WWUTT 2123 Jesus Dies (Matthew 27:45-66)

While Jesus was dying on the cross, he prayed to the Father, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? A lot of debate about that particular passage as to whether the Father turned his back or not.

When we understand the text. This is when we understand the text.

A daily Bible study in the Word of God that we may comprehend with all the saints how wide, how high, and how deep is the love of Christ. Tell all your friends about our ministry at www .tt .com. Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky, and greetings.

Everyone. In our study of the Gospel of Matthew, we're finishing up chapter 27 today. We're right in the middle of reading of Jesus' crucifixion. So I'm gonna pick up where we left off yesterday in verse 45 and go through verse 56 out of the Legacy Standard Bible.

Hear the Word of the Lord. Now from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, that is, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

And some of those who were standing there when they heard it began saying, this man is calling for Elijah. And immediately one of them ran and taking a sponge, he filled it with sour wine, and put it on a reed and gave him a drink.

But the rest of them were saying, let us see whether Elijah will come to save him. And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit. And behold, the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two, from top to bottom, and the earth shook, and the rocks were split, and the tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised.

And coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many. Now the centurion and those who were with him keeping guard over Jesus, when they saw the earthquake and the things that were happening, became very frightened and said, truly this was God's son.

And many women were there looking on from a distance who had followed Jesus from Galilee while ministering to him. Among them was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.

And then, of course, we have the account of Jesus being buried, which is verses 57 to 66. And I'm going to save that and close with that at the end. So here in this section that we're looking at, once again, broken up into three parts, where we have Jesus' last moments before he is to die.

And then Matthew kind of steps aside from the action almost, describes some things that happened after Jesus had risen from the dead. But then coming back and recalling the testimony of the centurion that was standing there at the cross.

And then Matthew also letting us know who else was at the cross observing Jesus' death. And then, like I said, we've got the burial portion, verses 57 to 66, that closes out the chapter. So in this section we're looking at today, we have one of the most controversial lines in the death of Jesus.

And that's where he quotes from Psalm 22, saying, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? So let's start in verse 45, and we'll consider what was really intended by those words. In verse 45, from the sixth hour, darkness fell upon the land until the ninth hour.

Now, I believe I said yesterday that Jesus was only hanging on the cross for three hours. That's not accurate. I was thinking of the darkness that came upon the land. It was really more like six hours, because it's in Mark's gospel where it says that the crucifixion began at nine o 'clock, and then Jesus died about three o 'clock.

So six hours was as long as he was hanging there. The darkness lasted from about noon to three. So the way that Hebrews told time, the hour in which the sun rose, that was the first hour. That's the first hour of daylight.

And so the sixth hour would have been about noon, when the sun is directly overhead. So going until the ninth hour would have been about three o 'clock. So Jesus is crucified at about nine. You have the darkness that covers the land at noon, and then Jesus surrenders his spirit into the hands of the Father at about three o 'clock.

So darkness covers the land. It's like there is an eclipse, a solar eclipse of some kind. Whether that would have been the moon moves in front of the sun and just hangs out there for three hours, that's unlikely, because otherwise the eclipse could have been observed in other places.

I don't think there is any historical record of anything like that. So it may have been an isolated darkness, kind of like the darkness that came upon Egypt in the plagues. Now, this wouldn't have been that thick, because that darkness in Egypt is described as it was so dark that you couldn't even see your hand in front of your face.

And this wasn't quite that dark. But certainly there is a sense in which the Father has turned himself away. He's turned his eyes from what is happening. In Habakkuk 1 .13, Habakkuk says, your eyes are so holy you cannot even look at sin.

And so as you think of Christ dying on the cross for our sins and taking our sins upon himself, sins from the past and sins even in the future that had not been committed yet, but Christ dying as an atoning sacrifice for his own, the Father could not bear to even look upon his son and turns his face away, as often the way that that is depicted.

If you think of the song by Stuart Townend, that's where we find the line in a popular hymn, the Father turns his face away. The face or seeking God's face was generally understood as seeking the presence of God.

I actually just talked about this in my church this past Sunday. What does it mean to seek the face of God? One of the most popular passages is 2 Corinthians 7 .14. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and turn from their wicked ways and seek my face, then I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and I will heal their land.

You surely know that passage. So God is calling upon us to seek his face. Yet we also know from, I think it's Exodus 33, where God says, no one can see my face and live. So how is it that we seek the face of God, if by even looking into his face, it would destroy us?

Well, once again, this is synonymous with desiring the presence of God. And here it is almost as if the Father has removed his presence from the Son. Now, there is no division in the Trinity. It's not like the Holy Spirit and the Father abandoned the Son and the Son is no longer part of the triune Godhead anymore.

All the things that are happening here are really quite mysterious. We're never really going to get to the bottom of it, and that is why these things have been debated for so long the way that they have.

I remember listening to R .C. Sproul preach on this particular passage, and he's one that I can say, having heard him preach on this passage several times, has gone both ways with it. He has said that this doesn't mean that the Father turns his face away, but then I've also read a sermon from him or heard a sermon from him in which he said the Father did turn his face away from Christ.

So there's something that's happening here that is just beyond our comprehension and our understanding. I've read articles that go either way. One is saying, no, there's no way that the Father could have turned his back on the Son, and yet another that says, why would Jesus have said, why have you forsaken me, if he had not been forsaken?

So surely the Father does separate himself from the Son in a certain sense here. And once again, Jesus cries out with a loud voice in the ninth hour. So we're getting right up to his death, right near the end of the six hours that he was hanging on the cross.

And he cries out in Aramaic, Eli, Eli, lemme subachthanai, which translates, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And we know that to be the beginning of Psalm 22. In fact, we have there in Psalm 22, a description of the way that Jesus would die hundreds of years before crucifixion was invented by the Romans.

The Romans wanted a slow method of death that resulted in a person taking days to die, and crucifixion was that method that they had come up with. We know that Jesus and the thieves did not hang on the cross.

They're on their respective crosses for days because the Pharisees did not want bodies to be hanging there for the Sabbath, which was coming up. So they had their legs broken, and they died quickly. But Jesus was already dead by that point, so his legs were not broken.

And once again, as I had said yesterday, though Jesus had been severely beaten, it was still surprising that he had died as quickly as he did. But of course, that was in fulfillment of what he had said, that his life was his to give up.

He had the authority to lay down his life and the authority to take it up again. So Jesus yielding his spirit to the Father shows that all of this was still under the sovereign hand of God. No one was actually taking Jesus' life from him.

He was allowing these things to happen, but he gave up his life to the Father. But here, at the end of that time that he's hanging on the cross, he quotes Psalm 22. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

And let me continue on in that psalm and what we read there. Far from my salvation are the words of my groaning. Oh my God, I call by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I have no rest. And again, even here, we're reading about darkness over the land, right?

Yet you are holy, enthroned upon the praises of Israel. In you, our fathers trusted, they trusted and you rescued them. To you, they cried out and were granted escape. In you, they trusted and were not disappointed.

It is also in this psalm that it is said, all who see me mock me. They smack their lip, they wag their heads saying, commit yourself to Yahweh. Let him rescue him. Let him deliver him because he delights in him.

Did we not read that from the passersby that saw Jesus hanging there? They said exactly those words. This was in verse 43. He trusts in God, let God rescue him now. If he delights in him, for he said, I am the son of God.

Did they not even realize as they were saying those things, they were fulfilling prophecy that had been spoken about in Psalm 22. Going on, I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint.

My heart is like wax. It is melted within me. My strength is dried up like a pot shirt and my tongue cleaves to my jaws and you lay me in the dust of death. For dogs have surrounded me. We talked about that yesterday with the soldiers that were there casting lots for his garments.

A band of evildoers has encompassed me. They pierced my hands and my feet. I count all my bones. They look, they stare at me. They divide my garments among them and for my clothing they cast lots. Now, as we go on through this Psalm, it is also said that God does not hide his face from the afflicted.

So in verse 24, for he is not despised and he is not abhorred the affliction of the afflicted. And he has not hidden his face from him. But when he cried to him for help, he heard. So Psalm 22 says that God had not hidden his face from him, had not hidden his face from the afflicted.

So would it be out of place then to say that the Father turned his face away? Well, I think they're in the moment that Jesus is dying on the cross. It's right in that moment to say that the Father forsook the Son.

He was indeed forsaken. It is not out of place for us to say that the Father has forsaken the Son because that's exactly what Jesus cries out. Why have you forsaken me? He didn't merely feel forsaken.

He was forsaken. But the Father doesn't turn himself away permanently. He doesn't leave Jesus to just die and stay dead. The Father does indeed show compassion and favor to the Son who was afflicted and receives the sacrifice that the Son gave and shows that he received it by raising him from the dead.

So here in this moment, with darkness over the land, it would be right for us to say that the Father turns his face away or the Father has forsaken the Son, but he doesn't leave the Son in that state.

Christ's sacrifice was perfect, the only perfect sacrifice that had ever been made. For as said in Hebrews, even the blood of bulls and goats did not really have the power to save. So Christ gave himself as an atoning sacrifice, as John the Baptist said, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.

And so though the Father would turn from the Son while the sins were being placed upon him and the wrath of God was poured out on the Son to crush him, yet the Father did not leave the Son forsaken, but accepted this perfect sacrifice.

And because Jesus was indeed sinless, had all of our sins placed upon him, but he himself was sinless, the Father shows favor to the afflicted and raises him from the dead. Going on in Psalm 22 to verse 26, the afflicted will eat and be satisfied.

Those who seek him will praise Yahweh. May your heart live forever. In verse 29, all the prosperous of the earth will eat and worship. All those who go down to the dust will bow before him, even he who cannot keep his soul alive.

Their seed will serve him. It will be recounted about the Lord to the coming generations. They will come and will declare his righteousness to a people who will be born, that he has done it. Now the interesting thing about that closing line, verse 31, that he has done it, that sounds like it is finished, right?

So we have the first line, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And then John recalls that his last words were, it is finished, it's as if we have the beginning of Psalm 22 in the end. And this is what Jesus calls out and the people who are standing there baffled by his words, they didn't even understand that he's singing Psalm 22 as he's dying on the cross.

Instead they think he's calling Elijah and they say, wait, wait, wait, let's see if Elijah is going to come to save him. But then verse 50 says, Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit.

Luke recalls that Jesus' last words were, father into your hands, I commit my spirit. So in that sense, the father could not have completely abandoned the son because the son surrenders his spirit to the father.

John recalls that his last words were, it is finished. But somewhere in there, the last words that Jesus spoke were both into your hands, I commit my spirit and it is finished. Luke just recalls the one phrase, John recalls the other.

But then in verse 51, after this, after Jesus yields up his spirit, behold, the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom and the earth shook and the rocks were split. There's an earthquake.

This would have been an isolated earthquake just like this darkness was isolated darkness. But God uses this earthquake to tear the curtain in the temple that separated the holy of holies from the most holy place, that place where the priest would enter in once a year on Yom Kippur and sacrifice on behalf of the people.

The Jews believe that God dwelled there. Now God did not dwell with his people like he did in Solomon's day, in the period of Solomon's temple. God had never sent his presence back into that most holy place as he did when the temple was first constructed.

Well, the first temple anyway, this is the second temple and even larger than the second temple, it's Herod's temple. But nonetheless, God tears that curtain to show that he doesn't dwell in temples made by human hands anymore.

But we are the temple of God. The followers of Jesus Christ, his disciples who have put their faith and trust in him, our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit whom we have from God. And so God's showing that through the tearing of the curtain, that he would dwell with man through the spirit that would reside in us.

Now with the splitting of these rocks, it says in verse 52 that the tombs were open and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they entered into the holy city and appeared to many.

So some of the graves are opened up and then the the people that were in those graves, the saints that were in those graves go into Jerusalem after the resurrection. So this would have been after Sunday.

Remember there's an earthquake when Jesus rises from the dead then too. So that could be what Matthew is looking toward is what's going to happen on Sunday morning, not what's happening at the time that Jesus dies.

What happened to those saints that were raised from the dead and went into Jerusalem and testified? We don't know for sure. There's a couple of possibilities. Either their bodies went back to their tombs and just laid back down or they ascended into heaven with Jesus when he ascended 40 days later after he rose from the dead.

We don't again we don't know exactly what happened here. Matthew's the only one that records this and it doesn't come up in any of the other gospels nor does Matthew ever resolve it explaining what happened to those saints that had come out of the tombs.

But I think what we have here is a taste of the resurrection that we all receive in Christ. So even at Jesus even at Jesus resurrection we get a picture of the fact that all who are in Christ Jesus will receive a resurrection like his.

So these saints were raised from the tombs, testified in Jerusalem and perhaps they ascended into heaven with Jesus when he went so that we get a picture of what it will be like when Christ returns. And as Paul talks about in first Thessalonians 4 the dead in Christ will rise first.

They receive their glorified bodies too. And all of this foreshadowing to the glorified bodies that we will receive on the last day. So jumping to this last section here verse 54 the centurion and those who are with him keeping guard over Jesus when they saw the earthquake and the things that were happening they became very frightened and said truly this was God's son.

I mean there are there are obviously supernatural things that are happening here even before we get to saints rising from the dead Jesus rising from the dead and then being seen by many even before we get to that.

Just the darkness that's over the land the earthquake the rocks being split the the curtain in the temple being torn. There's enough happening here that this centurion is convinced he was the son of God.

And many women were there looking on from a distance who had followed Jesus from Galilee while ministering to him. Among them was Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Joseph and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.

And we also know that the wife of Clopas was there. There were actually three Marys that were there. There was Mary Magdalene there was Mary Jesus' mother and then there was his mother's sister whose name was also Mary.

Mary the wife of Clopas as John recalls those three Marys being there John 19 25. And then of course we also have the mother of the sons of Zebedee who were James and John that was there at the cross as well.

These women had ministered to Jesus from the time that he was in Galilee and then coming into Judea so they were there the entire time. Yeah Jesus had disciples who were women none of them were apostles but he did indeed have women that were that were in that group that would travel around and as Jesus taught and perform many of those miracles and these are some of those women that were with him even his own mother who was with him.

Now we come to the conclusion of Jesus' death his time on the cross and then we finish chapter 27 with this Jesus being buried verses 57 to 66 let me read this here now when it was evening there came a rich man from Arimathea named Joseph who himself had also become a disciple of Jesus.

The man went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus then Pilate ordered it to be given to him and Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen cloth and laid it in his own tomb which he had hewn out in the rock and he rolled a large stone against the entrance of the tomb and went away and Mary Magdalene was there and the other Mary sitting opposite the grave.

Now on the next day the day after the preparation the chief priests and the pharisees gathered together with Pilate and said sir we remember that when he was still alive that deceiver said after three days i'm going to rise again.

Therefore order the grave to be made secure until the third day lest his disciples come and steal him away and say to the people he has risen from the dead. And the last deception will be worse than the first Pilate said to them you have a guard go make it as secure as you know how.

And they went and made the grave secure and along with the guard they set a seal on the stone. We've been reading in isaiah 53 about how jesus was buried in a rich man's tomb that was prophesied even by the prophet isaiah.

And here that is being fulfilled with jesus being buried in the tomb of joseph of arimathea. We have one chapter left and that's chapter 28 the resurrection which we will get to on monday. We come back to our study of isaiah 53 and finish up that chapter tomorrow.

Let's finish with prayer. Heavenly father we thank you for what we have read here. And we remember what christ took upon himself when he died on the cross for our sins. He took our sin our judgment in our place that the wrath of god would be poured out on him crushing the sun so that the requirement of our sins would be met.

For as said in the scriptures the wages of sin is death. But the free gift of god is eternal life through jesus christ. Our lord jesus took the wages of our sin and he gives us his life his righteousness.

And so god if we are followers of jesus christ may we walk in the righteousness of christ today and look forward to that day when even our bodies will be transformed to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself.

Keep us keep us hopeful for that day not clinging to the things of this world but longing for the things of heaven when we get to be with our god forever in glory.

It's in jesus name we pray amen. You've been listening to when we understand the text with pastor gabe hughes. Monday tuesday and wednesday gabe will be going through a new testament study then on thursday we look at an old testament book.

On friday we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow we'll pick up on an old testament study when we understand the text.