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Week 12: Final Series in Matthew
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Every time I approach this text, my mind weeps over the original sin of man and its implications for all humankind. God created man perfect in all his ways, named Adam. But when Adam was deceived by his wife and the devil, he chose to rebel against God and plunged the whole human race into sin.
Although we are different in color, ethnicity, background, and socioeconomic status—born in different homes, raised by different parents—humanity despite our distinctions shares one common disease: sin. It has infected every part of the human being: our mind, our intellect, our heart, and our lives.
Sin is the bane of all human existence. It is the origin of all your pain, all your suffering, all your trials, all your tribulations, all your shame, all your insecurities, all the abuse you suffered when you were young, all your relational tension. Every divorce, every marriage in trouble, every teenager astray, every unforgiveness—these flow from sin. Sin is the source of all our problems: wars, murder, disease, famine, aging, and death.
Because of what Adam did, what we all have inherited is not only a sinful nature, but we have all inherited the due penalty of that sin. The Scripture makes it very clear theologically: because human beings were born in sin, we all have inherited eternal damnation from God.
According to the Scriptures, every single person was born unrighteous in the sight of God. And as a result of that unrighteousness, we were all headed for damnation. The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans chapter 5, verse 12: "Just as sin came into the world through one man who was Adam, death through sin and death spread to all men because all have sinned."
Paul also tells us in Romans chapter 3, verse 23: "For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." If there's any person who thinks they're righteous in the sight of God because of good behavior or morality or piety, the Scripture calls you and me a liar. Because all human beings have sinned and because of those sins, we have broken God's laws.
But Paul did not stop there. He said in Romans chapter 6, verse 23: "For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ." I want to draw your attention to the word wages. It is what you have earned for what you have done. According to this doctrine, Paul said because we have sinned against God, because we have broken His laws, and because we have been born in sin, we have earned death from God. Not just death at a funeral, but spiritual death—separation from God because of our sin nature.
Because we have been separated from our God through our sin nature, there is nothing that you and I can do to right that wrong in our own merit. No human being can earn righteousness from God in their own merit or strength. If we could, we would be able to boast on the day of judgment.
Every human being was already born separated from God, headed towards damnation with no hope apart from some pardon that comes from God.
Let me explain it to you like this. I've told this story before. I'm going to tell it a hundred times because good leaders are good repeaters.
When I was raised in New York, my mother sent me to a day camp. Consequently, almost nobody in New York knows how to swim. We don't have pools. We don't have parks with water. But my mother sends me to a day camp, and on that first day, they're trying to teach kids how to swim.
They lined all the kids up along the edge of the pool from the shortest to the tallest. I end up at the front of the line. No accident there. The instructor is walking down the line and he's telling everybody, "Today you're going to learn your very first lesson in how to swim." And then he shoves me into the deep end of the pool.
Because I can't swim, I go straight to the bottom of that pool. Now I'm trapped at the bottom of the deep end. No matter what I'm doing, I cannot get out of that pool. I'm struggling. I'm trying to get out, but because I don't know how to swim, I can't get out from the bottom of the pool. I start to feel water rushing up my nose, and I start to feel my head start to swell.
Out of nowhere, I feel this pole poking me in the side of my head. This pole was nudging me, trying to help me while I was at the bottom of the pool. And although it was hitting me, at first, I didn't have enough common sense to grab that pole. The water continued to fill my head and I felt that I was about to die. And after enough pokes in my head, I finally had enough common sense to grab that pole. And they yanked me from the bottom of the pool.
The news that went around the camp that day was: a little black boy was saved from drowning that day.
This is what we approach in our text. It is the apex of the redemption plan of God. The Lord reaching His hand down into humanity to pull lost people from the bottom of the pool.
Because God demands payment for sin, and His payment for sin is blood. This is why in the Old Testament, when the people came out of Egypt, He gave them a sacrificial system. They would have to shed the blood of animals one after the other. Every time they committed a sin, they had to shed the blood of animals.
That blood they were shedding for thousands of years was a foreshadow of a lamb that was coming in the future. That sacrificial system was meant to teach the people that because God is holy, He demands a blood payment for sin. Where blood is not shed, the Scripture says there is no forgiveness of sins.
Now, God does not have a body, so you have never seen Him. And the Holy Spirit does not have a body, so you've never seen it. But there is a person in the Trinity, the Godhead, who had a physical body. And that body came for a purpose: Jesus.
The purpose of that body was for the Father to break it that He could reach down into your life and mine and raise us from the bottom of that pool. This is what we approach in the text: God's ultimate plan of redemption.
What we are about to read in the text was God's plan to save you. You recall how Christ was arrested in a garden on a Thursday night and how He was dragged out of that garden into the house of Caiaphas, the high priest. He endured six illegal trials through the night and never got a chance to sleep.
By the time the sun raised, those religious rulers had condemned Him for the charge of being the king of the Jews. They could not crucify Him, so they brought Him to a governor named Pontius Pilate. They asked Pontius Pilate to crucify this man who had been blasphemous.
Pontius Pilate did everything he could to exonerate Jesus because in the Roman trial he found Jesus not guilty. He put up another notorious criminal named Barabbus and said, "Choose which one you want." But the people, corrupted by the religious leaders, chose a murderer over the Lord Jesus.
You remember how Pilate had Jesus scourged or beaten within an inch of His life and then brought Him back before the people. But that was not enough for the bloodthirsty religious leaders. They said, "No, we don't want that man. Crucify him."
And so Pilate took a blood-beaten, lacerated body with bones hanging out the side, so deformed that the Scripture says He was beaten to the point He was unrecognizable. Pilate took Him and handed Him over to some 200 soldiers who then mocked Him, put a crown of thorns on Him, beat Him in His head, spit in His face, bowed a false knee (a knee they will bow in the future). They abused Him in silence behind Pilate's back when He was supposed to be in a safe place. Then they put his clothes on him and then they finally obey. They carry him out of that praetorium to be crucified.
In verse 32, as they went out, they found a man of Cyrene named Simon by name and they compelled this man to carry his cross.
Matthew tells us that as Jesus was coming out of that room, they saw a man whom they forced to help Jesus carry that cross. John tells us in his writing that Jesus came out bearing his own cross, but Jesus was tired and Jesus was weary and Jesus was hurting. So they found somebody to help him carry the cross on his way to crucifixion.
Now, crucifixion was the most barbaric and the most torturous form of capital punishment human beings have ever invented. It was created by the Assyrians or by the Persians and perfected by Rome.
What would happen during persecution or execution? They would take the prisoner. They would strip the prisoner naked. They would beat that prisoner so his blood would start to leak out. Then they would put a cross beam on the prisoner, make him walk to the place of execution—usually a public place because Rome liked to string up people in public as a deterrence against Roman law.
They would then either with a rope or with nails fix that person to the cross beam. They would then affix the feet to the cross beam. Then they would string up that person. And all throughout the Roman Empire, you would see people on crosses on the side of the road.
As a person hung on the cross, they would have to reach up to breathe and come back down. If they did not reach up, they would not be able to breathe. And so every time they came back down, they could feel the wood on their lacerated back. Most people would hang there for days, watch, until they died of suffocation in their own lungs. They'd be foggy in their mind. Then animals would come and pick their body. They're left there to rot.
Jesus, who was tired, couldn't go all the way by himself. So the Roman soldiers conscript or compel a man to follow him. There was a law that a Roman soldier, if they wanted somebody to carry their armor, they could go up to a Jew and conscript him and then hand the armor to that Jew to follow him for at least one mile. This is where Jesus taught his followers: if that ever happens to you, go a second mile. This is where we get second mile service from. It's where Chick-fil-A got that from. He says, "Don't just go one mile. Show them that you belong to me. Go the second mile. Do what's necessary to be excellent."
Sirene was a Greek colony, a Roman city in Northern Africa. So they tell this man, "Help Christ carry this cross." Later in the Scriptures, we learn he had two sons, Alexander and Rufus, who were prominent men in the church. This means it is very possible that because of this one encounter he had with Jesus carrying the cross—all that time he was walking with him, maybe he was staring at him, maybe he was feeling something on the inside—at some point in time something must have happened to that man Simon because he has two sons now who I watch: they're beasts in the first century church. They had to learn that from somewhere. They learned that from their father. This is why we should disciple our children.
Last thing I want you to see in this verse: he was forced to help Jesus carry his cross. I only pause to point that out to you because when I read "his cross," it reminds me of language that Jesus used to teach you and me that you too must carry your own cross. It is language speaking of discipleship in which Christ wants us to be growing in character and in faithfulness, growing in the knowledge of who He is, crucifying in our flesh all the things that He says are not for us to be doing.
I just want to remind you and me who love isolation and hate community: nobody's going to carry the cross all the way to the end by themselves. This is a beautiful picture of what we do in biblical community.
Every single one of you will go through hardships, trials, and circumstances that demand other people to get involved. That demands somebody else to pray for you. Nobody in this room is going to carry that cross all the way to the finish line alone. Life will create circumstances for you that demand you saying, "Brother, pray for me. Sister, pray for me. Would you help me with this?" Life creates circumstance in which we have to help others. And life creates circumstance in which we have to be helped.
This is why it's only the devil to make people say, "I hate community. I hate the church. I could do God by myself until I get to the end." The devil is a lie. And when you lie to yourself like that, the Lord would just hand you a circumstance to make you see that you need other people outside of yourself.
In verse 33, they came to a place called Golgotha, which means the place of a skull. It was a small hill just outside the ancient walls of Jerusalem. It's called the place of the skull in Aramaic—not a place with dead skulls, but a place that looked like a skull.
I just want to say this to you: it was about 2,000 years earlier that another man of God named Abraham got an instruction from God to take his son, his only son, and carry him to the top of the hill. He made his son carry the wood to the top of the hill. He was told to sacrifice his son at the top of the hill. When he raised his hand to kill that son, he found a ram in the bush as a substitutionary death in place of his son. And it is believed that Christ was crucified on the exact same hill.
They mix this cocktail, right? This ain't henny and coke. This ain't an old-fashioned. No. They mix up stale wine with gall, a bitter bitter substance that they put in the wine, and give it to Jesus to drink. They would give this substance to men to drink to sedate them—not for compassion, but so that they would be so drunk they would not fight back when it's time to nail them to the cross.
But the Lord chooses not to be sedated in this moment because He wants to absorb the full pain of what He's about to suffer for you and for me. So when we read things in Isaiah 53 like "He was bruised for our iniquities" and "He was wounded for our transgressions," this is Jesus taking on Him the full force of the punishment that was coming. He chooses not to be sedated because He was thinking about you when He was headed to that cross.
When they had crucified Him, they divided His garments among them, casting lots. Then they sat down and kept watch over Him there. Over His head they put this charge against Him, which read, "This is Jesus, the king of the Jews." Then two robbers were crucified with Him—one on His right and one on His left.
I just want to draw your attention to three things right here. It says when they divided His garments. This is a very important detail that Matthew put in the text. When they stripped Jesus naked and they crucified Him, four soldiers took His garments and they ripped it up. Then they cast lots, meaning they're gambling for His clothing—like playing CEO if you're from New York.
You think that's an inconsequential detail, but Matthew put that there for a reason. Matthew put that there for a reason because he knows a thousand years earlier, a man named David wrote Psalm 22, which prophesied about the crucifixion of the coming Messiah.
If we go back to Psalm 22, verse 18, listen to what was prophesied about the Messiah:
"They divide my garments among them. And for my clothing they cast lots."
Meaning even these unsaved barbarians are fulfilling biblical prophecy as they're fighting over the clothes of Jesus.
I only point that out to you because the Scriptures is the only book in the world that has prophecies that have come to pass accurately. I only point that out to you that you can learn to trust the word of God. You can trust every promise that has been made to you and everything God has said about you. His words will not fall to the floor because men lie. God does not.
So if He said it, it will come to pass. If He promised it, it's available for you. No prophecies like that in the Quran. No prophecies like that in the Pearl of Great Price. No prophecies like that in any other book in the world except the inherent, infallible, immutable, alive, active and breathing word of the living God Almighty.
God cannot lie. If He said it, He will bring it to pass. If I was you, I'd be searching for what He said about me.
You'll be reading stuff like it's a little devotional, trying to make it cute. These are the words of God the Almighty. So when He says stuff like "You're the head and not the tail," when He calls Himself a provider, when He calls Himself a healer, when He calls Himself a deliverer, when He calls Himself a way maker, when He talks about where you will be when Christ comes back to get you, when He talks about the place that Jesus went to prepare for you—ain't no devil in hell going to rob me of what the truth of God's word has already said.
And the Scripture says they kept watch over His body because people had a habit: when they saw their loved ones hanging on crosses, soldiers would go away. They go then take their bodies down and try to resuscitate them. But they wanted to make sure this man does not come down. So they hung out to watch Him and make sure none of His followers could come sneak Him off the cross.
In verse 39, those who passed by derided Him, wagging their heads, and saying, "You who would destroy the temple, rebuild it in three days. Save yourself. If you are the son of God, come down from that cross."
They question His identity like the devil did when Jesus was fasting in the wilderness. The enemy will always try to make you question your identity. So the people mocked Christ as He hangs.
In verse 41, the chief priests and the scribes and the elders mocked him saying:
"He saved others but he cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel. Let him come down from the cross and we will believe him. He trust in God that God deliver him now if he desires him or he said I am the son of God."
They speak with authority what they do not know. It's the same way people crucify you and speak with authority what they do not know.
And I just want to tell you this: nails did not keep Christ fixed to the cross. Love kept Christ fixed to the cross, for He could have come down if He wanted to. But He knows without this sacrifice you remain at the bottom of the pool. You remain with no hope for heaven, no hope for eternity. And so the Father must bruise the Son like this to provide a way of escape for you, to provide a pathway for you to have a right relationship with God.
The robbers who were crucified with Him also reviled Him in the same way. Jesus is in the center. They put him there as to say he is the most guilty. On one side is a thief and on the other side is a thief.
But who was supposed to be there in the middle? Barabbus. The Lord dies in his place. A perfect picture of the substitutionary death. He dies in our place for you and for me.
But as they hung there for hours, one of those robbers had a revelation as he's staring at this man saying, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." One of those robbers gets a revelation and he makes a simple prayer that changes the whole course of his life.
Luke tells us what that robber said in Luke 23, verse 39:
"One of the criminals who hang railed against him saying, 'Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us.' But the other man rebuked him, saying, 'Do you not fear God? Since you are under the same sentence of condemnation, what we indeed justly, we are receiving the due reward for our deeds. But this man, he says, has done nothing wrong.' And he turns to Jesus on the cross and he says, 'Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.'"
A simple prayer of honesty and humility. And the Lord turns back to that man who did not deserve to get out of that situation, who did not deserve grace, who did not deserve anything that you and I have. And yet, while He's dying, Jesus says to him:
"Truly I say to you today, you will be with me in paradise."
And this man dies and he wakes up in glory.
I close with two words for two groups of people. First, for the believer under the sound of my voice, I ask you: How in God's name can we read about the sacrifice of what Christ did for you and me? How could you see images of what Christ did for you and me and have no desire to love Him? No desire to serve Him?
People got to beg you to be in gatherings, beg you to lift a hand, beg you to be faithful, beg you to be generous. How in God's name do we read what Christ did for you and me, rescued you from damnation, saved you, recorded your name in the Lamb's book of life, and have no desire to live for Him? No desire to be faithful to Him, no desire to walk after Him?
But what our response should be, my brothers and sisters, to the cross? Our response to the cross should be a life of service, a life of surrender, a life of love, a life of humility, a life of generosity, a life of gratitude. The only right response to the cross of Christ is a life laid out on the altar for the Lord Jesus saying, "Lord, my life belongs to you. Your will be done and not my own."
It is the cross that compels me to be a better husband to that woman over there. It is the cross that compels me to be a better father to my children. It is the cross that compels me to be a better pastor, a better shepherd, a better leader. It is the cross that compels me to forgive people who have hurt me.
It is the cross that compels me to forgive. It's the cross that compels me to love even people who are unlovable. It is the cross that compels me to let people go who I've been holding in my heart for years.
How could you receive that level of forgiveness and not restore that to other people? It is the cross that compels me to be a better follower of Jesus. It's the thing that wakes me up in the morning and says, "Lord, for you I live." And if they come and get me, for you I die.
For you and me who call ourselves Christians, that's easy to post. That's easy to text. But it is another thing to live like the Lord Jesus Christ. And our only response to the cross should be: "Lord, my life for your sacrifice."
How long are we going to keep playing games doing this before something in your heart says, "For what He has done for me, I surrender all for Him and I am moved to be a better believer in every sphere of influence"?
And for the unbeliever under the sound of my voice: God help you. You are headed for a punishment and a wrath you are not prepared for. But the Lord in His love for you nailed His son to the cross.
If you would just be honest and repent and say, "I have committed sins and I am sorry for what I have done." If you would just be honest like that thief on the cross and cry out, "Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom," He might hear you today and He might respond to you today. He might reach down His hand and pull you out from the bottom of that pool like He did for me over a toilet seat when I was suicidal.
With every head bowed and every eye closed, Father, I pray first for the believer. God, that you would do a work in our hearts right now—more than just songs, more than just sermons. We will have a ferocious desire to live for you, to surrender all to you. That we will be radically loving, radically generous, radically giving, radically forgiving of others.
God, I pray right now you give us grace to let people go who has hurt us, people who have abused us and mistreated us. I pray you give us the grace to let them go. Lord, it is an affront to the cross to hold them in our hearts. I pray right now somebody would get delivered from the people they've been carrying in their hearts for years and decades. I pray there will be an outpouring of forgiveness in our hearts.
I pray you would increase a desire in us to be better men and better women, better disciples and better followers, to be radically sold out for you. No more playing church. We want to live for you in every sphere of influence and be an agent.
And Father, I pray for the unbeliever. Listen to me right now. God, I pray they're praying right now. They would pray in their own chair. They need nobody to touch them. That they would surrender right now, for tomorrow it's not promised to them. Lord Jesus, please. I pray you would fill them up and fill them with the Holy Spirit and that you would record their name in the Lamb's book of life, that they would know the pardons of their sins and live in purpose the rest of their days until they meet you in eternity.
I thank you. You're saving some man right now. Some woman right now is leaving here with a different future like that thief on the cross. Jesus Christ.
Father, I pray this right now in the mighty and the majestic and the matchless name of the one who was crucified that we may be saved in his mighty name, I pray. And all God's people, amen.
If the cross can't compel you to live for him, what is a sermon going to do? I'm just a man. I didn't die for you. Ain't nobody here shed blood for you, man.
We rise tomorrow morning striving to say, "Lord, I want to love you and serve you. I want to help others and be generous. I want to be kind. I want to forgive. I want to love the way that you love. I want people to see Jesus in me. I want them to smell the fragrance of Christ coming off of me everywhere that I go."
Ain't that what the world needs to see?
