Truth from the Tomb

Series on Luke

VI The Invincibility of the Kingdom

H The Tomb

Text: 23:50-56

Introduction

Paul writes to the Corinthian Christians, O death where is your sting, O death where is your victory. This is good news from the grave. What makes it so good is that no matter how different our experience in life and no matter how varied our troubles, we all meet at the same place in the end. Young people think about it too little; old people may think about it too much. Regardless of what we think about it death always confronts us with astonishment and disbelief. The reason is that when the spirit has departed either to be with Christ or to be lost forever, the lifeless form that remains is part of us. We are created body and spirit and we are not hiding inside these bodies. They are a uniquely created part of our personality, and when they turn to dust it is a violation of our person. Objectively it matters little whether we are consumed by lions, or buried at sea, or burned in a fire, or cremated or buried in a coffin. Subjectively when we have the responsibility of making that decision it may matter very much. Our passage is about the treatment of Jesus body, which according to our text was implemented in traditional ways. Now there was a man named Joseph, a member of the Council, a good and upright man, who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea and he was waiting for the kingdom of God. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body. Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth and placed it in a tomb cut in the rock, one in which no one had yet been laid. It was Preparation Day, and the Sabbath was about to begin. The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment. I always tell people to follow their own preferences in this because how they honor the remains of their loved ones is important to them. i remember a lady who wanted her husband’s grave moved. i explained to her that it would make no difference, the body would turn to dust and be raised at the last day by Jesus. She understood perfectly with her mind, but emotionally she couldn’t deal with it. So he was moved. That was all right, but nothing can change the fact that unless we live until the return of Christ, we must all see the end of a part of us in the dust of the earth. So what can we learn about this from the account of Christ’s burial; truth from the tomb.

I The Provision of the Grave

God has provided through Joseph of Arimathea, assisted by Nicodemus, a burial place for His Son. These were rulers of the Jews, members of the Sanhedrin who while they did not consent to Jesus death never fully confessed Him while he was alive. Now with newfound courage they claim His body, and thus his friends give Him what He cannot give himself. All of our funerals are like that. In fact we call a graveside service a committal. Have you ever wondered why it is so called? It is an act of faith. we are committing our loved one’s body into God’s care. During their lives they committed themselves to Christ, but now they can no longer commit, so we do it for them, in sure and certain hope of their resurrection. The apostle John reminds us that Jesus escaped the common fate of the crucified whose bones were broken to hasten their death. When they found Jesus was already dead because He voluntarily committed his spirit to the father, they thrust a spear into his side instead. The significance of this is beautifully explained by David in Psalm 34, A righteous man may have many troubles but the Lord delivers him from them all. He protects all his bones, not one of them is broken. This means that no matter what happens to us, ultimately God preserves us. The intact bones are a symbol of final preservation. So it is for them and for us as we say goodbye to the physical part of our loved ones.

II The Perversion of the Grave

But at least in one respect there is a difference in our Lord’s circumstance. While we stand by, in hope, to carry on for our loved ones after the dissolution of death and after the spirit has departed, Jesus was denied this tribute at the moment of His death. In his death He is utterly alone. The very people who bury him do not fully understand who he was and others have deserted. These are the people who later said on the road to Emmaus, We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel but it’s the third day and the body’s gone. The tomb is empty. In their ignorance they do not see the significance of this fact. To them this is no more than the final indignity. We eulogize our loved ones but there is none to speak well of Jesus. There is love, but no understanding. For them, hope ends in this tomb exactly where it should begin, and because Jesus dies unknown this is the ultimate humiliation. The glory of God that shines brightly in the tiniest atom of creation is in this act of interment reduced to nothing. But because He endures this humiliation we may stand at the graves of our loved ones and know that they are sons of God who live forever.

III The Pollution of the Grave

Once i was called in the middle of the night to a family where a young mother had just died. Her body still lay on her death bed. Her husband and children lovingly touched her. It was appropriate because that was part of her person, but we need to understand that death means pollution. We bury people because of the pollution, and it is not just physical. In the Old Testament contact with a dead body disqualified a person from society and worship until they were cleansed. The pollution of physical death was a symbol of the consequences of sin. So the friends of Jesus must hurry to bury him before the sabbath. Normally the Romans would have casually disposed of the body but because the friends are tending to it they must hurry. This is why the women went home and prepared spices and perfumes and then rested on the sabbath to return on Sunday morning, the day after the Jewish sabbath, to take care of the body. Now the Bible says the body of Jesus did not see corruption, He rose from the dead. But corruption was what they expected. These are the people who come to the tomb and finding the stone rolled away think that the body has been stolen. In other words Jesus joins us in the grave with all the normal expectation of decay. The Prince of Life is truly dead. They gather round the pale and lifeless body with the same dismay we experience at death. But if He is not dead He cannot rise and say, I am he who was dead and am alive forever more and i have the keys of death and hell.

IV The Promise of the Grave

Where would we be if Jesus had not been buried? the Heidelberg Catechism asks, “What is your only comfort in life and death?” And the answer is, “That i with body and soul both in life and death am not my own but belong to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ, who with His precious blood has fully satisfied for all my sins and delivered me from all the power of the devil.” Listen to all the great confessions of Christendom. The Apostle’s Creed, the Nicene Creed. They say, He died and was buried, or He suffered and was buried. They mention his burial because it is a vital part of gospel history. The Bible says that when men mock God He laughs. The applause of heaven and the laughter of God is heard also in the tomb they sealed. Remember Paul giving expression to that in the triumphant cry “Death where is your victory, death where is your sting?” Only the blood-bought, born again, child of God can stand before his own grave and mock it because if there is no death there is no burial, and if there is no burial there is no resurrection and if there is no resurrection there is no hope. But, Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.