So, as you turn there, I want you to keep in mind that after this point, there are only a few short verses before the resurrection of Christ and His ascension, and the rest of the New Testament hangs on that. So, Matthew chapter 27. If you're able to stand, please stand with me as we read the Word of God. I'm going to read starting in verse 32, to remind us of the context. And our sermon today will be starting in verse 45 through around 54 probably. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. They compelled this man to carry his cross. And when they came to a place called Golgotha, which means place of skull, they offered him wine to drink mixed with gall. But when he tasted it, he would not drink. And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. Then they sat down and kept watch over him there. And over his head they put the charge against him, which read, This is Jesus, king of the Jews. Then two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and 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. So also the chief priests with the scribes and elders mocked him, saying, he saved others. He cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel. Let him come down from the cross and we will believe in him. He trusts in God. Let God deliver him now if he desires him. For he said, I am the son of God. And the robbers who are crucified with him also reviled him in the same way. 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, l'mak sabachani, that is, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And some of the bystanders hearing it said, this man is calling Elijah. And one of them ran and took a 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 whether Elijah will come to save him. And Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up his spirit. And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom, and the earth shook, and the rocks were split. 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 and appeared to many. 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. We'll pause there. You may be seated. Heavenly Father, I ask for your kindness now as we come to read your Word. We understand enough to know that without your Spirit, there is no understanding. Without your will, we have no light, and yet your Word is truth. Your Word is light to our dark path, and how profound is this text before us today. Lord, there is no more fearsome text for a person, a feeble man with lips to speak than this, that the Son of God be crucified, that he give up his life for the ransom of many. And Lord, there is little I can add to say anything to its majesty, but I pray that by your Spirit, those of us who are assembled here in your name would marvel like the centurion who marveled, and who said, truly this man was the Son of God. I ask this in your name. Amen. Well, this is my one prayer and hope for us this morning, that we would be able to say, as this centurion said, truly this man was the Son of God. There's no greater response to such an event as this than to look at it and say, that man was truly the Son of God. And there were many here that we saw last week who were blind to what was happening, but God by His Spirit had given it to this one centurion, standing there witnessing the power of God, and he was able to say it with clear conviction, this man was the Son of God. And so, if the Lord wills, we will do this together. And we're structuring this in the same way that the Scriptures structure this. That is, we need to first reckon with the darkness that is given, and then we will see the light that comes at the end. So we can put the structure of all that we're saying into two categories with a climax of confession. So, there is the darkness which is revealed and is given by God as revelation to the world, and there is then, as the light comes, great acts of power that accompany this divine death. And on the heels of that, we confess, truly, He was the Son of God. So, our Scriptures say, Now from the sixth hour, there was darkness over the land until the ninth hour. And this is about noon to 3 p.m. And at the ninth hour is when Jesus cries out. Now, darkness can be something of a fearful thing. Maybe there are children here who remember a time where they were scared of the dark, where they did not know what was there and they could not see, and it was kind of a fearful thing to walk into darkness. Well, darkness is a common human experience for all of us. There's confusion when there is darkness. And I'm speaking probably particularly of sudden darkness. If you can think of a time where suddenly the lights went out in a place or where you were in somewhere that should have been lit and it was dark, there's suddenly a moment of confusion and perplexity, maybe a little bit of fear until the light is on and you can see. Well, in the Scriptures, darkness has something of a similar role, but it is added to that. I'm speaking of specifically darkness that God gives supernaturally. But when darkness comes, it is always a sign of God's curse and of God's judgment. Light is what God gives when He reveals His will and when there is delight. And darkness is what is there when there is particular judgment and curse given. Think of the prayer that Hannah prayed in 1 Samuel 2 when she was praying of the Messiah that would come. He will guard the feet of the faithful ones, but the wicked shall be cut off in darkness. Think of Job, when he was suffering because of what God had sent his way, the suffering of Job. He needed to express it, and he grabbed a hold of this theme of darkness in Job chapter three, and I'll read a little section. Think of how many times you hear darkness read in this passage. And Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth and said, let the day perish on which I was born, and the night that said a man is conceived, let that day be darkness. May God above not see it, nor light shine upon it. Let gloom and deep darkness claim it. Let clouds dwell upon it. Let the blackness of the day terrify it. That night, let thick darkness seize it. Let not rejoicing among the days of the year, let it not come into the number of the months. Behold, let that night be barren. Let no joyful cry enter it. Let those curse it who curse the day, who are ready to rouse up Leviathan. Let the stars of its dawn be dark. Let it hope for light, but have none, nor see the eyelids of the morning, because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb. nor hide trouble from my eyes. Why did I not die at birth? Job was a man who was in the providence of God, experiencing much pain and suffering as he lost everything. And he rose up and said, I wish I was never born. And to express that, he said, may that day be a dark day, a dark, dark day in the eyes of God. And he cursed that day. Now, when God comes and answers Job later in that same book, listen to what God says to him. He says, and he's rebuking Job here a little bit, he says, do you really have the power of darkness? Here's what God says. Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the gates of deep darkness? Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare if you know all this. Where is the way of the dwelling of light? And where is the place of darkness? In other words, Job, you don't have the control of light and darkness. I will declare what is light and I will declare what is dark. Well, brothers and sisters, God from heaven declared this day, when Jesus was crucified, a dark day. Particularly these three hours, as Jesus hung in agony on the cross, in torture, God sent darkness over the face of the earth, a supernatural darkness, to declare the evils of that day and how dark it was indeed. Now this darkness pictures the judgment of God that has come. Think of the book of Ezra, just a small snippet there. God speaking the judgment that he will give to all mankind. And he says, I will drench the land, even to the mountains with your flowing blood, and the ravines will be full of you. When I blot you out, I will cover the heavens and make their stars dark. I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give its light. All the bright lights of heaven I will make dark over you. and put darkness on your land, declares the Lord." So the judgment of God is present here as Christ hangs on the cross. And not to give the story away, but we're going to take particular note of how that darkness is lifted at the death of Christ, is it not? There is a judgment here that God has declared over the world, and there is a judgment that is lifted. at the end, at Christ's death. So I want us to consider this darkness. I want to reckon with the darkness of these hours for a few minutes. Consider the darkness as Jesus hung there on the cross. He cried out in this darkness, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Now, He did not come up with those words. We know from Psalm 22 that Jesus was quoting these things. Jesus had the words of the very Psalm in His mouth as He said, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? Jesus felt this darkness more than anyone could feel it. Jesus, as the Son of God, had perfect communion, perfect fellowship with His Father. And knowing that perfect intimacy with God, to have it removed in the providence of God, for Him in His flesh to have no apprehension of that close connection with God, was the most painful thing that anyone would feel. And when He cries out, My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? He alone can say how true that was. For God truly was far, was He not, for saving Him? I want to read the words of that psalm, the first part of it, so that we have it in our mind. Psalm chapter 22 that Jesus quotes as He hangs on the cross. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me? From the words of my groaning. Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer. And by night, but I find no rest. The psalms are given to us that we may express in our hours of need the great longings of the human soul, but here this psalm is given that Christ Jesus may declare the travails of His soul as He hung there and He pleaded, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And He knew the distance of God from saving Him, did He not? and revoke his plan and save his son? Jesus knew it would not be so. He knew he must see death to the end. And his soul cried out, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? But there's not mere darkness in what he experienced. There is darkness in the souls of those who stand and mock him. I want to read a little further for you in this passage. As he cries out this, Psalm, and the words are quoted there helpfully so that we can see what is happening as they mock him. Eli, Eli, lamach sabach nai. Those words Eli, Eli, my God, my God, the people take because it sounds a lot like Elijah, which would have been Elias in that tongue, and they twist it and they say, oh, he's given up on God and now he has to call for Elijah. In other words, they're they're mocking him and saying, here's one who has pretended to be God the son this whole time. And now in his dark hour, when God has forsaken him, now he has to turn to the prophets of the Jews and ask for help. And some pitying him said, well, let's we will give him some of this some of this wine to ease his pain. And others say, no, don't even do that. We want to see if Elijah will come. Don't stop the agony. We are entertained. Let's see if Elijah will come. God has given up on him, and we know Elijah won't come. We've been waiting for the prophet Elijah for 400 years. Elijah will not come. You see the hardness of these people's heart, even as he stands there, as he hangs there on the tree, nailed there, mocking him to his face. These people who were, by God's design, given all the law and all the prophets to lead them to this moment. The Jews were a people specifically so that when the Christ came, they would see this is the savior of the world. And so they knew all the prophecies. They knew that Elijah was the one prophesied to come right as the Messiah would come. And yet they stood there and mocked it. They mocked him and they would jeer at him as we labored over last week. And so as Jesus hangs there, the darkness of the hour is found in the darkness of the sinfulness of these human hearts. Consider then the darkness of those souls who mock him. As they disbelieve all that God has said, as they cast it off and they say, I have no need for this, let the agony and torture continue. We are entertained. This is what they will say. But there's another way that this day is dark, and we see it in the death of our Savior. As we come to verses 49 and 50, specifically they said, wait, let us see whether Elijah will come and save him. But Jesus cried out again, and with a loud voice, he yielded up his spirit. There is a darkness about death that we must all reckon with. There is something about death, it comes to all of us, that we are prone to put in the back of our mind, but death truly is a very final thing for us, is it not? Here we see what death truly is. Jesus yielded up his spirit even as his body hung on the cross. His soul went to be with God, or it would go to be with God as his body hung on the tree, but his body was left there. So we know that death is a departure of the soul from the body. And we know because we read in further revelation that this departure is a final departure. In other words, we will stand and give account to God for the things that have been done in the body. 2 Corinthians 5.10 says, for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. There is a finality about death which ends life and which says, at this moment, all that is done will be accounted for. And this will be just before a holy God. Our death comes. The writers of scripture speak about death as that which holds us in slavery. It says we're enslaved to death because of fear to death all our life long. And it speaks of a redemption that is there from that fear. But I want to linger for a moment on the finality of death when our soul departs. But here, our Lord and Savior, as he is in control of his own spirit, he gives it up, he yields it up as he cries out with a loud voice. And then the darkness is lifted. And so as we think about what that darkness was, I want us to consider how this death of Jesus was a real death. It really came, his soul really was in his body and his soul left his body and his body was left hanging on the tree and it was a real and complete death. And yet, what was going on in this death is about to be revealed. The light of God's power is about to shine and show us that what was happening was not merely the death of a man, but the death of the Son of Man, of Jesus Christ. And it was a death to pay for all the darkness of humanity, all the sin of humanity. It was a death that was to make atonement for the sins of the people. And so we see these miracles, these powers of God revealed in these five things. It says, behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and rocks were split. The tombs also were opened and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised and coming up out of the tombs after his resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. And so these things I want to consider now as we think about this death. Because I think it is in light of these things that God has done that we will be able to see what was happening on the cross. If we look at it just with our eyes, we see a man who died on a tree. and was buried, and it was something quite common in the ancient world. But if we were to look specifically to the light that God shines now, as the darkness is pulled back and the power of God is put forward, we're going to see what is this death about. First, we have the favor of God given as the son returns. In other words, the judgment that was here told, the judgment was laid on someone else. there will be a judgment that comes to this world. And we read in Matthew chapter 24, as Jesus said, the sun will be darkened, the moon will be darkened, and the son of man will be revealed in the clouds of heaven, coming for a final judgment. But in this judgment day, judgment was poured out, not on the world, but on one, on one for many. And having taken that judgment, the light of God now comes, the favor of his providence. If you look out to the window right now, you'll see the sun is shining. Day and night haven't ceased. You see that. God promised when he flooded the world that as long as the earth continues, day and night will not cease. As long as God is doing his work in the world, day and night will not cease. But here we have the first tremor of that judgment day as we saw the darkness that came, but it was the judgment and the curse was given to another. God will tarry. God is waiting. God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. As long as there is day, and as long as there is night, you may know that God's judgment has not finally come on the world, and there is one who you may find salvation in, and it is in Christ who hung on that tree this day. The veil of the temple was torn in two. And to understand what this is, we need to put our minds there for a little bit. So remember, we talked about the Jewish people given so that they would picture, they would dramatize all of redemption, and we would be able to understand what is happening. It makes the work of Christ intelligible to us. So in that tabernacle, there was a place called the Holy of Holies. It was the most holy of all places. And in there was the Ark of the Covenant, the mercy seat, where the sins of the people of God were atoned for once a year. And no one could enter but the high priest and once a year and no one without the shedding of blood. And he would atone for his sin and then he would make entry through this veil. And if you remember on that veil was was woven cherubim and the whole picture of the tabernacle was meant to represent that garden of Eden. You remember Adam and Eve, they sinned. God cast them out of the garden and God set a flaming cherub to guard the entrance to the presence of God. That was because of sin. There was now division between the holy God and a sinful people. And to guard that, to make that division, to make it so that God's holiness would not break out in wrath upon the people, God sent this cherub. Now it was in the temple, there was this curtain that divided the holy of holies from the holy sanctuary. and no one was allowed to enter there. While in this moment, in this hour, God takes that curtain and he rips it from top to bottom. In other words, God's the one that does the ripping, right from the top to the bottom. It's ripped and it's thrown open. And what is he saying? What is he saying? He's saying the holiness of God is now, a way to the holiness of God has now been made open. That's what Hebrews says. There is a way to the holiness of God that is made by the rending of his flesh. That is his veil. In other words, God is saying there is now a way made plain and straight to the presence of God. And it's not by sacrifices of bulls and goats, but it is by a once for all final death. And we may enter boldly in behind that veil. But I want you for a moment just to think, if you will. Imagine, and I take a little liberty because I think it's appropriate here, if you were a priest ministering in that temple when the veil was torn, what would your first thought be? You thought the end of your life would be then. Anyone who was ministering with faith and believing in the power of God, when that veil was rent apart, you would think the holiness of God was coming to burn, up the evilness of sin. Remember in the old covenant, when people came and offered forbidden fire to God, fire came out of heaven and consumed them. This is what you would have thought, but here the veil is torn open and there is mercy given. There is mercy given. In other words, on that day, there was a real atonement for sin. On that day, there was real mercy in the temple. This the ninth hour is the hour, the very hour of the evening sacrifice, the very hour of of Daniel's prayer and the prophecy of one who would atone for sin. And it is it is thought, as you put the pieces together, that Christ died to the very hour of that prophecy. And there was atonement made for all the sins of the world once and for all. So when you think of the veil being torn in two, think of an access to God, fellowship between God and man being restored, and not through some system, not through shadows, but through the real thing, through Jesus Christ, his body torn, and it is through that sacrifice we have access to God and restored fellowship with him. The earth trembles. The earth shakes at this death. I wanna ask you, have you ever swallowed something that you can't keep down? And what I mean is, have you ever swallowed something, and as soon as it comes down all the way into your stomach, you think, that's not gonna sit right? That's coming back up, right? Well, think of that, if you will, for a minute, and think about that in terms of the world. Matthew Henry was helpful here for me in thinking of this. The language in the Bible is clear that from the blood of Abel all the way up through all the evil that is there, the ground itself cries out for justice. The earth cries out for justice. But Jesus' blood is a blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel, the first murder in the Bible. So that's Hebrews. It says there's a blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel, the first murder in the Bible. In other words, what is happening here is as all the death has come upon the world, the earth would take it. But when the death of a pure and holy, innocent one of Jesus comes and is taken to the grave, the world cannot contain him. There are there are tremblings and shakings. Think of think of Jonah as he swallowed in the whale. Right. And three days he's in the belly of the beast and the whale spits him out. You cannot hold him because God commanded the whale. Well, here the earth takes the blood of the innocent lamb of God and it cannot contain him. The tremors are beginning and we know in a few short days the earth, if you will, will vomit him back out. Christ will raise again victorious over death and he will be the victor over death. But here one has died who has no right to die. One is laid in the grave or will be laid in the grave who has, and the earth has no right to contain him. One is being tortured and bearing the curse of sin who has never sinned in his life. There is a profound, if you will, perplexity and trembling and shaking of the very earth. There are fissures in the bedrock of the world as the creator dies this day. And there are tremors that there will be a day when this world will be remade. The tremors of Matthew chapter 24, Jesus had just given instructions to his disciples, there will be earthquakes, there will be a coming day where the earth will shake and the judgment of God will come. And on this day, we felt a tremor, but on this day, Christ took that judgment on himself. The tombs were opened. Those prisons of death that held all the bodies were broken. And the saints, those who were dead in faith, rose. Do you remember that story in 2 Kings where Elisha had been buried? It's a very short story. It's told in one verse. And as a man was being buried, behold, a marauding band was seen. And the man was thrown into the grave of Elisha. And as soon as the man touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood on his feet. Well, something like that is happening here. As Jesus dies and he descends into the grave, the bones of those saints who were dead could not be contained and they revived and they went into the city and were seen. There is power in this man's death. There is power of life in this man. There is power, greater power than Elisha or Elijah. Truly, this man was. the Son of God. And there's only one question that remains for us then to see. As we look at all the divine works that were done, these powerful, mighty acts that are given by God to say, this is my son. We must reflect on the contrast between this declaration of God and the one that began his ministry. Remember when Jesus was first baptized, a voice from heaven said, this is my son in whom I am well pleased. Hear him. And now with these divine acts, God is telling the world, but not with a voice of love, but in the curse that is set upon his only loved son. This is the payment for your sin. Hear him. Hear this one. This is what all of this is meant to say. It is revelation. It is light from God and saying this is not merely a death. This is the death. This is the death of all death. This is the end of death for those who are in him. And we must say truly, this is the son of God. All of our hearts need stirred to say this again and again, because we are so prone to forget the grandeur of this truth that happened. So let's take this light upon us again. First, that light which appeared and shone there, the body of Jesus hanging on the cross, we must look on him whom we have pierced. That's to quote Zechariah 12. It says, they will look on him whom they pierced and they will mourn and weep. In other words, if apart from faith, there is a day when you will look on him whom you have pierced and weep and mourn. because the day of judgment has come. The first sermon ever preached in the books of Acts, Peter lays this to the heart of the Jews, and he says this, Acts chapter 2. As he's preaching there, these men are cut to the heart. Listen, I'm going to read two verses to shorten this up, or two parts of it. This Jesus delivered up according to the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it. Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified. And listen to the response. Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles brothers, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. This is what the centurion realized as he was there guarding the body, taking part in the death of our Lord and Savior. And he saw all that was happening. He said, truly, this is the Son of God. Think of that curtain torn in two, that curtain which represents all the revelation of God and His law, right? That was what they were making atonement for. God had given the full law to them in the Ten Commandments and all the ceremonial and the civil aspects of it laid out in all its detail. They were given to those people so that they might see their need for a Savior and make atonement for it. So God has shown you His law and He has shown you His mercy in the renting of that veil. Consider the earthquake. Consider how it speaks of the groaning of creation. Creation itself groans and waits for the revealing of the sons of men. All the world is under the curse of God and it waits for that day and that day will come. Consider the rocks that were split in two. The bedrock of the earth that was broken. I tell you, the builder of those rocks The master of stones wants your heart. He alone can take the heart of stone and turn it into a heart of flesh. He alone can split the rock with this man's body and blood. Jesus himself, the master of the rocks and of tombs. Though you die, yet shall you live, says John 11, John 25. Jesus said to her, I am the resurrection. and the life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. Think about that. Old and young, to our little children who are sitting here, each one, I want you to think about that. Nothing seems further away to you than your death, I promise you. It's hard to even think about dying. Right, little ones? It's hard to think about dying. But God says, Though you die, yet shall you live in him. In him is life. The world couldn't keep him. The world couldn't contain him. This man's death is your life. The darkness that was to be upon you was put on him. The righteous anger of God that was to be on you was on him. The wickedness that is yours under the law is his. and it is by his stripes that you are healed. It's hard to think about a passage like this and feel the weight of it. There's something about it. You can look on a small mountain and gather something of its height or its scale. But when you look at the grandeur of the Rockies, or maybe someone here has seen Everest, I don't know, there's something about its immensity that you just can't grasp. It just becomes beyond you. It's so high that you just stand back and you're like, I don't even know what I'm looking at, to be honest. Well, the death of one who was the creator of the world, who was perfect, who had all the splendor of God, The death of that one, the agony of that one for the sin of one like me who will this very day, this very moment, turn my back on his law again and need forgiveness again is something that cannot be thought about. It cannot be contained. It cannot be perceived. And yet, we must cast ourselves upon this confession, saying, truly, this man is the Christ, the Son of God. Our Heavenly Father, we pray and we come to you. We ask with humble hearts that you would teach this to us. It's not something that we can get into our minds. These are infinite truths that cannot be contained in finite brains. Lord, it's a truth that by your spirit comes to us and convicts us with weight of our sin, with need for pardon. Lord, we see the beauty, we see the beauty of your law and we see the weight of our sinfulness. We see the just payment that was due us by looking at Christ and the crucifixion and the agony. And we say, that was mine, but he took it. And we say, Lord, give us this gift of the Holy Spirit. As was promised by Peter and by all the scriptures, that those who believe in your name, who repent, shall be given this gift of the Holy Spirit. Pray that you'd help us now to discern your body and your blood in your name. Amen.