Sermon 04062012 Good Friday

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer.  AMEN.

Let us pray, Lord Jesus Christ, just as our altar is stripped and bare, You hang naked on the Cross in order to bear our sins.  May we bear our souls and feel Your love surround us as we look to the Cross.  For You bore our sins and died this Good Friday in order to set all of us saints gathered here at Emmanuel free from our sins.  Thank You for this gift of eternal life through Your death.  AMEN.

From our text this evening, we hear how Jesus Christ our suffering servant bears the sins of many.  Here from Isaiah:

¹² Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, And He will divide the booty with the strong; Because He poured out Himself to death, And was numbered with the transgressors;
Yet He Himself bore the sin of many, And interceded for the transgressors.

Tonight we gather around an altar that is bare.  Tonight we see the black of the cloth draped on the Cross.  Tonight we mourn because we know what happened on Good Friday.  Jesus Christ in the last 24 hours has been stripped of all humanity.  He was taken by force from the Garden, beaten in the Jewish courts and now as He hung on the Cross at Golgotha, He is naked for all to see.  Jesus Christ humanity is revealed for all to see.  People revile Jesus Christ, taunt Him and He is there to bear every insult every burden everything and anything anyone can dish out upon Him.

For Jesus Christ was nailed to the Cross.  Jesus Christ endured the nails through His hands and feet.  The Roman soldiers not known for being gentle forced the nails through His flesh with blow after blow.  Jesus Christ blood flowed from the wounds of the nails.  And now the full weight of Jesus Christ body hung from the nails through His flesh.  But it was more than just Jesus Christ weight.  Jesus Christ in being nailed to the Cross was held there by the sins we commit.  Jesus Christ chose to stay on the Cross, pinned by our sins and the sins of the entire world.  Jesus Christ chose this for a divine purpose.

Jesus Christ fulfilled the divine purpose of setting us free from our sins.  For Jesus Christ bore our sins and died for all of mankind.  Jesus Christ fulfilled the divine plan of salvation in His death on the Cross for You and for me.  Tonight is difficult for us, unlike the disciples who saw their teacher hang from the Cross, dead and never expected to see again, we know a different truth.  We know Jesus Christ has fulfilled the plan of salvation.  We have been grafted into the promise of forgiveness and eternal life through Jesus Christ life, death and resurrection.  For the plan of our salvation began its fulfillment in the Garden of Eden, was seen in the betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane and now is fulfilled on Golgotha for You and for me and all of us saints gathered here at Emmanuel this evening.  AMEN.