The Cross

GETTING STARTED

Suffering, pain, abandonment, and death. These are uncomfortable subjects we don’t like to talk about and experiences we go to great lengths to avoid. Yet, it is exactly what happened to Jesus. He faced it head on, and he did it all for us as a sacrificial gift.

READ THE WORD: MARK 15:16-41 (ESV)

¹⁶And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor’s headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. ¹⁷And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. ¹⁸And they began to salute him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” ¹⁹And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. ²⁰And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him.

²¹And they compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross. ²²And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull). ²³And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. ²⁴And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. ²⁵And it was the third hour when they crucified him.²⁶And the inscription of the charge against him read, “The King of the Jews.” ²⁷And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left. ²⁹And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, ³⁰save yourself, and come down from the cross!” ³¹So also the chief priests with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. ³²Let the Christ, the King of Israel, come down now from the cross that we may see and believe.” Those who were crucified with him also reviled him.

³³And when the sixth hour had come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.³⁴And 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?” ³⁵And some of the bystanders hearing it said, “Behold, he is calling Elijah.” ³⁶And 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.” ³⁷And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. ³⁸And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. ³⁹And when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way hebreathed his last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”

⁴⁰There 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. ⁴¹When 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.

DIGGING DEEPER

RESPOND TO GOD

Every day an offering was made to God in the temple at the ninth hour. This offering was known as the Mincha offering and was an offering that even the poorest of the poor could make. The Jewish people believed that after the offering was made the forgiveness of sins was complete. Jesus was our Mincha offering, and he destroyed the barrier (the curtain in the temple) that separated people from God. Even the poorest of the poor—EVERYONE—can now enter the Holy of Holies because Jesus completed the sacrifice. He saved us.