What a difference a day can make in eternity

April 22, 2002

BaptistWay Bible Study for Texas lesson for May 26

What a difference a day can make in eternity

___Mark 15:21-41; 16:1-8
___^15:21A certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross. ²²They brought Jesus to the place called Golgotha (which means The Place of the Skull). ²³Then they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. ²⁴And they crucified him. Dividing up his clothes, they cast lots to see what each would get.
___²⁵It was the third hour when they crucified him. ²⁶The written notice of the charge against him read: The King of the Jews. ²⁷They crucified two robbers with him, one on his right and one on his left. ²⁹Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads and saying, "So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, ³⁰come down from the cross and save yourself!"
___³¹In the same way the chief priests and the teachers of the law mocked him among themselves. "He saved others," they said, "but he can't save himself! ³²Let this Christ, this King of Israel, come down now from the cross, that we may see and believe." Those crucified with him also heaped insults on him.
___³³At the sixth hour darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour. ³⁴And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"--which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
___³⁵When some of those standing near heard this, they said, "Listen, he's calling Elijah."
___³⁶One man ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a stick, and offered it to Jesus to drink. "Now leave him alone. Let's see if Elijah comes to take him down," he said.
___³⁷With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.
___³⁸The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. ³⁹And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, heard his cry and saw how he died, he said, "Surely this man was the Son of God!"
___⁴⁰Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome. ⁴¹In Galilee these women had followed him and cared for his needs. Many other women who had come up with him to Jerusalem were also there.
___^16:1When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus' body. ²Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb ³and they asked each other, "Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?"
___⁴But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. ⁵As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.
___⁶"Don't be alarmed," he said. "You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. ⁷But go, tell his disciples and Peter, 'He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.'"
___⁸Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

___By Debbie Chisolm
___I was on my way to work when I heard a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. When I walked into the office, the secretary told me my mom was on the phone.
___She was calling from Mississippi and wanted to make sure I had heard the news. Another plane had plowed into the second tower. While we were talking, my father yelled, "They just hit the Pentagon!" Mom and I didn't say a word. After a moment or two of silence, quietly she said, "Do you know what this means? We're at war."
___The events that unfold in the span of a few short hours can destroy the lives of thousands, forever change our sense of safety and alter the course of history. What a difference a day makes.
___The story of Mark culminates in the episode of Jesus on the cross. Crucifixion was the most painful and degrading form of capital punishment in the ancient world. Originally, a cross was a wooden pointed stake and was used by the Assyrians and Persians to display the heads and impaled bodies of captured foes. In the beginning, the Greeks and Romans reserved the punishment only for slaves, because they thought it too barbaric for citizens.
___By the first century, however, it was used for any enemy of the state. As time went on, the Romans began to use crucifixion more and more as a horrifying means of executing criminals, so by Jesus' time it was a common sight. Josephus says during the attack on Jerusalem in A.D. 70, the Romans crucified so many there wasn't adequate space for the crosses or enough crosses for the bodies.
___When a person was crucified in Jesus' day, they would be scourged or at least flogged. This was not just done out of cruelty but to hasten death and lessen the terrible ordeal. After the beating, the victim was forced to bear the crossbeam to the execution site. The nail would be driven through the wrist rather than the palm because the smaller bones of the hand could not support the body's weight. A small wooden block was sometimes placed halfway up to provide a seat for the body so that the nails would not tear open the wounds. In the end, death would be caused by the loss of blood circulation and coronary failure. Roman crucifixion was a slow, torturous and degrading death.
___In this week's lesson, we have arrived at that point in Mark's story where Jesus hangs upon the cross. In Jesus' death on the cross, his conflict with the religious leaders intensifies and comes to fundamental resolution.
___The leaders mock the crucified Jesus in two ways. They mock him because, although he demonstrated such astonishing authority when he scattered the tables in the temple and in his public ministry to save others from disease, here he is unable to save himself. And they mock him as the messiah, the King of Israel, because, as they see it, his messiahship is a fraud. Suspended in space, he shows he does not even possess the power to get himself down from the cross.
___As these religious leaders look up at Jesus hanging on the cross, they see him as one who is stripped of all authority. They see his cross as the symbol of his defeat and see themselves as having triumphed in their battle with him. The passersby, the religious leaders and even the men crucified on either side of him challenge him to save himself by coming down from the cross. But Jesus does not save himself, instead, he calls out twice, and then he dies.
___Mark reports the Roman centurion standing opposite him, seeing how Jesus died, cries aloud, "Truly this man was the Son of God." For the first time, Jesus is perceived by another human to be the Son of God. Isn't it ironic that in a time when Gentiles were treated as second-class citizens, it was a Gentile who first proclaimed Jesus was truly the Son of God. When all the disciples had run away in fear, it was a Gentile man and a handful of faithful women who remained with Jesus. What a difference a day makes. At the cross, Mark unveils the secret of Christ's identity and thus the cross is the culminating point of Mark's entire story of Jesus.
___What the Jewish leaders do not perceive is that God and Jesus willed this execution. Jesus permitted his own death because he is God's perfectly obedient Son. God willed Jesus' death because through it, God would re-establish the covenant and offer salvation and the forgiveness of sins to all humankind.
___After Jesus died, "the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom." The veil that shrouded the Holy of Holies from the faithful who came to pray was torn into two pieces by God. It was totally and irreparable destroyed from heaven downward. This total destruction of the temple veil forevermore changed the idea that God lived in the temple.
___Through his death, Jesus had, in effect, torn down the manmade sanctuary and begun the creation of a new sanctuary, not made by the hands of men. Unlike the temple in Jerusalem, the new temple would welcome both Jew and Gentile, male and female, priest and laity, long-time followers and new converts. What a difference a day makes.
___Mark offers no post-resurrection appearances; instead, it has only the amazement and frightened silence of the women: Mary Madeline and Mary, the mother of James and Salome, who have come to the tomb to anoint Jesus' dead body. They see a young man in a robe, and he announces the resurrection has occurred.
___Isn't it ironic that in a time when women were valued as little more than objects, in all four gospels, women were the first to know of the resurrection?
___Mark's account of the resurrection is much different from the other gospels. Instead of having a detailed account of the resurrection and post-resurrection appearances, Mark leaves his readers at an empty tomb with only the promise that Jesus had risen and gone ahead to Galilee. There are no appearances of the risen Christ.
___Mark presents only ambiguous words that a mysterious young man speaks to amazed women disciples. This angel-like man commands them to go and remind the disciples of the promise Jesus had made earlier: "But after I am raised up I will go to Galilee before you" (Mark 14:8). The women flee in a panic, paralyzed with fear and contrary to his instruction, they say "nothing to anyone."
___When Jesus was alive, teaching and healing, he often would instruct those who had witnessed God working in and through him, to go and say "nothing to anyone." Now, after his death and resurrection, there is no longer any need to keep his true identity a secret. For the first time the instruction changes from, "Don't tell" to "Go tell."
___The women's saying nothing to anyone may not be a sign of disobedience, but rather evidence that they were temporarily struck dumb with awe. When you associate their behavior with their amazement and their trembling and astonishment, their fear seems to be the proper human response to an action of God that has displayed his overwhelming power. What a difference a day makes.
___The passion story recorded in Mark is almost a capsule of the whole story of the revelation of God in Christ. Watching Jesus clear the temple, serve their final meal, pray in the garden and then allow himself to be arrested and killed it was yet another slow revelation that he and God were one.
___Throughout the years they had slowly come to understand who he was. In the beginning, they regarded him as a rabbi or prophet, just one of the many teachers of those days. Step by step along the way, they became aware of the spiritual depth of this teacher. One day Peter confessed him as the Christ, although he didn't know exactly what that title implied. A week or so later, the disciples had the experience of the transfiguration, and they saw still more deeply into the inner spiritual reality of Jesus. They glimpsed there a glory which was the very presence of God in this man. The process of a deepening awareness of the glory of God in the person of Jesus Christ continued and reached its climax at Calvary. There they witnessed the revelation of the pure unbounded love of God present in the Crucified One. They had finally discovered that in the person of Jesus Christ dwelled the eternal life of God himself, untouched by death and indeed imperishable.
___Sometimes the day is so dark and you feel like the sun will never shine again. Your hopes are dashed, nailed to a cruel cross and you don't think you'll ever feel alive again. But tomorrow is a new day, and what a difference a day can make.

Questions for thought and discussion
___ In your lifetime, other than Sept. 11, has there been a day that has changed the course of global history? What day was it? How old were you when it happened? Where were you when you heard the news? In your personal life, can you share an example of a day that has changed the course of your life in a positive way? In a negative way?
___ What do you believe about capital punishment? Are there any crimes that in your mind would justify capital punishment? What form of capital punishment do you believe is the most brutal? How does capital punishment in the United States compare to other democratic countries?
___ Looking at the characters in today's story, who do you most relate to today--the crucified Christ, the testifying centurion, the grieving women, the passersby, the Jewish leaders, the angelic messenger or the frightened women? What is unfolding in your life that causes you to identify with them?
___ Have you ever lost someone or something that has plunged you into the darkness of grief? What are some of the stages you must go through in order to travel through the grieving process? Which stage was the most difficult for you? How would the crucifixion story been told if it had been written by the centurion?
___ Have you ever been somewhere where you felt the presence of God in such a strong way that it almost frightened you? Were you with a group of people, or were you alone? If with a group, did they experience the same presence?

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