Amen, and please be seated. If you have a Bible, let me invite you to turn with me to Matthew 20, this morning, verses 17 through 19. You'll find this on page 825 of the Pew Bible. Today, we hear Jesus foretell his sufferings once again.
And we learn that in his kingdom, the first will be last. He is first in the kingdom of heaven and yet puts himself last. Now two weeks ago, the last time we were in Matthew, in the parable, in verses 1 to 16, the parable of the day labors, we saw an illustration of the last being first. That is, the laborer's hired late in the day, even at the very last hour, were generously and graciously paid first, way beyond what they deserved.
And so in God's kingdom, we learn when you are saved by Him. It's not like you receive the just waged duty for your works. No, in His kingdom, the rewards and compensations are all out of proportion to anything you could ever do to meet them. They are generously and freely given.
The same riches that are lavished upon the last and the least and the lowest, as upon those considered to be the first. So the last could be first, but also the first can be last. And there is no greater example of the first being last than the Lord Jesus Himself, the king and head of His people, with Himself take the lowest position and suffer the greatest burden of the kingdom of heaven. Being in very nature God, He humbled Himself and became a man, and He became obedient even to the point of death, even death on a cross to lift us up.
And so we think about Him this morning from Matthew 20, beginning at verse 17. Let me invite you to hear now the holy and inspired Word of God. And as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, He took the twelve disciples aside. And on the way, He said to them, see, we are going up to Jerusalem.
And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes. And they will condemn Him to death and deliver Him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. And He will be raised on the third day. This is God's Word.
And He write it on our hearts. Let's look to Him in prayer. O Father, take your Word and by your Spirit show us your Son in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Well, not that you all have been here along the way in Matthew, but this is now, and some of you will remember the third time that Jesus very explicitly tells His disciples, He's going to Jerusalem to be killed and then rise. He said it in Matthew chapter 16 verse 21. He said it again in Matthew chapter 17 verse 22. Now here again, a third time, like any good teacher, Jesus is not afraid to repeat Himself.
He often repeated Himself because He knew His disciples were prone to forget what He told them. And He also knew that they often didn't understand Him in the first place. And so it was true. Well, that's our expectation here of all of you, of all of us.
We don't understand the Lord when we first hear His Word more often than not. And when we do understand, we quickly forget. And so we need to have the gospel, the good news pounded into our hearts and minds again and again. So now here in chapter 20, He repeats Himself.
But He does add some new information. He expands for them what's about to happen. For instance, Jesus will mention here that He'll be condemned to death. He had previously said, I'm going to be killed.
Now we learned that there's going to be some kind of trial before some kind of court and He'll be officially condemned. He also mentions not only suffering at the hands of the Jewish leadership, but here He mentions suffering at the hands of the Gentile leadership. That's new. He also had previously mentioned He would be killed, but He now says I'm going to be crucified.
It's actually the first use of by Jesus of the word crucifixion or reference to His own crucifixion explicitly in all of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. All of these details which He foretells are important and all of them are fulfilled. Notice there are four major events that will happen to Jesus. He'll be delivered verse 17 and 18 in the hands of the chief priests and scribes.
And verse 18, He'll be tried, convicted and sentenced to death. Verse 19, He'll be delivered over to the Gentiles to be ridiculed, tortured and killed. And verse 19, He will be raised. These are the four major events of the last hours of the life of our Lord Jesus upon this earth.
And this passage is a kind of table of content for chapters 26, 27 and 28. In fact, I'm going to take it that way and we're going to peek ahead at each of these events as we go and here again the old, old story of Jesus and His love. For at its heart, Christianity is not about your love for Jesus, but His love for you. It's not about what you do for Jesus, but what Jesus has done for you.
And it's at its heart. So here again, this story, as Jesus puts it in the first place, notice that the Son of Man will be delivered into the hands of chief priests and scribes. Verse 17, as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, He took the twelve disciples aside and on the way He said to them, see, we are going up to Jerusalem and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes. So what's He doing?
Well He's lovingly preparing His disciples for what they still have yet to understand is expected that what Jesus is going to do is not only celebrate the Passover in Jerusalem, which was one reason to go, but that Jesus is going to be presented ultimately as the true Passover lamb who takes away the Son of the world, but he'll have to suffer. He won't be welcomed. He won't be crowned King. He will be treated unjustly.
And it's the leaders of Israel who will begin it. And I want to show you the fulfillment of this in Matthew chapter 26. If you want to turn in your Bible there or perhaps just listen in, in Matthew chapter 26, this happens just as Jesus said it would. In the beginning of verse 14, we learn.
In one of the 12 whose name was Judas Iscariot went to the chief priests and said, what will you give me if I deliver him over to you? And they paid him 30 pieces of silver. And from that moment he sought an opportunity to betray him. And so it happened.
After the Lord's Supper, Jesus went to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. And we learn in Matthew 26, now verse 47, while He, Jesus was still speaking, Judas came one of the 12 and with him a great crowd with swords and clubs from the chief priests and the elders of the people. Now the betrayer had given them a sign saying, the one I kiss is the man, sees him. And he came up to Jesus at once and said, greetings Rabbi and he kissed him.
Jesus said to him, friend, go do what you came to do. And then they came up and laid hands on Jesus and seized him. And behold, one of those who were with Jesus stretched out his hand and threw his sword and struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his ear. That was Peter.
Then Jesus said to him, put your sword back in its place for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Do you think that I cannot appeal to my father and he will at once send to me more than 12 legions of angels? But how then should the scriptures be fulfilled? That it must be so?
At that hour Jesus said to the crowds, have you come out against a robber with swords and clubs to capture me? Day after day I sat in the temple teaching and you did not seize me. But all this has taken place that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. And then all the disciples left him and fled.
Now why did this happen? Did you hear it twice there? Jesus said that the scriptures might be fulfilled. None of what happened to Jesus was a surprise to him.
It was the unfolding of the purpose and plan of God foretold by the prophets. As Peter preached to the Jews at Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, men of Israel, he said, here these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested by God to you with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst as you yourselves know. This Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified by the hands of lawless men. You see what Peter is saying?
What Jesus is foretelling? He's going to be delivered in the hands of the leadership of Israel according to the definite plan of God, according to the foreknowledge of God. God knows about it ahead of time, certainly, but more than that God knew about it ahead of time because God had planned for it ahead of time. And so it happened just as God planned, even when Jesus became a punching bag in the hands of humanity and subject to human power and authority, yet he freely chose this course of action and remained in control of his own future, a future which he, as the eternal son of God, had planned.
He foretold it long before he ever came to earth in the scriptures, and he forewarned his disciples before they ever went to Jerusalem. So none of this is an accident, and he was not subject to fate or ill luck or ill fortune. And this too is our confidence for our own lives, as it was for the Lord, so it is for his service that God has a plan for his people and he works all things, even all the hard things together for good, for those who love him, who are called according to his purpose. What did they do with Jesus now that they had him?
Well, they did what they planned. They didn't just simply cut him down in the garden and bury him under an olive tree. They brought him to the high priest's house to be tried in a Jewish court of law. That's the second thing I want you to see, verse 18 at the end.
They will, Jesus says, condemn the son of man to death. And so the son of man will be tried and convicted and sentenced to death. He's telling them that they're going to put him on trial. They're going to pronounce him guilty, and they're going to condemn him.
That's just what happened in Matthew chapter 26, now beginning at verse 57. I want you to hear some of this. Then those who had seized Jesus led him to Caiaphas, the high priest, where the scribes and the elders had gathered. Peter was following him at a distance as far as the courtyard of the high priest.
And going inside, he sat with the guards to see the end. Now the chief priests and the whole council were seeking false testimony against Jesus that they might put him to death. I mean, right there you can see the injustice of this, right? They sought false testimony because he had done nothing worthy of death.
Verse 60. But they found none. They found no testament, true testimony. Though many false witnesses came forward.
And at last two came forward and said, this man said, I am able to destroy the temple of God and to rebuild it in three days. And the high priest stood up and said, have you no answer to make? What is it that these men testify against you? But Jesus remained silent.
Now here's more injustice. It's a kind of kangaroo court. The high priest sought to make Jesus his own accuser, which was forbidden according to their own rules in a courtroom. But like a sheet before it shearers is silent, Jesus opened not his mouth.
Isaiah 53. Now verse 63. And the high priest said to him, I assure you by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God. And now Jesus does speak.
Verse 64. Jesus said to him, you have said so. But I tell you from now on, you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his robes and he said, he has uttered blasphemy.
What further witnesses do we need? You've now heard his blasphemy. What is your judgment? You see the high priest understood that Jesus was actually claiming to be God.
That's why they accuse him of blasphemy. Don't ever let anybody tell you Jesus never claimed to be God. That's the charge. They find so offensive.
But this too was unjust. First of all, because the Son of Man is the eternal God. So it's not blasphemy for him to claim it, but second, because of the high priest was the chief justice of the court. Again, according to their own rules, he wasn't to give his own verdict of the case until everybody else had given their own verdict of the case so that he wouldn't be seen to be as their leader in charge leading them towards a certain judgment which they would be afraid to contradict him concerning.
But he led them to the unjust conclusion. It's a kangaroo court. Verse 66, they answered, he deserves death. Then they spit in his face and they struck him.
And some slapped him saying, prophesied to us, you Christ, who is it that struck you? And then Matthew 27 says, when morning came, all that she frees to the elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death. And they bound him and led him away and delivered him over to Pilate the governor. Now let's just pause there.
Do you see how everything about the last hours of his life was known ahead by Jesus. He went up to Jerusalem knowing he would be mistreated, knowing he would be falsely arrested and falsely accused and falsely condemned. And can you imagine the burden that knowledge would have been upon him throughout his whole life? I mean, he knew what was going to come.
He knew ahead of time the mistreatment, the injustice, the spitting in the face, the striking, the slapping, the mocking, the wicked verdict of wicked men against him and yet he set his face to go to Jerusalem to endure it. And J.C. Ryle says the Lord Jesus was a voluntary sufferer. When he died on the cross, it was not because he had not power to prevent it.
He suffered intentionally, deliberately, and of his own free will. Don't you realize we call it 12 legions of angels? It would be rescued from this? But that's not God's plan.
That's not my plan. He chose it freely. But as it happens in accordance with John 10 when he had said, I lay down my life, that I might take it up again and no one takes it from me. I lay it down of my own accord.
I have authority to lay it down and I have authority to take it up. He knew, says J.C. Ryle, that without the shedding of blood there could be no remission of sins. He knew that he was the Lamb of God who must die to take away the sin of the world.
He knew that his death was the appointed sacrifice which must be offered up for reconciliation for our iniquity. Knowing all this, he went willingly to the cross and his heart was set on finishing the work that he came into this world to do. So the condemned him. But as the Jews were occupied by the Romans, they had been forbidden by the Romans to carry out capital punishment themselves.
So what do they do? They walk him over to the Gentile authorities to get him capital punishment. You see that. Verse 18, they will come down to death.
Jesus says, verse 19, and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified. So the Son of Man will be delivered to be ridiculed, tortured and killed. That's the third thing. And again, it happened just as he said it would.
Back to Matthew 27, verse 2, they bound him and led away and delivered him over to the governor. And now Jesus stood, verse 11. Matthew 27, 11, Jesus stood before the governor and the governor asked him, are you the king of the Jews? Jesus said, you have said so.
And when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he gave no answer. Then Pilate said to him, do you not hear how many things they testify against you? But he gave him no answer. Not even to a single charge.
So the governor was greatly amazed. And what did they do to him? Verse 27. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters and they gathered the whole battalion before him.
They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him and twisting together a crown of thorns and they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand and kneeling before him, they mocked him saying, hell, king of the Jews. And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the robe and put his clothes on him and led him away to crucify him. And so they did crucify him.
Verse 32. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. They compelled the man to carry his cross. Jesus was already two weeks from the flogging and from the crown of thorns, two weeks through blood loss to carry his own cross through the site.
And it says when they came to a place called Golgotha, verse 33, which means place of a skull and they offered him wine to drink mixed with gall, only tasted he would not drink it. And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. And then they sat down and kept watch over him. And over his head, they put the charge against him with red which red.
This is Jesus, the king of the Jews. And two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. And those who passed by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, you who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself if you are the son of God. Come down from the cross.
So also the chief priests with scribes and the elders, they mocked him saying, he saved others. He cannot save himself. He's the king of Israel. Let him come down now from the cross and we'll believe in him.
He trusts in God. Let God deliver him now if he desires him. For he said, I am the son of God. And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way.
So it was that humanity was set against him. But then we also see that God the Father likewise was against him upon the cross. Where do we see that? Verse 45, now from the sixth hour there was darkness over the land until the ninth hour.
About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice saying, Eli, Eli, Lemma, Sabaklani, which is my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? You see that Jesus was conscious upon the cross as he hung in the place of sinners, substituting himself for what we deserve. He was conscious that he received in himself the wrath of God due to us for our sin. And for a time felt in his heart and his mind deserted forsaken by the heavenly Father.
And then verse 50 he cried out again with a loud voice and gave up his spirit. He died. Why did he die? He was abandoned over to the judgment of God that all who trust in him might never be abandoned over to the just judgment of God, such as the strength of his love for us.
He did it for love. He chose to be condemned for us, crucified for us, cursed for us because he loves us. More than he loved his own life, his own safety, his own peace, his own happiness. So what's most important about your relationship with God, dear friends, is not you, but Jesus.
Not your love for him, but his love for you. Not what you've done for him, but what he did for you. You can't pay the wage of sin that you are owed, which is death, spiritual and eternal death. You can't satisfy divine justice due to you.
You can't free yourself from its grip. But he can't for you. Trust in him and what happened to him happened for you. But notice one final thing.
You can't raise yourself from the grave. I trust you knew that. But he was raised for you that in union with him, you too will be raised. And that's the last thing Jesus tells him in this passage at the end of verse 19.
He the Son of Man will be raised on the third day. What he says he will do, he does. And here's how it happened. Chapter 27 verse 62.
The next day that is after the day of preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered before Pilate. It said, sir, we remember how that imposter said, while he was still alive, after three days I will rise. Therefore, order the tomb to be made secure until the third day lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people he has risen from the dead. And the last fraud will be worse than the first.
And Pilate said to them, you have a guard of soldiers. Go make it as secure as you can. So they went and made the tomb secure by sealing the stone and setting a guard. And so the Jews and the Gentiles here carried out their plan to arrest and condemn and mock and flog and crucify the Son of God.
They did as they pleased. You didn't fulfill him in a prophecy. But now that he's dead, they remember the prophecy of Jesus himself that he would rise from the dead and they seek to thwart it. They seek to stop him.
But he can't be stopped by anyone. What he says he will do, he will do. And so verse 1 of chapter 28 after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb and behold, there was a great earthquake for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came down and rolled away the stone and sat on it. And his appearance was like lightning and his clothing, white as snow.
And for fear of him, the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, do not be afraid for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen as he said. And behold, he's going before you to Galilee and there you will see him.
See, I have told you. So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, greetings. And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshipped him there.
Then Jesus said to them, do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee and there they will see me. So he rose from the dead, alive forevermore. He said he would rise and he did.
Because what he says he will do, he does. So if he says, and he did say it, that he will return for his people, you can bank on it. Do you remember his words in John 14, let not your hearts be troubled? Believe in God, believe also in me and my father's house are many rooms.
If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself that where I am, you also may be. You can count on him. If I all believe in him, he will take you home with him to his father's house.
So how should you and I respond to the love of this Son of Man crucified, dead and risen? Well, what did the disciples do? They fell at his feet and they worshipped him. Why not you?
Let's pray. We bow and worship you, Lord Jesus. Being eternal God did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but you made yourself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant. Being a found in appearance as a man, you humbled yourself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross and therefore God exalted you to the highest place and gave you the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow and tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
O grant our knees to bow, for we need you. Love us like this, Lord Jesus. In your name we pray, amen. Amen.
Let's stand together and sing.