PT-8 "The Ignorant Wicked" (Matt. 27:27-37)

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/10/2024 9:08 AM

 

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus: PT-8 “The Ignorant Wicked”

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                              Reference:  Matthew 27:27-37

 

            Message of the verses:  “27 Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole Roman cohort around Him. 28 They stripped Him and put a scarlet robe on Him. 29 And after twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on His head, and a reed in His right hand; and they knelt down before Him and mocked Him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!" 30 They spat on Him, and took the reed and began to beat Him on the head. 31 After they had mocked Him, they took the scarlet robe off Him and put His own garments back on Him, and led Him away to crucify Him.

 

            “32 As they were coming out, they found a man of Cyrene named Simon, whom they pressed into service to bear His cross.

  

             “33 And when they came to a place called Golgotha, which means Place of a Skull, 34 they gave Him wine to drink mixed with gall; and after tasting it, He was unwilling to drink. 35 And when they had crucified Him, they divided up His garments among themselves by casting lots. 36 And sitting down, they began to keep watch over Him there. 37 And above His head they put up the charge against Him which read, "THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.’”

 

            I continue quoting from John MacArthur’s commentary as he now quotes from Dr. Truman Davis as he gives and additional description of Jesus’ crucifixion:

 

            “At this point another phenomenon occurs.  As the arms fatigue, great waves of camps sweep over the muscles knotting them in deep, relentless, throbbing pain.  With these cramps comes the inability to push Himself upward.  Hanging by His arms, the pectoral muscles are paralyzed and the intercostals muscles are unable to act. Air can be drawn into the lungs but cannot be exhaled.  Jesus fights to raise Himself in order to get even one short breath.  Finally, carbon dioxide builds up in the lungs and in the blood stream and the cramps partially subside.  Spasmodically He is able to push Himself upward to exhale and bring in the life-giving oxygen.

            “Hours of this limitless pain, cycles of twisting, joint-rending cramps, intermittent partial asphyxiation, searing pain as tissue is torn from His lacerated back as He moves up and down against the rough timber; then another agony begins.  A deep crushing pain in the chest as the pericardium slowly fills with serum and begins to compress the heart.

            “It is now almost over…the compressed heart is struggling to pump heavy, think, sluggish blood into the tissues.  The tortured lungs are making a frantic effort to gasp in small gulps of air. (‘The Crucifixion of Jesus; The passion of Christ from a Medical Point of View,’ Arizona Medicine, vol. 22, Mar. 1965, pp. 183-187)

                        Now I am coming close to the end of this section from MacArthur’s commentary and it would be my hope to finish this in tomorrow’s SD, but I will see.

 

            MacArthur goes on “It was not Matthew’s purpose, however to focus on the physical particulars of the crucifixion that led to Christ’s yielding up His life, but rather on the character of the crucifiers.

 

            “Through all of that torment the callous soldiers sat impassively, as they had done many times before.  They had no idea who Jesus was, except for what was written on the sign above His head as a sarcastic taunt by Pilate.  They doubtlessly were aware that Pilate, governor of the region and their military commander, had repeatedly declared Jesus innocent of any crime against Rome.  But Jesus was probably not the first innocent man they had seen executed.  They had no religious concern about Jesus’ identity and no moral concern about His innocence.  Out of their wicked ignorance they, too, eventually joined in mocking Jesus saying, ‘If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself!’ (Luke 23:36-37).

 

            Jesus had  repeatedly told the disciples of His coming suffering, scorn, and death, and it had been predicted by Isaiah and other prophets hundreds of years before that.  The Messiah would be ‘despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief and like one from whom men hide their face, He was despised, and we did not esteem Him’ (Isa. 53:3).   Not only was He to suffer unjustly at the hands of wicked men but He endured that affliction for the very sake of those responsible for it—which, in the fullest sense, includes every fallen, sinful human being who has ever lived and who will ever life.  ‘He was pierced through for our transgressions,’ Isaiah goes on to say, ‘He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed….The Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him’ (vv. 5-6).

 

            “Christians in the early church are reported to have begged God’s forgiveness for the unknown sufferings they caused Jesus, realizing the could not conceive of the full extent of the pain He endured at men’s hands, a pain to which they knew their own sins had contributed.

 

            “The King James Version of verse 35 contains the additional words ‘that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots.’’  The oldest known manuscripts of Matthew, however, do not include those words, suggesting that some well-intentioned scribe added to Matthew’s gospel the prediction from Psalm 22:18 that is quoted in John 19:24).

 

8/10/2024 9:22 AM