The Crucifixion

good morning and welcome to Midweek

Insights This is Pastor John from and

I'd like to welcome you here today Today

we're going to talk about the

crucifixion Um this is Holy Week This is

the week everybody celebrates the death

burial and resurrection of Christ And

today I want to focus in on something

that's in John 19:31

And we need to look at it if we're going

to truly understand a few things in

verse

31 This is as Jesus dies on the cross It

says "The Jews therefore because it was

the preparation that the body should not

remain upon the cross on the Sabbath day

for that Sabbath day was an high day

besought Pilate that their legs might be

broken that they might be taken away."

And there's there's a lot of confusion

out there

uh because of that statement And to

understand what that high Sabbath was or

what that special Sabbath day was

according to Jewish law every seven

years they had a a special Sabbath day

And at that time during the Passover

anybody who had who owed a

debt or had become a uh indentured

servant was supposed to be

released Uh their debt cleared away and

they were anything that they had given

in collateral for the loans or for their

indentured servitude was to be restored

to them And if you think about what

Jesus did on the cross it makes complete

sense It totally correlates But this

special Sabbath

day is important to understand because

when we're

looking to completely understand what

they're saying and all four gospels

correlate this that Jesus was crucified

on the preparation of the Sabbath They

had already had the Passover meal which

is on the 14th of Nissan the night

before So when Jesus is crucified they

have to get him off the cross before

sundown to be in compliance with the law

And it says it was a preparation day for

the next day was a was a special Sabbath

So the normal Sabbath according to the

law starts on Friday night at 6

PM and it runs to Saturday night at 6:00

p.m

So we have to take a look at this and

understand that Jesus rose from the

dead on Sunday on the first day of the

week And that understanding this to

understand that is the Jewish day is

divided between the night and the day

and the night comes first and then the

day So if Jesus rose on the first day of

the week he

rose

between 6:00 p.m on Saturday night and

6:00 a.m on Sunday morning And it tells

you that when Mary and the other Mary

Mary Magdalene and the other Mary when

the women came to the tomb it was still

dark outside on the first day of the

week which meant he rose from the dead

between 6:00 a.m uh 6:00 p.m on Saturday

night and 6:00 a.m on Sunday

morning And so as we're trying to figure

this out we have to go we have to count

backwards

So if he rose on the first day of the

week and he fulfilled scripture by being

in the tomb three days and three nights

we come back He was he was in the tomb

on the Sabbath which starts Friday night

at

6 He was in the tomb the day before that

Sabbath

And then he was in the tomb the day

before that which was the high

Sabbath which means that he was placed

in the tomb before

dusk the day before So if we count it

back so we have we have he rose from the

dead sometime between 6:00 p.m and 6:00

a.m Saturday night 6:00 p.m Saturday

6:00 a.m Sunday morning

So we count back from that point three

days and three nights So he because he

went into the

tomb before that Sabbath started So we

count

backwards So we go back to Friday that's

one day Thursday that's Tuesday

Wednesday evening 6:00 p.m Wednesday

evening is when he's placed in the tomb

So he's crucified on

Wednesday We celebrated on Good Friday

uh which is a tradition that happened

uh over the

years But if you look into John's gospel

and you look into the other gospels you

can see he had the Passover meal and

then the very the very next

day is the preparation for the Sabbath

And this is a high Sabbath This is a

special Sabbath It falls on either one

of those seven-year

cycles where all debts are forgiven and

all indentured servants are released or

it falls during a jubilee year which

comes around every 50 years where

everything's reset and they start over

on that Jubilee year So it's either a

seven-year cycle or it's on a jubilee

year And both of those involve the same

thing There are extra Sabbath days added

into that week So in that week of

Jesus's cru crucifixion there are two

Sabbaths celebrated The special high

Sabbath and the regular Sabbath And then

Jesus raises from the dead after the

regular Sabbath is completed And I

wanted to share this with you because I

want you to to really understand this

because it had to the cru the

crucifixion had to happen on one of

those cycles It either happened had to

happen on a 7-year cycle or it had to

happen in a jubilee year or it wouldn't

have been a special Sabbath that year

And so and it ties in uh directly with

what Jesus accomplish accomplished on

the cross He died for our sins that

we're our sins would be forgiven our

debt would be

paid and we would be

released from the curse of sin

And so as you go through and you look at

this if you really open yourself up to

understanding of exactly what's going on

in this one particular week this high

Sabbath week we

understand how the progression of time

goes to be able to

look at when Jesus rose from the dead

And we have to count back three days and

three nights to find out when he

actually went into the tomb And the the

math only works if he was crucified on

Wednesday during the day and he was

placed in the tomb before

dusk on what we would call Wednesday

night but is actually for the Jewish

people it's

Thursday So I want you to keep that in

mind this week It could

be I I'm not saying

that that your salvation hangs on this

uh information What I am saying is this

though If

we're Oh crap