The Lutheran Hour
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"He Knew"
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Text: Mark 10:32-34
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Christ is risen! He is risen, indeed! Willingly the innocent Son of God gave His life to rescue sinful humankind from sin, death, and devil. Knowing the suffering and death which awaited Him, Jesus still went to Jerusalem to be offered as our Substitute, our Sacrifice. Now, by God’s grace, all who believe are forgiven, saved, and can face death with hope. God grant such a saving faith to us all. Amen.
Would you like to know the day and the way you’re going to die? How’s that for a way to start out a Lutheran Hour Message? Goodness, to start out any message? Years ago I heard the made-up story of a man whose greatest dream in life was to make a fortune from the stock market. Every day the man studied the financial page of his newspaper until, quite frankly, it became an obsession with him. The reason he found it frustrating is because he realized playing the market had too many variables, too many things he didn’t know. Those unknowns made it impossible for the man to make a really informed decision as to what he should buy and what he should sell.
One day, according to the fiction, the man wished aloud, “What wouldn’t I give to see the paper one year from now?” No sooner had he voiced his heart’s desire than there was a puff of smoke and a genie handed him a newspaper. When he had recovered from the shock, the man saw his wish had been granted. In truth, the paper he clutched in his greedy hands was dated a year in the future. Shaky hands found the financial page and excited eyes scanned the market. Some stocks were down while others had made great advances. A list of the big winners was quickly compiled and the man called a cab to take him to his stockbroker. As the blocks passed by, the man finally took time to review the rest of the paper. It was then and only then that he found his own picture in the paper, staring back at him from the obituaries.
Would you like to know the time and way you are going to die? When asked that question, most folks give their heads a negative shake. “Why would I want to know that?” is the most frequent response. Then they add: “I don’t want to spend my entire life counting down my years, months, weeks, and days. It would be too depressing, too distressing, too disturbing. Knowing the day on which I’m going to leave this world is a bit of the future I’m glad the Lord has decided to withhold.” Of course there are people who realize that response only deals with one part of the question… the time when they are going to die? It ignores the manner in which they will leave this world.
Over the years I’ve had numerous conversations about death and dying with people of all ages.
Indeed, if I asked you, right now, to list three ways you don’t want to die, you could probably do it. Top on the list for most people is fire. Others will quickly add, I don’t want to get whittled away. I don’t want to forget everything and everybody who is special to me. Others will list drowning or freezing. Among the more common answers are, “I don’t care how I go, but I sure don’t want to go slowly or painfully.” And although it’s harder for those who are left behind, most of us, given a choice, would say, “I prefer to die quickly and in my sleep.”
Do you want to know the day and the way you are going to die? My friends, right now the Christian Church is in the middle of the season of Lent. During Lent, we begin to concentrate our studies and worship on the Savior’s suffering and sacrifice. In less than a month we shall have remembered Jesus’ betrayal by a friend, His illegal arrest, His trumped up trials, His refusal to rebut the false witnesses brought against Him. Before this time next month we shall have stood in sad silence and watch how His church hurried Him to the cross; how His government turned a blind eye to justice and His release. Before too many weeks will have passed we shall see Jesus’ back torn to ribbons by a Roman whip; His head crowned with thorns; His face dripping with the spit of scorners; and a crowd calling for His crucifixion. We shall see Jesus crumble under the weight of His cross as His steps stagger to the summit of Calvary. Soon we will hear the sound of hammer on nails as He is attached to the cross; we will listen to the derisive comments and the disdainful challenges the crowd will hurl at the Christ and we shall stand in awe when He, through savage, searing pain, forgives those who have put Him there; when He makes sure His mother will be taken care of; when we hear Him give up the ghost. And those who are part of the family of faith; who have been called by God’s good news of forgiveness and salvation, will have stood in sorrow because it was their sins, their disobedience and defiance which brought Jesus to this end.
Would you like to know the time and way you are going to die? My friends, Jesus knew. Unlike the founders of the other great religions of the world, Jesus knew what His future was, what terrible terrors He would endure for the salvation of others. If you take a look at the Buddhist religion, you will find no evidence that Siddhartha knew his future or his fate. The text indicates that Buddha, who lived about 500 years before Jesus, through a series of trials and errors came up with what he thought was a good idea for humankind’s spirituality. Many of those around him thought it was a good idea, too. Around those ideas grew up a religion which many still espouse. But the best Buddha could do was encourage people to keep trying, keep striving, keep struggling, and then, maybe, in some way, you will free yourself of that which is evil.
The prophet Mohammed was born over 500 years after the Savior and he also was the founder of a global religion. Although his early years had not been filled with any special wisdom or knowledge the day came when he was supposed to have been chosen by god to share a final revelation with the world. Mohammed thought he had been given a good idea, and some of those around him thought so too. Eventually a religion formed around those teachings and you see its many adherents around the world today. But there is no indication that Mohammed’s coming, life, ending, and resurrection was ever predicted by prophets. There is nothing in the historical record to indicate he always knew his future and fate.
Not so with Jesus. Immediately after humankind’s fall into sin, God’s promise was made: He would send His Son into this world to give His life as the ransom which would rescue humankind from its kidnappers. Over the centuries other prophets would add to the promise of the heaven-sent Rescuer. Working under the Holy Spirit’s direction, one of those prophets, Isaiah, revealed Jesus would be despised and disrespected. Even more, Isaiah prophesied Jesus would be saddled with our sins, sadnesses, and sorrows. For us, Isaiah promised, Jesus would be beaten, wounded, and murdered with thieves. All this, Isaiah related, would happen without Jesus ever making a defense for Himself. (Isaiah 53:3-9 ESV)
But Jesus knew more than that which the prophets had shared. As God’s omniscient Son, he was aware of His final fate. He knew all which would befall. How do I know? The Evangelist Mark tells me. Now you should know, Jesus was never shy in sharing what His ending would be. Time and again the Gospels relate the warnings He gives to His disciples. No doubt He did this, at least in part, because He wanted them to be informed and unsurprised when He reached the final days of His earthly ministry. He knew: when things would start to happen, they would happen quickly and there would be no time for Jesus to give them a blow-by-blow explanation of what was going on.
But there is another reason Jesus shared His future fate. He wanted His closest followers to realize that He was not a Pawn being moved across the game board of ancient politics. On the contrary. His complete knowledge of the events which were to transpire showed that He was not only a Player in the process, He was in control of what was happening, a willing Principal in God’s plan of salvation. John records Jesus saying as much in the tenth chapter of His Gospel. The Savior said, “I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father.” John 10:17-18 (ESV)
So the disciples might know is why, one day, as they walked along, Jesus called them to His side and said, “Gentlemen, we are going up to Jerusalem. I want you to be aware of what is going to happen there. I am going to be betrayed into the hands of the chief priests and the scribes. It gets worse. You should know they will be successful in condemning me to death and delivering me over to the authorities. Those authorities will allow me to be mocked and spit on and whipped. Then, when those indignities have been completed, they will kill me.”
Would you like to know the time and the way you are going to die? Jesus knew. He knew Jerusalem would welcome Him with cheers that would quickly turn to jeers. He knew the bitter taste of the suffering that awaited Him there; of the uncounted multitudes of sins He would carry there. He knew the devil would find no shortage of hands to arrest Him and nail Him to the cross. He knew false witnesses would speak at His trial and each would try to outdo each other in the lies they told about Him. He knew that hour after hour He would be shuttled from courtroom to courtroom; judge to judge. There would be no one to say, “Enough! This is cruel and inhuman punishment.” He knew that nobody would try to take Him down from the cross and offer Him life imprisonment. Nobody would set Him free years later because He had saved the lives of countless souls. None of that would happen. Instead, Jesus knew He was going to Jerusalem. There, the innocent Son of God would suffer much at the hands of the leaders of the church – and He would die.
And here is the amazing part: to die for you is one of the reasons Jesus was born. If I asked you the purpose of your life, you might tell me it is so you could do good, or so you could love and be loved, or so you could be a good parent or a good child, or so you could help those who are in need, or add something to the lives of those who surround you. But none of us would say our purpose was to die. Yes, we know we will die, but that is not the same thing, not the same thing at all. Dying is not the reason you were born. But Jesus was born to die. Jesus, Who was always about His Father’s business knew that after He had fulfilled all the laws we have broken, after He had resisted all the temptations to which we have succumbed, it would be His job to carry our sins and give up His life as a Ransom for us all. He would sacrifice Himself so we might live as forgiven and redeemed children. That knowledge was with Him every moment of His life. What a weight to carry. What a burden for Him to carry. Still, if you examine His life, you will never see that information changing the way Jesus dealt with those who came to Him.
Would you like to know the day and way you are going to die? Jesus knew and, in spite of knowing, He still went to Jerusalem; He went to Jerusalem for you; so your life might be changed. My friends, I have conducted many funerals and been a mourner at many more. Every one of those funerals has been marked by grief. But some have had that grief intensified by an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. I have stood at gravesides with such despairing, despondent families who have looked to stuff and not the Savior for satisfying their souls’ longings. Their lives, their attitudes, their interests showed they had cared only about that which this present life could offer. They had thought nothing about God’s good news as they foolishly concentrated their focus on the fads and foofarah of life, with no attention given to the day and way they would die. Then, at the gravesite that neglect showed itself in their grief. There was a hardness, a harshness, a hopelessness to the whole thing. Without a Savior to hold to there was no future to look to. Quite often their grief could find an outlet only in anger and frustration with one another.
But I have stood at other gravesides where the tears were tinted with hope. Yes, friends and family had wept. They had hurt for one another and the loss they shared. But a light was shining in their darkness. They confidently talked of a future reunion. They spoke of grace and love experienced and shared. They could look through the grief of the moment to a greater day yet to come. This they could do because they knew that Jesus had died for them. They loved their Savior because they believed that He, knowing all which would happen to Him, willingly went to Jerusalem and gave His life so their day of grief might be changed.
And why would their mourning be changed? Why would the death of a Galilean Rabbi over 2,000 years ago make a difference? I can tell you. Better yet, Jesus can tell you. Among the many fearful things Jesus told His disciples that day, there was a bit of good news. Indeed, that good news was the most important thing Jesus told His disciples the day they marched to Jerusalem. This is what He said, “(in Jerusalem) they will mock Me and spit on Me, and flog Me and kill Me. And after three days I will rise from the dead.”
Coming from anyone else the claim would have been preposterous, unbelievable. And after three days He will rise. Look at your history books; examine the media, reference your own life’s experience. Who do you know who could make such a claim? The answer is simple: only the Son of God could say such a thing. Only the Son of God Who had done all which was asked, all which was necessary so that those who believe on Him might be saved. Looking down from the cross, knowing all was completed, Jesus had said, “It is finished” and He gave up His spirit. He died. After that His body was taken down and given a hurried burial in a borrowed tomb. By then all those who had heard His words either dismissed or forgot His prophecies and promises about what would happen. That is not surprising. They know, even as you knew, people do not rise from the dead.
But Jesus did. The last and greatest enemy of humankind was defeated and three days later, when some women went to His tomb to finish the burial rituals given to a beloved friend, they were met by no stone or guard. Instead, they were greeted by one of the Lord’s angels who at the doorway of an open and empty tomb informed them that Jesus was alive. He encouraged them to go inside Jesus’ rock-hewn grave and have a look; have a good look. He assured them they could look as long and as hard as they wished, but they would never find Jesus in that grave or any other. Jesus had died for us and now He lives for us. That is the truth which changes the way Christians look upon such things.
Do I exaggerate? Not in the least. Joseph Addison was an English politician and member of a literary clique which included Jonathon Swift. For all of his life Joseph Addison had been a devout Christian. Because he knew a risen Lord meant he would live forever, on his death bed, Joseph sent for a nephew of his who had been living a wayward life. Addison held on to life until the young man came into the room. Then, having made the identification, Addison whispered the last words he would ever say in this life. He said, “Do you see in what peace a Christian can die?” Those who were there said Joseph’s countenance reflected that peace… the peace that comes from knowing Jesus had died and risen for him.
The question, my friend, is: do you know? Do you have a Savior Who knowingly suffered so you might be saved? Do you know? Do you know a Savior who can let you live with confidence and die in peace? I pray you do. And if you don’t, if this day the Holy Spirit has put a longing in your heart to become better acquainted with your divine Rescuer, I gladly hold out this invitation: please, call us at The Lutheran Hour. Call us and let us introduce you to Him Who can change your day of death into a day of hope. A day of hope whenever it may come. Amen.