Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / April 3rd, 2015 | Good Friday

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April 3rd, 2015 | Good Friday · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: There's something special about Good Friday this year.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: It coincides precisely with the Jewish Passover.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: Passover and Good Friday are often close together, but rarely do they ever fall on exactly the same night.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: So tonight, around the world, Jewish families right now are celebrating, starting with a meal, the Passover Seder, the first of their eight-day Passover celebration.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: A celebration that is very, very old, nearly 3,500 years old.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: It dates from the days of Exodus, from the days of Moses, and let my people go, from the days of Israel breaking out of slavery, coming out of Egypt, crossing the Red Sea and moving toward the Promised Land.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: And the Passover celebration tonight in Jewish homes around the world remembers the Passover celebration celebrated for hundreds of years in biblical times, which always began with the sacrifice of a lamb.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: So tonight, at the same time that Jewish families are gathering, we gather to celebrate, to commemorate the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in our place.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: We call it Good Friday.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: And because tonight these two things coincide, we're calling it the night of the Lamb.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I'd like for you to join me in going back in time.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: Let's transport ourselves sort of in a time machine back to a whole nother place and a whole nother time.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: The place, let's imagine ourselves in the land of Israel.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: We've hiked for hours in our sandals through the hot, sandy soil of the desert, through spiky bush, in order to see the most entertaining thing in our entire country these days.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: A person.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: We break out of the bushes, out of the shrubs, and there we stand on the bank of a river.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: We look down, and there he is, jutting like a stone pillar out of the river.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: This thin, this gaunt man.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: His hair is uncombed and long, and yet his eyes pierce like a flame of fire through his hair.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: His chin is unshaven, but looks strong enough to crack walnuts.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: His whole body is focused intensely in communicating a message.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: And this message is one that's like a stalk in the solar plexus to the entire country because again and again, no matter how he says it, it always comes out of his mouth the same way.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: That God is about to burn this country down, including King Herod and the chief priest, that everyone is guilty, needs to fall on their knees and repent.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: And we stare at this man, this sort of skinny scarecrow of a man, not an ounce of fat on him, burned dark bronze by the sun and by sleeping on the ground.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: And we can't take our eyes off him.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: And neither can anyone else.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: We're mesmerized by the person and we're convicted by his words.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden, something very strange happens.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: He stops in the middle of a sentence and just stares.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: His eyes grow wide.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's as though they're fixed and staring, like a bolt of lightning has paralyzed him.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: He's just staring at something or someone.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: And then, like it's moving of his own accord, his arm moves up and then begins to point.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: And this man, his name is John.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: The man we've come to see, the man the whole country wants to come and see, says in a voice that's trembling and somewhat strange, she says, Look there, behold, the Lamb of God.
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: We overhear a couple of guys next to us trying to stifle their giggles.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: See, I told you, we heard one of them say, I told you this guy would be worth the hike.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Is he entertaining or what?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Who is he pointing at?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: says his buddy.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Ah, just some guy, he says.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: From the look of him, he's from up north from Galilee.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: His hands sort of look like he's a stonemason or a carpenter or something, but the Lamb of God, he ain't.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Then we hear John interrupting again.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: John's repeating himself.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: He says, The Lamb of God, he yells, who takes away the sin of the world.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: Another snort from next to us.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: This guy is mental.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: Since when has a person been a lamb?
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: That as we hike back to Jerusalem, the friend reap we brought with us thinks John may not be so crazy after all.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Don't you guys remember back years ago, our our forefather Abraham, and he took, God told him to take his son Isaac on the mountain and sacrifice him, to sacrifice him like a lamb.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then Isaac, as they're hiking up the mountain, he says to his dad, Dad, here's the fire and here's the wood, but where is the lamb?
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: And his dad says, Well, God will provide the lamb, and and God at the last minute did.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Don't you think that Abraham from that moment on looked at Isaac sort of as a lamb?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: And the lamb took his place?
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: And don't you remember, remember when we came out of Egypt?
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: Remember that God was trying to convince Pharaoh that he ought to let us go?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so he had these plagues, and the last plague was this death angel that was going to fly over.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so Moses told all of us that we should all sacrifice lambs, that God was going to kill all the firstborn, then the lamb for each house would stand for the firstborn and put the blood on the door so that the death angel would see the blood and pass over.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: So in that case, wasn't the lamb sort of like the firstborn?
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I remember that, you say.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: And how about Isaiah?
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know that those verses about he was rejected and that the servant was going to come, God's servant, he was going to die for us for our sins, and he'd be despised and rejected and die as a lamb, as a sheep before slaughterers, is dumb.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he wasn't gonna open his mouth.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, so there, isn't the lamb a person?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And you know how we bring lambs all the time to the temple to sacrifice them in our place for our sins?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that possible?
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Bear with me, he says.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: And isn't it just possible that that person that John was pointing at, that he could possibly be the lamb person that's been predicted to die, you know, for the sins of everybody, to take everybody's sins and die in their place?
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that possible?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: And you say nothing.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: But you wonder, I mean, is it possible that in my lifetime that now, even now, that God might be sending the lamb person to die in my place?
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And you say to yourself, wow, I want to be there when that happens, if he's gonna die for the sins of the world and for my sins.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: And here you are.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: It is happening.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Today is the day.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: But I I I've got to warn you, it's not a pretty sight.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: A few years ago, a friend of mine, Jeff, who's here, and I were in Calcutta, India, and we had some time on our hands, and so we went to this temple, this famous old Hindu temple by the river.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: It was a temple to the god Kali, K-A-L-I.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, what a weird guy.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: We waited in line and then got in the temple, and there's a big gold god with his red tongue hanging way out of his mouth.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: He's scary, he's freaky looking.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: But as we were waiting in line to get in, there was a cute little goat.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: I grew up with goats.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: I used to melt goats.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: We had a couple of goats I took care of when I was growing up on the farm.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_00: Cute little goat.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I knew this this goat was in his first year.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that he was darling, he was tied up right there right there at the temple to the little gate.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so we, you know, it takes us about an hour, and we go through, and we're leaving, and then we see a crowd just coming.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: So we stay, and then we see the priest come out of the temple with this with this long knife, and he goes and he releases the goat, and then he pulls the little goat's head back and he slices his throat, and the blood just spurts out, and it's so gory, and it's so awful, and it's so sad.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: We call it Good Friday, and not not because the death of a lamb or a person on this day isn't gory or bloody or awful or sad.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: But here's the catch.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: If the blood, if the death of that one lamb forever takes away the sins of the whole world, your sins and mine, and I'm telling you, then yeah, this is the goodest Friday that's ever been, and this is the goodest and best day of your life and my life.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: And you and I say, I want to be there when that happens.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: I want to see that guy.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: I wanna, I want to have a hand in this.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: One one Good Friday many years ago when Melody and I had three young children, ages six, four, and two.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: It was on Good Friday, and just thinking about the lamb, I asked my uh the three kids, I asked each of them, I said, if you could be any animal in the world, any animal at all, what animal would you choose to be?
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: Looked at A.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: She was six.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: What about you?
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: Horse, she said.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to be a horse.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: I said.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then because she had no sin nature, she said, because I lie, I'd like to give children free rides.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: I turned to Mark, he was four years old.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Marky, uh, if you could be any animal in the world, what animal would you be?
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Marky was always deliberate.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: You'd have to ask him a question, you'd have to think about it.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: He never wanted to get it wrong.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: He thought about it.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: Said the last thing I'd expect.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I'd like to be a bee.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: A little nervous about the question here.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh why would you like to be a bee?
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: He said, because I'd like to fly.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: I was okay.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Peter Pan or something.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: So then I asked Dougie, two years old, but always ready with an answer very quickly, very loudly.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Dougie, what animal in all the world would you like to be?
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: A hippopotamus, he said.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: Really?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: I said, not the most attractive animal in the world.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: If you could be any other animal, a dinosaur, he said.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought I'd just leave it there.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: But none of them picked, here's the point, none of them picked a lamb.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Not one of them picked a sheep.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, if I'd have given them ten animals, I'm guessing lamb, sheep wouldn't have been on that list, wouldn't be on my list, wouldn't be on your list, would it?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: Not interesting, but yet in eternity past, when the Godhead, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit got together to discuss what would be the best metaphor, the best animal of all on earth, to represent who the Son of God, who the Savior was, and what he would do for us, they chose a lamb.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why the poem goes, His only son, no sin to hide, yet God sent him from his side to walk upon this guilty sod and to become the Lamb of God.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: God's gift of love we crucified.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: We laughed and scorned him as he died.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: This humble king we called a fraud and sacrificed the Lamb of God.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: Oh Lamb of God, sweet Lamb of God.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: I love the holy Lamb of God.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, wash me in his precious blood.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: My Jesus Christ.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: The Lamb of God.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: On this good Friday, this Passover, this night of the Lamb.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: There is no better time as we take the communion to whisper over and over again to God.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: Lamb of God.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: I come in.