Good Friday

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0:00 Okay. Glad you made it. So I really like Good Friday gathering, and I'm glad we get to do it together. Of course, it's like this weird time because it is sad, but also like we're grateful for the sacrifice to kind of try and locate how you feel. How are we feel fine?

0:31 But what we're going to focus on here is mainly the second half of the gospel, which is Matthew, Chapter 27. But before we do that, we're going to look at Psalm 22, which they assigned for Good Friday, the Church did. And Psalm 22, just tell me, Mike, is a Psalm that Jesus quotes as he hangs on the cross. Remember when Jesus says, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

1:01 Voting the first part of Psalm 22, and it's what the term I use is or heard, learned. It's called synecdoche. It's a part that stands for the whole. And it's a rabbinic teaching style when they wanted to clue you into a section of the scriptures. They would quote a little section of it, and you were intended to know that they were implying the whole thing. So Psalm 22 is long, but when Jesus quotes, it starts, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

1:33 But has elements of deliverance in it. So this is going to be a theme for us as we think about the Good Friday, is that even as he hangs on the cross, Jesus goes into death. With faith that yet God will have some way of prevailing. So Psalm 22, it's long, but just sit back and enjoy it, or you can follow along if you want. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning?

2:06 Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer. And by night, but I find no rest. Yet you are holy and thrown on the praises of Israel, in you our fathers trusted. They trusted and you delivered them. For you they cried and were rescued, in you they trusted, and were not put to shame. But I am a worm and not a man.

2:38 Thorns by men and despised by the people, all who see me mock me. They make mouths that need a wag their heads. He trusts in the Lord, let him deliver him. Let him rescue him, for he delight in him. Yet you are he who took me from the womb. You made me trust you at my mother's breast. Oh you, on you, was I cast from my birth. And from my mother's womb you have been my God.

3:10 So be not far from me, where trouble is near. And there is none to help. The many bulls encompass me, strong bulls of Bishan surround me. They open wide their mouths at me like a ravening and roaring lion. I am poured out like water. All my bones are out of joints, my heart is like wack. It is melted within my breath and my strength is dried up like a pot stirred and my tongue sticks to my jaws and you lay me in the dust of death.

3:44 Even fog encompasses me, a company of evil doers encircle me. They have pierced my hands and feet, I can count all my bones. They stare and gloat over me. They divide my garments among them and for my clothing they cast lots. But you, O Lord, be not far off. Oh you, my help, come quickly to my aid. Deliver my soul from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dog.

4:15 Save me from the mouth of the lion. You have rescued me from the horns of the wild oxen. And I will tell of your name to my brothers. In the midst of the congregation I will praise you. You who fear the Lord prays him. All you offspring of Jacob glorify him and stand in all of him, all you offspring of Israel. For he has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted and he has not hidden his face from him.

4:46 But he has heard when he cried to him. From you comes my praise in the great congregation. I vow I will perform before those who fear him. The afflicted shall eat and be satisfied. Those who seek him shall praise the Lord. May your hearts live forever. All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord. And all the families in the nation shall worship before you. For kingship belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nation.

5:18 And all the prosperous lie of the earth eat and worship. Before him shall bow all who go down to the dust. Even the one who could not keep himself alive. Posterity shall serve him. It shall be told of the Lord to the coming generation. They shall come and proclaim his righteousness to a people yet unborn. That he has done it. Oh Lord, thank you for the faith demonstrated in your son Jesus as he hangs on the cross.

5:53 Lord, admit his pain, his isolation, his loneliness and yet good father. He hopes in you to teach us how to hope in you in hard times and good. He just has to hope in you. He's the same we pray. Amen. So I want to think about like I said Matthew 27.

6:26 Poster a second. That's what I was talking about in his hand. They cast lot for his clothing. Didn't write that. Eddie David wrote that generations before Jesus. And as he hangs on the cross as they're doing those things piercing him, casting lot. He's quoting that song in the hopes and the instruction or the ones he knows to pay attention to the end.

7:03 So even as he's being crucified, he's pointing to the deliverance of God. I mean, it's really impressive. And even as we look at Matthew chapter 27 here, it will his faith comes in stark contrast to the people around him. So Matthew 27. Sunday for the gospel reading. They gave us Matthew chapter 26 and chapter 27, which 27 has 66 verses.

7:40 So we weren't doing all that. So we're going to finish that tonight. Chapter 27. Couple of notes here. And like I said on Sunday, I'm going to read this because we read Luke 2 on Easter. I mean on Christmas. And this story takes up way more space in the gospel than the Christmas. For reading a loud hearing how it unfolds.

8:10 And so we'll pull out some things, but I'm mostly going to read chapter 27 from Matthew for us. And he says, when morning came, remember, this is the morning after. So they have Passover the night before where he reinvigorates the Passover and institutes the Lord's Supper and says this thing that the bread and wine will carry my body and blood. Then he goes out to the Garden of Gethsemane and that Garden of Gethsemane, he asked God three times, could I not go through this suffering, please?

8:43 He's not being coy or he's not speaking with hyperbole. He's not being sarcastic. Jesus would actually rather not have to go through the cross. And yet he does. And so he submits to it. Judas comes and they come. We notice Sunday with like clubs and like a mob. And that Jesus or Judas has to point out which one of the twelve gathered there, the eleven plus Jesus, the twelve gathered there, they can't take Jesus out from twelve men, the mob.

9:22 They don't know what he looks like. Judas has to point it out. Then they, then they take him immediately to an emergency trial in the middle of the night when everyone is resting from Passover. They definitely do it dark when no one's paying attention. So that first thing in the morning we pick up, they can take him to Pilate. Because remember that the Israel is an occupied country, they can perform religious punishment and enforce religious rules, but they can't enforce any civil rule.

9:54 And so they are worried that Jesus might cause a civil uprising, so they want to take him to Pilate to enforce civil laws and they prefer a pilot would kill him instead of Jesus inciting riots and then a bunch of people back. So they take him to Pilate early in the morning. So when morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people, all the church leaders took counsel against Jesus to put him to death. And they bound him and let him away and delivered him over to Pilate the governor.

10:27 Then when Judas the betrayer saw that Jesus was condemned, he changed his mob and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders saying, I have sinned by betraying innocent blood. And they said, why do we care? What is this to us? Take care of that yourself. And throwing down the pieces of silver into the temple, he departed and went and hanged himself.

10:58 But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said it's not lawful to put them into the treasury since it's blood money. So they took counsel, took counsel, talked about themselves and bought with them the potter's field as a burial place for strangers. And so it's always been called. And so it fulfilled the prophecy. They took thirty pieces of silver, the price of him on whom they had been set by some of the sons of Israel, and they gave them for the potter's field as the Lord directed me.

11:31 The thing I want to point out here, of course Judas' story is a real tragedy, right? And the tragedy here is the lack of faith that's demonstrated. Like Judas doesn't cast his future or his hope onto God, not knowing how it might turn out. He doesn't take his chances on God. He retains the authority himself.

12:04 He determines his future. So I think so much of faith is where we give up control and move into a situation where we don't know what will happen and leave the outcome up to God. And what we're going to see in this chapter of Matthew is over and over again, the people around Jesus in these last days for him, refused to act in any kind of thing, preclued any action of God by taking control of the situation himself.

12:36 We'll see that in faith and give up the outcomes to God. The tragedy of Judas is that he does that because as we know, our God is defined by his mercy. And Judas can't find in himself the faith to see what God might do, instead just jumps to the end. He doesn't give God a chance to move in with mercy, but assumes he knows how the story will go and follows it through to the only end he can see.

13:11 Verse 11, now Jesus stood before the governor and the governor asked him, are you the king of the Jews? And Jesus said, you said it, not me. But when he was accused by the chief priests and the elders, he gave no answer. And then Tyler said to him, do you hear how many things they testify against you? But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge. So the governor was greatly amazed. Now, at the feast, the governor was accustomed to release for the crowd any one prisoner whom they wanted.

13:46 And they had then a notorious prisoner called Barabbas. So when they gathered, Pilate said to them, whom do you want me to release for you, Barabbas or Jesus, who is called Christ? Or he knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up. Pilate seems to be getting a lot of clues about the situation. He's amazed at Jesus' restraint first among the church leaders. He doesn't lash out among these people lobbying, obviously false claims against him. He's amazed then.

14:20 And when he gives them the choice of do you want Barabbas or Jesus, he's already intuited that it's not a genuine concern that the church leaders have. It's about ending that they write. And but Pilate is trying to manipulate an outcome to what he wants. And he has a choice, of course, right? His wife comes and talks to him. Let's see, for he knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up, verse 19. Besides, while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife said word to him,

14:52 have nothing to do with that righteous man, for I've suffered much because of him today in a dream. Now the chief priest and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask, before we get to, Pilate had lots of opportunities to just kind of bet on Jesus and see what would happen. Like he's amazed at his restraint, the way that he comes to him. It's clear that the charges are not genuine, they're envy. And his wife calls him a righteous man and says, step away. And yet, Pilate is only trying to manipulate the outcome rather than betting on Jesus.

15:28 Rather than just saying, you're all crazy, this guy's fine, I'm going to keep the killer, you can have the Christ. Instead of doing that and just seeing what happens, he's afraid his job is to keep the Israelites from uprising. And so instead of betting on Jesus, he bets on an outcome that will keep the peace. He controls his future, he precludes an opportunity for faith, and he does what he thinks will be back when he can control the outcome.

15:58 And then verse 20, now the chief priest and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus. And the governor said to them, which of you do you want me to release to you? And they said, Barabbas and Pilate said to them, what should I do with the one who, the Jesus who is called Christ? And they said to him, let him be crucified. And he said, why, what evil has he done? But they shouted all the more, let him be crucified. Even the chief priest have a chance here, they think they're protecting Israel. They think they're making the right choice for the people of God.

16:33 And rather than like that and see what happens, let's see if the people of God respond in light with us. They trump up the crowd and manipulate the outcome to get what they think they need. Instead of waiting in faith, moving into a situation where they don't know the outcome, casting their fortunes and their future on God. And there is no faith.

17:04 So the chief priest over and over again, the church leaders demonstrate they want to control the outcomes rather than trust God. Judas wants to control the outcome rather than trust God. Pirate wants to control the outcome rather than trust God. And so when Pirate saw that he was gaining nothing but rather that a riot was beginning, he took water, washed his hands before the crowd, saying, I'm innocent of this man's blood. See to it yourselves. And all the people answered his blood beyond us and on our children. Then he released for them Barabbas.

17:36 I've encouraged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters and they gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and put on starlet robe on him. And then twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head. And put a knee and put a reed right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, all hail King of the Jews. They stood on him and put the reed and struck him on the head.

18:10 And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his clothes on him and led him away to crucify him. Of course this would be very difficult. Jesus at times in the Old Testament as the angel of the Lord receives worship. We know in the end he will receive authentic and honest worship like this mocking. He has an idea of where he's coming from, but even for you and I this would be hard to hear.

18:40 You're not deserving of it. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene's Simeon, or Simon by name. They compelled the man to carry his cross. When they came to the place called Galgatha, which means place of a skull, they offered him wine to drink mixed with skull. But when he tasted it, he would not drink it. He consisted of experiencing the whole thing. Jesus, through the whole process, is clear-eyed and awake.

19:14 He is calm and experiences the whole thing all the way through. He endures the ridicule, he endures the false trial, he endures the pain, fear-eyed, awake, and willful. He lays down his life, it is not taken from him, and he lays it down willfully by thought. They offered him wine to drink mixed with skull, but he tasted it, he would not drink it.

19:46 When they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. Then they sat down and kept watch over him there. Over his head, they put a charge against him with thread. This is Jesus, the king of the Jews. Two robbers were crucified with them, one on the right and one on the left. Those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads, saying, You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself if you are the son of God, come down from the cross.

20:19 So also the chief priests with the scribes and the elders mocked him, saying, You save others, you cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel, let him come down now from the cross. And we will believe him. He trusts in God, let God deliver him now if he desires him. He said, I am the son of God and the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way. There is truth here. If he claims to be the son of God, God would save him. Of course, they are controlling it, right?

20:51 They created the disaster and then are determining the time by which God will be measured whether or not he comes through. They have created the problem and then when God does not resolve the problem exactly when they want, they dismiss God as no action at all. There is no faith in any of those steps. You see what I am saying? My concern is that too often I see myself in all these lack of faith. I preclude an opportunity for God to come into my life by controlling all of the circumstances and the outcome.

21:32 I risk on the way of God, not at all. I open up myself to no cost or loss. There is no room in my life for God to come in and deliver. I have closed all the doors, I have controlled all the outcomes, I have manipulated all the people to get the things that I want. There is no faith there. I have created disasters, I have determined when God should deliver, when he does not I sit in judgment on the God, as though I know what he is up to.

22:04 In the midst, walking through all the faithlessness is the Lord Jesus Christ. I humble faithful. In the midst of faithlessness, gives himself up to the God. Search and death. Clearly he has lost. They have driven nails through his hands in his feet.

22:36 They have beat him and mocked him. He can't breathe. He is hanging on a thing. Clearly, and yet he hangs there. Look, even on the cross, where are we? Verse 45. Now, from the sixth hour, there was darkness over all the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, Lama Savatani, which means, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

23:07 That's our song. Can't breathe. He has got nails through his wrists and his feet. They mock him and have mocked him and mock him still. He has been abandoned by his friends and his countrymen. He has been abandoned by the overseeing towers. He is all alone on the outside of town next to two diamonds who also mock him. And yet, with death at the door, he cries out and says, my God, my God, not you fool,

23:43 not you horrible father, not you failure of a divine. He says, my God, my God. And he quotes it to us that you and I, though we can't hardly breathe enough to say the whole song. You heard it, it's long, that you and I might look through to the end and see that even at the end, Jesus brings with him. When the end is so unclear and open-ended and good heavens outside of his control,

24:17 Jesus has no control and yet has faith that even as he dies, somehow God will not abandon him. My God, my God, he says, why have you forsaken me? This cannot be. And some of the bystanders, hearing it, said, this man must be calling Elijah and one of them at once ran to the sponge and filled it with sour wine and put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink. But others said, wait, let's see.

24:48 Let's see if Elijah comes down to save him. And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit. Behold the curtain of the temple, pour it in two. Holy of holy, opened up. It topped the bottom. And the earth shook and the rocks were split. The tombs were opened. The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. And coming out of the tombs, after his resurrection, they went into the holy city.

25:21 Here at this moment, eternity breaks in. It's called proleptic. It's called now and not yet. Eternity breaks into the present moment just for a moment because what we learn, the more we pay attention to the story of Jesus is that all the work of Jesus is done right there in that moment. The resurrection validates the work of the crucifixion. It's the death that accomplishes our new life. Because of course, death can't hold Jesus, but the death puts to death him and us and launches something new.

25:53 The death is where all the work is. The resurrection proves that the crucifixion works. And so Matthew recalls in this story that in that moment, when all was dark, the curtain was poured into, that the tombs were opened and the dead came up. As the death of Christ accomplishes life for all who are interested. We were raised and coming out of the tombs, after his resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. And when the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake, and what took place they were filled with awe and said, truly this was the Son of God.

26:33 And there were also many women there looking on from a distance who had followed Jesus from Galilee, administrative time. Among them were Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Joseph and also the sons of Zebedee. And when it was evening, there came a rich man from Aramathia named Joseph, who also was a disciple of Jesus. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. Jesus took the body and wrapped it in clean and browned and laid it on the new tomb.

27:05 He had cut in the rock and rolled a great stone to the entrance of the tomb. Went away. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were there, sitting opposite the tomb. The next day, that is the day after the preparation the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate and said, sit, see, we remember how the church was gathered. He said, remember how this imposter said, while he was still alive, after three days I will rise, therefore order the tomb to be made secure. Under the third day, until the third day, lest his disciples go and steal away and tell the people he has risen from the dead.

27:42 And the last fraud will be worse from the first. And Pilate said to them, you have a guard of soldiers go, make it as secure as you can. So they went and made the tomb secure by stealing the stone and setting a guard. To the end, they're going to control the outcome. They've already determined what would happen rather than... For me, the moral of Good Friday is that my petulant disheartening faithlessness, that the people, patient, humble, kind, mannerist faithfulness,

28:31 by Jesus. You and I have been, are, and will be, faithless. We will preclude the action of God. We will control outcomes. We will manipulate people to get the things that we want. It will be hard and hard, hard for us to trust or even risk on the God. It is not hard.

29:01 Does it every time? The promise of Good Friday is that his faithfulness comes with you. Are you interested? Right, we've read it a little bit. Hey, Lord, your great faithfulness ripples down through generations.

29:35 Past those three days in the Pharisees, past Pilate and the church leaders, past the mob and the crowd, past the centurion soldiers. Your faithfulness runs right through all obstacles and finds us here this evening, or capture us with your faithfulness that we might be faithful as well. Because you have loved us. We would love to love you now. How to do that?