The Book of Mark
How God Buried His Son
Mark 15:42-47
Most of us are well-acquainted with the cross and what happened there. And we’ve taken the time in our study of Mark to look again at what he tells us about the crucifixion.
And we are very familiar with the resurrection, and before long we’ll see what Mark’s gospel tells us about it also. But there is an event that takes place in between those two that is just as significant as the others, and yet, it is often overlooked and that is the burial of Jesus.
Maybe you’ve never even thought about that. Maybe you’ve never even taken time to consider the significance of the burial of Christ, but every time Jesus predicted His death and resurrection, He also mentioned His burial.
And I would submit to you that while there are some very practical, human elements involved in the burial, we also need to remember that the burial of Christ was an amazing, supernatural, divinely arranged event. In fact, the burial was no less supernatural than what was happening at the cross, or the Resurrection.
In fact, when you think about it, even thought Jesus was dead in the physical body, He was alive in the Spirit and therefore as eternal God, He coordinated His own funeral and controlled every detail of His own burial.
In fact, I would consider the burial of Jesus to be one of the strongest affirmations the Bible provides us of His deity, His Messiahship, the accuracy of Scripture, and the sovereignty of God.
And you may be asking, “In what way does the burial do that?” Think about it like this: Something doesn’t have to be miraculous to be divine. Obviously miracles occur at the cross and the tomb and it’s easy to see the hand of God in those events. The burial is not miraculous, but God is easily seen there also.
In fact, when you think about it, miracles occur fairly rarely in Scripture and when they do, they are signs that God is verifying that Jesus is His Son and the other things I mentioned a moment ago.
But there is another way in which God accomplishes His will and verifies Christ and so forth that does not involved miracles, but it is more amazing and more supernatural than a miracle and that is by what we call providence.
Providence is an old theological word that is used to explain the fact that God accomplishes exactly what He plans, purposes, promises and prophecies and He does it without interrupting, suspending or overturning the natural course of things.
Providence means He is able to pull together and orchestrate all the behaviors and actions and reactions and circumstance of people and events throughout history so they come together just as He planned.
Our American Constitution references this idea when it references our “firm Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence.”
In the Thanksgiving Proclamation that President Abraham Lincoln signed in 1863, he referenced the need for such a day because hearts grow “habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God.”
And it occurs to me that providence may well be a greater display of power than a miracle. In fact, if you compare the two, a miracle is much easier. If you are God, you can just step into a situation and use your power to do what you want to do.
But to go back before time and think about every detail that needs to happen and how they will eventually interact and cross paths with every other decision and consequence so that at the end of history it all comes results in your desired plan is a much bigger deal than a miracle!
And that’s what we find with the burial. No, it’s not miraculous, but we cross paths with some people doing some things that appear to be them doing what they are expected to do, but when it’s all said and done, it accomplishes the will of God and it is a great illustration of how providence works all the time.
So as I read this text, listen for the hand of God and then we’ll look at the details and see more clearly how divine providence works.
Mark 15:42-47
Now Mark leaves out some details that we know from the other gospels about the soldiers coming to make sure Jesus and the others are dead. And because the Jews want the bodies off the cross before the Holy Days begin, they break the legs of the criminal’s and find Jesus has already died, so prophecy is fulfilled about none of His bones being broken.
We also find out about the spear being thrust into His side and the blood and water coming out which was, by the way, a verification that He was really dead which means He really came back to life.
But here in Mark, the focus is on the burial. Verse 42 tells us evening had come. Jesus died about 3 o’clock and it’s now late in the afternoon, sometime before 6 o’clock. And in verse 43 we are introduced to a man named Joseph who is from a village called Arimathea.
We aren’t really able to identify Arimathea and know exactly where it was at. Luke says it was a city of the Jews. Some think it was the birthplace of Samuel. Some have other suggestions, but we can’t know for sure.
However, the early disciples probably did know and since the name of Joseph was very common, this identifier would help them understand which Joseph is referenced. The main thing is, he came.
Now that is especially significant because of what the next phrase tells us. He was not just from Arimathea, he was a “prominent member of the council”. Now that’s a big deal because that means he was a member of the Sanhedrin.
That is so big that all four gospel writers mention that fact. I also find it interesting that this is the only mention of him we find in Scripture. But while it may be brief, his story is an unexpected testimony of faith in Christ by a member of the Sanhedrin, the very ones that had just executed the Messiah.
So in addition to the thief on the cross and the centurion and some of the soldiers, here we find another testimony of salvation.
If you chose to categorize those salvations, you would find in the thief, though he was a Jew, one who was an outcast and criminal, in the Roman soldiers, you find those who were law keepers, but outsiders, hated by the Jews and with Joseph, an insider who is as holy as you can get by man’s standards.
In fact, Luke says of him, “He was a good and righteous man.” The word righteous is the same word he uses to refer to Jesus as a righteous man. Jesus and he possessed the same righteousness. One was righteous by nature, the other was righteous by grace.
Matthew says he was, “a disciple of Jesus.” John adds that he was a disciple, but a secret one for fear of the Jews, particularly the Sanhedrin of which he was a member. He had come to believe in and follow Christ.
In fact, verse 43 says, “He was waiting for the Kingdom of God.” He was waiting for the Kingdom of God.
So he is a true Jew who understood the Old Testament promise of salvation and a Kingdom in the correct way and was waiting for the Kingdom to come and had come to the conviction that the Kingdom had come because the King had arrived, and the King was no other than Jesus.
We also discover in Luke 23:51 that he had had not consented to the Sanhedrin’s plan of action. When they came together early in the morning and hatched the plan to kill Christ, he either voted “no” or abstained or wasn’t present for the vote.
One has to wonder what is going through his mind at this point. He was convinced that Jesus was the Messiah. He has watched as his peers in the Sanhedrin sentence Him to die. He has witnessed the crucifixion, and all that anticipation, all that hope has disappeared.
The easy thing to do would be to let it go. After all, he’s kept his convictions secret. No one knows he is a disciple of Christ. He can just go back to his life and his position and continue to wait for the Messiah.
But he doesn’t do that. Even with Jesus dead, he’s willing to acknowledge that he has been a disciple of Jesus. Verse 43 tells us, he “took courage” and comes out of the closet, and goes to Pilate to ask fo the body of Christ.
Now I think it safe to assume the Sanhedrin was still hanging around. Most likely they are still discussing what to do with the stragglers who might hang around. They’ve got to deal with Jesus claims to rise again and what if somebody tries to steal the body. There is still some mess to clean up.
And about that time, Joseph steps into that scene and asks for the body of Jesus. The Romans would typically give the body, if it was requested, to the family. If the family requested it and there was some reason to honor that request, the Romans would do that.
Criminals who had no such family to request their bodies were thrown into Gehenna, thrown into the dump to be burned, no burial, no honor.
And in one of the saddest moments the New Testament records, we discover there was no one to come and ask for His body. The women were around but fearful. The disciples had disappeared. And here is one man who steps up and asks for the body.
Verse 44
Pilate makes certain Jesus has died, and grants permission to Joseph to take the body. So Joseph, righteous Jew that he was, now has a corpse on his hands. Why is he exposing himself for a dead person who can’t fulfill everything he hoped? What motivated him?
Maybe he was motivated by his love for Jesus. Maybe He just didn’t want to see His body thrown away or dishonored. Maybe he wanted the dignity of an appropriate burial. After all, he volunteered his own tomb, one that had never been used before. Those old tombs had a shelf where they laid the body. After the body decomposed, the bones would be gathered and placed in a box called an ossuary, then take the box somewhere else and the tomb was available for the next body.
Joseph’s tomb had never been used. By the way, that was a burial fit for a king. You would never think of laying a King’s body where someone else had been. He deserved better than that.
So maybe it was all that love and affection. Maybe it was a sense of guilt that he hadn’t opened up and acknowledged that he was a disciple of Jesus Christ, but he kept his distance. Maybe all that is true. Certainly he was motivated to give honor to Jesus. So from a human perspective, there were things working on him that made him do this.
But that’s not all that’s going on here. He is, in his own freedom, and his own independent motive and action, doing what he wants to do but in the end, he’s fulfilling God’s will.
Isaiah 53:9 tells us that He should have been buried with the wicked, but His grave turned out to be with the rich. He should have bee thrown on the garbage dump outside of town, but instead, He’s given the burial of a king. How could Isaiah know that? He couldn’t, but God did.
So at the appropriate time, a secret disciple, probably not even known to the Apostles, shows up and buries Christ. He’s being moved and directed by God Himself. It’s not just about an honorable burial for Christ. It’s about fulfilling Scripture.
Did Joseph know he was the rich man Isaiah had talked about? I doubt it. Joseph was just acting on his own, doing what is appropriate, what he thought was right.
But verse 46 tells us he took the body of Jesus from the cross, wrapped it in linen, laid Him in a tomb hewn from the rock and rolled a stone against the door.
Verse 47 ends this passage with a comment that’s so important.
We saw these women back in verse 40 watching as Jesus dies. They started out near the cross and eventually they moved far away, looking on from distance, but they’re still there when Joseph shows up to take the body. They’re still there, mourning in sadness, paralyzed by the disappointment, they’re still there.
And when they see Joseph, this man they don’t know, take the body, they don’t know what’s going on, they followed, verse 47, they were looking on to see where He was laid. They followed Joseph as he took the body to the nearby grave, very near Golgotha.
We know Nicodemus was there. Luke adds that Joanna was there, and others were there. And we have the name of Salome back in verse 40. This is the group of women, you’ll remember, I told you followed Him from Galilee and had been loving disciples of Jesus.
Why did they follow? Obviously they loved Him, they wanted to see what was happening. They watched these men and they watched these men do the preparation, whatever they did. They didn’t want to be outdone in that. Mark doesn’t tell us anymore than that they watched.
But Luke 23:56 says this, “They returned to their homes and prepared their own spices.”
They weren’t going to be outdone by a couple of strangers. They wanted to have their moment to show their love to the body of Jesus. So they’ll be back early on Sunday morning, Luke 24:1, with their spices. And, boy, were they in for a surprise when they arrived.
Now I want you to think about something. In the cold, hard, human facts that occur after the crucifixion we see men and women doing what would seem to be explainable in completely human terms.
Soldiers show up to do their jobs. To hasten death, they break the legs of those crucified. But Jesus is already dead, so no action is needed. And to prove it, they thrust a spear into his side and out comes blood and water.
Joseph shows up to ask for the body of Jesus, most likely motivated by his love for the Lord, and in a gracious moment of respect, he uses his own tomb to bury Him.
Everything they did was done, either because they were commanded to or they decided to do it. The circumstances they were faced with determined their course of action. But above and behind and beyond and around all of that, we see divine providence at work to fulfill Scripture and accomplish the will of God.
I don’t know about you, but that is exciting to me! That means everyday, as we live our lives and do what we do, there is so much more at work than what we see and witness and are aware of. Just as surely as the providential power of God arranged the details of the burial of Jesus, and just as surely as they led to the formation of a nation called the United States and just as surely as they led President Lincoln to acknowledge the hand of God in a Civil War that threatened our nation, God is at work in and around us.
I don’t know about you, but if ever there was a reason to thank God, it is His divine providence!
Let’s pray.
