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I want to welcome you to day five of our look through John 19 and daily drive
time devotions. We're going to look at verses 31 to 42 today. We're going to
look at the three last pictures of what Jesus did for us on that day that he
died.

Jesus is dead, but the pictures of his life continue. Picture 13 in this series
of pictures, the picture of a spear in his side. John 19, 31 to 37.

Now it was the day of preparation, and the next day was to be a special Sabbath.
Because the Jews did not want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath,
they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies taken down. The
soldiers therefore came and broke the legs of the first man who had been
crucified with Jesus, and then those of the other.

But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not
break his legs. Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear,
bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man who saw it has given
testimony, and his testimony is true.

This is John writing. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that
you also may believe. Verse 36 says, "These things happen so that the scripture
would be fulfilled.

Not one of his bones was broken. And as another scripture says, 'They will look
on the one they have pierced. '" This all happens on the day of preparation for
the Passover, that's what the day of preparation means at the beginning.

And they didn't want the bodies there the next day, a day of celebration, a day
of special Passover for them. And so they asked that the criminals would be
quickly killed. Now many on first reading this asked what it means for the legs
to be broken.

How would that help for the people to die more quickly? Well, a death on a cross
was a death by suffocation, suffocation and exposure. And if a person's legs
were unbroken, they would be able to push their legs up upon the cross so that
they would get some relief in the chest muscles that would constrict with your
arms stretched out on the cross.

With the legs broken, they were no longer able to do that, and very quickly they
would die of suffocation. Jesus had already died. Why did he die before the two
others?

Because as we said yesterday, he gave up his life. So when they came and found
that he was already dead, apparently to make doubly sure of his death, the
legionnaire, the Roman soldier drove his lance through the fifth interspace
between the ribs upward through the pericardium and the heart. And as he did
that, blood and water came out.

Now that blood and water show us two things. First they show us that Jesus
really died. The fact that he put a spear all the way into his heart.

Anyone who says that Jesus swooned on the cross or didn't actually die, not only
did he give up his life, he was also speared into his heart. But this blood and
water also show us another thing according to most doctors, most physicians.
They show us that Jesus died, Jesus literally died of a broken heart.

The fact that blood and water came out, as doctors write about this, they talk
about the fact that it shows that his heart had literally burst and that's what
would create the blood and water in that portion of his body. He died of a
broken heart. As our sins came upon him, as my sins came upon him, as your sins
came upon him, as he gave his life for us, his heart was broken for us.

So that when you and I look at the cross, we don't see a place of torture. We
don't even see a place primarily of death. When you and I look at the cross, we
see love, we see obedience, we see God.

As we think about the cross, remember that the Bible tells us not just simply to
contemplate the cross but to take up the cross. The truth of what Jesus did for
you should be a part of your everyday life. To take up the cross doesn't mean
that you're to die on a cross of crucifixion like Jesus.

It means that you're to recognize what he did for you in everyday life and to
live the kind of life that he's given you to live. Picture number 14 in John 19
is the picture of two men, Joseph and Nicodemus, unlikely men to be there at the
cross. John 19, 38 and 39, "Later Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body
of Jesus.

Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus but secretly because he feared the Jews. With
Pilate's permission, he came and took the body away. He was accompanied by
Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night.

Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about 75 pounds. These two men
who come to bury Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea.

Arimathea was a town about five miles north of Jerusalem and Mark tells us that
this Joseph was a member of the Jewish ruling council, the council that had
condemned Jesus to die. Luke tells us that Joseph was looking for the kingdom of
God. He was a man with a heart towards God's kingdom, not his own selfishness,
but God's kingdom.

Nicodemus, Nicodemus who talked with Jesus about being born again in John
chapter three, he joins him. He was also a part of this ruling council, the
Sanhedrin that had condemned Jesus. Now we don't get any insight in the Bible
into what they were thinking or what they said at that council that condemned
him.

We can only guess as to whether they fought the decision. But obviously there
were at least two men in this group who weren't focused selfishly on their own
position, but they were focused on the things of God. They were searching for
God's kingdom.

And here they see that Jesus has been mistreated and they're going to be sure
that he gets a burial. I just want to note as an aside here, I've talked to
Jewish friends sometimes who are concerned that Christians somehow see Jews as
the villains of the story of the crucifixion. And I try to explain to them,
nothing could be further from the truth.

Now there are some Jewish people in this story who did condemn Jesus to be
crucified, but there are also Jewish people in this story who took him tenderly
from the cross and put him in his grave. There are also Jewish people in this
story, his mother and the women who were with him and his disciple John who
stood at the foot of the cross and worshiped him in that moment. There's also a
Jewish man in this story by the name of Jesus Christ who gave his life for us.

The idea that somehow Christians think Jews are the enemies in this story is a
totally false idea. I praise God for Jewish people today and in history and on
this day when Jesus died. I thank God for Joseph and for Nicodemus who had the
courage, who had the courage to come and take him from the cross and put him in
a tomb knowing they might lose their position for doing just that.

That leads us to picture 15, the last picture in this chapter, John 19 verses 40
to 42. Taking Jesus' body, the two of them wrapped it with the spices and strips
of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs.

At the place where Jesus was crucified there was a garden and in the garden a
new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. Because it was the Jewish day of
preparation and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus there. Now we learn
in one of the other gospels that it was Joseph's tomb, his family tomb.

It had never been used and it uses it first for Jesus Christ. And this is where
the chapter ends. Jesus in this cool dark tomb.

But this is not where the story ends. All that's being done in John chapter 19
is not in conclusion but it is in anticipation. I'll never forget as a teenager,
brand new Christian, I'd just been a Christian a few months.

We went to a play called Godspell in San Francisco with some friends. I went
with several Christians who'd been believers for quite some time. If you've seen
the play, you know that it ends with Jesus' crucifixion.

There's no resurrection scene. So the play ends. We'd never seen it.

It was a brand new play. And the curtain closes and one of my friends, Peggy,
says so that the whole audience can hear. They left him in the grave?

Where's the story? You see, the story of Jesus Christ is not a story of a martyr
who gave his life for us. It's the story of a savior who died for you on the
cross and is going to be resurrected in three days.

That's what these pictures look forward to as you look through John chapter 19.
And as you see the pictures in that way, they are awe-inspiring pictures. But in
some ways, they're almost too big.

They're almost too big to fit into life. And so as we end this look at John
chapter 19, I'd like to ask you in a spirit of prayer, how does this series of
awe-inspiring pictures of what happened at the cross fit into your ordinary,
often routine, daily life? What should I picture?

What should you picture in our lives today because of what Jesus did at the
cross? Well, picture this. Picture victory over sin and temptation.

Romans 6 says, "We know that our old life died with Christ on the cross so that
our sinful selves would have no power over us and we would not be slaves to sin.
" Where's the power to say no to temptation? It's at the cross.

Picture this in your daily life. Picture God's power as a part of your everyday
life. First Corinthians 1.

18 says, "For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are
perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God. " What should
you picture because of the cross in your daily life? Picture yourself as a
person of incredible faith.

Galatians 2. 20, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but
Christ lives in me. And the life that I live in the body, I live by faith in the
Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

" What should you and I picture because of the cross? Picture a change in that
which is most important to you. Galatians 6.

14, "As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in all the
attractive things of this world was killed long ago, and the world's interest in
me is also long dead. " It changes what's important.

And what do I picture because of the cross? Picture victory over sin and
temptation, God's power in your everyday life, incredible faith in your life, a
change in what's important. What should I picture?

I should picture forgiveness. Picture yourself forgiven and pure in God's sight.
Colossians 2.

15, "In this way, God took away Satan's power to accuse you of sin and God
openly displayed to the whole world Christ's triumph at the cross where your
sins were all taken away. " As we come to the conclusion of John 19, those are
the pictures that we have in our hearts of what God has done for us on the
cross. And next week, I can't imagine anyone listening to John 19 and then not
listening to John 20 because that is where the story is really completed.

That's where the story of life and God's life for you and me is completed. Join
us next week for Drive Time Devotion as we look at the resurrection of Jesus
Christ.