Opening congregational hymn - #385 - Near the Cross
Welcome and thank you for your time in being here this evening to pay your respects and to show your love for someone whom we loved so dearly. We gather this evening to celebrate the life and accomplishments of Jesus Christ our Lord.
He is preceded in death by His step-father, Joseph and His cousin John the Baptist.
What a story Jesus has. Shortly before Jesus was born, the Roman emperor Caesar Augustus decided that a census be taken throughout the Roman Empire, including the land of Israel. People were required to return to their ancestral homes for registration. For Joseph and Mary, that meant leaving Nazareth, which is a town in the northern district of Galilee, and traveling to Bethlehem, which is in the southern region called Judah or Judea. His parents were not rich by any means.
In fact, on the night that Jesus was born, his parents found that all the hotels and motels were booked and they literally didn’t have a place to stay the night. But His mom was in labor. Someone offered them the use of a stable where they could at least get out of the weather for the baby to be born.
Jesus was born on December 25, 00 in Bethlehem.
His life started off in chaos. You see, at that time, the King was Herod and he was a very jealous man. He had heard from some astrologers that Bethlehem was where the new-born King was born. King Herod made a decree that all the babies from 2 years old and under were to be killed because he felt his throne was being threatened.
To protect his step-son from any harm, Joseph took the baby and the baby’s mother and moved to Egypt for a while. After a time, King Herod died and Joseph moved back to what became Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth. Jesus grew up in Nazareth. He was an active little boy but learned the skill of carpentry since his step-dad was a carpenter.
One time, when Jesus was 12 years old he and his mother Mary and stepfather Joseph traveled to Jerusalem to celebrate the annual Feast of the Passover. When the feast had ended, Mary and Joseph got separated from Jesus and they searched for him. Jesus had gone to the church and was talking to the people there. Jesus was a very smart child. He knew things that only the scholars of that day knew. But, none the less, Jesus got in trouble and was told to stick close to the family as they traveled and to never wander off like that again.
As Jesus grew older, He felt a calling to the ministry. He felt without a doubt that God was leading Him to have a ministry and to try to draw people closer to God by preaching to them and performing what was called miracles.
Jesus was about 30 years old when he began his ministry. He had left the district of Galilee, which included the town of Nazareth, where he grew up, and had traveled to the wilderness of the Jordan River to be baptized. There, His cousin John the Baptist drew crowds as he preached and baptized.
For some reason, Jesus felt the need that He, too, needed to be baptized. I’m not sure at the time that Jesus knew what an example He was setting for any future followers to be obedient to God’s pull on their life and following that example.
As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment, the strangest thing happened and was witnessed by many—heaven was opened, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." - Matthew 3:16-17 Everyone there heard that voice and saw that dove-like being.
After he was baptized, Jesus went into the desert and fasted for 40 days. Satan used this time to tempt Jesus. We are told the story that as Jesus fasted, He was tempted by the devil. During the temptations, Satan used the supernatural to find Jesus in the desert, then to transport Jesus to the top of the Temple in Jerusalem, and then to take Jesus to a high mountain. With each successive temptation, the loftiness of what Satan offered increased, as does the height from which he made the offer.
Each time, Jesus resisted the temptation and quoted scripture to rebuke Satan. Yes, Jesus walked the walk of a good and righteous person. After he had fasted for 40 days, His call to the ministry officially began.
The story is told of Jesus’ first public miracle. Jesus and some of His friends went to Cana, a town in the district of Galilee, to attend a wedding party. His mother, Mary, also attended. The host of the wedding party didn’t have enough wine for everyone and this was considered a very embarrassing situation. Mary intervened on behalf of the wedding host and told Jesus about the problem. Jesus then miraculously changed six barrels of water into wine for the wedding party. No doubt, he was the most popular person at that party.
Of all the miracles that Jesus performed, this one might seem minor. But it did accomplish important things. It shows that Jesus had concern for people's problems, even if they are not major problems. And it showed Jesus' friends that He was able to perform miracles.
Jesus was such a renowned young man that many of His miracles He performed were written down and published in a book that we call the Bible today. There are 34 miracles that Jesus performed that were recorded in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. But all told there may have been thousands, as sometimes when surrounded by a large group of people, I was told that Jesus ". . healed them all." These 34 miracles are a sampling of what he did and the compassion he felt for people. Everything from raising the dead, controlling nature, healing the sick, casting out demons, and providing enough food from a few baskets of bread and fish to feed thousands.
What a compassionate person Jesus was. We would do well to learn from His example. And preach, this guy could preach. Some of what he preached in one of His sermons went something like this:
"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
He always said that his purpose was to fulfill the law and the prophets, at the same time claiming the authority to speak in a way that went beyond the law. His intent was to move away from a law intended to be enforced by judicial authorities and to move people more toward focusing on their own heart and life. He dealt with difficult topics of anger, adultery and covetousness, retaliation, and resisting evil. Preachers today could learn a lot from this guy.
One time, Jesus went to the holy city of Jerusalem. When he arrived, he saw that many people were selling animals and exchanging money in the Temple courts. This made Jesus mad because the Temple was intended to be a place to worship God, not a place for commerce. Jesus made a whip out of some strands of rope and He actually chased the merchants out of the holy Temple. That was a sight to behold. But He meant business. Someone said that they heard Jesus say to them: "How dare you turn my Father's house into a market!" Yes, He was a man of conviction. He wasn’t ashamed to stand up for what He thought was right.
WOW! The stories I can tell of this guy. One time, Jesus explained to a man named Nicodemus what a person must do to have salvation and eternal life. Jesus said something to him that you might have heard mentioned before. He said: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
That’s a unique thing about Jesus. He was always referring to Himself as the Son of God. But I think, in that, that He was wanting all of us to realize that as a Christian, we are all sons of God.
During the early part of Jesus' ministry, he went to the district of Galilee, where Jews and many Gentiles (non-Jews) lived. Jesus preached and performed a lot of miracles there. He became a beacon for many as he shed light on the word of God.
That’s one thing that can be said with surety of Jesus, He knew His Bible.
Jesus went to a synagogue (a Jewish place of worship) in Nazareth and read from the scroll of Isaiah to the people gathered there: Then, Jesus announced that he was the Messiah that Isaiah spoke of. That’s where His troubles began. Shortly after Jesus announced that he was the Messiah, the people at the synagogue in Nazareth rejected him as the Messiah. All of these uprisings are what eventually led to Jesus passing away. I’ll get to that in a moment.
One of the most important things that Jesus did was when He explained that God is his father. Jesus also explained that all who believed His words would have eternal life: I hope I can do justice to how Jesus said it. It went something like this; “. . . the Father judges no one, but has entrusted all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father, who sent him. I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. (John 5:22-24 NIV). I’m not sure everyone understood what Jesus was saying at the time but I think we are understanding that even more today.
Jesus had some good friends that stuck close by his side through MOST, not all, but MOST, of His ministry. The people referred to them as his apostles, or disciples. But Jesus gave some of his friends the ability to heal people of their diseases and illnesses. Jesus did this after going up a mountain and spending the night in prayer to God the Father. As I said, these friends became known as the twelve Apostles. You might recognize some of them. So He is survived by:
1. Peter, also known as Simon Peter.
2. Andrew, brother of Peter.
3. James, son of Zebedee. Actually a cousin of Jesus.
4. John, brother of James. Another cousin of Jesus.
5. Philip.
6. Bartholomew.
7. Thomas.
8. Matthew, the former tax collector.
9. James, son of Alphaeus.
10. Thaddaeus, Judas the son of James.
11. Simon the Zealot.
12. Judas Iscariot, (actually he preceded Jesus in death) who unfortunately cut ties with Jesus before Jesus passed away. In fact, the story is told that Judas actually had a part in Jesus’ passing.
Jesus even came up with His own prayer as a model for us all to follow as a pattern when we pray. So many have memorized that prayer. It was during one of His most famous sermons, I believe it’s now referred to as the Sermon on the Mount.
During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus talks about praying to God:
But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.”
"This, then, is how you should pray:
"Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
10 Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
I’m not sure many of us even realize how much this Godly Man taught us. Even I am reminded as I wrote some of these things down. He taught forgiveness. He taught us reconciliation. He modeled a sinless life. All in the hope of us doing our best to pattern our lives after His.
When a group of religious leaders saw that Jesus had the power to cast out evil spirits from people, they accused Jesus of getting His power from the devil. Jesus, who was filled with the Holy Spirit, rebuked them and explained that only good can come from good, and only evil can come from evil. He healed the sick. He caused the blind to see once again. He healed the deaf. He strengthened the lame to walk again. He somehow brought life back to those who had died, more than once. He even seemed to be able to control the weather—calming a storm. He fed thousands of people more than once with just a few morsels of bread and fish. Why, He even walked on water once. How He did that I’ll never know, but His 12 friends all testified to that fact.
Anyway, there are so many stories that I can’t even scratch the surface tonight. One of His disciples, John, even said that Jesus did so many things, that if they were written down in detail, even the world itself wouldn’t be big enough to hold all the books.
But oh, how things have changed. Just last Sunday we witnessed Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey in some sort of parade. Everyone was pretty sure that He was the promised Messiah that they had read about in the old scrolls. And even as recently as this past week, Jesus still taught us a lot. Even when the religious leaders were constantly trying to pin something on Him to have Him arrested, He avoided it all and taught some important lessons.
- About paying taxes.
- About how valuable our offering is, not because of the amount, but because of the heart that gives it.
- But I think the most important lesson of all that He taught us was to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul. And that we are to love one another in the process.
What a lesson that is?
But, as I said, things took a turn for the worse this week. But what is kind of strange is that Jesus told us that He felt His death was coming soon. He even predicted how His life would end. And that, my friends, leads us to rest of the story. Let me tell that story with the illustration of these candles.
Light the one white candle. Dim the lights. This one white candle represents our friend Jesus and the love He has for us. I’ll explain the other candles in a moment.
During the Passover celebration, Jesus gathered with his 12 friends. He knew that this would be the final meal that he would share with his friends before His crucifixion. It was at this time that Jesus instituted what is now known in many Christian churches as "communion." It is also called "the Last Supper" or "the Lord's Supper." Our friend Jesus started that.
In memory of His last meal, we are going to partake in a silent Lord’s Supper. Why silent? Simply to give each one here a time of silence and solitude to reflect inwardly on your motives, and to reflect outwardly on what Jesus did for us. Let me explain how it will be done.
As we begin, I will come to the table and receive the elements. Then I will, by hand gesture, invite you to do the same and sit down. At any time, following my lead, whenever you are ready, you may come to the table and take the bread and the cup, return to your seat, and then it’s up to you. There will be no words spoken and the bread and cup will not be served to you.
What I would like for you to do to receive the full experience, is to sit down with the bread and the cup, focus on the light of the candle, (representing Jesus Christ), sit in complete silence and remember what Jesus has done for you. Then when you’re ready, at any time, you can take the bread and the cup. After everyone has taken the elements, we will continue. So, let’s pause for a moment and partake.
Light the other candles. Each of these candles represents the final steps that led up to our friend being killed. These candles represent the light of Jesus’ ministry. Oh, how brightly His light shone on us as we witnessed the wonders of His teachings and His miracles.
I don’t know if someone squealed on Judas or what happened, but somehow Jesus knew that Judas was plotting to have Him arrested. Even during that meal, Jesus leaned over to Judas and plainly told him to go on and do what he was going to do. I wonder what was going on in Judas’ mind at that point. How did He know? I don’t know how He knew, but He did indeed know and that marks the first step towards Jesus’ death. (Put out one candle)
After the supper, Jesus and his followers had entered the Garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives. His friends were sleeping for the night when a crowd of Roman soldiers and Jewish officials showed up to arrest Jesus. Then, out of the darkness, Judas walks up and kisses Jesus on the cheek. Little did we know then that was the signal of which person would be arrested.
Remember when Peter grabbed a sword and cut off that guy’s ear? That was pretty intense. But Jesus scolded Peter for doing that: "Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword." And then, with all that going on, Jesus healed the injured man's ear and then allowed Himself to be arrested and led away. That’s amazing and yet another step towards Jesus’ death. (Put out candle 2)
And we all know that Jesus didn’t get a fair trial. In fact, it was more of a mock trial. Here’s something that you may not know but I heard that in that mock trial, Jesus was falsely accused of being an anti-government rebel. He is slapped during that process, His beard was pulled, they even spit at Him. What kind of treatment is that when our friend only portrayed good throughout His entire life? But, non-the less, they passed Him around to the leading authorities and we see now that this is just another step towards His death. (Put out candle 3)
He appears before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of the land of the Jews. Pilate passes Jesus over to King Herod who then sends Him back to Pilate. Neither of these rulers found any fault in our friend. Why didn’t it just stop right there? But Pilate, to please the religious rulers, allows them to vote and they chose that murderer Barabas to be released and our friend to be punished. So, Pilate has our friend whipped to almost the point of death. At that point, Pilate turns Jesus over to the people to be crucified.
Oh, what humiliation Jesus went through before being led to the cross. They stripped Him naked and put a scarlet robe on Him in humiliation. Then one of them twisted together this vicious wreath of thorn branches and shoved it down on His head and those long thorns made His head bleed. They put a staff in His hand and knelt before Him mocking Him as a king. Then they took the robe off of Him, leaving Him naked, then He was given a cross to carry and they led Him through the main streets of Jerusalem. What did our friend do to deserve all this? Nothing that I know of. Yet one more step towards His death. (Put out candle 4) (Play Via Dolorosa Video)
Once at Calvary, He was nailed to the cross, through his wrists and feet. The cross was raised and Jesus was left to die. Many people had gathered to watch. Some mocked Jesus even as he was dying. Others mourned for him. I’ll never forget what He said amongst all this humiliation. "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." That tells us what kind of a man He was. He still forgave everyone who was involved. (Put out candle 5)
I don’t think any of us will ever forget what happened this afternoon. Jesus cried out to God and asked why God had forsaken Him. I can’t answer that question. God is God and things happen because they are in God’s plan. Who are we to question that? In it all, it was yet another step towards His death. (Put out candle 6)
Jesus finally couldn’t take any more of the agony and suffering. I don’t how He lasted as long as He did. But He finally had enough. He lifted His head and in case you didn’t hear what He said, he cried out, “It is finished.”
That’s the last thing I heard Jesus say. “IT IS FINISHED.” And then He died. (Put out the last white candle).
I don’t know if He was talking about His physical body, His spirit, the agony, the torture, the mocking, the rebellious attitudes or what when He said It Is Finished. I wonder though if He might have even been talking about death being finished.
Whatever the case, we all know that our friend is gone. Jesus passed away today at about 3 o’clock at the age of 33.
We mourn today. Will we ever meet another man like Jesus? I don’t know. But I am glad He counted me as His friend. We’ll miss you Jesus. I pray that we can follow the example that You set for us. Good bye our friend. This concludes our service for this evening. Thank you for coming.
The congregation exits solemnly, quietly, reflecting on our loss. AT LEAST FOR NOW!
