Christ Our Mediator | Pastor Cody Harlow June 22nd, 2025 Mark 15:33–41

At the 9th hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice Elilabakani which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" And some of the bystanders hearing it said, "Behold, he is calling Elijah." And someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine and put it on a reed and gave it to him to drink, saying, "Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come down to take him to take him down." And Jesus uttered a loud cry and breathed his last. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion who stood facing him saw that in this way he breathed his last he

Said truly this man was the son of God. There were also on from a distance among James the younger and of Joseph's and Salom. When he was in Galilee they followed him and ministered to him. There were also many other women who came up with him to Jerusalem. Let's pray. Lord, we do thank you for this time that we have together gather to with each other to Virginia. We thank you for the joy of our salvation where we get to work you and delight in who you are. You are just worthy of our full attention and our affection and our we feel so at that. And so we give you all the honor that you deserve. And so we plead for your mercy. And we are for And Lord, we just Lord, thank you for what you're doing. And brother Steve Warren thank you for his good surgery on Wednesday. We thank you that didn't take as long as they thought it would and that the doctors, they don't think that he'll need chemo. U so we just we miss him apart from our flock with this cancer and we just love him so much. Continue to work in him and thank you for his wife Cindy. We thank you Lord for little Samuel birth just and we thank you that the fathers have a new little one in our church and we ask that you would continue to him improve. Thank you for helping him get to breathing indep Thank you that they too. And we pray for Preston and as back to hopefully home here in the next couple. We ask that just having home that you would just give him grace and that Samuel would be able. We thank you for and we pray that she would heal up and

That she would be walker free soon and painfree soon as well. Lord, we want to continue to lift up to you Denny Johnson. We pray for her new treatment to eradicate that cancer in her body. We pray for you to restore her completely. We ask that with faith you would do that knowing that you can. And so we ask for her and we ask for Vern as well to just fix their eyes on you as they go through this season. And that we know that they will see the joy of your work on the other side of all this. So, we want to pray for our brother Dale McFeders. He's not doing well and so we pray for healing for him if that's your will, but we also pray for Molly as she visits him every day. And so, please Lord, give them both strength as they rely on you during this season of their life. We want to pray for Steve Bis as his mom is declining. We ask that you would just be with him and Janet as they head north to be with them. Father, just please give them endurance as she's on hospice and as she transitions into your arms. Lord, we pray that would be a smooth transition and not full of suffering. Lord, we pray for peace in our world. We pray that you would give our nation's leaders wisdom as they navigate these times and these issues. We want everyone to make the best possible decision for our sake, Lord. Help them. And we plead for you to work it out in the most glorifying way possible. Lord, we also want to lift up to our teens and our adults that are leaving for summer camp. I ask that you would prepare their hearts and their minds to follow you, to surrender to you, for your will. We ask for the many other needs that we have in our church. We pray for men to grow into leaders from within our flock. We have plenty of men and we ask that you would give them a heart for

Ministry, for evangelism, for disciplehip. We ask for servants that would come to you with a here I am attitude. And so I thank you for the dozens in our church that serve week in and week out. Their investments are eternal. And Lord, thank you for hearing our prayers. We ask that you would bless the preaching of your word this morning. And speak through me, Lord, in Jesus name. Amen. Well, before we get into this, I believe that would be a good place for us to start, as to why did Jesus have to make atonement for our sins? Why did he have to be that sin offering? And, so you see, the Christian belief is that the plan of salvation was in motion from creation. Jesus is not plan B. He is plan A. He is the lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world. In the beginning God he made all things. At creation he looked at everything and he made everything good. On the sixth day God he made man in his own image. And there is nothing else in all of creation that was made in the image of God except for humanity. Not even the angels. And so God he set Adam in the garden. He made for him a helpmate and her name was Eve. And they had everything that they could ever want or need and everything was perfect. God, he was delighted with his creation. And he looked at everything and he said, "Behold, it's very good." Unfortunately, Satan, the deceiver, Lucifer, the morning star of heaven, the worship leader at the throne of God, rebelled against God and God cast him out of this. One big story is the cross of Christ. From Genesis to Revelation, every single story whispers the name of God. All throughout the Bible, God, he didn't delight in burnt offerings or sin offerings. He says that over and over through the prophets, all the offerings, they never justified anyone. The reason why they were there was to point to the

Promise of the future deliverer, the future Messiah, that the king is coming, a deliverer who would come and he would suffer and he would die on their behalf. And our passage in Mark, it begins around noon on this horrific Friday where we have our Savior, the Messiah, the promised one, the son of God, suffering on the cross. And he's already three hours into the crucifixion. And we learn about this supernatural darkness that's over the land. And I want you to imagine standing at the foot of the cross. There's an eerie darkness everywhere. It is black outside and the weight of sin is crushing our Savior. Amos 8:9 it says, "And on that day, declares the Lord, I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight." What day is Amos talking about? He's talking about the day of the Lord's judgment. The most famous time of darkness probably in the entirety of the Bible is the ninth plague in Exodus. It's when the darkness was so heavy and so oppressive that you could feel the weight of darkness. And what is happening here is God's judgment on sin. Jesus, he is bearing the weight and the guilt of all the sin and all the shame, all the secret things that you've done, all the evil thoughts that you've had, they will be judged. Every single one of them. No exceptions. Maybe except one. Either they have been judged when you trusted in Christ and his death paid for them or they will be judged if you do not turn away and trust in Christ for salvation. And he beckons you to do that. It's in this moment in human history that everything changes. Jesus Christ is here making a substitutionary atonement for us. Jesus

Christ. He took our place on the cross in order to satisfy God's justice and he took our place. He's the one that died instead of us. He's the one that takes the judgment instead of us. In 2006, a soldier named Ross McInness, he was in Baghdad, he was manning a Humvey when an insurgent threw a grenade into the vehicle and he shouted a warning and he dove on top of the grenade and his actions saved four other soldiers that were in the vehicle. He could have escaped. He was at the top, but he didn't. And in a similar way, Christ, he laid down his life for us. And he didn't just die for us. He died instead of us. And he took our place. He suffered the wrath that we deserve so that we could have abundant life. And he beckons us to come to him, to trust in him, to abide in him. And when we believe that Jesus is who he says he is, that he died on the cross for our sins, we lean all of our hopes on him. What happens is that we are set free. We no longer have guilt. We no longer have shame. Jesus, he's the one that bore the weight and the judgment of our sins. And he took the darkness so that we could walk in God's light. So now we don't have to worry about judgment anymore because God is not wicked. He's not going to collect debts twice. Now, some groups they celebrate something that they call mass. It's a it's a sacrifice that takes place. It's a representation of Christ's sacrifice. And what these groups do is they offer up what they call a eukarist and they make another atonement every time they take it. That's what they do. That's what they believe. It's another sacrifice. But here's what the Bible says. It says he has no need like those high priests to offer sacrifices

Daily. First for his own sins and then for those of the other people. Since he did this once for all when he offered up himself. You see, the atonement is a one-time sacrifice for our redemption. It doesn't take reoffering over and over again. And the darkness of the cross of Jesus does not require ongoing sacrifices on our part. It requires faith. It demands our faith and our trust. So we don't supplement the work of Christ by our own efforts, by our own obedience. We are justified by faith alone in Jesus's death, burial, and resurrection. And so for three more hours, Jesus, he continues to suffer on the cross until suddenly we get to the next event, which is the cry, the cry from the cross. Jesus, he quotes this. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning? Now, the Pharisees, the other Jews that were around would have immediately recognized this quotation, but this was not considered back in the ancient times to be a messianic psalm. For a Jewish person to think that the Messiah would be a suffering servant was not on their radar at all. The deliverer, he would he would conquer. He would bring a time of peace and prosperity for God's people. He wouldn't die on a cross. The Bible, it teaches in Deuteronomy 21:23 that the one who hangs on a c on a tree is cursed. The Messiah wouldn't be cursed. He couldn't be cursed. And yet, that's exactly what God's plan was. Jesus Christ, the Messiah, he would hang on a tree. He would become cursed so that we would no longer be cursed. And it is because of this curse that the father he turns his face away from the son. And Jesus, he expresses the sheer agony of being forsaken by the father as he bears the overwhelming burden of sin penalty. And why did this separation have to take

Place? Well, it's because Jesus was becoming the mediator between sinful man and a holy God. 1 Timothy it says for there is one God and there is one mediator between God and men the man Christ Jesus. This is the cost for Christ to be the mediator. It is because of this work that he is able to be our great high priest who now intercedes on our behalf. Look at what the Scripture says. Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. Do you feel alone? We have Jesus. Are you in pain? You have Jesus. Are you suffering tremendously? You have Jesus. We have a great high priest who knows all of our weaknesses, who knows your anxieties, who knows the feeling of desperation and yet does so perfectly with great faith in the father. This is why Christ cried out on the cross. Is because the sheer weight and the agony pushed him to his limits. Our sin, it separated us from a holy God. And yet, it is in this cry that Jesus, he becomes our mediator. And he bridges that chasm that we can never cross so that we could be reconciled to God. We don't need any other mediators. We have one mediator and his name is Jesus. And he alone bore the cost to become our mediator. And there is no one else that can ever share that role. Not one person. There's not one saint. There is not one grandparent. There's not one person that can fulfill that role of mediator. If you want to know God, you have to go

Through Jesus and no one else. Now, at this point, the story, it changes a little bit because you have Jesus crying out and the bystanders, they're they think that he's calling out to Elijah. And so, they look out and they see this the sour wine that's there. This is different than the wine that they had offered to him earlier in the chapter. That wine was kind of a narcotic that would diminish the pain. This wine is just simply almost like a vinegar. It was really watered down so that way it would just quench some thirst. And they were hoping maybe they would keep him alive a little bit longer so that way they could see is Elijah actually going to come down and save him. This is in direct fulfillment of prophecy found in Psalm 69. It says, "They gave me poison for food and for my thirst. They gave me sour wine to drink." And the bystanders, they thought that Jesus, he was calling for Elijah, and they believed that Elijah would come before the Messiah. What they didn't realize is that Elijah had already come through John the Baptist. And so Jesus, he takes the sour wine and he in verse 37, he uttered a loud cry. And this is what it says in John 19, it is finished. That's the word. And he bowed his head. He gave up his spirit. Jesus's life was not stolen from him. He laid it down willingly. It says that Christ, he yielded his spirit. He gave up his spirit. He's the one that surrendered it. He laid down his life. He's the one that said to Telsty, "It is finished. The cup of wrath was drunk. The way to God was open. The price had been paid in full." Other Gospels they record that an earthquake. It struck Jerusalem. At this time the righteous dead were raised and preached

The Gospel. And the third event happened that Mark records that the veil is torn. The veil was ordained by God to keep men and God separated. Humans were unworthy to enter into the most holy place because of their sin. Only the high priest for a very brief period of time on one day for each year could do it. And this veil was a means of safety. It was a means of grace to keep sinners from dying who may have accidentally looked upon the Lord. But it was also a way of demonstrating God's holiness and his set aartness. And that veil, it was it was made of blue and purple and scarlet and fine linen. That color blue, it reminds us of the divinity of God. Blue is the color of the sky. And so that's what they used as a symbol for that. That's why Israel's flag has blue on it. It's Jesus Christ is the son of God and his divinity is essential to him being the perfect sacrifice. It was a divine offering who could fully atone for our sins. The purple, it points to the royalty of Jesus. It points to his kingship and his authority which he proved through the many miracles that we've learned about over the last year and a half. He came from the line of David and his royalty was mocked at his humiliation. The scarlet points to the sacrifice of Christ. It points to Jesus's humanity that he bled red like everyone does. And it also reminds us of the necessity for blood to take away our sins. Here's what John writes. He says, "But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And the blood of Jesus, his son, cleanses us from all sin." The fine linen points to the purity of Christ. He is the sinless lamb of God who is completely righteous and his perfect obedience qualified him to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Here's what it says in second Corinthians. For our sake, God he made

Him Jesus to be sin who knew no sin so that in Jesus we might become the righteousness of God. And it is because of Jesus's death that the veil is torn. And it wasn't torn from bottom to top as though humans had made a way to God. It was torn from top to bottom because salvation is of the Lord and he made a way for us to be redeemed. It's his way. It's the only way and no one can come to the father by any other way. Back in the Garden of Eden, it was God that placed a flaming sword at the entrance of the garden. And God, he did that to kill anyone that would try to get into the garden and attempt to eat of the tree of life and live forever separated from God. And the plan of God was to offer up his only son. You remember how Abraham was commanded to ascend the mountain and offer up his son Isaac. Here's what Abraham said in Genesis 22. Abraham said, "God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son. God himself will provide the lamb." And it is God who provides the way to eternal life for you. And he invites you to come to him. He bled, he died, he suffered to open the way so that whosoever would could come. Hebrews 10, it says, "Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places, by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is through his flesh." So, how do we come to a new and living way? How do we get there? Here's what the author of Hebrews writes. He says, "Every priest stands daily at his service offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a foottool for his feet. For by a single offering, he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us. For after

Saying, "This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord, I will put my laws on their hearts and write them on their minds." Then he adds, "I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more. Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin." That new covenant is the covenant of the blood of Christ, which we become partakers of by faith. When we trust in Jesus, when we lean all of our hope on what Jesus did, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as a propitiation as a payment for by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance, he had passed over former sins. Notice that we are not justified by penance. We're not justified by sacraments. We're not justified by baptism. We're not justified by church membership. We're not justified by communion. We're not justified by good works. We're not justified by our obedience to keeping the rules. We're justified by faith in Jesus's work. Amen. And because of Christ's death, all the barriers to God are now removed except for one. Except for one, and that is you have to come to Jesus. In order to have salvation, you have to trust in Christ. Believe in Christ with your whole being. You don't rely on yourself anymore. You don't rely on your goodness anymore. You come to Christ and you believe on him alone. So don't try to gain eternal life by trying to find your own way to the tree of life. God's sword of judgment, it awaits any that try to sneak around. But if you come to Christ, what happens is that the sword of God has stayed and eternal peace and

Life in God is there for you. Lastly, notice the confession of the witnesses of Christ. The centurion, he's a leader of 80 to 100 soldiers in a Roman army. He likely oversaw dozens of crucifixions. He heard all the curses, all the godless suffering imaginable. He was there when the whole battalion stripped our Lord down. That's what the Bible says. The whole battalion was there. He was there when Jesus was beaten. He was there when he was scourged. He saw his fellow soldiers place a reed in Jesus's hand. A robe on his back, a crown of thorns on his head, saw them bow down and mock Jesus. He saw Jesus walk to Goltha. He saw forgiveness as Christ said, "Father, forgive them. They know not what they do." He saw Jesus continued to teach and to warn about the coming destruction as a result of the Jews rejection of the Messiah. He saw Jesus offer to comfort a penitent thief on the cross. He saw the way that Christ did all these things. He saw the darkness. He saw the earthquake. He saw how Jesus died like a man on a mission to redeem the world. And when Jesus died, the centurion, he confessed exactly what the demons had been told to keep silent about. Surely this man is the son of God. Can you imagine the fear of being the one to oversee the execution of the son of God? Can you consider for a moment what you might be feeling in that moment? And there were women that were there. Watching, weeping. John was there. According to the other Gospels, you have Jews, you have Gentiles, you've got men, you've got women, and Jesus's death draws them all to confess him as Lord and God. And now we believe according to what Paul wrote, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in

Your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, "Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." And when you trust in Christ, when you trust in his death for you on the cross, it is this faith, not ritual, not baptism, not anything except for the living faith that saves you. Paul, he teaches us this that it is by grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not your own doing. It is the gift of God and not a result of works so that no one may boast. You can't be good enough. I'm not good enough. You're not good enough. None of us are good enough. But we can be made good when we trust in Christ. You see, his atoning death is the complete once-for-all sacrifice that makes him the sole mediator between the father and humanity. The darkness that shows the weight that Christ bore for our sins. His Christ reveals the cost of his mediation. The torn veil opened the way for us to come to God. And the centurion's confession cause all of us to faith. So what should you do? You should trust in Christ today. Do it now. Don't delay. Francis Habbergal, she wrote nothing to pay. Yes, nothing to pay. Jesus has cleared all the debt away. Blotted it out with his bleeding hand. Free and forgiven and loved you stand. Some people may say that you need to clean yourself up. Or maybe you need just need to believe all the right things about everything and know all the right answers. But the Bible says that we have one mediator. And the great thing about a mediator is that he's the one that has all the right answers. He's the one that has all the

Right beliefs. And yeah, we may not look very righteous, but he is what we need. So trust in Jesus. Trust in him. Head, heart, hand, head. God, he wants you to know that Christ's death on the cross was the decisive once-for-all atonement for sin, fulfilling God's plan in opening the way to the father. Jesus, he's the one that bore the full weight of divine judgment. He fulfilled the Old Testament shadows and promises. His cry of death in the torn veil. It reveals his role as the only true mediator. The cross is not just a tragedy, but it's a central turning point in redemptive history. Heart. God wants you to believe that you must believe that Jesus is the son of God who bore your judgment and that his sacrifice alone can reconcile you to God. So there's no religious ritual, no good works, no saintly intercessor that can make us right with God. Only Jesus, the sinless divine mediator, can bridge that gap. And so you must trust in him, not yourself, for righteousness and for eternal life. In hand. God, he wants you to turn from self-reliance and to trust wholly in Jesus Christ as your Savior and your mediator. So no matter your past sins, your present struggles, you come to God through Christ alone. So trust in him today. Don't wait to clean up your life. He alone cleanses us. He alone saves us. So call upon the name of the Lord and be saved. And so Lord, we do thank you for this time that we get to have together. Thank you for the mercy and the grace that we have that you've shown to us through your son. I pray that if there's anyone here that maybe they need to be saved, Lord, that you would just move their heart that you would prompt them to say, "I need you right now, Lord." And

Lord, just don't let them walk out of here without talking to someone about before they say, you know, I want to think about it. Lord, this is not the time to do that. Lord, help them to feel that urgency, feel the weight, but also the freedom that you offer. Lord, help them to understand that. And for us established Christians who are walking with you. Lord, help us to see the joy of having you as our mediator, God. It's just such a privilege such an honor that you would look on even me in my sin, Lord. And in spite of all that, still invite me to follow you, Lord. It's been 20 25 years now and Lord, I just I thank you for it. We ask that you would bless us. Pray that you would keep us, Lord. And as we respond in worship, help us to do so with full and grateful hearts in Jesus name. Amen. Let's all stand and let's respond in worship together. There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel veins. And sinners plunge beneath the flood. Lose all their guilty stains. Lose all their guilty stains. And sinners plunge beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains. Dear dying lamb, thy preious blood shall never lose its power. Till all the ransom, church of God, be saved to sin no more. Be safe to sin no more. Be saved to sin no more. Till all the ransom church of God be saved to sin no more. Well, if you do have any questions about what it means to be a follower of Christ, feel free to come up and talk to me after service. Grab a friend that invited you. Other than that, you are dismissed. Thank you so much for worshiping here at First Baptist. There you go.

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