Matthew 27 and verse 45 onwards. Matthew 27 verse 45, 45 Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. 46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? 47 Some of them that stood there, when they heard that, said, This man calleth for Elias. 48 And straightway one of them ran, and took a spunge, and filled it with vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink. 49 The rest said, Let be, let us see whether Elias will come to save him. 50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost. 51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; 52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, 53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many. 54 Now when the centurion, and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly this was the Son of God.

We will also read from the Gospel of John, chapter 19. Gospel of John chapter 19 John 19 verse 27. And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home. 28 After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst. 29 Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and they filled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. 30 When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost. 31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. 32 Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him. 33 But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: 34 But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water. 35 And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true: and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe. 36 For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken. 37 And again another scripture saith, They shall look on him whom they pierced.

Since we began the study about eight classes ago, we are witnessing a very submissive Lord Jesus, submissive to His own creation. and to the will of His creation. We considered last week how the Gospel of Luke explained that Pilate gave Jesus over to the will of them and He delivered Jesus to their will, speaking of the will of man concerning the Lord Jesus as to what did men desire of the Lord Jesus. And yet we also saw that it isn't the full picture of what has happened so far on the cross. In fact, right from the very start, from the Garden of Gethsemane, where you see the Lord so bitterly crying out Abba, the very first and the only occasion of how the Lord would address the father as Abba, where He is saying, take this cup away from me, to this point where we read, He has bowed His head and He says it is finished. From the start up to this point, we can never be dismissive of the role that God the Father played in the crucifixion of Christ.

It was silent, it was invisible, it was not so apparent, but yet we can never discard what role God the Father played in the very death of Lord Jesus Christ. It doesn't in fact start at Gethsemane. If you were to ask, what role did the Father play in the death of His Son, it takes us right back beyond time, where Peter says that it is according to the determinate counsel and the foreknowledge of God that the Lord Jesus was delivered. That the decision for Christ to be delivered takes us way beyond time, beyond the start of time. In fact, Psalm 45 talks of a scroll that the Lord says in the volume of the book, it is written of me, as if it was written that Christ is going to come. And we read in Revelation of a book, a book of the Lamb, a Lamb that is slain before the foundation of the world, where even before time began, even before the foundations were laid, there has always been in the mind of God, a Lamb that is slain.

And so, when the Lord Jesus in Psalm 40 is saying that I come, behold it is written of me in the volume of the books, it is probably referring to that covenant that the Lord Jesus had with God the Father concerning His own sacrifice, concerning His own death. And so, the council of men is so premature in time versus the council and predetermined council of God, which was initiated before there was even time. It is not men that could put Christ to death. It was the involvement of God Himself where God gave Him over. And so that's the beautiful verse we see in John 3.16, God so loved the world that He gave. It is His giving, it is His sending, it is He delivering Christ up to be crucified. In Hebrews 1, it refers to a God who brings His only begotten into the world. God who brings His only begotten into the world. God sending His Son, God giving, God bringing His Son into this world. In fact, it is written of the life of Christ that Christ did not work, did not live isolated. He did not live independent. He did not live separate of God.

How Peter puts it is, God by Him did those mighty works and signs. Peter didn't say Christ did it. God by Him did it. Where Christ Himself would say, My Father works and I work hitherto. So God was with Christ. God was doing those wonderful signs and miracles by Christ. So though it was by the hands of Christ, by the words of Christ, Christ always gave the glory back to God. In fact, is God who did it by Christ. That's how the Lord Himself would say, that I have a meat to drink that you do not know, and that meat is the very will of God. So throughout the very birth of Christ, the life of Christ, you see the Father being alongside Christ, Father being with Christ, even to the point where there is an occasion where He is taken to this Mount, and Peter recounting this incident in his epistle would say that the Father gave Him honor and glory on that Mount of Transfiguration, the Father gave the Son honor and glory, where the Word was spoken out of His excellent glory.

Well, that is how far as the predestination, the birth and the life of Jesus Christ is concerned. But the role that God played in the death of Christ is extremely special. It is so silent. It is invisible. In fact, there is nothing explicitly written about what God did, except that we have to infer from the words of Christ Himself. For when He prayed that prayer in Garden of Gethsemane, He was submitting Himself to the one who had the authority to give Christ over to death or not. And so the whole plan, the whole work of salvation that Christ initiated began with the prayer, Let Thy will be done. That Christ is submitting Himself to the will of the Father, before anyone could touch Christ, before anyone could get their plans going, before anyone's plans and wishes were executed. Christ is submitting Himself to an overarching will of God, saying, it is that will which will be brought to pass, not the will of men. And so you see a Christ who is constantly in fellowship with the Father in the midst of all the sufferings. In the midst of what men try to do to Christ, you see a Christ who is constantly in fellowship, in closeness, in nearness with God the Father.

You see how The Lord Jesus was swift to rebuke Peter, he rebuked Peter saying, My father has legions, shall I not ask my father? And won't he readily give those legions of angels? And then he tells Peter, Should I not drink the cup that my father has given me? He is so much in nearness with the father in the midst of all what men are trying to do to him, so much so that the Lord Jesus would also say that you will all leave me. but my Father is with me." So in the midst of all kinds of afflictions and injustice and brutalities that was inflicted upon Christ, one overarching truth is that the Father was always the Son, Lord Jesus. The Father would not leave Him. So much so that it is written that when the people, the kings and the rulers, they set themselves to destroy the Lord and His anointed, the Psalmist says, the one who sits on the throne above laughed. What we see in the Gospels is the one on this earth who is like a sheep, who is dumb before his shears, who is not reviling when he is reviling. But what we do not see is what the Psalmist says. The one who is on the throne, the one who sits in heaven is laughing out when he sees the rulers and the kings coming to plot the death of Christ Jesus.

So the father was very much in control. He is the one who has given the cup to drink as much as he is also ready to dispose legions of angels to prevent any inflections to Christ. Ultimately, we see a Father who is ready to listen to the prayer and the cries of the Lord Jesus. You see that men have put Christ to the cross, they have nailed Him, they have stripped Him, they have given Him a crown of thorns, they have marred His visage more than recognition. Our face would not desire to look upon, that's the form, that's the worst that they have ever done to Christ. After having done all what they could do to Christ, the Christ on the cross says, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. And here you have a Father who is forgiving, a Father who is willing to listen to the plea of His Son on the cross. We stand today as a testimony to that answered prayer, a God who is forgiving those that put Christ to the cross.

But here is the most definite role that the Lord played, the role that we see now in Matthew chapter 27, a role which is so inconspicuous, where now it is no more of what men did to Christ, it is now about what God will do to Christ. Done is the part as much as men could do to Christ. They could do their worst, they could do their most. They could do their heart's desire out and nothing what they do could ever put Christ to death. Christ is still not dead and Christ would still not die just because of what men did to him. The words of the prophet had to be fulfilled that it pleased the Lord to crush him. It pleased the Lord to put him to grief. It pleased the Lord to make his soul an offering for sin. God making the soul of Christ an offering for sin. Where now it is about the role of God coming in to make the soul of Christ an offering for all of us. And so, how does the Lord go about doing that? He does that in very definite signs, not so evident, not like how He does it in Mount Sinai, not like how He does it before the Red Sea, not like how He did it through Sodom and Gomorrah, not like how He did it in Noah's time, not so evidently, but yet with enough signs and evidence to know that it is God at hand.

We read here in Matthew 27, starting in verse 45, Now from the sixth hour there was darkness. And that's the first evidence to know that God is at work. That at the sixth hour, Matthew 27 verse 45, that at the sixth hour there was darkness. The sixth hour is 12 noon. And it says that there was darkness over all the land. It was not just a very localized incident restricted to Jerusalem. The language over here suggests it was global. There was darkness over all the land or as much as you could see, there was darkness at 12 noon. And that's the very first sign to show that God is at hand. Because this was the day of Passover. The day of Passover always falls on full noon. So there is no chance of an eclipse. There can be no natural explanation for a day close to the full moon having sun becoming dark at 12 when it's supposed to be shining all the more bright. And we see this fulfillment back in the prophecies of Amos. Let's turn to the prophecy of Amos chapter 8. Amos 8 and verse 9. It shall come to pass in that day, says the Lord God, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon and I will darken the earth in broad daylight.

So specific concerning not just what is going to happen but at the very time, at noon, it's so specific, at noon I will make the sun to go down and I will darken the earth in broad daylight when it's supposed to be getting brighter and brighter from 12 noon to 3. At that 3 hour period, the Lord is saying, I'm going to brighten, I'm going to darken the day at broad daylight. This is not in reference to the cross, but this is in reference to the Day of the Lord. When the Lord will one day come on this earth, this verse is going to be fulfilled. But standing at the cross, when the Jews who know the sun and the stars and the moon, as the Lord Himself said about the Pharisees, they look at the stars, they know to read things, they knowing that it is full moon, they knowing it is Passover Day, They, knowing that they have done something so atrocious against the one who has always been doing good, to see the sun go dark at 12 noon should only mean one thing, something that should startle them, something that should terrify them, because the scripture says, the sun will go dark at noon, at the day of the Lord. It's a great day of judgment.

If you just read the next verse, you will come to know, it's a great day of mourning, where the people will mourn as if they have lost their son. That is what is going to happen when the Lord will bring darkness upon the earth at 12 noon. And when they see that happening before their eyes, they should not be too slow to understand that this is indeed God at work. This is indeed the day of judgment. This is at least judgment where God is making the earth go dark at right 12 noon. Some try to explain this off naturally, saying it's an eclipse. Some try to say it's... It's probably because an earthquake was going to happen. Some say that sometimes before an earthquake there is darkness, but you see how the language is, it is not just to that place where it happened, it happened all the land. And it is so evident that what is happening here is so supernatural. It is so mind-blowing. It is so out of control of man's ability. Man can do nothing to understand what is happening here. That right at 12 noon, the Lord makes the whole earth go dark.

And so when we come back to Matthew 27 and verse 45, it says, from the sixth hour, there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. So three hours of complete darkness. And you immediately notice something. It's written, everything that happened in those three hours is encapsulated in that one verse. We don't know what happened. There's no description given. There's no explanation given. Anything that is written about the three hours is given only in Matthew and Mark. Luke and John don't even talk about it. Luke does talk about the darkness. Luke doesn't even talk about Eli, Eli, Lama, Sabatini. It is only in Matthew and Mark we have some fragmented details of what is happening. John doesn't talk about anything. It is only in these two gospels, we have one to two verses to understand what happened in those three hours. And that's in stark contrast because if this happened at 12 noon, we can assume that the Lord was crucified at 9 a.m.

So for three hours, He was hanging on the cross. And we have so much details about those three hours. We have sufficient details to understand what happened during 9 to 12. But suddenly 12 to 3, We just have one verse to understand. It is in fact a warning probably that we need to be cautious in our explanation of what has happened here because the scriptures are deliberately silent. It is giving just as much as information, so much that we need to know that there was darkness within three hours. And within that two verses, we need to connect it to all of the scriptures to understand what is happening there. We have already seen about the time that the time was not random, it was already prophetic, that at 3, at 12 noon, it is going to be dark, it was already prophesied. But now let's consider darkness. What does darkness in itself signify?

We'll bring ourselves now to the prophecy of Isaiah, Isaiah chapter 8. Isaiah chapter 8, and we reading verses 21 and 22, and as we read, I would probably want us to compare what is written here in Isaiah 21 to what is happening before the cross. And now the next verse I shall start talking of a time when the people are going to be outrightly, without any shamefulness, with bold nakedness, rebelling against God. They will be hungry, they will be enraged, they will curse by their King, by their God, and then they will look upward, and as they are looking upward, the whole earth is filled with darkness, and they are driven into that darkness. As a response to their rebellion, as a response to their heart-heartedness, the whole earth becomes dark. And Isaiah the Prophet says, they are driven into the darkness. Well, at the cross we see great resemblance. The cross is the greatest epitome of human rebellion. The words over here written were literally fulfilled. They did curse by their King and by their God.

They ask Christ to come down if He is the King of Israel. They ask Christ to come down if He is the Son of God. By their King and by their God, they curse the one on the cross. On the contrary, they also put Him to the cross which made Him a curse for us. So it is about cursing God. The whole cross is the greatest, is an example of the greatest rebellion man can ever come up with. When man has been so enraged, so angry against God, so much that man wants to put Christ to the cross, and destroy the Lord and His Anointed. The Prophet says when that happens, the earth will be filled with darkness. And that's again exactly what happened. And if you were to ask what is this darkness, Chapter 9, that's Isaiah Chapter 9, the next chapter, in verse 19, we read, Through the wrath of the Lord of Hosts is the land darkened. Through the wrath of the Lord of Hosts is the land burned up and the people shall be fuel for fire and no man shall spare his brotherly. So we don't need to try to break our heads in understanding what darkness is.

It's written here that the wrath of the Lord of Hosts is darkness. By the wrath of the Lord of Hosts is darkness. And so that gives us understanding of what's happening in those three hours. It has to do with the wrath of God. In fact, we associate darkness always with sin. We associate darkness as something not so good, but we rarely associate darkness with God Himself. In fact, when the Lord first showed forth His glory to the visible eye that was in Mount Sinai, and when He did that in Mount Sinai, He came in thick clouds of darkness. So darkness is very much strongly associated with the presence of God. just as much as God is bright and He is light and He can shine as much as ten thousand suns brightness, way more than that, but still, He is also associated with darkness. When the Psalmist says, He bowed the heavens, He came down and darkness was under His feet, thick clouds of darkness and He made thick waters and dark clouds His pavilion, where clouds surround Him, clouds and darkness surround Him. That's how Psalm 97 says.

Darkness is so much associated with the presence of God, as much as light is. And in fact, whenever darkness is associated with the presence of God, it is associated with judgment. It is associated, as you see here, with the wrath of God. You see a God who is angry, and when He is angry, when He is giving His wrath, when He is establishing His holiness on this earth, It is all darkness around Him. It is all clouds in darkness. is darkness under His feet. He has made dark waters and thick waters His pavilion. That's the description of the Lord of the Old Testament. And so here we could probably look at the cross. When men have exhibited their utmost rebellion, utmost wrath, utmost anger against God, that God comes to now respond to that wrath. God comes now to deal with the rebellion of man. God comes to deal with that anger of man and like all the prophecies, He does it right at 12 noon. He makes the earth go dark right at 12 noon, just like He prophesied. And like has He prophesied, He has driven the whole earth into darkness.

By the wrath of the Lord of hosts is the land burned up where the whole earth has become dark. Though all of these prophecies are concerning the day of the Lord much, much in future yet to be fulfilled, you see so strong resemblance of it. Being fulfilled in the very day when Christ was crucified. Shows us how it was the day of judgment, it was the day of wrath. When we come back to Matthew 27, Matthew 27 and verse 46, and about the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice saying, That is to say, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And that's all we know that happened in those three hours of darkness. At the end of it all, the Lord cries out saying, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? You see, so much of this is so unknown. So much of this is hidden. It is hidden from our eyes. We do not know how God dealt with His Son. We do not know in those three hours the kind of wrath that befell the Son of God. We know it only from the prophecies where the Lord says the sword of Jehovah is going to fall upon Him.

We know it from the prophecies where the Lord is going to be pleased to crush Him. He is going to be pleased to put Him to grief. He's going to be pleased to make his soul an offering for sin. But we do not know the how of it, the what of it, how it all happened. We are blinded from that wrath of God. And that's the irony you see, because all the prophecies we read speaks nothing of God being angry or pouring His wrath upon His Messiah. Whether it was Amos or whether it is Isaiah, God is pouring His wrath upon people that have put Christ to the cross. And that's the vision that the prophets had, where the people will rebel against God and God will come down, He will drive them to darkness and pour His wrath on the people. But what we have on the cross is God did come down. He did bring His darkness with Him. He did make the whole earth dark. But instead of the wrath falling upon people that put Him to cross, the Lord poured His wrath upon the one on the cross, where the Lamb of God took away the sins of our world.

You see, this one incident of how the Lord dealt with His Son makes all the difference to the work of Christ. Where Christ could have suffered so much at Gethsemane, so much before the priest, so much before Pilate, so much before the soldiers, so much before the people, even to the point where Christ was crucified. But if this was missing, If this was missing, if what God did to Christ was missing, the whole salvation falls apart. It is not what men did to Christ that brought our salvation. God is the executioner. He is the judge. He is the one crushing the servant to death. It is what the Lord did to Christ that brought us salvation. For it is written that He laid upon Him the iniquity of us all. It is written that He was wounded for our transgression, bruised for our inequities. He was stricken, smitten, afflicted of God. For God was in Christ, reconciling the whole world unto Himself. For the one who did not know sin, God made him sin. And that was happening here. For He became curse for us. And that was happening here.

Here is the Lord Himself dealing on behalf of us on His very well-beloved Son. where Christ bore the sin for many, He gave His blood for the remission of sins of many. Father is completely in control, being the judge over His own Son, over His own servant, where the Lord put Him to death. You see, there are several prophecies that come to our mind over here. One being how Zechariah says, when the Lord rises up from His throne, even Habakkuk said the same thing, when the Lord rises up from His throne, the whole earth will be silent. And that's again referring to the judgment of this earth. But when you see the judgment of the sun, the judgment that fell on the sun, it's very much same. But the Lord rose up from the throne, He brought His presence down on this earth with darkness filled the whole earth. And the whole earth is silent. That explains why for three hours we have no word spoken, no record given, no description given. The hours are pure silence because it was indeed the time of judgment.

The book of Romans Paul says that when the law is opened, man will be silent. He cannot speak a word. And again, you see at the end of the three hours, during those three hours, there is not a word spoken, no involvement of man, no mockings, not even a sly remark. Nothing is recorded because those three hours was reserved for how God would deal with his own son. And so, during those three hours, God poured upon His Son all our sins, sins of all men, sins of all time, infinite sins of infinite proportion, falling upon a son of infinite personhood, that he should bear the wrath of infinite wrath, so that there should be salvation given to all.

Now it is in this we can rest, not the wounds that men did to him, not the scourgings, not the crown of thorns, not the nails. not even the crucifixion, but what God did to His Son, to the Servant in which we can rest, that here is someone who has tasted death for us all. That God made Him to be indeed sin, that He was in Christ reconciling the whole world unto Himself. You see, the Psalmist says that there is a cry that the sinner will cry out on the day of his judgment in the future when God judges all the sinners. The sinner will cry out, God, why have you forsaken me? And that's the cry that the son cried out. Only that when the sinner cries out later on in the day of the Lord in the future when the sinner is judged and he cries out such a cry, there will be no answer given to him. There will be no need of an answer given to him. That would be such an ambiguous question and a question that needs no answer, that warrants no answer because a sinner is crying it out.

And here you have a Lord who has sinned not who does not know sin, who is crying out, My God, My God, why have you forsaken me? The very implication is that there is only one reason for God to forsake. There is only one reason for God to forsake and look aside from His Christ, His Messiah, and that reason is sin. And in this we understand that God indeed made His Son sin an object worthy of being forsaken. For in those moments, Christ experienced what it means to be eternally separated from God. He experienced the damnation, the wrath, the judgment that will only be experienced by a sinner on the Day of the Lord. Christ experienced it all. So much so Psalm 22, when David accounts this incident for us, he begins with this incident. He says, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from the words of my roaring? where He experienced the pain of distance, the pain of separation, the pain of being forsaken, and that's probably what it means for the Lord, it pleased the Lord to put Him to grief.

Where this is what pained the Lord the most, not just all our afflictions, not just what we did to Christ, but what the Lord did to Christ, it put Him to grief that He's crying out, Lord, why are You so far? from my afflictions. Why are you silent? Why you do not hear me?" You see, this was what the Lord also prayed during the days of His flesh, that He should be heard, that He should not be forsaken, that the Father should indeed hear Him out. And that's what happens at the end of the three hours, where this separation, this damnation, this condemnation that fell on Christ was not eternal. It was just for those three hours where He began on the cross saying, Father forgive and He ended His life on the cross saying, Father into Your hands I commit my soul. It shows how that relationship was soon after restored where it was only at the three hours of judgment where He experienced Himself to be like a sinner condemned. But so much so, the Lord also heard Him that it was not just three days He had to wait for God to hear him.

On the very cross, he was ascertained of the fact that he is going to come and he gave that assurance to the thief. The thief was wanting to be remembered but the Lord gave him the assurance that you will be with me and not just going to merely remember you. The thief wanted the assurance that when you come into my kingdom but the Lord gave him the assurance that it is not going to be then. It is going to be today. The thief wanted the assurance of when it will be in my kingdom. When it will be in your kingdom as a king. But the Lord gave him the assurance, it's going to be today in Paradise itself. Where the salvation was offered then and there, right at the cross. Right at the cross is a sinner coming to the Kingdom of God. Right at the cross is the thief being made a son of glory.

That in itself shows how the efficacy of Christ bearing all the judgment of our sin was sufficient. For the Lord will see His seed, the Lord will prolong His days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in His hand. Just as much as it pleased the Lord to crush Him, it pleased the Lord to put Him to grief, it pleased the Lord to make His soul an offering for sin, so much so the Lord will also look at the seed. The Lord will prosper and prolong His days. and the will of the Lord will indeed prosper in His hand. And that brings us to the end of the life of Christ on the cross, where He majestically, gloriously cries out with a loud cry and gives up His ghost. It was a loud cry. He was not weak. He was not in form. He was not just breathing out His life. His life was not just oozing out. He was not just becoming breathless and breathless and breathless and breathless and dying out. No, He cried with a loud voice. And that's how He died.

John adds the last saying of the Lord where He cried with a loud voice and says, it is finished. Probably that loud cry which Mathew never says what it is, is what John says. It is finished. And with a loud cry, He cried out, it is done. Everything. Right from eternity past, whatever was in the predetermined counsel of God and the foreknowledge of God, whatever was in the pleasure and the will of God, the counsel of God, it is done. Whatever was in the cup of the wrath of God has been done. It is finished. And with a loud cry, He gave up His ghost. John beautifully says, He bowed His head, like in His own terms, in the way He wanted to die. He bowed His head and died. People die and then they bow their head. But Christ bowed his head and then he died. He gave up his goals. Here is the one fully in control of his life, showing forth to the people that it is not what the people did that brought him death. It is not that death met Christ, like the hymn says, Christ met death. It is Christ willingly submitting his life. It is not He who was conquered who died, but like a conqueror, He died. And this is what the Lord on the cross as indeed doth for us. May his name be glorified.