Death is something that is inevitable, it comes to everyone sooner or later. And yet I suppose, for something that is so universally common, considering it on a personal level is studiously avoided. At the risk of sounding overly morbid, the reality is that all of us are dying. When we are young, death seemed like such a distant, otherworldly concept, that it scarcely concerned us. We live like we will live forever. But as we get older, as we see more and more of death, and as we see considerably more of the sands of time in the bottom of the hourglass than is left in the top, the reality of death becomes something which seems more inevitable.
Still, I think most people try to avoid thinking of death right up to the bitter end. There is no other reason that explains why people live the way they do. Right up to their last breath, it seems many people continue in their amusements and enterprises as if they will live forever.
Funerals are a mechanism which can cause people to stop and think about death and dying. However, I think there is even a tendency today to do away with funerals because people don’t want to face death. A big trend today is to cremate someone and then at a more convenient time have something like a celebration of life, but without a body to remind us that they are dead.
But I would suggest that death is something we need to think about, and even embrace, to a certain extent. I suggest that the scripture talks a great deal about death and burial because it is a vital part of the sequence of life. Physical death is a vital part of our existence, and it’s a vital link in our salvation. For this reason I believe we are given details of the burial of Jesus Christ. In fact, I think that God deliberately planned for the burial of Jesus Christ, that He might teach us certain important principles. There could have been other ways in which Jesus could have died, and satisfied the wrath of God, which would not have included a burial. But the burial of Jesus Christ is an essential link in our salvation, which God orchestrated down to the smallest detail.
As we look then at the death and burial of Jesus Christ, we need to understand the necessity of His death. As I said a moment ago, in reality all of us are dying. Ephesians 2:5 and Colossians 2:13 says that we were dead in our trespasses and sins. This sin nature that we are born with we inherited from Adam. 1Corinthians 15:22 “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.” The curse of death began at the fall, and it came upon all of creation.
Adam and Eve sinned, and as a result, they incurred the curse of death which was passed on to all men. But you should remember that even as God pronounced the curse, He also promised there would come One from the woman who would break that curse. Genesis 3:15 “And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.”
Satan bruised Christ on His heel, by nailing Him to the cross. But through the death of Christ, God crushed Satan’s head, by taking away the sting of death. 1 Cor. 15:54, says, It is written, “DEATH IS SWALLOWED UP in victory. O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR VICTORY? O DEATH, WHERE IS YOUR STING?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
This victory over death was accomplished in the life, death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In life He was innocent, He was the spotless, righteous Lamb of God. In His death He took the punishment for sin that was meant for us by offering Himself as our substitute. And in His burial He fulfilled the penalty for sin that was due to all men. “For the wages of sin is death.” Romans 6:23
Isaiah 53:8 says, “By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished.”
Now I want us to consider more fully the theological implications of His burial, but let’s do so within the context of the details that Mark gives us here in this passage. Note first of all vs40 “There were also [some] women looking on from a distance, among whom [were] Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the Less and Joses, and Salome. When He was in Galilee, they used to follow Him and minister to Him; and [there were] many other women who came up with Him to Jerusalem.”
It’s interesting that these women, who themselves were far from home, were in Jerusalem with the Lord, and though all of His disciples had deserted Him, yet they stuck with Him. These women were witnesses of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We see them here at the cross, then at the end of this passage in vs47 we see them watching to see where Joseph buries Jesus, and then in the next chapter, we see them as the first to visit the empty tomb, and the first to tell the other disciples that He had risen. Their faithfulness and testimony was critical to the faith of His disciples. God gave them the opportunity to witness everything concerning Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection firsthand. And I believe that was because of their faithfulness.
And I think that there is a possible lesson in that for us here today. God rewards faithfulness in the little things by giving you greater faith to do greater things. And we could also say that God confirms your faith when you are faithful in little things. Being stedfast, persevering even in the face of persecution is promised a great reward. Jesus promised a reward to the church of Philadelphia because of their faithfulness. Rev. 3:8 “I know your deeds. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut, because you have a little power, and have kept My word, and have not denied My name.” In being obedient to what you have been shown to be true, God then reveals to you greater knowledge or revelation.
The second person that we see here is Joseph of Arimethea. Mark tells us that he was a prominent member of the council. That means he was a member of the Sanhedrin, perhaps a leader. This is the same institution that arrested Jesus and put Him on trial and condemned Him to death. Luke tells us though that he did not consent to their plan. Either he wasn’t at the trial, or he abstained from the proceedings. Mark goes on to tell us that he was looking for the Kingdom of God. That means that he was looking for the Messiah. That implies that he believed that Jesus was the Messiah. In fact, John’s gospel describes Joseph as a secret disciple. And the other gospel writers also tell us that Joseph was a rich man.
So Jesus died about three o’clock on Friday afternoon, and this secret disciple, knowing that the Sabbath is quickly approaching at sundown, wants to ask for Jesus’s body so that he might give Him a proper burial. In fact, he gives Him a burial fit for a king. He puts Jesus’s body in his own tomb, in which no man had laid. A more common tomb would have held multiple bodies in holes in the walls, or a series of holes in a cliff face. So this would have been a very expensive tomb. It’s big enough for people to stand inside, it’s big enough for angels to sit down inside of, and Mark tells us in the next chapter that it had a very large stone rolled across the opening. This was a burial vault fit for a king. And I think that is an indication of Joseph’s faith, in that Mark says he was looking forward to the kingdom of God. I think that Joseph was looking forward to Christ reigning in His kingdom.
I think we see the same idea conveyed in the answer of the thief on the cross to Jesus. He said in Luke 23:42 "Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom!” Jesus is dying on the cross, and the thief is confessing his faith that Jesus will come back in His kingdom. That’s pretty incredible faith when you think of it. Though he was watching Jesus physically die, yet he believed in the resurrection of Jesus, that He would come back as the King of His kingdom.
And perhaps Mark indicates that Joseph believed that as well. Because if he believed that Jesus was the Messiah, as is indicated by the gospel writers, then he would have also believed the prophecies concerning the eternal reign of the Messiah. He may not have understood the timing, but I think he believed the promises. But perhaps something in the manner in which Jesus died, made Joseph move from secret discipleship to being willing to take up his cross and follow Jesus. You know, the Lord doesn’t want us to be secret disciples. That’s why we are to confess with our mouth Jesus as Lord. That’s why we have public baptism. The Lord wants us to step out and follow Him, as a testimony to others.
So Joseph steps out from the shadows and makes his faith known. Mark says that Joseph gathered up his courage and went to ask Pilate for Jesus’s body. Like the centurion who also saw the manner in which Jesus died, he decided that surely this was the Son of God, and so whatever position he had as a member of the Sanhedrin, whatever gain he had because of riches, he counted but loss, for the surpassing value of knowing Jesus Christ as His Messiah and Lord.
Undoubtedly, this public confession of being a disciple of Jesus Christ would have resulted in his being excommunicated from the Sanhedrin. Quite possibly, it could also have meant that he would be barred from attending the synagogue. So for Joseph to publicly proclaim Jesus in this manner would have meant his social, political and eventual financial ruin. I wonder if we would make public our faith in Christ if we knew it would ruin our career.
There was another secret disciple, and that was Nicodemus. You will remember Nicodemus who came to see Jesus at night in John 3. Jesus called him the teacher of Israel, indicating he was an important rabbi. John tells us that Nicodemus accompanied Joseph in burying Jesus, and he brought a great wealth of myrrh and spices to anoint His body for burial. So ironically, we see the women and the fearful, secret disciples becoming bold at His death, while the ones who were closest to Him had abandoned Him.
At crucifixions, it was a common practice for the soldiers to either leave the criminal’s bodies to rot on the cross, to be eaten by birds, or to dump them on the nearby garbage heap which was called Gehena. It was a place of continually burning garbage outside the town, which the Lord alluded to in a sermon about hell. But the law of the Jews required that the bodies of one hung from a tree be taken down before dark, and the fact that it was also the evening before a high Sabbath, meaning during the Passover, they wanted the bodies taken down. Joseph and Nicodemus were the only friends that were willing and able to see to it that Jesus was buried.
And as we will see, it served God’s purposes that Jesus be buried. There are a lot of questions that could be raised concerning the death and burial of Jesus Christ. For instance, why did God choose to crucify Jesus? Why not some other death? Why did God choose to torture Jesus on a cross as opposed to a more normal death? Why did God choose to bury Jesus for three days? And there are even more questions that could be asked.
Well, concerning the method of death, ie, crucifixion, it satisfied the wrath of God towards sin. Hebrews 2:10 “For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.” Isaiah 53:10 says, “But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.”
God’s judgment against sin, His wrath against sin, is measured by the affront of sin to a Holy and Righteous God. As I said last week, We have too small a view of sin, and too mild a view of God’s wrath against sin. When we understand the affront of our sin, then we can understand God’s wrath against sin. Crucifixion was the Roman government’s harshest punishment for the vilest offenders. And so God satisfied His wrath against sin by crucifying Christ.
The second question is why the burial of Jesus? Why not raise Him up immediately upon death? Why was He buried and in the grave for three days? Well, again let’s look at Hebrews chapter 2, this time in vs9, “But we do see Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.”
First of all, His burial attested to the certainty of His death. He was reported as being dead by Joseph to Pilate. Pilate couldn’t believe that He was already dead, and so he sent for the centurion. The centurion attested to His death. We have already seen that the Jews attested to His death, and also that the women from Galilee witnessed His death and burial. So God made sure that He was dead, and that everyone knew that He was dead. Pilate then gives the body to Joseph. And when he does so, Mark records that he uses the Greek word, ptōma, which means a corpse. So the death of Jesus was witnessed, certified by Roman soldiers, and attested to by many people.
What the author of Hebrews tells us though is that Jesus tasted death for everyone. Now that gets to the theological underpinnings of the burial. Hebrews again, this time in chapter 9, tells us that Christ was manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself, and then in vs27 “And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him.”
What that means is that we are appointed to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ died on our behalf, so that we might escape judgment, having been justified by faith in what He accomplished for us.
And what did He accomplish for us through His death and burial? One thing we know for sure, He satisfied the wrath of God in fulfilling the complete punishment for sin, but also He was considered righteous before God, and thus God delivered Him up from death through the resurrection.
In the Apostle’s Creed, which some of you might be more familiar with than others, there is the following statement. It is not scripture, nor inspired, but it is a synopsis of the doctrine of the apostles as recorded in about the third century. It is an early Christian statement of faith. And in it, we read, “I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth: And in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord, Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, Born of the Virgin Mary,
Suffered under Pontius Pilate, Was crucified, dead, and buried: He descended into hell; The third day he rose again from the dead; He ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.”
Now notice that phrase concerning the burial of Jesus Christ, “Was crucified, dead, and buried: He descended into hell; The third day he rose again from the dead…” That raises an important point. Jesus’s body was buried, His corpse was buried, but His Spirit was not dead, and neither was it in the tomb. The Apostle’s Creed said He descended into hell. Now a lot of people are offended by that, or don’t know what to make of it.
Let me try to explain. Remember when Jesus was on the cross, He cried out with a loud voice, “it is finished!” and then Luke 23:46 says, And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, "Father, INTO YOUR HANDS I COMMIT MY SPIRIT." Having said this, He breathed His last.
Now “into your hands” simply means into your care, and then notice that Jesus commends His Spirit to pass out of His body, signaling death to His body. He had the power to lay down His life, and He entrusts His Spirit to the care of the Father.
Now remember also that just previous to this, He told the thief on the cross who confessed faith in Him, in Luke 23:43 And Jesus said to him, "Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise."
Jesus Himself described Paradise by using the familiar phrase “Abraham’s bosom,” in telling the story of the rich man and Lazarus, and Lazarus was being comforted in Abraham’s bosom, while the rich man was being tormented in flames. And Abraham said to the rich man, that between them was a great gulf which no man could cross. Jesus was giving a picture of Hades, called Sheol in the Old Testament, which the Jews understood to mean was in the center of the earth, with an upper and lower chamber, and in between a great chasm which separated the two, being Paradise and Hell.
Now the Apostle’s Creed gets that idea of descended into hell, from 1 Peter 3:18, “For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison, who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.”
Now I could preach a message or two on these verses but we don’t have the time this morning, so suffice it to emphasize that Peter says, “having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison…” What he is saying is that though Jesus’s body was in the tomb, His Spirit was alive and went to what he calls prison, and preached to those who had died during the days of Noah. So Jesus’ Spirit was not in the tomb, though His body was.
But also note vs 22, where Peter says that He is at the right hand of God having “gone into heaven, AFTER angels and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him.” So sometime between the crucifixion and the ascension, the angelic powers and authorities, which is how Paul refers to demonic powers in Ephesians 2, are subjected to Him.
Paul also refers to this ascension and descention in Eph. 4:8-10 “Therefore it says, "WHEN HE ASCENDED ON HIGH, HE LED CAPTIVE A HOST OF CAPTIVES, AND HE GAVE GIFTS TO MEN." (Now this expression, "He ascended," what does it mean except that He also had descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things.) Paul says that Jesus descended into the lower parts of the earth, which is a reference to Hades.
Now we cannot be dogmatic about all of that happened to Jesus during those three days when His body was in the grave. But I do know that Jesus fulfilled all of God’s wrath against sin, and He fulfilled all righteousness so that according to Psalm 16:10 “For You will not abandon my soul to Sheol; Nor will You allow Your Holy One to undergo decay.” God punished Jesus unto the full extent of the law, even unto Hades, having been made sin for us, but God also raised Jesus because He was innocent of any sin, being righteous in all things and having fulfilled perfectly the punishment for sin.
Going back to Isaiah 53 again, looking at vs 9 “His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. But the LORD was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If He would render Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.”
Most commentators believe that vs 9 is speaking of Joseph of Arimethea’s grave, in the phrase, “His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death.” So Jesus’ burial was an incredible fulfillment of prophecy made 700 years before His death. But another aspect of the grave is that it establishes the doctrine of the resurrection. Without the grave the certainty of the resurrection would be in doubt. But the resurrection is vital to proof of the divinity of Christ, the doctrine of salvation and the promise of new life in Christ. Christ is the first fruits of the resurrection, which is promised for all who believe in Him. But for there to be a resurrection, there must first be a death, being in the grave, though the spirit is alive in Paradise awaiting the call of God.
Well, we must leave this for now. But I want to impress on you one last aspect of the burial of Jesus Christ that is for our application. The burial of Jesus Christ speaks to the mortification of the flesh. Putting to death the flesh. Paul says in Romans that baptism is a picture of dying to the flesh. Romans 6:4 “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”
Christ died for sin, so that we might die to sin. Christ overcame sin through death, so that we might have life through His righteousness. We now walk in the Spirit, by putting to death the passions of the flesh.
The flesh and the Spirit are diametrically opposed to one another. Repentance is recognizing the need for dying to the flesh, so that we might live in the Spirit. That’s what it means to be conformed to the death of Christ. I said earlier that Joseph was an esteemed member of the Sanhedrin, a rich man, a man of social standing in the community. Yet those things which were of great earthly value to him, he counted as loss for the sake of knowing Jesus as Lord.
The apostle Paul was also once greatly esteemed by the Sanhedrin. And yet he came to know the surpassing value of counting such things as dead, that he might have life in Christ. He said in Phil. 3:7-11 “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”
May we have the same attitude as Paul, and be conformed to His death, that we might be raised to walk in newness of life in the Spirit. And that life we have in Christ is everlasting life, because as He lives, so we will live. Jesus said in John 11:25-26 "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?"
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