God's Plans vs. Man's: Which Prevails?

Introduction and Review of Mark 14:1-11

0:02 This sermon was preached on Sunday morning, January 15th, 1989, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now let us turn together to the 14th chapter of the Gospel of Mark, Mark chapter 14.

0:28 And will you follow, please, as I read the first two verses. And then we shall turn back to the 26th chapter of Matthew, to read the parallel passage in Matthew's Gospel, which, it will become evident to all of us, is a more expanded account of this incident. Mark 14.

0:55 Now after two days was the feast of the Passover and the unleavened bread. And the chief priests...

1:04 And the scribes sought how they might take him with subtlety and kill him. For they said, not during the feast, lest happily there shall be a tumult of the people. And now Matthew chapter 26, verses 1 through 5.

1:28 Speaking with reference to what we know as the Olivet Discourse, and the following, teaching recorded in Matthew 25, parables concerning the second coming of Christ, Matthew writes, And it came to pass, when Jesus had finished all these words, he said unto his disciples, You know that after two days the Passover comes, and the Son of Man is delivered up to be crucified. Then were gathered together the chief priests, and the elders of the people, unto the court of the high priest who was called Caiaphas. And they took counsel together that they might take Jesus by subtlety and kill him. But they said, not during the feast, lest a tumult arise among the people. Now let us again seek the face of God in prayer, asking God by the Spirit to be our teacher, as we open his word together.

2:44 Our Father, we do thank you for the sweetness of those moments that we spend contemplating the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. And as we come to these chapters in Mark's Gospel, in which all of the lines of the narrative lead to the cross and flow out from the cross, we ask that the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit will be present in unusual and in felt measures of his own ministry, that we may know as never before the heart of the Gospel, Christ died for our sins. O come to us that it may be said of the preaching in this place that Christ crucified was openly preached, and that we may be called to the kingdom of God. And that we may be called to the kingdom of God. And that we may be called to the kingdom of God. And that we may be called to the kingdom of God.

3:44 And that we may be called to the kingdom of God. In his name, amen. Now after an interval of some five months, we return to last Lord's Day morning to our studies in the Gospel of Mark. And as we did, we considered together two major units of thought from this first section of Mark 14, particularly verses, verses 1 through 11.

4:16 First of all, I attempted to set before you a brief review and overall structure of the purpose of the Gospel of Mark. And then I attempted to give an overview of this opening section of chapters 14 and 15, the section bounded by verses 1 through 11. And in that overview, we had occasion to notice the contrasting attitudes and actions with reference to Jesus as embodied in the religious leaders described in verses 1 and 2, in the unnamed woman whose actions are described in verses 3 through 9, and in the treacherous Judas whose betrayal is recorded in verses 10 and 11, or the intention, of his betrayal. And after summarizing these three divergent attitudes and actions regarding the person of Christ himself, I then proceeded to assert that the main burden of this introductory section, I believe, is designed of God to underscore one very central issue. And what is that issue?

God's Purpose vs. Man's Plan: A Central Issue

5:42 It is this. That each of us would see through the glass of this inspired record not only the realities that are there in the text, the actions and intentions of the religious leaders, the action and devotion of the unnamed woman, and then the settled intention of Judas with reference to the betrayal of Christ, but that that very action, that very glass of Scripture through which we look upon these objective facts, would also become a mirror in which we discover ourselves. That we see ourselves in one of the three categories so clearly depicted in this introductory section. We come now this morning to a more careful exposition of verses 1 and 2, verses which one commentator has described as a setting forth of God's counsel versus man's collusion. And I will change that heading and put it in more simple language and call it an account of God's purpose

7:05 versus man's plan and intentions. And as we examine these verses, which form a prologue and an introduction to all that follows, we shall do so under three major headings. First of all, we shall note from the text the precise time of the events to follow. Secondly, the expressed design of the religious leaders.

The Precise Time of Events: 'After Two Days'

7:36 And then thirdly, the central application of these verses to our own hearts. First, first of all then, the precise time of the events to follow. By using a very significant little particle of transition that is found in Mark's Gospel, Mark indicates to his readers that he is taking up a new subject when he writes, now, after two days. We are moving by transition into a new, new focus of concern.

8:16 And the first thing that Mark does by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit is to identify the precise time of the events that will now be the focus of his narrative. We are told that these things begin in a time reference described by these words after, two days was the feast of the Passover and the unleavened bread. Everything that follows then, unless scripture indicates otherwise, took place two days before the passion, sorry, before the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread. Now since such terminology is unfamiliar to many of us, it is necessary for us to pause and to consider precisely what these words mean. When Mark wrote, after two days was the feast of the Passover and the unleavened bread, to what was he making reference? And of all the attempts to give a succinct and accurate explanation that I found in my preparation, none was more helpful than that given

9:43 by Edmund Hebert in his excellent commentary on the Gospel of Mark. And commenting on these very words, he writes as follows. The double designation, the Passover and the unleavened bread is characteristic of Mark and views the chief Jewish festival from its two aspects. The Passover was the solemn annual Jewish observance in commemoration of the passing over of the houses of the Israelites by the death angel in the destruction of the firstborn of Egypt.

10:26 If you've never read the account of this, you will find it in Exodus 12, 1 through Exodus 13 and verse 16. It was celebrated on the fourteenth day of Nisan, which would overlap our months of March and April, the first month of the Jewish religious year, and it continued into the early hours of the fifteenth day. It began on the fourteenth and moved into the early hours of the fifteenth day of Nisan. The Passover lamb was slain on the afternoon of the fourteenth, but was eaten after sundown, which according to Jewish reckoning, was the beginning of the fifteenth day. Those of you who have seen the fiddler on the roof, you'll know a little something of Jewish custom. You remember all the flurry in the household as mother and father are seeking to ready the household for the beginning of the Sabbath, and they were watching the setting of the sun and fearful that preparations would not be made and that poor Tevye might still be out in the barn shoveling hay, and feeding the cows when the Sabbath began. They reckoned the beginning of their day with sundown of that previous evening.

11:51 The Passover observance was immediately followed by the feast of the unleavened bread in commemoration of their exit from Egypt. You'll find this in Exodus 23 and verse 15. And this was celebrated from the fifteenth to the twenty-first day of the month Nisan. Popular usage merged the two feasts and regarded them as one since all leaven was removed from Jewish homes before the slaying of the Passover lamb.

12:24 In keeping with Deuteronomy 16, 5 and 6, the Passover could only be observed in Jerusalem. And in that passage God makes it very plain that there was only one place where the Passover could be celebrated and that was the place where He put His name, which was Jerusalem, the place where the temple was eventually erected. The term the Passover then was used in three senses. In Mark 14 and verse 12 it refers to the Passover lamb.

13:04 And on the first day of unleavened bread when they sacrificed the Passover. So the term there obviously refers to the slaying of the Passover lamb. Sometimes it refers to the feast at which it was eaten. Look at verse 16 of Mark 14.

13:25 And the disciples went forth, came into the city, found as He had said to them, and they made ready the Passover. Not so much focusing upon the Passover lamb, but the Passover feast in a broader sense. And then sometimes it refers to the Paschal festival as a whole. And there is no reference to that in Mark, but you find it in Luke 22 and verse 1.

13:58 Here the Passover festival, as distinct from the feast of unleavened bread, seems to be intended. That is, here in Mark's Gospel, he identifies the two elements. After two days was the Passover and the unleavened bread. But you will notice in verse 12 of the same chapter, and on the first day of unleavened bread, when they had sacrificed the Passover.

14:31 So you see both the distinction and the connection between the two. Now our text says that after two days there would be the sacrificing of the Passover and the beginning of the feast of unleavened bread. Now if the two days are figured according to the usual inclusive Jewish count, the time was Wednesday of the Passover week. But if two whole days are meant, then it was Tuesday evening, the twelfth day of the month Nisan.

15:13 Now because Matthew tells us in the parallel passage that these things occurred after Jesus had finished all of the words recorded in the Olivet Discourse and the subsequent parables, which we know was on Tuesday of the Passion Week, these events, most likely occurred on Tuesday evening. So that gives you, I trust, a little feel of the precise time in which the events recorded here actually took place. Now you say, why in the world be bothered with such details? Why should Mark be concerned to give the precise time of the events to follow? So what? Well I might answer like someone who was a renowned mountain climber responded to the question, why in the world do you bother to climb such a massive mountain like the Matterhorn?

Why the Precise Timing Matters: History and Fulfillment

16:28 And his answer was, because it is there. And with reference to the careful exposition of any portion of the word of God, one asks, why bother to expound it carefully? We could answer, because it is there. And it is part of the mountain of God's revelation, and man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

16:59 But I believe there are reasons that are quite reasonable. And our careful attention to the details of Scripture is not only a matter of religious principle, while it is that. For God says to this man, will I look? Even to him who is of poor and contrite spirit and who trembles at my word.

17:24 We do not sit over the word to judge what is important. We sit under the word with trembling hearts, believing that all that God has, all that God has revealed is worthy of our most careful investigation. But in addition to that fundamentally religious principle that makes us handle the word of God carefully, there are some very clear reasons. First of all, we are reminded again by the fact that in moving into the central issues of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, moving into such matters as his rejection, his suffering, his horrible agony upon the cross, Mark by the Holy Spirit is putting into writing what was first of all preached in all of its details by eyewitnesses of these very events. Now remember in our introductory studies of Mark, many of you were not here at the time, I emphasized that the content of the Gospel records did not first of all confront mankind in printed form. It was years after the substance of what is found in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John

18:53 had been preached as the apostolic tradition, that is the apostolic declaration of the Gospel. It was after these things were preached that they were embalmed in, we would say, printer's ink, in the ink of the scribe's pen. And many of those things were preached just a matter of fifty days after they happened. In Acts chapter 2, in Acts chapter 3, you have the record of Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost.

19:30 Fifty days, sorry, forty days after the resurrection, I'm sorry, fifty days after the crucifixion and resurrection, we have the day of Pentecost, and then Acts 3 records Peter's preaching shortly thereafter, and he makes reference to these very events. He speaks of Jesus being delivered up into the wicked hands of the religious leaders. Now why am I taking the time to underscore that? For this simple reason.

20:01 We are being confronted that we are dealing with real history. Salvation is rooted in matters that happened on specific days within the framework of specific hours, and in conjunction with specific feasts. We do not have a salvation that has its tap roots in the fog of unreality. In the language of Peter, we do not follow cunningly devised fables.

20:39 Our salvation came to us in the stuff of real human events, places and times and circumstances, feasts and rituals well known to the contemporaries of that day. Furthermore, as we shall see, all of the major events, ceremonies and ritual feasts of the nation were divinely established centuries before as pointers to Jesus Christ. And Mark is concerned to isolate and focus upon the specific time of these events, not only to reassure us that the gospel concerning Jesus Christ is embedded in history to change the imagery. It is made of the reinforced steel of historical facts, but also by giving us as the reference points these ancient feasts. He is setting the stage for us to see that all of those ancient feasts are now to their fulfillment in that to which they pointed year after year,

The Expressed Design of the Religious Leaders: Identity, Intention, and Qualification

22:06 decade after decade, century after century. They were fingers pointing forward to Christ, and now the time of fulfillment is at hand. And it is for that reason that the Apostle Paul can pick up in 1 Corinthians the very imagery of the Passover and say in 1 Corinthians 5-7, Christ, Passover, has been crucified for us. Warranting then that we should read into the Passover all of the rich significance of that which God embedded in those foreshadowings of the death of His Son. Now so much then for our attention to the precise time of the events to follow, now notice secondly the expressed design of the religious leaders at that time. Now after two days was the feast of the Passover and the unleavened bread, and the chief priests and the scribes, how they might take him with subtlety and kill him, for they said, not during the feast, lest haply there shall be

23:34 a tumult of the people. Now in opening up the latter part of verse 1 and verse 2 under the heading the expressed design of the religious leaders, note with me these three things, the identity of the leaders, the intention of the leaders, and the qualifications of that intention. The identity of the leaders. When we read in Mark's Gospel the chief priests and the scribes, this is a kind of verbal shorthand to describe that supreme ruling body of the Jews called the Sanhedrin.

24:16 Now it is clear from the parallel passage in Matthew 26 in verse 3 that this is not reading something into the scriptures, for Matthew tells us, then were gathered together the chief priests and the elders of the people unto the cross, the court of the high priest. Chief priests, scribes, and elders were the three categories of those who comprised this supreme governing ruling body in Israel called the Sanhedrin. And it is clear from Matthew 26, 3 that they gathered in the court of Caiaphas, the high priest at that time, indicating, and this is vital, indicating that all of the events to follow will find the priestly element of the Sanhedrin taking a prominent place that hitherto they have not had. One man has gone through and tabulated all of the references to the chief priests prior to Matthew 26 and Mark 14 and all the references after and it is amazing the contrast. Just look into Luke, Mark chapter 14

25:42 in a very cursory way, verse 10. Where does Judas go? He goes unto the chief. He knows that in his purpose to betray Christ, he has his greatest affinity with this element of the Sanhedrin, the chief priests.

26:06 Notice verse 43. And straightway while he yet spake comes Judas, one of the twelve, with him the multitude with swords and staves, from the chief priests, the scribes and the elders, but the chief priests mentioned first. Verse 53. There come together with him all the chief priests.

26:32 Verse 55. Now the chief priests and the whole council. He would have said the whole council, but he singles out the chief priests and then the concentration is upon the high priest. In verse 60.

26:49 In verse 61. Verse 63. Verse 66. High priest, high priest, high priest, high priest.

26:58 We come into chapter 15 and we find chief priest again. Verse 3. The chief priest accused him of many things. Verse 10.

27:08 He perceived that for envy the chief priests had delivered him up, but the chief priests stirred up the multitude. Do you begin to feel the emphasis upon the priests, the priests, the chief priests? And so the identity of the leaders who take the lead is to be understood of the entire Sanhedrin, the priests, the scribes and the elders, but in a unique way the spotlight falls upon the chief priests. Now having looked at the identity of the leaders, now what is their intention?

27:48 Their intention is bound up in three verbal forms. For you Greek students, two finite verbs and one participle. Notice them. After two days was the feast of the Passover and the unleavened bread, and the chief priests and the scribes sought.

28:09 There's our first verb. And it's an imperfect. They were seeking. This was a settled, continued action.

28:20 They were seeking how they might take him. And the word seek embodies within its very essence the ideas of desire, eagerness and concrete effort. Someone comes to you and says I am seeking a given thing. Embodied in that concept is desire, eagerness and effort.

28:45 If you simply say I would like to have, there may be no present desire, there may be no effort. But when someone says I am seeking, it embodies the concepts of desire, eagerness and effort. They were continually seeking. They were continually purposing with a purpose-finding expression in desire, eagerness and concrete steps.

29:13 And what were they seeking to do? That they might take him. That's the participle. That they might take him with subtlety and then our finite verb again and kill him.

29:28 The taking, you see, only had reference to the subsequent action which was to kill him. Their taking is thrown, as it were, into the background of emphasis because the taking was only with a view that having taken him, they might put him to death. Now this idea of killing him was not new to them. It goes all the way back to chapter 3 of Mark's Gospel.

29:58 And in verse 6, And the Pharisees went out and straightway with the Herodians took counsel against him, how they might destroy him. And as we compare the Gospel records we see that this hatred that is of the very essence of murder had been brewing in the hearts of these religious leaders as a conscious intent to kill him for some time. But it came to its most focused expression after Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. And all of the multitudes that were coming into the area of Jerusalem prior to this very Passover feast that Mark describes as beginning in a couple of days, it was the raising of Lazarus from the dead that had brought this murderous intention into a very focused and concentrated and settled determination. Notice in John's Gospel chapter 11 how we are informed of this very fact. This is subsequent to raising Lazarus from the dead and we read in verse 47 The chief priests therefore

31:24 and the Pharisees gathered a council and said What do we? For this man does many signs. If we let him alone all men will believe on him and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation. But a certain one of them Caiaphas being high priest that year said unto them You know nothing at all nor do you take account that it is expedient for you that one man die for the people and that the whole nation perish not.

32:01 Verse 53 So from that day forth they took counsel that they might put him to death. So it was from that day onward subsequent to the resurrection or to the raising of Lazarus from the dead that there is this settled commitment to put Jesus to death and Mark describes the state of their minds in the midst of that settled commitment that now gives birth to a continuous seeking seeking how they apprehend him with a view to killing him. So we have seen the identity of the leaders the intention of the leaders but now notice what Mark tells us in qualifying their intention. Two things are said as a qualification of their deep settled murderous intentions and they underscore that this murderous intention was not an uncontrolled rage it was not a blind irrational fury rather it was calculating it was devious it was devilish and the qualifications pertain to the manner in which they would do their deed

33:28 and the timing. You see that in the text? First of all as to the manner we are told they sought they were continually seeking how they might take him with subtlety. The Greek word Dolos is the standard word translated in our English Bibles Guile.

33:51 The thing Satan used in the tempting of our first parents particularly of our mother Eve. He sought by guile. This is the term used of Nathaniel an Israelite in whom there is no guile with reference to our Lord Jesus who had no guile. What is guile?

34:18 Well guile is deceit and treachery raised to their highest imaginable human heights or I should say sunk to their lowest imaginable human depths. It is venom veiled in velvet. It is poison deliberately hidden in one's favorite candy bar. And they are determined to find a sneaky subtle devil like plan to take him and to kill him.

34:56 Their method must be one of duplicity of deception. Their intention must be veiled behind some other specious reasoning for getting close to him near enough to apprehend him and to kill him. And then notice adds to its timing they plan to do it in a situation of relative secrecy and it's described negatively by Mark. For they said not during the feast lest happily there shall be a tumult of the people.

35:38 Knowing that Jesus was riding at this time the crest of a tremendous resurgence of popularity. Remember what we just read in John? They said the whole nation after him. If we don't do something why the Romans will come and take away our place and our nation.

35:58 So he comes into Jerusalem proclaiming himself as Messiah in the triumphal entry as we saw in our previous studies. The next day goes into the temple and cleanses it. He overthrows all crappings decadent religion and in the court of the Gentiles he stands as a sentinel to make sure that not even someone using the temple court as a shortcut to market will pass through with a grocery bag. They had witnessed this.

36:37 Then with the temple cleared of its animals and its money changers you'll remember he entered in to those white hot intense but short debates with the various representatives of the leaders. They came asking questions seeking to show him up before the people but in each case he cut them off at the ankles then at the knees then at the waist until he was done. They hardly had a stump left. So you get the picture.

37:07 He's riding a crest of popularity. They have been openly shamed by him in the cleansing of the temple in the manner in which he thoroughly exposed their sophistry their ignorance of the scriptures and during this time by the way he also pronounced the horrible scathing contents of Matthew 23 in which he called them what they were and yet they have enough possession of their deep-seated murderous intention to say look whatever we do we cannot do it during this feast time because the multitudes are in a sense turned towards him and if we do that especially with these wild Galileans where he had much of his ministry and the temple precincts in Jerusalem is full of Galileans why if we cause an uproar and a stink among the people the Romans will come and they'll exercise with an iron fist their judgment that we are unstable and even the few liberties we have will be taken from us we must not allow it to happen during the feast time. Now there are a few commentators who say that in those words what they are saying is let's get it done right now before the Passover actually begins and they would say

38:35 that their intention was to take him by subtlety before the two days is up and the Passover feast actually begins but most commentators and I think more responsibly say no, since Jerusalem was already swollen with multitudes of Jews who had come from all places in the Roman Empire as well as devout proselytes since in a sense you didn't start the Passover feast when everyone flew in between three and five o'clock on Passover day it was much of the crowd that entered in on that triumphal entry before and behind our Lord who comprised the multitudes who swelled the ranks of Jerusalem historians differ some say as many as a million and a half may have squeezed into the Jerusalem area at the feast others say half a million others say a quarter of a million but whatever it was great masses were there and they said no we must not do it during the feast and most commentators agree that what they are saying is let us bide our time that we must take him by subtlety that we must apprehend him and kill him is settled

40:02 but we must not do it at this time when all of the multitudes are gathered together and if we do it there will be a tumult among the people and Luke tells us they said this because they feared the people there was this sense not only of the fear of an unruly mob but a fear of the mob's prevailing sentiment for Jesus and they are concerned lest there shall be a tumult and that word tumult is exactly the word used to describe some of those tremendous upheavals caused by the Apostle Paul in his ministry Acts 20 verse 1 and 21-34 and then in Acts 19 you have a graphic description of a tumultuous mob and they said whatever we do we must not do it in that context therefore we'll wade out this crest of this popularity we'll wade to all the sojourners who flocked into Jerusalem have dispersed and gone back to their places of dwelling and then in a more quiet and in a more safe and private setting we will seize him and we will put him to death now I have sought to be honest

The Central Application: God's Purpose Prevails Over Man's Plans

41:28 and as thorough with the text as I believe edification demands we have looked at what the text tells us first of all about the precise time of the events to follow and secondly the settled intention of the religious leaders who they were what they intended to do and the qualifications on their intention now we come thirdly and finally this morning to the question so what what does all of this say to us and as I have meditated for several weeks upon these very verses I've thought on many occasions that we could take as a legitimate strand of application the horrible and morally grotesque picture of these official leaders of Israel plotting murder on the threshold of their most significant religious feast day while the chief priests should have been preparing themselves for their sacred functions praying for the worshipers who've come to remember God's past deliverance out of Egypt and express their longings

42:56 for the future deliverance of Messiah who would deliver them from their greater enemies of sin and of death where are they not gathered in a prayer meeting but huddled in the house of God in Caiaphas in an unofficial meeting of the Sanhedrin and the only parallel that came to my mind was some of those secret meetings of the mafia leaders that some of us had lived long enough to see reported in the news when they gathered in a hideout in the Catskills to plot a hit upon some upright judge who exposed their crimes for what they were and here the company of the chief priests become like a gathering of mafia dons and hitmen now brethren that's what happens to religion when it becomes decadent and the essence of their decadent religion was this they were determined to maintain the bitly man while refusing a view of Jesus forced upon them by the facts of who he was and what he did you've heard it said

44:23 hell hath no fury like a woman spurned that's not true has no like the fury of form betrayed by religious leaders who are determined to have their gowns and their collars and their rituals but who refuse to see Christ for who he really is and who refuse to have any concern that others see him and know him I say that is a fruitful field of application but I pass over it and there are other avenues because there is but one central application in the passage that I want you to leave with this morning and I trust it will ring in your heart and in your spirit and come back again and again as we move through these chapters verse by verse and paragraph by paragraph and that application is this as this passage focuses upon the settled intentions and calculated plans of evil men it is set in direct contrast to the noble holy intentions and plans of God the Father

45:50 and God the Son go back to the parallel passage in Matthew and notice how clearly the contrast is set before us Matthew 26 when Jesus had finished all these words he said unto his disciples you know that after two days the Passover comes now notice how clearly he speaks and the Son of Man is delivered up to be crucified now get the equation two days equals Passover Passover equals deliverance and crucifixion of the Son of Man do you see that in the text look at it two days Passover comes Son of Man is delivered to be crucified in the mind and intention of the Lord Jesus two days Passover Passover deliverance and crucifixion but now look at the contrast as we read on in Matthew very similar to Mark then were gathered together the chief priests of the elders in the court etc. and they took counsel that they might take Jesus by subtlety and kill him but not during the feast

47:19 in other words not during Passover well who's going to have his way Jesus said you know overcomes two days when Passover comes uncrucified there's a meeting going on at the same time in Caiaphas's house Caiaphas's court and one thing is clear in that meeting beyond their settled conviction to kill Jesus and it's this not on the Passover not during either it's beginning it's middle or end one thing we're settled on we're going to kill him but not in conjunction with Passover now whose will is going to prevail Jesus says today Passover delivered and crucified Caiaphas and his henchmen gathered their little hives like an ecclesiast saying we'll but it will be secretly it will be subtlety and not the feast now do you see why one commentator entitled this paragraph God's counsel versus man's collusion

Jesus's Voluntary Obedience and God's Sovereignty

48:45 and I've entitled it God's purpose versus man's collusion versus man's plans and intentions what I want you to see as we enter this section is first of all a central truth with respect to the Lord Jesus and a central truth with respect to God the Father with respect to the Lord Jesus every single thing that follows when we read of him being taken we read of him being apprehended read of him being dragged from the court of the high priest before Herod before Pilate taken out and placed upon a cross again and again we will read of actions described as terminating upon him he is taken he is scourged he is bound he is led he is crucified he is mocked and we could gain an entire entirely as concept that here was God the Son overcome by the murderous wicked intentions of men and yet to manifest the spirit of the Lamb he passively acquiesces to their evil designs

50:11 as in carried away of their in and hatred and murderous designs my friends that would be an entirely wrong understanding of what we read on the very threshold mark and with the added light of Matthew's Gospel we are led to understand that everything that follows is an outworking of the deliberate voluntary obedience of the Son of God to the will of his Father in the language of John 10 he said no man takes my life from me I love you I lay it down and I have power to take it up again oh for some of you who are new Christians and to whom the concept of a world in all of its details that is under the control of God is new what a wonderful way to learn the doctrine of God's sovereignty to learn it with all of the as we consider this amazing truth Peter said it this way he was delivered up

51:36 by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God but you by wicked hands took him and slew him but in the midst of it we must understand he was not passive before men and I say it reverently he was not passive even before his Father when he prayed in the garden not my will but thine be done he did not mean thy will be done upon me but thy will be done and that's why the writer to Hebrews says that he through the eternal spirit offered himself unto God he was never more active than he was in his passion when he bore our sins in his own body to the tree his most passive submission to suffering was his most active submission his active endurance of suffering that he might be both priest and offering offerer and offering and on the very threshold we are led to understand it and you see this is what unlocks the mystery of that strange passage in Mark 10 that we studied some months ago we read in verse 32 and they were on the way

53:05 going up to Jerusalem and Jesus was going before them they would say in runners terms he broke out of the pack there were 13 of them and suddenly the Lord Jesus breaks out of the pack he's going before them and he's doing it with such a look and such a demeanor that it says they were amazed now what was happening he was saying in essence I have a baptism to be baptized with and how am I straightened until it be accomplished after two days comes the Passover and with the coming of the Passover all of the intentions of Jehovah God of the covenant with reference to the Passover lamb and the deliverance from Egypt that pointed to me the lamb of God and the deliverance from sin and wrath and death that which I long to accomplish after two days comes the Passover and the son of man is delivered up and is crucified why? because he wills to be delivered up and to be crucified he is thirsty for your salvation and mine and he says I'm pressured

54:32 until I can accomplish it and we need to understand that with respect to our Lord and these opening verses of Mark 14 highlighted for us in a way that we cannot miss it unless we are willfully blind but then it underscores a marvelous truth with respect to God the Father we've already alluded to it and that is that everything that happens in these coming days as Mark records it will be but an unfolding of God's eternal plan and purpose I ask you to turn to the words I alluded to in a few moments ago in Acts chapter 2 verse 22 Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost you men of Israel hear these words Jesus of Nazareth a man approved of God unto you by mighty works and wonders and signs which God did by him in the midst of you even as you yourselves know see here's a preaching of the very things that Mark contains in his gospel of the mighty signs and wonders of Jesus of Nazareth this stuff was preached before it was ever committed to writing

55:58 him being delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God you by the hand of lawless men did crucify and slay Peter tells them in all the activity in all of the horrible murderous designs and the accomplishment of those designs they were but planting their feet and their hands and their hearts with their evil intention in the tracks laid out by almighty God in the very bosom of eternity that's what he told them and without in any way being stained by the evil murderous designs for that they bear 100% of the responsibility and yet in fully bearing the responsibility being totally active consistent with their natures they were planting their feet and moving their hands at the end of the strings of God's determinate counsel and purpose and foreknowledge and we need to understand that as we approach the whole matter of the suffering the betrayal the agony of Gethsemane the shameful treatment

Application to the Unconverted: Don't Mess with God

57:26 in the sham trial of the Son of God the mystery of the agony of those dark hours when the heavens were shrouded in inky black darkness and the soul of the Son of God plunged into a darkness deeper still that in all of this a sovereign God is working out his plan for the salvation of his people and I say therefore in closing to you who are unconverted don't mess with a God like that if you're going to pick a fight pick a fight with someone with whom you got a fighting chance to come off at least even what would you think of some 137 pound junior welterweight that dared to get into the ring with Mike Tyson you don't have a breathing chance let alone a fighting chance he's a fool my friend don't you mess with God you think you're a match for God a God like this who when he sees them meeting in Caiaphas' house you know what God was doing while they were gathering together like that the Bible tells us what God was doing it's quoted in the fourth chapter of Acts from Psalm 2 when the same crowd got together and tried to squelch the gospel

58:53 you know what God was doing? God was having a belly laugh yes it says the kings and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his anointed and while they're having their secret mafia meeting God's sitting if I may use the picture of Psalm 2 it's picture X language God's looking down at their meeting and God's chuckling he says oh so you're going to frustrate my plans ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha God laughs the surest way to demean your enemy is to laugh at him my friend don't you mess with a God who laughs at all of your intentions to escape his claim who with holy has a belly laugh at all of men's intentions to frustrate his plans we high priests we the Sanhedrin we're in control we'll kill him but on our timetable not during the feast lest a tumult arise and God laughs and says from the time I instituted the Passover I have intended that my son the great Passover should die on Passover day long before he created Adam

60:17 God's great lamb from before the foundation of the world he had marked it out and so when they get together and said we'll set up the calendar for his demise God laughs he said my calendar's got a little more sense my calendar's got a little more seniority than yours my calendar is made of the fabric of eternal decree and divine purpose I will work and who will hinder it I shall do all oh my unconverted friend that's the God of the Bible not this little bitty itty bitty God who's a little amorphous glob of love with glasses thick as coke bottles can't see too well wouldn't hurt a flea my friend that God's an idol the God of the Bible is a consuming fire the God of the Bible is the God of whom scripture speaks and says it's a fearful thing to fall into his hands my friend don't you mess with a God who can frustrate the designs of the great ones of the earth and who has a belly laugh when they attempt to frustrate his plans

61:45 but there's a flip side to that my sinner friend it's that very God that very God who so loved the world of lost humanity as to give his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life that God who can laugh at even kings coming together and the Sanhedrin plotting and planning so futile are their efforts God who could crush us all yet in mercy and longsuffering and grace he has sent his son and in his son has accomplished a salvation perfectly suited to any and every sinner who will have it a salvation adequate for any sinner who will have that salvation by having the Savior oh my unconverted friend all of this is written not for you to go away with a more accurate idea of when Jesus was crucified and how it all fits in to the purposes of the old feasts and all the rest no this is good news concerning Jesus Christ the Son of God who voluntarily went through all

Application to Believers: Take Courage in God's Control

63:11 that is described in chapters 14 and 15 that I might have the privilege of standing here this morning and saying to every boy, girl, man or woman Jesus Christ in all the plenitude of his saving grace and power is yours if you will but have him is yours if you will but have him and you say how can I believing your sins and running to him and throwing the whole weight of your sinful guilty soul upon him and saying Son of David have mercy on me and for you the people of God this final word take courage never did it seem less that God was in control than when we enter these dark chapters you see what we're going to examine is the conspiracy of the religious leaders finding of unusually helpful providence in the betrayal of Judas it seems as though heaven itself

64:38 is conspiring against the Lord Jesus the religious crowd on the outside meeting in Caiaphas' house to plot his death and sitting right at the table at Passover one of the twelve who's already handed him over in his heart what a dark night for our Lord Jesus it seemed as though everything without and even his inner circle is against him but surely he still has the eleven and we'll read on and we'll see how they forsake him but surely he has his father but then he forsakes him and it reaches its frightening depth when he cries My God My God why have you forsaken me you see the tightening of the circle the religious crowd the eleven Judas the eleven and then his father and dear child of God you need to understand that in all of this the father was still upon his throne

66:04 accomplishing his sovereign designs and there may be times when though we dare not in any way parallel any suffering any trial any dark providence through which we pass and make it a one to one equivalent with our Lord Jesus the Bible does speak of the koinonia the fellowship of his sufferings and there will be times when it appears that even God himself is conspiring against you when all the circumstances without and within will seem to say even God has washed his hands of you and my friend as our redemption was accomplished in such a setting sometimes God's deepest work in you to give to Jesus what he died to get from you is being carried on in what the old writers called the dark night of the soul learn from this passage Christian that you are to measure God's commitment to you as we were reminded in the previous hour not by what men are doing to you at any given point not even by what God seems to be doing with you but by his covenant promise I will never leave thee nor forsake you

67:31 that's reality even when his face seems turned his heart is to be read in his word not in your ability to discern his providence and if there's any lesson stamped on the face of this section of the gospel narrative it is that word of comfort for the father had pledged behold my servant whom I uphold and I though it looked as though all the upholding grace of the father was removed in these chapters that we're about to expound he was never more upheld than when he appeared least upheld he was upheld for his most mighty in the semblance of being utterly abandoned in the midst of that work child of God learn the lesson well get beyond reading God's heart by how many cookies and candy bars you find in your top drawer you know what I'm saying

68:57 get beyond trying to read God's heart in how many moles you find in your pocket and candy bars in your top drawer get beyond it Christian when the top drawer is empty or seems to be filled with nothing but that which is bitter and not even unto your own little helping were you to eat it read the heart of God in his word his oath his covenant weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning read the 22nd psalm that begins my God my God why hast thou forsaken me where does it end in the midst of the congregation will I sing thy praise our Lord Jesus is here this morning mingling his praise with ours that's the morning of joy after the night of weeping child of God learn the lesson well and learn from it that as we give ourselves in our generation to see the Lord Jesus have the reward of his sufferings that all for whom he died would be brought to him let us not cower before the modern Sanhedrin's apostate religious leaders

70:25 that are gathering week after week there in Trinidad plotting more and more how to constrict the liberties of our brother Amrush let's not get nervous and bite our nails he that sits in the heavens will laugh he will still get his people in Trinidad let the ecumenical leaders do what they will say what they attempt and actually say in restriction of the liberties what has so-called atheistic communism been able to do by all of its declarations that there is no God and there will be no Christianity well even the most modest reports coming out of China tell us that the church has multiplied so many times over since 1947 that it blows one's mind dear people that's why we don't get turned aside for secondary issues that's why we don't get on isolated political issues that's why we're not found sitting down in front of an abortion clinic in New York giving our energies to a one-issue Christianity something bigger and more noble occupies our vision and it is that King Jesus

71:53 will get his seed not only delivering women from the sin of abortion but delivering polite middle-class idolaters from the curse of their materialism and their idolatry that will take them to hell as much as murder and to see God deliver self-centered people filled with the me-ism and the I-ism of this day and make them so conscious that they have been bought by the price of the blood of Jesus to live no longer to themselves but unto Him that they count it their joy to be like that noble woman in the next paragraph whose devotion was excessive in the eyes of men but perfectly acceptable to the heart of our Lord Jesus so dear people take courage he that sits in the heavens will laugh here are men's plans men's purposes we're going to kill him not on the feast day not publicly God says we'll see who's in control and on Passover day he dies not in secret but openly and publicly outside the city walls so that he is placarded before that nation

73:21 as God's immolated lamb who takes away the sin of the world what a wonderful thing to know that God's in control let us go forth in that confidence to serve him with renewed vigor and confidence for his glory let us pray our Father what can we say when we stand before truths in the presence of which our feeble little minds shrivel and recoil but before which our renewed spirits can worship and adore oh God we praise you that you are God we would have you none other than that which you are we thank you you're the God who laughs that you are so able to frustrate the purposes of men that they do not disturb you enough to even bring a frown upon your brow but you can laugh with holy disdain while you accomplish your own sovereign purposes and fulfill your eternal decrees we worship you we bow we inwardly press our foreheads to the earth

74:44 and cry out from the depths of our being worthy are you oh Lord our God to receive blessing and glory and honor and praise we worship you our Lord Jesus Christ that all that you underwent you underwent deliberately willingly voluntarily freely oh we thank you for all that you bore for us that we might know the blessings of your salvation this day thank you Holy Spirit forever giving us eyes to see and a heart to embrace and to love the Savior revealed in the scriptures send us on our way rejoicing in you great triune God and track down those who think that they can stand against you hear our cry for your glory and our good Amen