Mark 15:16-47
16 And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor's headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. 17 And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. 18 And they began to salute him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” 19 And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. 20 And 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.
21 And they compelled a passer-by, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross. 22 And they brought him to the place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull). 23 And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. 24 And they crucified him and divided his garments among them, casting lots for them, to decide what each should take. 25 And it was the third hour when they crucified him. 26 And the inscription of the charge against him read, “The King of the Jews.” 27 And with him they crucified two robbers, one on his right and one on his left. 29 And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, “Aha! You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, 30 save yourself, and come down from the cross!” 31 So also the chief priests with the scribes mocked him to one another, saying, “He saved others; he cannot save himself. 32 Let 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.
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!”
One almost hesitates to make comment here, for the place where we tread is holy ground. And yet we must needs try to grasp something of the significance of our Lord's atoning sufferings, remembering that, so far as the apostolic teaching is concerned, it is the interpretation of them that constitutes the gospel. Today we think particularly of the mocking words of the onlookers in 29-32, 'Himself He cannot save' this phrase has a deeper significance than is at first evident, or than they knew. The truth is He could have come down! Even then the legions of angels were at His command. But He would not come down. He chose not to, because He was fulfilling the Father's plan and purpose for Him. This is the meaning of Paul's great word in Philippians 2:8 - 'He was obedient unto death', His death was an act of obedience to the Father's will, and it was an act undertaken voluntarily in conformity to the divine purpose of redemption. In the last analysis it was not the cruel nails driven by the Roman legionaries, but obedience to the will of God that kept Him on the Cross during these hours of agony. In the words 'The Son of Man must suffer', that 'must' is one of divine necessity, not human ordination. It was 'by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God' that He was taken and slain. And 'by the obedience of One' many are made righteous (Romans 5:19).
In our studies on Gethsemane we pointed out the distinction between death as we know it and death as Jesus endured it. Here we see it supremely. The death that He tasted was death in all its horror as the wages of sin. Anyone reading this story with an unprejudiced eye can easily see it was no ordinary death. Everything about it was unusual, and above all the supernatural darkness that came down (33) and the terrible cry that came forth from it, 'My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?' In that extremity of horror He tasted death for every man (Hebrews 2:9), drinking the bitter cup to the dregs for our sakes. It was a scene of judgment, and a holy God turned away His face from His Son, when He bore in His body the sins of the world. Sin separates - that is the teaching of the Scripture, and when the Son of God was made sin for us, He bore the consequences of sin too and endured the separation from God that it entailed. The darkness itself was symbolic of the blackness of darkness that is separation from God, and the nameless horrors of eternal loss were all crowded into these hours on the Cross. Few words could express this more movingly or truthfully than these in the hymn 'The Ninety and Nine'. But none of the ransomed ever knew How deep were the waters crossed, Nor how dark was the night that the Lord passed through, Ere He found His sheep that was lost.