Calvary No.3 The Faithful Band

Luke 23 verse 26, as they led him, the Lord Jesus, away, they seized Simon from Cyrene, who was on his way in from the country, and put the cross on him, and made him carry it behind Jesus. A large number of people followed him, including women, who mourned and wailed for him. Jesus turned and said to them, daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, weep for yourselves and and for your children, for the time will come when you will say, blessed are the barren women, the wombs that never bore, and the breasts that never nursed.

Then they will say to us, then they will say to the mountains, fall on us, and to the hills, cover us. For if men do these things when the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry? Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. When they came to the place called the skull, there they crucified him, along with the criminals, one on his right, the other on his left.

Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they're doing. They divided up his clothes by casting lots. The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him.

They said, he saved others, let him save himself, if he is the Christ of God, the chosen one. The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar, and said, if you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.

There was a written notice above him, which read, this is the king of the Jews. One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him, aren't you the Christ? Save yourself and us. But the other criminal rebuked him.

Don't you fear God, he said. Since you are under the same sentence, we are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.

Then he said, Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom. Jesus answered him, I tell you the truth, today, you will be with me in paradise. It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining.

And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. When he had said this, he breathed his last.

The centurion, seeing what had happened, praised God and said, surely this was a righteous man. When all the people who had gathered to witness this sight saw what took place, they beat their breasts and went away. But all those who knew him, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance watching these things.

Now there was a man named Joseph, a member of the council, a good and upright man, who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea, and he was waiting for the kingdom of God. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus' body.

Then he took it down, wrapped it in linen cloth, and placed it in a tomb, cut in the rock. One in which no one had yet been laid. It was preparation day, and the Sabbath was about to begin.

The women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes. But they rested on the Sabbath.

In obedience to the commandment, on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices. They had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb.

But when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright, the women bowed down with their faces to the ground.

But the men said to them, Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here. He has risen. Remember how he told you.

While he was still with you in Galilee, the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men. Be crucified, and on the third day be raised again. Then they remembered his words.

Amen. There's a little verse in the Old Testament that says this. I looked for someone to have pity on me.

And there was no man. Often when you look into the first half of the Bible, you come across what are known as prophecies. They predict a future event.

And one of the things that makes this book the most outstanding of all volumes is the accuracy with which men who lived centuries before the birth and death of Jesus Christ were able to foretell what was going to happen. There's no other book in the English language or indeed in any other vernacular quite like the Bible that has this predictive element about it. And the Old Testament seer, the Old Testament prophet, sees into the future.

And he can envisage a day when God's own Son is in desperate need. His body is wracked with pain. He has been done badly by the hands of wicked, callous men.

And there was a time when he needed help. There was a time when he needed support. And the prophet when he accurately sees this in the forefront of his mind anticipating what's going to happen centuries hence, speaks for Jesus.

I looked for someone to have compassion on me. And there was no man. Now I don't want to push my exposition too far and read too much into one word.

But it's always struck me as significant that it says there was no man. Now very often in the Old Testament the word man also stands for woman. It's a sort of collective term.

But in one sense when you go to the fulfillment of the prophecy though it was true that there was no man in attendance on Jesus at the hour of his great need, there was a band of womenfolk. I've always felt that that's a very wonderful thing. Jesus on one occasion in his ministry says, if a man would follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross.

And then he can become my disciple. And when you watch Jesus literally hauling his cross down the flagstones of Jerusalem's streets and out into the Kidron Valley and up the skull shaped hill, it's not men who were his associates who are following him. But there are some womenfolk.

Not just a small number but according to Mark's account in the gospel that bears his name, there are lots of women who Jesus confronted in Galilee and in Jerusalem. They have an affinity, they have a relationship with the Lord Jesus and during the hours of his agony they're present as they witness his death. A hasty reading of the gospels might miss the fact that very important in the total story of the ministry of Jesus were womenfolk.

The gospels are dominated by the disciples. After all these were the group of men that Jesus was going to train and he spends more time with them than what he does with multitudes because ultimately eleven of them, for one played in foul, eleven of them will have the responsibility of taking the gospel to various parts of the world. But in the background as you read through the narrative you come face to face with the fact that there are many women who attend on the Saviour.

Many women who are involved with his ministry. And of course it had to take the perverted minds of the founders of the Mormon sect and the even more perverted mind of a D.H. Lawrence to cast suspicion on Jesus and his relationship with these women. But the gospel records stand and the person of our Lord Jesus Christ remains absolutely pure in his contact with these womenfolk.

They become his sisters. They become his daughters, encouraging him in the ministry, present at the hour of his great need when he dies on the cross of Calvary. Jesus Christ lent no support to the view that was often heard in his day that women were a second class type of citizen.

If there is reason for either sex to be grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ it is particularly, I say, womenfolk. If you were to go into the Muslim world you would understand what I mean by that conclusion. It was the Lord Jesus Christ who picked womenfolk up from the status of being second class and lifted them back onto the place, to the position that God Almighty had for them right at the beginning.

Jesus had no truck, not even with some of the Judaic rabbis who sometimes would go on record in public prayer saying to God I thank you that I was born free and not a slave, a Jew and not a Gentile, a man and not a woman. Jesus recognized the dignity in womanhood and that's probably the reason why women became his most sympathetic listeners and amongst his most faithful followers. If you had a TV camera present at the day of the death of Jesus as they were present at the attempted assassination of the American president during these last few days, as they made an arc around the scene they would have picked up not only the rabbis, not only the Roman soldiers not only the inquisitive ordinary person from Jerusalem and the villagers present at the seat of an execution but they would have shown you womenfolk with eyes streaming with tears as they looked upon the figure of one that they loved whose face had been so bashed by Roman fists so marked that there was hardly any comparison to draw in being able to illustrate the pain and the torment that Jesus went through as a result of his bodily suffering.

I looked for someone to have pity on me and there was no man but there was a large number of womenfolk present at the death of Jesus. I want to use those ladies as an example of that type of follower that Jesus is looking for in the 20th century. I don't want to strain this message and to suggest there's an importance in womenfolk that the Bible doesn't give.

I don't want, in correcting the balance, to go to another extreme but let me just suggest to you this evening, just for a moment and maybe you've never considered this area of study before that that group of women to whom every gospel writer makes mention illustrates in some fashion the type of follower that Jesus wants today both men and women. Will you notice that these people came from a variety of backgrounds from a variety of backgrounds. We're told that there was a large number.

Let Mark be our reporter at the moment. In the 15th chapter, the 40th verse, he says, Some women were watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, the younger, and of Joseph, and Salome.

In 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. Womenfolk who came from a variety of backgrounds.

Let's put our imaginary TV camera on a close-up focus and let's see some of the faces. Let's identify some of the personalities. And the one that stands out perhaps most prominently of all is that of Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Again, we're often caught in two extremes in regard to Mary. We're so afraid of the Roman Catholic position that almost makes her part of the Godhead that we jump to the opposite pole and we don't give Mary the position of importance that she had. But that was a unique, probably teenage woman that caught the attention of the Holy God and caused his angel to come to her.

And in the words of what we have just been singing, she responded to the news that she was to be the vehicle through which Jesus would be born into the world. An ordinary teenage peasant in northern Galilee says Malcolm Muggeridge, trying to work out what would have happened if the Annunciation had occurred in our day, in humanistic times like ours. A contemporary virgin would regard a message from the angel Gabriel that she might expect to give birth to a son to be called the son of the highest as ill tidings of great sorrow and a slur on the local family planning center.

As a matter of fact, under existing conditions it is extremely improbable that Jesus would have been permitted to be born at all. Mary's pregnancy in poor circumstances and with the father unknown would have been an obvious case for an abortion and her talk of having conceived as a result of the intervention of the Holy Ghost would have pointed to the need for psychiatric treatment and made the case for terminating her pregnancy even stronger. Thus our generation, needing a savior more perhaps than any that has ever existed would be too humane to allow one to be born, too enlightened to permit the light of the world to shine in a darkness that grows ever more oppressive.

But Mary submitted, submitted in the first century to being the vehicle through whom the Son of God should be born to this world. She didn't understand it all. She used to listen to what Jesus had to say and ponder those things in her heart.

There were moments of disbelief when with the rest of her family she stood on the edge of the crowd wondering if Jesus really were a little bereft of his senses. But there at Calvary, she's present. Won over.

Not perhaps fully comprehending yet but realizing that this had to be. She could have told more about Jesus than anyone in that scene. She knew of the virgin birth.

She knew of the miracle of his conception. And Mary, faithful, lovely Mary is among the women present when Jesus dies. There's another Mary.

Let's move the camera and fix our attention on her for a moment. She's Mary from Magdala. Popularly known as Mary Magdalene.

From her Jesus cast out seven devils. There are some who associate her with the story of the woman taken in adultery but perhaps that conclusion cannot really be justified. But Mary certainly stands for a representative of exploited womanhood.

She's been deranged. A laughing stock. And if some are right in saying that her trade was that of selling her body then even more she stands as representative of all those who have been exploited in this world.

And particularly her sex. Mary Magdalene is there. Where else can she be? Jesus has done for her what none other can do.

Her background is different from Mary of Nazareth. Her personality that too seems to be dissimilar. But Jesus has affected both of their lives.

And both these women are present when Jesus needs someone near him. And then there are others. Salome.

Salome. Possibly the sister of Mary from Nazareth. Then there's a woman by the name of Joanna.

She's been healed by the Lord Jesus. She comes from the aristocracy in Jerusalem. From the rich family background.

For Jesus' ministry touched many, many different types of women. And they're all there. Not just half a dozen.

Many of them says Mark. Many women from Galilee and from Jerusalem standing some distance away looking on a scene that pained them very much. The faithful band of women that come from a variety of backgrounds.

But stay with the thought for a moment. For as I draw your attention to these women there's something else I want to say generally about them. Not only do they come from differing circumstances in life and illustrate that the gospel draws people of a variety of classes.

They typify some important qualities. Important qualities which Jesus will expect from all those who ultimately will become his disciples. Have you ever thought how Jesus existed? I mean by that his economic state.

He didn't work, not during the last three years of his ministry. For that was a public preaching ministry and he hadn't got anything saleable. Well perhaps he had but people didn't recognize its value.

And he has in his company as I mentioned twelve other men. How do you feed twelve men? Including Jesus thirteen for three years. One of those men was a treasurer.

He had the bag. That's what the gospel writer puts how it is put in the authorized version of the Bible. The man who looked after the finance.

Well where did the finance come from? Well it came generally speaking from women folk. These women as Mark makes very clear who cared for the needs of the Lord Jesus. Financially, in the area of hospitality.

In the seventh chapter of Luke's gospel and the opening verses you again come across women. Or rather the eighth chapter of Luke's gospel. You again come across reference to women in the life of the Lord Jesus.

And there is further mention of Joanna. This one who I brought to your attention a moment or so ago. She was the wife of Cusa.

The manager of Herod's household. And there's another woman by the name of Susanna. And many others Dr. Luke refers to.

And he goes on to say these women were helping to support them, the Lord Jesus and the disciples out of their own means. The sponsorship of the ministry of the Christ at the human level came largely from the pockets of women folk. Or so the gospel writers seem to suggest.

I wonder if you've ever thought of that. Who was it who gave Jesus hospitality well when he went to Bethany it was Mary and Martha. They kept their home available to him.

And implication is that there were other homes open to him in Galilee. Could one not think of the widow of Nain often rejoicing in the fact that Jesus was back. And whatever she had belonged to him because he'd rescued her from an experience that was worse than death.

He brought back to life her own son. Women folk who ministered to the human needs of the Christ. And it seems to me that this typifies all that Jesus will be expecting of his true followers in the years, in the centuries that are yet to dawn.

Is it not significant that it was a woman who opened her home to the early Christians in Jerusalem. You can read it in Acts chapter 12. And the first church in Jerusalem met in the home of a woman.

Isn't it interesting that the first Gentile convert was a woman who responded to the ministry of Paul at Philippi in Europe. And when Paul writes his letters he time and time again thanks the Lord for women like Phoebe and Eunice and Louis and a host of others. Some he addresses collectively and he praises God for their fellowship and for their hospitality.

And you can trace their practice right back to that faithful band of women who stand some respectable distance away from our Lord Jesus as he hangs on the cross of Calvary. They typify these women generosity. They typify that hospitable spirit that the Bible says pleases the Lord.

But there's another quality that exceeds the two mentioned in its importance. These women were loyal. Essentially.

Absolutely. One hundred percent loyal. Why isn't Peter by the cross? Why isn't Matthew by the cross? Why aren't the rest of the disciples with the exception of John who came along ultimately.

Why aren't they at the cross? Because they're frightened. The shepherd has been smitten and the sheep have scattered. The men have gone away like frightened rabbits.

But the women not a small company a large number are present showing a spirit of loyalty which shall ever raise womanhood in the esteem of sensitive historians who stay their minds on this event. Around the cross are a large number of women some named the majority anonymous. They come from a variety of walks of life illustrating that the gospel call will be to every class of person and to every type of personality.

They typify the important qualities of hospitality of generosity, of loyalty. And what's more they witness unique events that many menfolk afterwards would have given their right hand to have seen. Luke makes it very clear in the 49th verse referring to all that has happened on the cross in the 23rd chapter of his gospel all those who knew Jesus including the women who had followed him from Galilee stood at a distance watching these things.

What did they see? They saw the conversion of the thief who had been pinned on another cross alongside Jesus. They saw the rapidly the rapidly darkening skyline though it wasn't time for the sun to have set. They were aware of the earthquake.

They listened to the cries that left the lips of the Son of God. They heard that tremendous shout of triumph it is finished. They witnessed the the testimony of the Roman centurion surely this was the Son of God.

All these remarkable never to be repeated events these women saw these women heard they witnessed what was unique and even if they didn't grasp the sum total of all that was being enacted during those hours they were well poised to respond to the events which were to follow and the mighty resurrection of the Christ. And when you move from Calvary you've still got the women very much dominant in the gospel record because staying with Luke's account and in the 23rd chapter you discover down in the 55th verse this comment the women who had come with Jesus from Galilee followed Joseph and saw the tomb and how his body was laid in it. Then they went home and prepared spices and perfumes but they rested on the Sabbath in obedience to the commandment.

It's the women who make preparation to give the last rites so to speak to the physical remains of the Lord Jesus. And it's the women who move into the garden area into the tomb where the body of the Christ has been laid that resurrection morning and it's Mary Magdalene the woman who'd been possessed with seven devils who first meets Jesus. A woman witnessed the fall of man in the garden of Eden.

A woman witnessed the resurrection of the proper man in the garden of the resurrection. Praise God! There is no greater tribute in history to womanhood and to the largeness of faith that is the potential of women than that band of followers who stuck closely to the Lord Jesus in his hour of great need. And in that representative of womanhood Mary who stands by the tomb the empty tomb in the garden and has the first encounter with the risen Lord.

Some people tell me that this book is against women. They read one or two comments of the apostle Paul and take them out of context and they get somewhat hot under the collar thinking that Paul was a crusty old bachelor. When you read the whole sweep of this book from Genesis to Revelation it does for women what no other book does.

It restores them in the sight of God creatures of dignity. Creatures who at the resurrection and the crucifixion of Jesus symbolize in some of the qualities that are apparent within them those characteristics that Jesus wants to see amongst all who will follow him. Jesus died for the Marys of Nazareth.

Jesus died for the Marys from Magdala. Jesus died for the aristocratic Joanna. Jesus died for every class of woman and every class of men.

And ultimately those women folk would see when he had been raised from the dead that the crucifixion they had witnessed had bought for them their salvation and they were present at the day of Pentecost. Now just for a moment forget the emphasis on women for God is no respecter of persons we're all one in Christ if words have been my paintbrush this evening I have tried as clearly as I can with the limitations of my vocabulary to take you to the cross and to show you the Saviour and I ask that your response to what you see shall copy that of those women. Lord I identify myself with you your death and your resurrection.

Lord I give my all to you my life my finance my everything. Lord I want ultimately to be amongst that faithful band of your followers who in eternity shall enjoy you forever. Lord I want to commit myself to your son right now.

Father we've dipped into your word and taken up something that may have been a little unusual by your infinite grace may what has been said have been the presentation of the plain truth that Jesus has come to restore dignity to women and to men to call to himself from every class from every walk of life those who will humbly submit to his authority we come to you now. Some of us here men folk have needed to come for a long time Father we offer ourselves to you restore our dignity by forgiving our sins make right the fractures within our personality some of us women folk come we follow the example of those fine ladies of yesteryear we offer you our lives we offer you our money we offer you our possessions Father God take what we bring and give to us what no other can the gift of salvation and let us treasure it as much as those women treasured their unbroken relationship with Jesus Amen Christ the Lord be with you