Sermon Tone Analysis
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Open your Bibles to Mark 15:33-41.
•We’re continuing our study of the Gospel of Mark.
•This morning we come to read of the final three hours of Christ’s crucifixion.
•In the text before us, we will read Mark’s account of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the climax of redemptive history.
•Everything has pointed to and waited for this moment as our Lord hangs on the tree.
•Our Lord suffers and gives His life as an atonement to save sinners from the wrath of God.
•This was planned from eternity and covenanted within God Himself.
•It was promised first to Adam and Eve after the Fall.
•It was promised to God’s People through the prophets of the Old Testament.
•It was pictured throughout the OT and it’s offices and systems and laws and sacrifices.
•Everything has worked for and toward this moment.
•And now it’s here: Our Lord hangs upon a Cross and makes atonement for sinners.
In this text, our salvation is revealed:
•The Lamb of God is sacrificed.
•God visits the Cross in divine justice and wrath.
•The Son of God cries out in God-forsakenness as He bears our sin.
•The Savior gives His life willingly.
•The curtain of the Temple is torn in two.
•And a Roman soldier confesses the truth about Jesus.
This text reveals the darkness of the Cross.
•It reveals that our Lord suffered the wrath of a holy God in the place of sinners.
•But through the darkness, the light of our salvation shines forth in the bleeding wounds of the Savior.
Brothers and sisters, all of Scripture is holy.
But as we read the passage before us, we are keenly aware that we are standing on holy ground.
•As you sit under the ministry of the Word this morning, allow yourself to be awestruck at the wonder of the Cross of Christ.
•Hear these old truths with fresh ears.
And allow the goodness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to wash over you once again.
•And, by God’s grace, we will leave here marveling at and rejoicing in the finished work of our Savior.
•May God bless us this morning as we hear His voice speaking through His Word.
If you would, and are able, please stand with me for the reading of the inspired, inerrant, and infallible Word of God.
Mark 15:33-41
[33] And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.
[34] And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?”
which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
[35] And some of the bystanders hearing it said, “Behold, he is calling Elijah.”
[36] And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to take him down.”
[37] And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last.
[38] And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom.
[39] And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
[40] There were also women looking on from a distance, among whom were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome.
[41] When he was in Galilee, they followed him and ministered to him, and there were also many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem.
(PRAY)
Our Heavenly Father,
We come to you now in need.
We always come to you in need.
We are needy sinners.
But God, we come to ask you for help to understand, believe, and profit from the ministry of your Word.
We cannot accomplish these things ourselves.
You must help us.
And we know that you promise to bless us with yourself as we humble ourselves before your Word.
And so, we ask that you would do what you’ve promised to do.
Keep your promise to us and bless us.
Show us your Son, our Lord, Jesus Christ.
Show us your glory displayed in His Cross.
Comfort us with His suffering.
Give us life by His death.
Sanctify us as we look to Him in faith.
Glorify yourself in us today by the mighty working of your Spirit through your holy Word.
We ask these things in Jesus’ Name and for His sake.
Amen.
1.)
Let’s go ahead and dive into our text:
[33] And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.
•The sixth hour, according to Jewish time reckoning, was noon.
(The clock started at 6AM.)
•And from noon until 3PM a thick, heavy darkness came over the whole land.
How far it went, we don’t know.
But it had to have at least covered Jerusalem, where this was all occurring.
This was not a solar eclipse.
•Passover happened during a full moon.
A solar eclipse can only happen during a new moon.
•More than that, an eclipse only lasts for a few minutes.
This darkness lasted for THREE HOURS.
•And IT IS NOON.
The sun is at it’s highest point in the sky as our Lord hangs on His cross.
•And then, the sun simply goes dark.
The sky goes dark throughout the whole land.
What is this?
•This is a divine sign.
God has done this.
This is unnatural.
God is doing something within the created order that is meant to signal something to those present.
•God is doing something here.
The suffering and impending death of Jesus is significant.
•God wants us to see that this is no normal death.
Jesus is not some common criminal on a Roman cross.
•There is something bigger going on here.
And we would do well to pay attention to the darkness the has descended upon the land.
Darkness is symbolic in the OT.
It is symbolic of God’s wrath.
•The Ninth Plague that God sent upon Egypt was darkness over the land.
Exodus 10:22 says, “…and there was pitch darkness in all the land of Egypt three days.”
•In Isaiah 10:9-10 God is declaring judgment upon Babylon and says, “Behold, the day of the LORD comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger, to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it.
For the stars of the heavens and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be dark at its rising, and the moon will not shed its light.”
•In Amos 5:20 the Day of the LORD, the day of God’s judgment is being spoken of.
And Amos says, “Is not the day of the LORD darkness, and not light, and gloom with no brightness in it?”
•Jesus Himself spoke of the wrath of God in Hell as a place of “outer darkness.”
•God’s judgment is spoken of as a time of darkness.
And sometimes darkness itself was a literal judgment of God.
Taking all of this together we see that darkness is an emblem of the fierce judgment and wrath of God.
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