPEAKER_00: And in the next verses, we're going to Capernaum, our hometown, but we're not going to stay there either, because what's in front of us is something far greater than ministering to all of these little villages along the way.
SPEAKER_00: What's in front of us is the city of Jerusalem, and what's there is suffering and death at the hands of sinners.
SPEAKER_00: That sounds terrible, but what in reality we see here is the hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: There are elements of human responsibility here that we're going to touch on in a moment, but first we need to see the elements of the hand of God in the Lord's death.
SPEAKER_00: And those elements tell us about our Savior and his actions to ransom us.
SPEAKER_00: What do they tell us?
SPEAKER_00: Well, they tell us first that Jesus' death required the humanity of God.
SPEAKER_00: We see this often in the Gospels, this term son of man.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you may be a little uncertain about what that means, so we'll help you out a little bit here.
SPEAKER_00: This is a favorite title that Jesus uses for himself.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus refers to himself, to other people, he often uses son of man.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's son of God, but most often it's son of man.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a term that carries a double implication.
SPEAKER_00: One of those implications comes from the Old Testament book of Daniel.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel saw a vision of the throne room of God, with God sitting on his throne full of glory and one beside him like a son of man.
SPEAKER_00: From Daniel, this term points to one associated with divine glory and the sovereign rule of God.
SPEAKER_00: But even more than that, it identifies the pre-existence of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Jesus, when he was born, already existed.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't suddenly come into being with his birth.
SPEAKER_00: As the Son of Man, he was present in the throne room of God in the book of Daniel.
SPEAKER_00: It's used also in Ezekiel, of the prophet Ezekiel, in ways that points to the lowliness of human beings.
SPEAKER_00: So on the one hand, we have this elevated glory of the person, the eternality of God.
SPEAKER_00: On the other hand, we have the lowliness of human beings.
SPEAKER_00: But those opposites come together to reveal the reality of Christ's being.
SPEAKER_00: He is the God man.
SPEAKER_00: He is the divine, pre-existent, sovereign God.
SPEAKER_00: And as we saw here in Matthew 17, it shows the humanity of God because he's going to die.
SPEAKER_00: When we see the humanity of God, it tells us that Jesus wasn't a figment of the disciples' imaginations.
SPEAKER_00: He wasn't an apparition.
SPEAKER_00: That's why John would later say, we saw him and we touched him.
SPEAKER_00: He was actually a human being.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't appear to be a man or simply look like a human being.
SPEAKER_00: No, he is fully human.
SPEAKER_00: Philippians 2 tells us that very clearly.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the scriptures say to us that Jesus was born, as a human being is born.
SPEAKER_00: He grew.
SPEAKER_00: He aged.
SPEAKER_00: He ate and drank.
SPEAKER_00: He walked and he talked.
SPEAKER_00: He became tired and he slept.
SPEAKER_00: He sorrowed and he wept.
SPEAKER_00: He had compassion.
SPEAKER_00: He touched.
SPEAKER_00: He saw.
SPEAKER_00: And in the end, he died.
SPEAKER_00: Those are all aspects inherent to humanity.
SPEAKER_00: So when Jesus says, I am the Son of Man, it identifies him as a human being.
SPEAKER_00: God, on the other hand, is eternal.
SPEAKER_00: He has no beginning and no end.
SPEAKER_00: He's always living.
SPEAKER_00: How then can Jesus say, the Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men and they will kill him?
SPEAKER_00: If Jesus is the divine Son of Man, how can He die?
SPEAKER_00: If God is eternal, how can God die?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Philippians chapter 2, verse 7, explains for us.
SPEAKER_00: It says of Jesus that even though he was in the form of God, he made himself nothing.
SPEAKER_00: To the point of taking on the form of a slave and being born in the likeness of men.
SPEAKER_00: So that as he was found in human form, he further humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross.
SPEAKER_00: There are stages of humility identified here.
SPEAKER_00: There's the glories of heaven that are unmatchable.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus set those aside to wrap himself in flesh to be one of his creatures.
SPEAKER_00: But that wasn't enough humility.
SPEAKER_00: He humbled himself to the point of being like a slave.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, even that wasn't enough.
SPEAKER_00: He humbled himself to the point of dying, God dying.
SPEAKER_00: And then he humbled himself even further by dying on a cross.
SPEAKER_00: So here we see the necessity of the two elements of Son of Man coming together.
SPEAKER_00: The manner in which the eternal God could die is by becoming one of his creatures and his own creation.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus wrapped himself in a house of flesh that could suffer death.
SPEAKER_00: God, the Son, must become man.
SPEAKER_00: That's the only way.
SPEAKER_00: That's the only way to die and pay a price sufficient to cover sin, to satisfy death, and to meet the justice of God.
SPEAKER_00: If that is not true, then what we have sung this morning is pointless.
SPEAKER_00: Now it ought to make us ask.
SPEAKER_00: If the Son of Man in all of his glory in the throne room of God would condescend to die, that kind of death for me.
SPEAKER_00: If he would take on that kind of humility, then why would I not be humble enough to set aside my pride and come to him?
SPEAKER_00: Further, what keeps me from humbling myself to serve my brothers and sisters in Christ?
SPEAKER_00: There's a second element of humanity that we see here.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus' death required the sovereignty of God over the affairs of mankind.
SPEAKER_00: This is the flip side of the Son of Man.
SPEAKER_00: We've seen now the humanity side.
SPEAKER_00: Let's consider the divine side.
SPEAKER_00: We see here that Jesus is about to be delivered into the hands of men.
SPEAKER_00: We see this divine side a little more clearly in Romans chapter 8, verse 32, where it says that he who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all.
SPEAKER_00: There is a divine handing over, a giving up of God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: From a divine perspective, humanity couldn't lay a hand on Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: God in his sovereign control must give Jesus up to be crucified.
SPEAKER_00: Because God is sovereign over all action.
SPEAKER_00: Scripture is clear about this.
SPEAKER_00: We could spend the rest of our morning looking at passages that detail this.
SPEAKER_00: You might be familiar with Proverbs 21:1.
SPEAKER_00: Speaks of the king's heart being like a stream of water in the hand of God.
SPEAKER_00: He turns it whatever direction he wants.
SPEAKER_00: Daniel chapter 4, verse 17 of speaking of Nebuchadnezzar says, the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whomever he will and sets over it the lowliest of men.
SPEAKER_00: When you see regime changes in your world, when you see presidencies change, when you see congresses change, when you see all kinds of leadership change, God is behind that.
SPEAKER_00: He is in sovereign control of all of these events.
SPEAKER_00: Now bring that concept to the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Think of Isaiah 53, with all of its details about the suffering and the death of God's chosen one.
SPEAKER_00: The only way for all of those things to take place is by God being sovereign over the affairs of mankind.
SPEAKER_00: That's why Luke would say the Son of Man goes as it has been determined.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, everything that we've sung joyfully, worshippingly, reverently this morning is because it was determined.
SPEAKER_00: That's why Acts chapter 2, verse 23 records that this Jesus was delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God.
SPEAKER_00: God is sovereignly in control of the purposes of men.
SPEAKER_00: Now that requires that humanity be submissive to the purposes of God.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we find in Acts chapter 4, just a couple of chapters later, where Peter says, There were gathered together in this city of Jerusalem against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, Roman rulers, along with Gentiles and the peoples of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: What were they gathered there to do?
SPEAKER_00: Whatever God decided.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever your hand and your plan had predestined, had determined beforehand would take place.
SPEAKER_00: My friends, think of what that means for your life.
SPEAKER_00: For all of its obstacles, all of its pains, and all of its trials, and all of its difficulties.
SPEAKER_00: Whatever your hand and your plan had determined beforehand to take place.
SPEAKER_00: For Jesus, that meant that he understood that the cross was coming with all of its suffering, with all of its pain, with all of its trial and with his death.
SPEAKER_00: And for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross.
SPEAKER_00: For Christians, it ought to be like the Apostle Paul said, I endure everything that is set before me so that I might gain Christ and be found in Him.
SPEAKER_00: How do we approach the things in life that feel as though they are outside our control?
SPEAKER_00: Do we complain and gripe and fight against it?
SPEAKER_00: Or do we say, Lord, I know that your hand has determined this.
SPEAKER_00: Help me to face it with joy?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus' death also required the sovereignty of God over time.
SPEAKER_00: Throughout the gospel record, we read that the leaders of Israel desired to do away with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: They wanted him gone.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about why it didn't happen earlier?
SPEAKER_00: Why did the cross take place when it did?
SPEAKER_00: Why didn't it happen later?
SPEAKER_00: Why did Jesus die at the time of the celebration of the Passover?
SPEAKER_00: Why did, according to the Gospel of John, did his cry, it is finished, happen at the moment of the sacrifice in the temple for the sins of the people?
SPEAKER_00: Why, when the people were desiring to push Jesus off of a cliff to kill him, was he able to just walk through the clouds, crowds, seemingly untouched, escaping death?
SPEAKER_00: Why was Jesus able to speak of Jonah and being in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights, and then to say that he was going to be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights and then be raised on the third day?
SPEAKER_00: Why is everything so precise?
SPEAKER_00: To the day, to the hour, even to the minute.
SPEAKER_00: There's only one sufficient answer.
SPEAKER_00: God is sovereign over time.
SPEAKER_00: God created time, and it's within his power to control and to direct as he wills.
SPEAKER_00: Consequently, everything within the plan of God will take place exactly when he determines it should, including everything in your life, and in my life.
SPEAKER_00: God is neither a second, a millisecond, a microsecond, a nanosecond, or even if you prefer a picosecond behind.
SPEAKER_00: Nor too soon.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus would not, indeed could not die before or after God's determined time.
SPEAKER_00: God was and still is completely sovereign over time.
SPEAKER_00: All of the events in your life, all of the events in my life happen within the divine sovereign control of time.
SPEAKER_00: Now we might ask, why now?
SPEAKER_00: Most of us probably have.
SPEAKER_00: If we haven't asked it, we've at least thought it.
SPEAKER_00: Why couldn't this have happened tomorrow?
SPEAKER_00: Why now?
SPEAKER_00: And it's okay to ask.
SPEAKER_00: Even Jesus asked, right, the night before the cross, Father, if it be your will, take this away.
SPEAKER_00: Can't there be another way?
SPEAKER_00: It's okay to ask.
SPEAKER_00: But when you ask, remind yourself and then labor to submit to the comforting place of submission to God's control over time.
SPEAKER_00: For your eternal rescue and your eternal rest is found in that sovereignty over time.
SPEAKER_00: There's a last element of humanity that we need to see, and that is that Jesus' death required the submission of death to the power of God.
SPEAKER_00: We won't spend much time here since we covered it back at Easter.
SPEAKER_00: But there is a fact that God is the always existing one.
SPEAKER_00: A characteristic of the divine is eternality.
SPEAKER_00: Scriptures say God is life.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, God cannot die.
SPEAKER_00: There is another fact that humanity is not eternal.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, all people die.
SPEAKER_00: If you question that, read the first few pages of Genesis and it'll convince you.
SPEAKER_00: But there is a divine truth that is revealed here, and that is that Jesus is the God man.
SPEAKER_00: He is the God who does not die, and he is a man who can die.
SPEAKER_00: And we are then told that Jesus does die.
SPEAKER_00: But what happens?
SPEAKER_00: And they will kill him.
SPEAKER_00: And what follows that?
SPEAKER_00: A comma.
SPEAKER_00: The translators were right, I think, in putting a comma there, not a period.
SPEAKER_00: It's not a full stop.
SPEAKER_00: Because there's an and.
SPEAKER_00: Something comes after the and they will kill him.
SPEAKER_00: And he will be raised.
SPEAKER_00: The expression of this divine truth of Jesus being the God man is an apparent disparity.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus dies, but Jesus rises from the dead and is alive forevermore.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus identifies all of that in advance, time and time and time again.
SPEAKER_00: Given all of that, what keeps you from resting all of your cares and all of your anxieties in Him?
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you what keeps you from doing that.
SPEAKER_00: You keep you from doing that.
SPEAKER_00: Because what we do is we wrestle control away from God so that we might have it.
SPEAKER_00: But what ends up happening is that we have no control.
SPEAKER_00: What keeps you from fighting for control over your life and your experiences and even your happiness when you have this kind of Son of Man in whom to rest.
SPEAKER_00: That's a divine side of this picture.
SPEAKER_00: There's a human side that identifies the culpability of sinful people.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 23, Jesus says they will kill him.
SPEAKER_00: I remember several years ago when a book was published with the title The Murder of Jesus, someone expressed to me his outrage over that title.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus wasn't murdered, this man said.
SPEAKER_00: Scriptures say he laid down his life for us.
SPEAKER_00: No one takes it from me, I give it up.
SPEAKER_00: Well, of course.
SPEAKER_00: The scriptures do say that.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus himself said in John chapter 10, verse 18, No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up.
SPEAKER_00: At the same time, there is responsibility in mankind for Jesus' death.
SPEAKER_00: Who's going to kill him?
SPEAKER_00: They.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: The ones into whom whose hands he is delivered are the ones who will take his life.
SPEAKER_00: In John chapter 11, we see a secret plot to kill Jesus by the leadership of Israel led by Caiaphas the high priest.
SPEAKER_00: So there's volition, there's intent behind the desire to be rid of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's why Peter said in Acts chapter 2 that we looked at a few moments ago that Jesus was delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, whom you, speaking of the leaders of Israel, whom you crucified and killed, there is responsibility laid onto human beings for the death of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Why would they do that?
SPEAKER_00: We would never do that, of course.
SPEAKER_00: At least that's what we think.
SPEAKER_00: So why did they do that?
SPEAKER_00: Well, there's probably several reasons, but maybe a couple that we could highlight this morning is that they desired to retain their own place of authority.
SPEAKER_00: See, human beings do not like to give up control to a sovereign God.
SPEAKER_00: As human beings, we want our way.
SPEAKER_00: That is the nature of sin.
SPEAKER_00: And the nature of sin is to wrestle control of life and events and of circumstances out of God's hands so that we might have control over our own lives.
SPEAKER_00: So we read in Luke 23, verse 5, that they said of Jesus that he was stirring up the people.
SPEAKER_00: He was teaching throughout all Judea and from Galilee even to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: And the question that we need to answer is: why were they upset with Jesus stirring up people?
SPEAKER_00: Why was that a problem?
SPEAKER_00: Why was it a problem for Jesus to go from village to village, from town to town, from location to location, teaching?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's because Jesus refused to accept their false teaching.
SPEAKER_00: He was teaching the right way of God.
SPEAKER_00: Do you remember in Matthew how Jesus told his disciples to watch out for the leaven of the Pharisees?
SPEAKER_00: They thought he was talking about bread.
SPEAKER_00: Don't buy the bread that comes from the Pharisees.
SPEAKER_00: No, Jesus wasn't talking about bread.
SPEAKER_00: He was talking about what they taught.
SPEAKER_00: He says, watch out for what people teach.
SPEAKER_00: See, Jesus called a spade a spade.
SPEAKER_00: He wouldn't let the hypocritical teachers of Israel continue to masquerade as examples of righteousness when they were nothing but decorated tombs full of rotting bones.
SPEAKER_00: But the people were flocking to Jesus for his provisions and for his teaching.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus didn't teach like everybody else.
SPEAKER_00: He taught as someone who actually had authority.
SPEAKER_00: And that came to a head when the day came to ride down into the city of Jerusalem on a donkey.
SPEAKER_00: We call that the triumphal entry.
SPEAKER_00: Some triumph when they then turned around and hung him on a cross.
SPEAKER_00: But on that day he rode into Jerusalem on a donkey and they were celebrating him, right?
SPEAKER_00: Crowds of people were gathering around him, shouting praises, Hosanna to the God of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And the Pharisees said, Jesus, would you tell them to be quiet?
SPEAKER_00: Because if they make a noise, the Romans are going to come.
SPEAKER_00: Leaders weren't about to lose their grip over the people, so they sought to destroy Jesus, even if it meant an illegal kangaroo court at midnight.
SPEAKER_00: All throughout the gospel records, we find the leadership of Israel despising Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And even after his ascension into heaven, they sought to quiet the apostles.
SPEAKER_00: They said, Don't say anything about Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because ultimately they chose to reject their Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: That's why.
SPEAKER_00: They would not see Jesus as the one who came by the hand of God to save them from their sins.
SPEAKER_00: They would not see him as their Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: And that was prophesied hundreds of years in advance by an angel speaking to Daniel.
SPEAKER_00: It's written in Daniel that an anointed one was going to come.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the same word.
SPEAKER_00: Anointed one is the same word as Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: And that Messiah, that anointed one, Daniel is told, is going to be cut off.
SPEAKER_00: So we read in Acts 2.23, this Jesus, you crucified.
SPEAKER_00: And you killed.
SPEAKER_00: Peter says, Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus, whom you crucified.
SPEAKER_00: You see the culpability there?
SPEAKER_00: God says, I'm giving you grace.
SPEAKER_00: And they received the grace and threw it back in God's face.
SPEAKER_00: Peter would later say in Acts chapter 4, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified.
SPEAKER_00: Speaking of a healing that took place.
SPEAKER_00: And then to top it all off, in that same text in Acts chapter 4, Peter quotes from Psalm 2, saying, The kings of the earth gathered themselves together against the Lord and against his Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: Peter says, That's the crucifixion.
SPEAKER_00: You did it.
SPEAKER_00: So from a purely human perspective, it may be accurate to suggest that Jesus' death was indeed a murder.
SPEAKER_00: He was completely innocent.
SPEAKER_00: As John stated so clearly in John 1, the light of the world came to his own people and they rejected him.
SPEAKER_00: And if that if that were all there was to the death of Jesus, it would be a sad, sad tale.
SPEAKER_00: It would be a sad story.
SPEAKER_00: But that's only one side of the Son of Man.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, there's one side of the Son of Man that is full of humanity where he would be beaten and killed.
SPEAKER_00: Be crucified.
SPEAKER_00: It's true that mankind does bear responsibility for Jesus' crucifixion because he had to come and he would give himself as a ransom.
SPEAKER_00: And by extension, it's all our responsibility because it's our sin that placed him there.
SPEAKER_00: But the hand of God is also very evident in his death.
SPEAKER_00: On the one side is culpability from sin, and on the other side is provision from God's grace.
SPEAKER_00: That's our reminder.
SPEAKER_00: How will you respond?
SPEAKER_00: I've likely not said anything that you haven't heard before.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe some things are new for some of you.
SPEAKER_00: But much of this is a reminder.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the disciples.
SPEAKER_00: We are now two-thirds almost of the way into the Gospel of Matthew.
SPEAKER_00: And Matthew's told us again and again and again expect the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Expect the death of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And the disciples are hearing this now for the second time, very clearly.
SPEAKER_00: And they were greatly distressed.
SPEAKER_00: Back in chapter 16, in Jesus' first statement of his plan, verse 21, from that time, chapter 16, verse 21, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and on the third day be raised.
SPEAKER_00: And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, Far be it from you.
SPEAKER_00: This shall never, ever, absolutely not, God forbid, happen to you.
SPEAKER_00: Peter speaking for the group of the disciples, saying, No, I will not accept that end from my Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, I'm taking control.
SPEAKER_00: We see Peter doing that a lot, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: Now in the second clear statement of chapter 17, the disciples seem to understand or at least grasp more clearly that Jesus is serious about his own death.
SPEAKER_00: They're beginning to understand that they're in Galilee, but they're not going to be staying here long.
SPEAKER_00: They're going to be going to Capernaum, but they're not going to be staying there long either.
SPEAKER_00: They're here to prepare to go to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and for Jesus to be betrayed and to be handed over to the powers that be for his own death.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew's theme of the death of Jesus has intensified to the point that the disciples are now realizing the reality that comes with following Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: What did he tell them?
SPEAKER_00: No one can be my disciple unless he takes up his cross and follows me.
SPEAKER_00: The intensity of that heat has gotten quite intense, hasn't it?
SPEAKER_00: The truth is sinking in.
SPEAKER_00: The disciples are no longer rebuking Jesus, even Peter.
SPEAKER_00: They're beginning to comprehend that Jesus really is going to Jerusalem and he really is going to die, and they're crushed.
SPEAKER_00: In their mind, Jesus' death is the death of their dreams.
SPEAKER_00: His being delivered into the hands of men is the end of their hope.
SPEAKER_00: Because, like we so often do, that they're looking at the present, they're looking at the temporal side of things, the present expression of reality, and they see this and they hear this and they feel hopeless.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the end of their dreams and the end of their hope, precisely because they are focusing only on his death.
SPEAKER_00: There's no thought whatsoever to the words, and he will be raised.
SPEAKER_00: The applicable truth here is that Jesus is not simply a man who dies.
SPEAKER_00: He is the Son of Man who dies but cannot remain dead.
SPEAKER_00: See, the key to a life of following Jesus is resting in Jesus' death and hoping in his resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: Even though Matthew has at this point this motif running through his gospel, this death upon death upon death, the hope is great because the tomb is empty and Jesus is alive.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: The very first people to read this gospel.
SPEAKER_00: We're a group of most likely Jewish Christians suffering under the rule of Imperial Rome.
SPEAKER_00: What does that mean for us?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it means they lived in a time when Christians were fed to lions.
SPEAKER_00: It means that they lived in a time when Christians were beheaded simply for being Christ followers.
SPEAKER_00: It means that they lived in a time when they were used as candles to light the emperor's gardens.
SPEAKER_00: It means they lived at a time when Christians were crucified, along with other hideous means of torture and death.
SPEAKER_00: They were truly experiencing the cry of Isaiah when he spoke to the sheep being led to the slaughter.
SPEAKER_00: And the only hope that these twelve disciples had, the only hope that the early Christians in the early church had, and the only hope that we have, is that death must submit to the power of the living God.
SPEAKER_00: And that submission was demonstrated in Jesus rising from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: Death could not hold him, for he is the Son of Man.
SPEAKER_00: And this repeated statement throughout the gospel should cause us to relish in what Jesus accomplished for us in his death and resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, we should be somber and even sad about his death.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's my sin that put him there.
SPEAKER_00: But the reason that we may relish in his death is because death could not hold him.
SPEAKER_00: On the third day, he rose.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus said these words to the disciples, they were full of gloom.
SPEAKER_00: They had no comprehension about Jesus' resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: But Matthew's readers, by the time this is carefully put together and recorded, Matthew's readers, including us, know the end of the story.
SPEAKER_00: We know that death could not hold our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We know that the grave could not constrain him.
SPEAKER_00: We know that he conquered death.
SPEAKER_00: That's why the risen Jesus revealed himself to John in the book of Revelation on the island of Patmos.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Fear not.
SPEAKER_00: I am the first and I am the last.
SPEAKER_00: I am the living one.
SPEAKER_00: I died.
SPEAKER_00: But behold, I am alive forevermore.
SPEAKER_00: I'm alive forevermore.
SPEAKER_00: My friend, there is nothing in this life that should keep you from submitting to the Lord's sovereignty over your life.
SPEAKER_00: It does not matter if you live.
SPEAKER_00: If Christ is your all in all.
SPEAKER_00: It does not matter if you die, if you rest in Christ's resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: He is the one who died and is alive, and he lives so that we might live.
SPEAKER_00: And the lives that we live, we live by faith in the one who gave himself for us.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was faithful to go to the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Will we be faithful to take up our cross and follow him?
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: Lord Jesus, we may not fully grasp in one moment all that there is in your death and resurrection, but we give you thanks for reminders.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that our hearts and our minds would be receptive to being reminded.
SPEAKER_00: Even more than that, Lord, would you give us light to see more?
SPEAKER_00: Would you open our hearts to greater depths of appreciation, of awe, of wonder, and of worship at the one who would leave the glories of heaven to be found in human form, to live as though he were a slave and die, even death on a cross, so that you might be raised, and the name given to you that is above every name, so that every knee, whether in heaven above or in earth beneath, or even under the earth, outside of the earth, whatever it case may be, would bow before you, proclaiming your praises, loving you and living for you, the one who is alive forevermore.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.
SPEAKER_01: Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: You can learn more by visiting our website at faithfree.com.