Good Friday
Dear friends in Christ. As we meet our Lord in our text this evening, it is right at the moment of His death on the cross. It says simply enough: Jesus, when He had cried out again with a loud voice, yielded up His spirit. What was it that He cried out in a loud voice? The other Gospel writers tell us. Right before His death Jesus said [Jn. 19.30], It is finished. All the work for the salvation of the world had been accomplished; every sin had been paid for; God’s justice had been satisfied and His anger stilled; sinful humanity had been reconciled to the holy God. Then we read [Lk. 23.46] that when had cried out with a loud voice, He said, “Father, into Your hands I commend my spirit.” And having said this He breathed His last. So what we see in our text is that Jesus’ final words on the cross right before His death were words of victory and joy. Even look at what the holy Evangelists tell us—Jesus cried out again with a loud voice. The point? Jesus was still strong. He laid down His life—it wasn’t taken from Him. He was in control of the events. In fact, all the suffering and all the events leading up to Jesus’ death were all according to God’s plan and will. The apostles and first Christians in Jerusalem prayed to the Father [Ac 4.28]: For truly against Your holy Servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose determined before to be done. Jesus, was in full accord and willingly gave up His life on the cross, as He said earlier: No one takes [My life] from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it again.
These words that Christ cried out with a loud voice on the cross before giving up His spirit give form and focus to our Good Friday observances. Yes, Jesus died—He gave up His spirit, that is, His soul and body separated. His death is sad beyond all measure—our sins drove Him, the Holy, sinless One to the cross. Although it looked like He died in shame and defeat, Jesus willingly laid down His life for us and so died in triumph and victory. Precisely in and by His death Jesus conquered our spiritual enemies for us!
The fact that Jesus died in triumph as Victor is seen in the events that followed the moment that He bowed His head and died. As we study these events, we will see Good Friday’s great blessings; the fruits of Jesus’ work.
1. Our text: Jesus…yielded up His spirit. And behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom... The blessed result of Jesus’ work that first Good Friday was seen in the most holy place on earth—the temple. There the veil, the curtain in the temple which divided the Holy Place of the temple from the Most Holy Place of the temple was torn in two as by invisible hands grabbing it and tearing it. That it was torn like this is no easy feat, no fluke; it was about as thick as a palm of a man’s hand. Normally the curtain was never lifted except on one day, the Day of Atonement, when the priest would go behind it to offer sacrifice. Now, with the temple curtain ripped in two, the Most Holy place lay exposed for all people to see. With the tearing in two of the temple curtain, we see the blessed result of Christ’s work—the OT sacrificial system and all of the OT law had now come to an end. All of the OT laws served to prepare the people for the Messiah’s coming; all of the OT sacrifices pointed forward to the perfect once for all sacrifice for sin that the Messiah would make. Now that Messiah, long promised and awaited had come; now that perfect once for all sacrifice had been made. There is no longer any need of the OT sacrifices. They couldn’t take away sin; all they could do was point forward to that sacrifice that the Messiah would make that could take away sin and reconcile sinful humanity with the holy God. Christ Jesus, the only priest of the NT, entered with His own divine blood into the Most Holy Place of heaven having paid a price that frees us forever. God then tore the temple curtain and began to dismantle the temple, which was no longer needed since the one perfect sacrifice had been made; its task was now over. God completed the task of dismantling the temple when He had the Roman armies come in and destroy the temple together with all Jerusalem a mere 40 years later.
With the temple curtain being torn in two at the moment of Jesus’ death, the Father was showing by this that the right and eternal sacrifice for sin had been made. It was His stamp of approval and visible sign of His accepting Jesus’ sacrifice. What a glorious comfort we have! The perfect once for all sacrifice for sin has been made and accepted. That’s Good Friday! What’s even better is that God announces right away its acceptance by tearing the curtain and ending the OT system.
Because that perfect once for all sacrifice for sin has been made and accepted, we sinners are now reconciled to God. The separation of man from God has ceased. Now being forgiven and reconciled in Christ we may freely approach God and His throne of grace. Our sin is paid for and forgiven; we are given the righteousness of Christ. That’s the blessed result of that first Good Friday and fruit of Jesus’ work.
2. Our text continues telling us that when Jesus had bowed His head in death: and the earth quaked, and the rocks were split. Those rocks that are split are not just boulders but great masses of rocks. We frequently run across such powerful earthquakes in Scripture. Very often they serve as signs of God’s wrath; they also serve as a reminder of God’s presence and of His intervention among us. Here, immediately after Christ dies, there’s an earthquake. Clearly this earthquake is a sign of God’s wrath, of wrath against those who rejected Him and His Christ. It is a sharp preaching of His holy Law—He is angry over this sin. But if God is angry over this sin that Jesus was killed, and if He breaks out in judgment over it, doesn’t that speak to the innocence and majesty of Christ? Certainly God would not be angry if Jesus had deserved what He got! But here the holy, sinless God-man is rejected and condemned. The people understood the events and earthquake this way as a call to repentance, as St. Luke records [23.48]: And the whole crowd who came together to that sight, seeing what had been done, beat their breasts and returned. By this earthquake, we are strengthened in our faith that Jesus is the Holy One of God and our Savior. And since He is the Holy One of God, righteous and innocent, that means that His sacrifice for our sins was holy and perfect. It means that His righteousness, that righteousness that He gives us, is an absolute holiness. This earthquake was the Father’s stamp of approval on the Person and work of His Son, Jesus Christ, for us and our salvation.
3. The next blessing Christ brought about on that first Good Friday when Jesus bowed His head and died: and the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the graves after His resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. What an amazing event but an event shrouded in a bit of mystery! The graves of believers—of OT Christians, that is, of those who in faith looked forward to the day that the Messiah would carry out His work and make that perfect, once for all sacrifice for sin—some of them had their graves opened and they were immediately brought back to life; that is, their body and soul were reunited. Their body that they had now was the same they had before they died; but now, it was a glorified body. And after Jesus rose from the dead they then went into Jerusalem and showed themselves alive. How long they were there, we don’t know. After they had done their divinely ordered task, they were probably then brought into heaven—but this time with both soul and body.
The raising from the dead of the OT saints shows us so clearly the great blessing Jesus brought about for us that first Good Friday—the conquering of death. When Jesus had bowed His head and gave up His spirit, death was destroyed. What we have with the OT saints being resurrected, raised from the dead, at Christ’s death is the confirmation of Jesus’ victory cry, It is finished. The raising of the saints attests to the victory that Jesus proclaimed from the cross with those words. Jesus who died in seeming disgrace and failure, actually died in triumph. And here is the fruit of His victory—life; some OT saints were resurrected. This glorious event is a token, a sample of what Jesus will do come the Last Day: He will raise all the dead and give all His dear Christians eternal life in heaven, in both soul and body. With His death, the rule, reign of death was broken.
Because it is so remarkable and hardly believable, the Lord had these raised OT saints go into Jerusalem to bear witness to the fact that death had been destroyed, that Jesus, that very Savior for Whom they had waited and in Whom they had trusted for forgiveness of sin and eternal life, had destroyed death. Jesus’ death means life—even to those believers already dead. Here is the glorious result of Jesus’ Good Friday death and the truth of His word [Jn. 11.25]: I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though He may die, he shall live. This event drives home the fact that the Apostle later writes [2 Ti. 1.10]: …our Savior Jesus Christ…has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel.
4. Finally, we see the blessings Jesus brought about that first Good Friday also among the people. Our text: Now when the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus, saw the earthquake and the things that had happened, they feared greatly, saying, “Truly this was the Son of God”. Here we see that Jesus, the word of the cross, the simple message that by His death on the cross He brought us forgiveness of sin and eternal life, that it is a life giving proclamation; it is a message that creates faith in the hearts of those who hear it. What the centurion and other soldiers there confessed, “Truly this was the Son of God” was worked by God as they heard about Jesus, what Jesus had said on the cross and the events surrounding His death. The message, the preaching of Christ crucified, which is a stumbling block for some and foolishness to others has power to convert and save because the Holy Spirit is here active working in and through it. This very Spirit-worked confession of faith “Truly this was the Son of God”, just like that of Peter and the other disciples earlier [16.16], You are the Christ, the Son of the living God, is the very confession on which the Church is grounded—Jesus is the Son of God and our Savior. The blessed result of Good Friday is also that our Lord’s dear Christians are empowered and emboldened to confess their faith.
With the beginning of the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, and with the centurion and the other soldiers coming to faith, we see the beginning of the Church spreading into the entire world, spreading to people who are non-Jews. Jesus’ work on the cross is for all people.
Our text: And many women who followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering to Him, were there looking from afar, among whom were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Josef, and the mother of Zebedee’s sons. Here we too see a great confession of faith—a blessed result of Jesus’ work on the cross that first Good Friday. In great faith and love, these faithful women could not separate themselves from Jesus. In that same bold faith, may we today earnestly ponder anew this day Jesus’ suffering and death, and stand by His cross in confession.
Today is a day of great victory and blessing. May we always see the great triumph in our Savior’s cross. INJ Amen.