In this sermon, the preacher reflects on the greatness and sovereignty of God. He emphasizes how God has created and ordered everything in the world, from the rocks and reels to the stars in the sky. The preacher also discusses the crucifixion of Jesus, highlighting how he was placed in the middle of two thieves as a symbol of being numbered with the transgressors. The sermon concludes with a focus on what breaks the heart of God, using Psalm 22:14 to explore the suffering and sacrifice of Jesus.

In your Bible, the book of Psalms, and chapter number 22. Thank you for being here tonight at the Franklin Oak Baptist Church. I have a number of visitors that are here. Thank you for the members, the regular attenders of this church, for being faithful all week long. And then thank you especially, you visitors, for coming. I understand this is the first time that some people have been here ever, and I praise the Lord for that. Thank you preachers also especially for coming. I understand your busy schedule, the pastors, the missionaries, the evangelists that are here. Thank you so much for taking your time out of your busy schedule to come and be here in our revival campaign this week. Psalm chapter 22. Let's all stand please out of respect for God's word. Many have come by the tape table this week. Let me just make a quick announcement. The tape that I preached Sunday night, or the message that I preached Sunday night from Judges chapter 19, Why Isn't Somebody Yelling Rape? It went out that night. Many people signed up to get it. There is a copy there. I think 10 or 12 people have signed up. I think I have 12 or 13 copies. And so it is back there. So if your name is back there, just go by, pick it up, and you can put a little check mark by your name, or let me or somebody that is at the table know, so I can take your name off the list. Psalm chapter number 22. The message I am going to preach tonight will certainly not be a message that is new to the pulpit of Franklin Road Baptist Church. But I fear sometimes as an evangelist that many times in churches we hear some things that are so simple that we get kind of complacent about them, and we get a little bit familiarized with certain portions of the Bible, and they just don't stir us anymore. They just don't bother us anymore. But yet I have a burden on my heart tonight. I have been praying desperately, asking the Lord, trying to seek His face about what He had me to preach. And so I hope this message will just kind of roll the curtain of your memory back just a little bit tonight. It goes along right with the song that was just sung. Psalm 22, verse number 1, please. Well, your Bible and mine says, My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? Why art Thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring? O my God, I cry in the daytime, but Thou hearst not, and in the night season I am not silent. But Thou art holy, O Thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel. Our fathers trusted in Thee, they trusted in Thou, didst deliver them. They cried unto Thee and were delivered, they trusted in Thee and were not confounded, but I am a worm and no man, a reproach of men and despised of the people. All they that see me laugh me to scorn. They shoot out the limp, they shake the head, saying, He trusted on the Lord that He would deliver him. Let Him deliver him, seeing He delighted in him. But Thou art He that took me out of the womb. Thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother's breast. Verse 10, I was cast upon Thee from the womb. Thou art my God from my mother's belly. Be not far from me, for trouble is near, for there is none to help. Many bulls have come past me, strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round. They gaped upon me with their mouths as a ravening and a roaring lion. I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws, and Thou hast brought me into the dust of death. For dogs have come past me, the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me, they pierced my hands and my feet. I may tell all my bones, they look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them and cast lots upon my vesture. But be not thou far from me, O Lord, O my strength. Haste Thee to help me. Please look at verse 14. The Bible says in Psalm 22, 14, I am poured out like water and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is melted in the midst of my bowels. And tonight, using this most unusual verse, I want to bring you a simple message entitled, What Breaks the Heart of God? Thank you for what you may be seated. Let's bow our heads and hearts, and let's pray and ask the Lord to bless our time together tonight. What Breaks the Heart of God? Father, thank you for this day that you've given us. Thank you for such another wonderful privilege to be as your people in the house of God tonight around your Word. Thank you, Lord, for the songs, for the time of fellowship. Thank you for our visitors, for our people that have been faithful all week long. And Lord, certainly I need your help tonight. I pray, dear Lord, that you would empty me of myself. And Lord, I would say all of thee and none of me. And Lord, I'd say nothing more than you want me to say, nothing less than you want me to say. Dear God, that your power and your hand would be upon me tonight. Lord, I pray not tonight for eloquence, but I do pray for the power and for the leading, the filling of the Spirit of God, that you would help me tonight to be true to the precious Word of God, as in truth it is the Word of God. Lord, if there be one in our midst tonight that has come to church but has never come to Christ, I pray the Spirit of God would convict him or her of their desperate need of a Savior. For my wife, for the ladies as they work with the children, open the hearts of the children. And Lord, I claim tonight, as David said, open down mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law. Thank you, Lord, for the sharp two-edged sword of the Bible, for the fact that it's a great hammer that breaks the rock in pieces. It's a great fire that stirs us and burns within our soul. And Lord, I pray tonight that your Word would do its convincing, its convicting, its breaking, its tearing, and its molding work in our heart. And oh, dear God, please move me out of the way. Preach through me tonight. And I pray You to this message to speak to hearts. In Jesus' name, Amen. If you know anything about your Bible as you begin to study through the Psalms, you know as well as I do that Psalm 22 is what we refer to theologically as a messianic prophecy. Now, we'll not let big theological words like messianic scare us or bother us away from the Bible. It simply means it's a prophecy of the Messiah. It was a prophecy of His life. It was a prophecy of His miracles. Obviously, a prophecy of the Gospel. And as I said on Sunday, there may be what we call social Gospels or moderate Gospels, but there's only one saving Gospel, and that's the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And that is what Psalm 22 is all about. As a matter of fact, these few verses that we have read in Psalm 22, many Bible scholars, historians, and theologians think that perhaps Jesus quoted all of Psalm 22 while He was hanging there upon the cross. And that is not the premise of my message tonight, whether He did or not. We do know that there are many direct references that are given to us in the Gospels that are a direct quote right from Psalm 22. But in Psalm 22 tonight, if we are going to understand the physical, the mental, the emotional, and the great spiritual suffering that Jesus endured for you and for me, we're going to have to lay some backdrop, if you will. We're going to have to lay some foundation to bring us back to Psalm 22. So use a finger, use a marker, use a pen, a piece of paper. Do something. Mark Psalm 22. We will be back there in just a little bit in our message. But I want you to take your Bibles tonight and turn to the New Testament Gospel of John, chapter number 19. The Gospel of John, please, chapter number 19. Out of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the Gospel of John has been called, obviously, the most evangelistic. And when we get to the Gospel of John, we have a great description of what Jesus Christ physically had to suffer for me and for you. But the great premise of my message, the main purpose of my message tonight is to show you that He did not just endure great physical suffering for you and for me. It was far deeper than that. But we must lay the groundwork using the physical suffering that He did endure. So please look with me, if you would, pardon as I read some Scripture, but we need to hear from the Bible tonight. John, chapter number 19, verse number 1. Verse number 1, John 19, where your Bible says, Then Pilate therefore took Jesus and scourged Him. And the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe and said, Hail, King of the Jews! And they smote Him, that's Jesus, with their hands. Pilate therefore went forth again and saith unto them, Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in Him. Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, and Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man. Ladies and gentlemen, I believe when Pilate said that, those were awaited words. I believe what he was saying in essence was, Behold what is left of a man. I'll show you why I believe that in just a moment. Verse 6, please. When the chief priests, therefore, and officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, Crucify Him! Crucify Him! Pilate saith unto them, Take ye Him and crucify Him, for I find no fault in Him. The Jews answered Him, We have a law, and by our law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid, and went again into the judgment hall, and saith unto Jesus, When saw it thou? But Jesus gave him no answer. Verse 10, Then saith Pilate unto Him, Speakest thou not unto me? Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and I have power to release thee? Jesus answered, Thou couldst have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above. Therefore He that delivered me unto thee hath a greater sin. And from thenceforth, please, ladies and gentlemen, underscore this, memorize this in your Bible, and from thenceforth Pilate sought to release Him. But the Jews cried out, saying, If thou meant to let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend. Whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat, in the place that is called the pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. And it was the preparation of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And he saith unto the Jews, Behold your king. But they cried out, Away with him, away with him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your king? The chief priests, that was the theological, religious big shots of the day. The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar. Then delivered he him therefore unto them to be crucified, and they took Jesus and led him away. And he, bearing his cross, went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew, Golgotha, where they crucified him and two other with him, on either side one, in Jesus in the midst, verse 19, please. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross, and the writing was Jesus of Nazareth, the king of the Jews. Our backdrop for Psalm 22 can be obviously found in John chapter 19. Ladies and gentlemen, as we get to John chapter 19, I want you to understand, John chapter 1 records for us in verse 11, that he came unto his own, but his own received him not, verse 12. But as many as received him, Jesus, to them gave he the power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe upon his name. So Jesus came, he healed the dead, he made the lame to walk, and the Bible even says in many occasions that he fed the 5,000. There was another occasion he fed 4,000. He walked upon the water, he stilled the waves in Mark chapter 4, the disciples looked at one another in bewilderment and said, what manner of man is this that even the winds and the waves obey his very wishes? We know that he cast out demons. We know that he healed. We know that there were certain people that at one time in their life, they did speak sign language, and they could not hear one bit, and they could not speak, but yet Jesus opened their ears, and Jesus opened their eyes, and Jesus opened their mouths, and Jesus did some wonderful miracles, yet the Jews refused to believe that he was the Messiah. He came unto his own, they rejected him, and therefore the Bible says it was opened up for the way of the Gentiles, and thank God for that. But yet your Bible and mine says that in this portion of Scripture, and for time's sake we cannot deal with all the gospel accounts of the crucifixion, Jesus has now been turned over to a crooked, perverse nation of politics, if you will. Here is this political puppet under too much peer pressure. He doesn't know exactly what to do with Jesus, so he decides to question him for a bit. He begins to question him, and sometimes we have the idea that the entire time he was standing before the people, and all they were yelling was incessantly, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him. But that's not the picture in John chapter 19. As a matter of fact, before Jesus was ever even led forth and shown to the people, as he was delivered to Pilate by the chief priest, the Bible even says in verse number one of John chapter number 19, that Jesus was taken by Pilate, and they scourged him. Let me just quickly run down through a list of a couple of things they began to do to the body of Jesus in utter humiliation. You talk about humiliation of character, if you will. You talk about humiliation of testimony. Here was Jesus Christ, the sovereign God of the universe, that created everything that we see. Colossians chapter 1 says, By him, for him, through him do all things consist. Yet he submitted himself to the direct divine will of his Father. I want you to understand, according to Philippians chapter number 2, not only was he 100% man, but ladies and gentlemen, he was 100% God, and never one time laid aside his deity, his holiness, or his attributes. He rather chose not to use them, so that he might submit himself to the will of the Father. He who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. 2 Corinthians 5, verse 21. And so here is Jesus standing before Pilate, and these people begin to mock him. They said, Oh, you say you're a king. Well, every king certainly has a royal anointing. The Middle Eastern culture, we know as David prayed in Psalm 23, he said, Thou anointest my head with oil, my cup runneth over. They would take some oil and they would put it upon that man's head, a symbolization that he had been anointed by God to be the king. But instead of pulling out that oil and anointing the soft head of the Lord Jesus Christ, I'm sure they'd set him down in a chair. And as they began to ridicule him, the Bible says they cleared their throats, and they literally, with all of the hatred they could muster up in their body, they cleared their throats and spit right in the face of the Son of God. Can you imagine? They spit in his eyes, and they spit there upon his nose, and they spit on his beautiful cheeks, and the spit will begin to run through his beard and across his mustache, and they spit there in his hair, and they spit all over his face, over and over and over again. And ladies and gentlemen, if there is one verse in the Bible that proves to me that Jesus was who he said he was, was Isaiah chapter number 53, when the Bible says, he opened not his mouth. Here he was being spit on upon the very people whose lips he had formed from the dust of the earth, Genesis 2, 7. They were spitting in his face. They were ridiculing him. Yet, he opened not his mouth. Now, I'm going to be honest with you. I believe there's enough red-blooded American men in here. Somebody spit in your face, friend, you'd have yourself a jolly time of revival, I guarantee you. I mean, you didn't want to knock somebody's head off. You didn't want to pull their beard out. You didn't want to knock them upside the head, give them a great big old noggin buster, if you will. But yet, Jesus didn't open his mouth. Jesus didn't say a word. They spit on him, and spit on him, and spit on him, and spit on him. Yet, he opened not his mouth. I remember when I was in 7th grade, I was seeing this little old girl, Brandy Thompson, and I thought the world hung and revolved around her. I remember one day I was trying to be Mr. Cool, and I was carrying her books around, and all of a sudden this little smart-aleck guy came up to me and knocked her books right out of my arms, my books as well, fell all over the ground, and we got into one of them 7th grade pushing fights, and you teenagers know what I'm talking about. He pushed me, I pushed him. He pushed me, I pushed him. In the back of our minds, we're thinking to ourselves, we probably look cool, but I hope nobody throws a punch because I don't want to get hurt. He pushed me, I pushed him, and we had ourselves a jolly little time there. All of a sudden, my homeroom teacher came up to me, grabbed my arms, pulled them behind my back. His homeroom teacher grabbed him, pulled his arms behind his back, and pulled us apart, pulled us away from one another. He was hollering, yelling, screaming. I was hollering, yelling, and screaming. As they were pulling us apart, our faces were probably about that far from one another when we were hollering. I mean toe-to-toe, nose-to-nose, face-to-face, and I mean we were just spitting, hollering, yelling like you wouldn't believe. And so they grabbed us, pulled us apart, and as they did, I'll never forget it, that young man cleared his throat in front of all of my friends, in front of the love of my life, and he cleared his throat and spit square down in my eyeball. It was everything I could do not to rip my teacher's arms off and beat that guy absolutely to death with them. I'm telling you, you talk about utter humiliation, you talk about utter devastation, and it was a long time before I ever got over that guy spitting in my face. And as you can see tonight, it still bothers me when I mention it tonight. Humiliation. Can you imagine? Spitting in the very face of the Son of God. The Bible says, oh, you say you're a king, you say you're a priest, you say you're a prophet. Well, see how much of a prophet you are? Instead of giving in that royal anointing, instead of giving in that royal rubbing, instead of the Middle Eastern culture, you know what they did with their kings? You know what they did with their men of high degree and political status, if you will? They would take that man, we would refer to them today basically as a masseuse parlor. They would lay that man down and they would begin to massage him. They would start there in the neck area, they would go to the shoulders, they would then go to the back in the ribbed area, and they'd go across the bottom and across the back of the legs all the way down to the bottoms of the feet. And they'd begin to massage that man. And they didn't want their kings to be all tense and to be all impatient. Oh no, they wanted the man to be loose enough. They wanted his body to be loose so he would think loose. And so they would give him that royal rubbing, as the Middle Eastern culture called it. Yet they stripped the clothes of Jesus Christ, they tied him to that whipping post, and that Roman centurion soldier came in and they gave him the royal rubbing all right. They took that cat of nine tails, that long leather whip with those nine strands of leather that came off. On every piece was the glass and the bone and the sand and all the rocks that was embedded. And that Roman centurion soldier began to take that cat of nine tails and lacerate the flat flesh off the body of Jesus. And nine would come off, then 18 would come off, and so on and so forth. And they began to start up here and work their way all the way down. And the body of Jesus was opened and bruised and bloodied and lacerated in every single drop of blood that hit that pavement in the judgment hall that day. You could hear it whisper, this is the love of God for the world. This is the love of God for the world. I want to remind you, ladies and gentlemen, this man, this Roman centurion soldier that was doing this, he was a professional. He was not some fellow that did this part-time and the other part of his life flipped hamburgers at McDonald's and pushed carts down at Walmart. Oh no, this was a man that made his money torturing people and killing men. He would take that thing, he would embed it into the flesh of Jesus Christ and within a split second, within a breath of a hair, I mean just that quick, he would rip it back and it would pull that flesh right out of his body. And even the Bible says, as the blood began to run down, he didn't say anything, he didn't holler, he did not revile against these people, and he was opened, he was bloodied, he was bruised. And I see sometimes these little pictures of Jesus, he's got a little poke in his side there and a little bit of water's coming out or a little bit of blood's coming out. He's got a little Roman nose and long hair all the way down his back. That was not a picture of my Savior. He endured ultimate suffering and punishment physically for you and for me. And he was open and the lacerations were all about his body. And these people were ridiculing the Son of God. Excuse me, ladies, but you know what history tells us? This was such a gruesome torture that many men did not even live through such an awful, awful whipping, a beating, the embedding of those leaded balls and that bone and rock and glass as it would go into the body. Many times when they would come around to the ribbed area, that Roman centurion soldier would wrap it around and in just a moment he would pull it back and it would literally open up the person's body and their bowels would spit out upon the ground. And I'm telling you, Jesus Christ did not endure just a little lashing. He endured suffering and punishment like no other for you and for me. He said, I give my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. They took the face of the Son of God and they grabbed at the hand a handful of hair. They began to rip it out of his face and then the Bible says, I don't know if it was a pellicase. I don't know if it was a potato sack. I know not what it was. But they put it over his head and they said, if you're a prophet, tell us who hit you. And they began to hit the face of the Son of God. I'm sure they hit him in the side of the face and they began to hit him in the mouth and his nose was swollen. I'm sure his lips were bleeding and his eyes were black and blue. And they began to hit him in the face over and over and over again. Yet he opened not his mouth for you and for me. I said, oh, pal, you say you're a king. Every king needs a crown. Instead of putting a beautiful golden crown studded with diamonds and jacknuts and olives and pearls upon his head, they took that crown of thorns and they placed it there. And your Bible says they plated it. You know what that means? It literally means drove it down into the skull, ladies and gentlemen. And every single drop of blood that came across his face that day had trickled down to the ground. You could hear it whisper, this is the love of God for the world. This is the love of God for the world. After the scourging and after all these terrible, gruesome things that they had done physically to the body of the Son of God, then the Bible says Pilate brought him forth unto the people. He pulls him out there on that terrace area, on that balcony. He says, behold, what is left of a man. You believe anything you want to about your New Testament Bible, but there's something that I believe dogmatically. I honestly think in my heart that Pilate thought those people would see that and say, that's enough, let him go. I honestly think, Pilate, after scourging him and whipping him and beating him and putting him through all of that torture, after they placed that purple robe of mulch around his back and they let that blood and all that goop and ooze and pus just kind of adhere, all those lacerations would begin to adhere to that purple robe and it began to squeeze tight upon his body like an old piece of leather. And he took him out there and said, look what we have done. Behold what is left of a man. And instead of saying, release him, instead of saying, let him go, they let the old crooked thief Barabbas go and they said, crucify him, crucify him. We have no king but Caesar. And you know who was the head honcho that was leading this whole thing? The chief priests. You study your Bible, the harlots, the drunkards, the publicans and the sinners never gave Jesus one day's trouble. Never one. He specialized in those type of people. I'll tell you who that wicked group was that always gave Jesus trouble. It was that religious crowd that was more interested in the doctrines of men than they were in the doctrines of God and that religious crowd still wants to crucify the Son of God. And religion has always been spit in the face of Almighty God. Because it's not by your works. It is not what you do that merits you one day's grace in the kingdom of God. It is what Jesus Christ has already done. That is why he said in John 19, 30, it is finished. Now friend, that's pretty plain. And so here he is. They said, crucify him, crucify him. Pilate said, I find no fault in him. Pilate said, listen, I'm not going to kill this man. So Pilate brings him back and he says, listen, these people are going to kill you. Don't you understand? I have power to release thee. I have power to let you go. I have power to keep you. I can do anything with you. I want to. And Jesus said, oh no, you have no power against me except that we're given thee from above. And Jesus didn't say a word. He didn't argue. He didn't revile. He did not plead his case. He didn't get David Gibbs to come and bail him out. Oh no, he stayed there in humility and rejection for you and for me. Now you study the Word of God and you will find out in verse number 12 that from thenceforth Pilate sought to release Jesus. That was it. As far as Pilate was concerned, this was an honest man. This was a man full of character. This was a man of integrity. He was letting him go. So he walks out there. He's going to let him go and here's what they say. We have a law. And by our law, he ought to die because he made himself the Son of God. Oh no, he was the Son of God. He didn't make himself anything. He was the Son of God, yea, God Himself for sure. And so they said, he's got to die. And he said, I won't let him go. Know what they said? If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend. Now, we're grownups in here tonight. We can handle this. But I'm going to be honest with you. Have you ever heard of little kids on the playground? You teachers here at the Franklin Road Christian School. You get the little kids. You get the elementary kids. I hope the junior high and high school don't do it. I'm sure perhaps, maybe they do to get what they want. But you know, little kids, they'll get around each other and they'll say, you know what, if you do this, I'll be your best friend. Now, they don't mean that. What they mean by that is you do what I want you to do, I'll be happy, you'll be happy, and everything will be hunky-dory in the kingdom. But if you don't, I'm going to be upset. And they say, if you do that, you're not my friend. And they give little ultimatums. If you go there, you're not my friend. If you do this, you're not my friend. You say, that's foolish, that's childish. It is. And here are grown men and women that are doing the very exact same thing in your Bible in John chapter 19. They said, if you let this man go, you're not Caesar's friend. That upset him and ruffled him so much. He was under so much peer pressure. You know, sometimes we preach to teenagers about peer pressure, but adults experience it just as much as teenagers do. And this guy gave in to the peer pressure. He released Jesus under them. Now, I want to remind you, we do not have time to turn there, but you study the other Gospels. You will find out. Pilate said, I am washing my hands of the blood of this man. And you know what they said? His blood be on us and on our children's children. And that verse right there answers the question to why the Jews and why Israel have had such a terrible, terrible time down through history because God took them up on that. But please let me say this. The truth is, the children of Israel have always been God's people. That is one of the big reasons that America has been blessed. And the day America turns their back on Israel is the day we go straight down the tubes, ladies and gentlemen. And don't you ever forget this preacher told you. KKK and a bunch of rest in cotton-picking bigots that get up and say stuff against the Jews, they'll give an account one day to God for that right there. And so here the Jews said His blood be on us and on our children's children. He said, you can have Him. They took Him out there, pulled that robe off of His body. I'm sure opening up all those lacerations, the blood, the ooze, the pus began to pour from His lacerated body. They took that strong cross and laid it upon the top of His back and 450 yards down the Via Dolorosa, right down the streets of Jerusalem. It means the streets of pain and what painful streets they were, ladies and gentlemen. He began to walk down there. Now we don't know if He fell beneath the load. The Bible does not say, but we do know that for some time a dear gentleman in history tells us a black man by the name of Simon of Cyrene picked up that cross and carried it for Him. I do know He did not carry it to the top of the hill. I do know He did not bring it all the way over there to Golgotha because John said, when I saw Him coming over the hill, He was bearing His own cross. Now don't let that bother you. That's not a contradiction in the Bible. It's real simple. He carried it some of the way, but not all of the way. That's simple. That's black and white on the pages of the Word of God. And so as Jesus is walking up Calvary's hill, these widows are weeping and they're crying and Jesus said, weep not for me, weep for your children. Those Roman centurion soldiers take Him up there and there's the people laughing. He trusted on God. Let Him deliver Him, seeing He delighted in Him. If He's such spiritual, why don't He jump off the cross and save Himself and save us and save the world and make this thing worth living? If you're really the Son of God, why don't you come down? And He opened up His mouth. The Bible says that they took Him up there and they laid Him upon the top of that old rustic Roman cross and they took His hand. Have you ever read in your Bible about the hand of God? Genesis chapter 1, verse number 1, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth and the earth was void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and God said, let there be light. He stepped off of His throne and flipped on the heavenly light bulb and the Bible says, sure enough, there was light. Genesis chapter 2, verse number 7, let me tell you something special about that hand. And the Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul. Psalm 19, 1, the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament show this handiwork. Day in the day out of every other speech and night into night show of knowledge. There is no language where their voice is not heard. Their line is going out throughout the entire earth and over and over again we read about the creative handiwork of God. I'll tell you how big and how majestic, how sovereign, how supernatural my God is. You know what David said in Psalm 8? He said, I consider the work of thy fingers, what is man, that thou art mindful of him. He said, I've looked at the rocks and rills, you raised the mountains, you lowered the valleys, you tapped down the grass and the loving daffodils and you roped off the beaches with the sand God and he said, you put all the stars there and Job 32 says, you put a song in the heart of the stars. A God that flew in the Milky Way galaxy, a God that put all the rocks and rills in their orders, a God that knows every single sparrow that ever falls and ladies and gentlemen, my Bible says in Colossians 1, 17, by him, for him and through him do all things consist. You know what that fancy word consist means? It means held together. If it were not for the sovereign hand of Almighty God, everything that we know would fly into oblivion. Every atom, every molecule, every speck of dust and yet the Bible says they took that hand, the very hand that formed them and they put that hand over on that cross and they took that long Roman spike and they drove it through his hand. The Bible says they took that other hand and drove it in. Then they took one foot and bent it over the top of the other foot for your Bible says in Psalm 22, we'll be in just a moment, he said, they pierced my hands and my feet. They then took that cross and they lifted it up and as they slammed it into the ditch, I believe the first part of Psalm 22, 14 was fulfilled. He said all. Did you hear that? Not some. Words in your Bible mean something. The Bible means what it says and says what it means. He said, all my bones were out of joint. I'm glad to report to you tonight that not a bone of him was broken. No corruption was set in on that body and that tomb for every single prophecy was fulfilled to the jot, the tittle, the if degree because Jesus was exactly who He said He was. He came the first time. It was fulfilled and ladies and gentlemen, He said He's coming the second time and it will be fulfilled as well. They took Jesus Christ and they raised Him up between the earth and between the sky. I believe a great symbolization of Jesus Christ being the only bridge of humanity between heaven and hell. John 14, 6, He said, I am the way. He didn't say, I am a way. He said, I'm the way, the truth and the life and no man comes unto the Father but by Me and they slammed that cross in that hole that day and every single bone was out of joint and if you'll allow me to say it this way, here was Jesus Christ hanging, open, bruised and lacerated, looked like a piece of raw hamburger meat hanging in a butcher shop. Just all of His energy was expended and He stood there and He barely could even move to get Himself some breath. The Bible says that darkness falls but yet the people come by and they begin to laugh. I want to remind you that Romans did not crucify people 25 and 30 feet off the ground as we see pictures. They crucified them between 4 and 6 feet off the ground so people could walk by and laugh. People could walk by in shame and humiliation and see the body of these prisoners. Have you ever wondered why they didn't crucify Jesus on the right of the two thieves? Have you ever wondered why they didn't crucify Him to the left? No, the Bible says they crucified Him right in the middle. I'm not reading into the Word of God but I believe it was a picture of dear Jesus being numbered with the transgressors, Isaiah 53. They put Him right in the midst. And here is Jesus Christ not opening His mouth, not saying anything whatsoever. The people come by and they wag the head. The people come by and they laugh and they scoff and they see the body of Jesus. Romans crucified people naked in that day but I will remind you that Jesus was a Jew and their law required a linen girdle around His midsection and that's all He had to cover humiliation. And here is Jesus opened and bloodied and bruised and raw for you and for me. And with that backdrop tonight, can you please go back to Psalm chapter number 22? Because normally when we preach on the cross, that is all we relay to our congregation. The physical, and I do not want to nullify this physical suffering. It was horrendous. It was torture, ladies and gentlemen. It was awful. You know, my Bible says in Isaiah chapter 52, the end of the chapter, that His visage was so marred more than any man. His face was so contorted and so twisted and so beaten. Not only was He unrecognizable as Jesus, He was unrecognizable as a human being. Now as a preacher, I've been to a lot of funerals. I've been to a lot of hospital visits. And these year pastors or pastoral staff could certainly say that they've been to more than I. I remember when I graduated from Ambassador Baptist College for two years, I was the staff evangelist for Brother Roy Steepe at the Somerville Baptist Church. And his eyes are not very well. He's only about 35 years old. He can't drive a whole lot. And so when we didn't have a lot of meetings when we were first getting started, we'd help him drive and I'd take him to hospitals and this, that, and the other. And I've seen some horrendous sights, but yet my Bible says that no man's visage was ever so marred as that of the Son of God. I remember our first year in evangelism. We graduated from college and we hit the road that summer and I was going to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. I was going to hold a meeting just for a couple of days at the Vernon Baptist Church there. And I remember I was driving and Brother Stanczak, I came up over a hill and my wife was normally trusting as she is when I was driving. We was in the minivan at that time and I was driving and she was sleeping. And so she was asleep and all of a sudden I came over the hill and I hit the brakes and came over into the right lane as fast as I could and I got off the side because I seen this Bronco pickup truck flipping end over end and the bad thing about it was it had about a 10 or 15 foot trailer behind it with a little Caterpillar tractor and that tractor had rolled completely over the top of that thing and I seen just the last end of it and the smoke was filling up and the gravel was flying and the sticks and leaves were going all over the place and I thought oh dear God, somebody's dead. Dear God, please help those people in that car and I pulled off the side of the road threw it in park and my wife said what are you doing? I said I've got to help somebody. I remember I jumped out and I ran down there as fast as I could. There was a patrolman coming the other way. He cut through the medium and came over there as fast as he could. There was an elderly couple that stopped just before we did. Several people stopped after us. I mean the windows was all blown out of that thing. The wheels were all contorted and discombobulated. That little Caterpillar tractor I mean as hard as heavy it was it was just crushed to a ball of metal. And I remember this man you could see the back of his feet he was kind of moving his feet back and forth like this and you could hear him saying stuff that I couldn't understand him and all of a sudden out of there he came pulling the body of his wife and I thank God that she wasn't dead but he came pulling her out and I can remember what he said my wife's in there somebody help me. My wife's in there somebody help me and he pulled out this woman who was broken all to pieces blood was all over her face and laid her down and immediately I thought to myself his visage was so marred more than any man. And I want you to go back to your Bibles please to Psalm chapter 22 because I want to show you the emotional the spiritual suffering was far worse than the physical suffering. Psalm 22 verse 1 is a direct quote. When it is quoted in the Gospels Jesus said Eloi Eloi lama sabachthani which is being interpreted in verse 1 Psalm 22 My God My God why hast thou forsaken me? That is one of the most mind-boggling verses I have ever attempted to read study, memorize or preach on in all of my ministry in all of my short years knowing the Lord that is one of the most mind-boggling verses there is. There is no other way to cut what this verse means God was forsaken by God. My God number 1 obviously a reference to God the Father. My God number 2 obviously a reference to God the Holy Spirit and He lifts up His voice in utter agony and He says My God My God why hast thou forsaken me? You know what the words are used here? My Elohim My Judge My Judge You study your Bible ladies and gentlemen do you know that every time Jesus spoke of God He called Him His Father? He said in My Father's house are many mansions. He said I am My Father 1 I must be about My Father's business Father forgive them for they know not what they do Father sanctify them through Thy truth and every time He talks about God He says Father Father Father Father Father until this chapter right here until this verse until this agonizing lonely time on the cross He does not call Him Father for if you would allow me to say it reverently tonight I believe He had no Father at that point in history He now had a Judge and I am sure that Gabriel and Michael the Archangel came to Almighty God and here they were with flaming swords getting ready to pull them out of their sheaths He said could I not presently call ten legions of angels to come and destroy the world and set me free yet He opened not His mouth and as Jesus was hanging there in utter loneliness humiliation and shame for the sins of the world He did not die for sin He became sin He became my depravity He became my ugly wicked vile sin that God's holiness could not look upon and the Holy God of heaven and the Holy Spirit had to turn their backs in utter shame and disgust of what they saw on that cross that day and the lights went out for a while here upon earth as Jesus the loneliest man that has ever lived on the face of God's earth the loneliest man that has ever walked the grassy knolls of God's earth He said my God my God why why have you forsaken me I believe there is a simple answer to that question you know what it is because of you and because of me because of our sin because of our disobedience and rebellion because all die in Adam but all thank God can be made alive in Christ but he said God you've forsaken me in the garden of Gethsemane just hours before Jesus Christ was crucified that we read there in Psalm 22 and also John 19 I'll take time to go over the Gospels the Bible tells us of a time when Jesus falls upon his face and here's what he says he says Father if it be possible let this cup pass from me nevertheless not my will be done but thine I've heard many good well-meaning preachers get in the pulpit and say at that time Jesus was looking for a way to bypass the cross I'm not a big controversial preacher but hear me and hear me well no he was not Luke 19 10 for the son of man has come to seek and to save that which was lost he came for the cross he wasn't looking for a simpler way he wasn't looking for a better way but he looked into the cup of depravity into the cup of sin physicians call it hematidrosis when he began to bleed great drops or sweat great drops of blood the blood capillaries beneath his skin beneath his epidermis he was under so much physical duress he was under so much emotional pain and stress that literally the blood capillaries burst and as the sweat began to pour from his glands the blood began to trickle down and he said oh dear God if it be possible let there be another way nevertheless not my will but thine be done I believe he was looking through the portals of time when he would hang there upon that cross and God the Father and God the Holy Spirit and the myriads of angels would have to turn their back on the son of God and in shame in humiliation and in loneliness I believe he was dreading that awful day when he knew he would lift up his voice and say my God my God why why hast thou forsaken me and the loneliest man that ever walked the face of this earth died on the low ready cross for you and for me still with the people scoffing still with the people mocking oh one beside him on the cross rejected him and went to hell one beside him on the cross received him and went to heaven and by the way you reject him you'll go to hell the night too and you receive him but you can go to God's dear kingdom a place called heaven the Bible talks much about but yet the Bible says that he lifts up his voice in utter anguish and pain but if that's not bad enough would you skip down to Psalm chapter number 22 and I want you to look if you would please at verse number 11 verse 11 of Psalm 22 he says be not far from me for trouble is near for there is none to help you see the loneliness the despair there is none to help verse 12 many not a few not some but many bulls have come past me strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round they gaped upon me with their mouths as a ravening and a roaring lion I've done everything I could to study this portion of Scripture I believe as sure as I'm standing here tonight please honestly study the Scriptures take not for granted everything that I say but be a Berean Christian go home and search the Scriptures daily to see whether those things be true and whether those things be so but I've studied it every way I can Psalm 22 verses 12 and 13 and I believe with all of my heart he's not talking about cows and goats and dogs and cats being around the bottom of the cross perhaps there were animals there on that land that day I do not know yet I do not believe he's saying that bulls gaped upon me with their mouth I believe this is a direct divine reference to the very demons devils and imps of hell I believe the demons came and what we could not see physically was going on in the spiritual realm and I'll be honest with you I'm glad tonight we can only see with physical eyes because it would scare us to death what's going on in this building spiritually right now the fighting and the striving for the souls of man but yet what we could not see with our physical eyes there was Jesus the Son of God seen as the very demons came and they began to flutter and flap around the cross that day and they began to laugh and I believe the devil thought that he won but man wasn't he isn't for a surprise three days and three nights later thank God for that as death come running out of that tomb and said listen I got Moses I got Abraham I got David and the rest of that crowd but I'll tell you one thing here's somebody I can't hold thank God for that and here's Jesus as the very demons of hell are gaping about his body does not the Bible refer to him here as lions 1 Peter chapter 5 and verse number 8 be sober be vigilant why? because your adversary adversary of God adversary of man your adversary the devil as a roaring lion walked about seeking whom he may devour and what we could not see here the very demons and the imps of hell antagonizing the very body and the very spirit of Jesus Christ as they began to scream I'm sure we've won and they began to gape upon the body of Jesus Christ and here he is the loneliest man in all the world as the demons of hell and humanity alone is taunting him laughing at him ridiculing and spitting their upon his battered and bruised body but would you please look at verse number 17 Psalm chapter 22 and verse number 17 where Jesus says I may tell all my bones they would you please tell me English teachers what the word they is referring to it is referring tonight to the bones he said I may tell all my bones they look and stare upon me although ladies and gentlemen understand me well although not a bone of him was broken he was so open and so lacerated physically his flesh was so riveted if you will that it could and his very bones protruded through his skin and he could see them open and he said my bones look at me my bones stare at me now that's a little bit different than some of those pictorial gospel tracts we have nowadays the little old Roman knows Jesus with no blood on him whatsoever no no friend it was an awful horrendous torture that Jesus went through but where we begin our message so tonight we must end our message and that's in verse 14 Psalm 22 verse 14 for Jesus in anguish he said I am poured out like water I believe that's a reference to the fact that he expended all energy that he had all energy he had he said listen I am poured out like water and all not some but all my bones are out of joint he says my heart is like wax it is melted in the midst of my bowels I tonight am a preacher and I praise God for the privilege and the honor of being such a preacher I praise God for the privilege and honor of being an evangelist I praise God for the privilege and the honor and the very humble experience that he gives me to be a mouthpiece for deity to open the Bible and stand behind the sacred desk with a sacred book and speak for a sacred God it's a very sacred thing a man should not treat it very tightly but I believe it's been treated much tightly in the day and age in which we live but yet ladies and gentlemen I am a preacher tonight I'm not a doctor I'm not a physician I'm not somebody that knows a whole lot physically about the body about biology and things like that I'm not real good about that but I've done some study here please follow me you're a doctor in the house I've spoke with many people before and every one of them agreed with me tonight around your heart is a water sack I mean around the very heart that is beating in your chest right this very moment that is circulating blood through your thousands and thousands hundreds of thousands of veins in your body you have a water sack around your heart it is a shock absorber called a pericardium the holy spirit of God is called a periclitos pera meaning alongside of if you will and so we see that a pericardium is alongside of goes beside of our heart and so we've got this pericardium we've got this shock absorber now I want to be honest with you tonight let's not be wicked here tonight let's not think everybody's carnal but how many of you tonight honestly have ever seen resurrected the program in the day and age how many of you have ever seen the dukes of hazard the dukes of hazard was a popular program in its day now when the duke would get in there they would keep on going they relied on what they would call shocks they absorb the great amount of pressure and they absorbed the great amount and they the great pressure and they absorbed the great and absorbed the great and the shock of your heart it absorbed it according physically to psalm 22 14 Jesus Christ had been under so much emotional physical and spiritual suffering and distress that the very pericardium around his heart that water sack literally burst asunder and sunk down into his bowels and that is why in the water and blood now that proved two things the water proved truly that he was dead but the blood proved that he was divine do we have anybody in here tonight who is a physician somebody in here that has some time in your life performed any type of surgery whatsoever would you put your hand out of the air perhaps there's some here perhaps there is not I don't see anybody well so I'm good but anyhow I was preaching this message in Kingman Indiana there was a physician there before I preached this message I jumped up and said brother I want you to verify what I'm saying is that true I said I have heard that before from other people I said is that true I have been working on a number of patients I have He would immediately go into a cardiac arrest. He said there'd be blood all over their body, blood all over them, that stuff would be pumping up and squirting out. He said I'd be cutting veins, cutting arteries, cutting all this. He said that person would die on the table, and immediately, he said immediately, it would dry up and begin to clot up immediately because dead people do not leave. But yet my Bible says that the heart of Christ broke and went down into his very bowels and the water poured forth proving that he was literally, physically, clinically dead. He didn't swoon and then revive in the coolness of the tomb. No, he died for you and for me. They placed him in that tomb and thank God, up from the grave he rose to the mighty conqueror and his foes. He rose victorious over the dark domain and he lives forever with his saints to reign. Hallelujah, Jesus arose. If I don't serve a dead Jew in a Palestinian tomb tonight, I serve a risen Savior who's in the world today. He walks with me and he talks with me. And the one thing that separates us tonight from all other cults and religions of the world is we serve a risen Savior who's sat down at the right hand of God. But yet the very heart of Jesus Christ broke and sunk down into his very bowels. What breaks the heart of God? If you know anything about Bible preaching, it'll be very easy for you to understand tonight it's the same thing that has always broken the heart of God. S-I-N, sin. He had to become sin and die for the sins of the world because not one other person could take your place. That is why we call it a substitution. You needed a substitute. And ladies and gentlemen, tonight your sin, my sin, broke the very heart of God. And if you've never come to the foot of a blood-stained cross tonight, ladies and gentlemen, you tonight by faith and faith alone can accept that's what Jesus Christ has done for you. He'll take residence, precedence in your life, in your heart, change you, make you a new creature, make you fit for heaven, put all of your sins, every sin you've ever committed, forgiven and under the blood of Jesus Christ. And you can walk out of here tonight redeemed by the precious blood of the Lamb because of what Jesus Christ has done for you and for me. Or, you can walk out of this room tonight lost, having every sin you have ever committed upon your back. And what a cumbersome load that must be on your pilgrim journey. Ladies and gentlemen, tonight the very thing that has broken the heart of God is sin. But might I just say this to God's people? We bow our heads, we pray. You may be saved tonight. Thank God for it. But your sin, your rebellion, your bitterness, and your back-slidden condition tonight sitting in the pews of a Baptist church still breaks God's heart. It still grieves Him. And tonight we need some people that are as broken over sin as God is.