115 The Burial of Jesus

Matthew 27:57-66

April 13, 2025

Tonight we come to the final event

Leading up to the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

It is THE BURIAL of Jesus.

Some have found it curious that the gospel writers

Were so adamant about adding details of this reality.

In some ways, I suppose,

The burial seems like an anti-climactic part of the entire scene.

And yet we find that all 4 gospel writers

Determined to include this one detail, that Jesus was buried.

And not only the gospel writers,

but clearly it was important to all of the apostles.

1 Corinthians 15:3-4 “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,”

Paul is specific to include it.

Even after the apostles had died and the early church began to establish a clear systematic theology, we begin to see the various creeds.

You are familiar with the one known as “The Apostle’s Creed”

(They didn’t write it, but those who studied their teaching did)

“I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended to hell. The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty. From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic* church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen.”

Even there the burial is not overlooked.

We know that burial was an important reality to Jews.

· You will remember that Judas returned the money of his betrayal and you will remember what they used it for.

Matthew 27:7 “And they conferred together and with the money bought the Potter’s Field as a burial place for strangers.”

It was important in Judaism not to leave bodies out to rot.

A dead body just eaten by the birds was grotesque and defiling.

The Law demanded that even the most vile criminals should be buried.

Deuteronomy 21:21-23 “Then all the men of his city shall stone him to death; so you shall remove the evil from your midst, and all Israel will hear of it and fear. “If a man has committed a sin worthy of death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (for he who is hanged is accursed of God), so that you do not defile your land which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance.

Aside from that, we even find Jesus speaking of His own burial.

John 12:1-7 “Jesus, therefore, six days before the Passover, came to Bethany where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So they made Him a supper there, and Martha was serving; but Lazarus was one of those reclining at the table with Him. Mary then took a pound of very costly perfume of pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of His disciples, who was intending to betray Him, said, “Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and given to poor people?” Now he said this, not because he was concerned about the poor, but because he was a thief, and as he had the money box, he used to pilfer what was put into it. Therefore Jesus said, “Let her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of My burial.”

I think it’s clear to us then that the burial of the Lord

Is far from just one of those insignificant details

That all the writers happened to include.

We should know by now that the gospel writers didn’t play that game.

They were very specific about every detail

As each one gave not only a historical fact,

But a theological point in everything they included.

And the burial of Jesus should be looked upon in the same light.

Tonight, as we examine it, I want to do two main things.

1. I also want to consider the theological ramifications about burial.

· What Jesus burial meant and what it means for us.

· I don’t know that we’ve ever discussed this before,

2. I want us to examine Matthew’s gospel account of the resurrection

· And learn what he would teach us about the event.

So maybe you can already let your mind begin to think about

Why this is important and what it means for us.

So first, let’s just talk about Jesus’ burial from a “birds eye view”

Something that all the gospel writers

Would have unanimously wanted to show you.

And perhaps I would start by just asking you, why the burial matters.

What significant truth do we learn here?

Now before you go too far, I would point out that I think there is one way in which our hymnology has not done us a ton of favors.

We sing the song “One Day” and you are likely familiar with the chorus, which is one of the few hymns that mentions the burial of Jesus.

“Living He loved me, dying He saved me, buried He carried my sins far away…

Rising He justified, freely forever, one day He’s coming, O glorious day!”

That hymn looks upon the burial as that scapegoat in the Old Testament

That Jesus was in some sense carrying our sins away below the ground.

I’ll admit that it is an interesting picture,

But you won’t find that imagery used in Scripture

As a legitimate explanation of His burial.

And yet the burial is theologically significant, WHY?

1) CERTIFICATION OF DEATH

This is, hands down, the most important aspect of the burial of Christ.

IT PROVES HIS DEATH.

You just don’t bury people who are alive.

The Heidelberg Catechism addresses this wonderful clarity:

Question 41: Why was He also “buried”?

Answer: Thereby to prove that He was really dead.

They site only one verse as proof, and it also is enough.

Acts 13:29 “When they had carried out all that was written concerning Him, they took Him down from the cross and laid Him in a tomb.”

The main purpose of revealing the burial of Christ

Is to emphasize the death of Christ.

He did not escape alive.

He died on the cross.

And the gospel accounts in absolute unison verify this fact.

Pilate verified it:

Mark 15:43-45 “Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the Council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; and he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus. Pilate wondered if He was dead by this time, and summoning the centurion, he questioned him as to whether He was already dead. And ascertaining this from the centurion, he granted the body to Joseph.”

Clearly there the centurion also verified it.

Joseph and Nicodemus then verified it by burying Him.

The women then verified it by watching Him be buried.

This is what the burial is for, to prove death.

As we said this morning, death is a requirement for redemption.

Romans 6:23a “For the wages of sin is death…”

And this goes all the way back to the garden.

Genesis 2:15-17 “Then the Lord God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it. The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”

The original announcement of God is that when sin occurs,

Death is the only acceptable consequence.

And when God’s demands were more clearly spelled out in the Law, we saw it again.

· The demands of the Law also had to be met which required death for sin.

· Over 50 times in the Law the death penalty is prescribed for sin.

Hebrews 9:22 “And according to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”

And it is not just bleeding, it is because the life is in the blood

The cost of sin is death.

If Jesus doesn’t die then the wage of sin has not been paid.

And to verify death, we get the burial.

There’s your chief theological point about the burial of Christ.

The burial proves He died on the cross.

As we examine the Scriptures we also see that out of that flow some other important understandings about the burial of Christ.

2) VERIFICATION OF MINISTRY

That is to say,

Jesus burial is set up to verify His ministry as the Son of God.

HOW?

Remember what Jesus said?

Matthew 12:38-41 “Then some of the scribes and Pharisees said to Him, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” But He answered and said to them, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet; for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. “The men of Nineveh will stand up with this generation at the judgment, and will condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah; and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.”

The religious elite wanted a sign from Jesus to further prove His authority to say the things He was saying.

· Jesus told them, “No”.

· I’ll only give you one sign, He said.

· Death, burial, and resurrection.

Jesus specifically referenced

Jonah’s stay inside the belly of the sea-monster as evidence.

With the focus there of “three days”

It equates to sure and certain, undeniable, absolute and total death,

With undeniable and absolute resurrection.

The burial proves death,

And coupled with His resurrection validates His entire ministry.

But that’s still not all that the burial speaks of.

3) ILLUSTRATION OF CONVERSION

Since burial is primarily a sign of death,

Christ’s burial even becomes an analogy of Christian conversion.

DO YOU REMEMBER Paul’s argument in Romans to people who thought that once you claimed grace you could just live however you wanted?

Paul balked at such a ridiculous notion and look what he said:

Romans 6:1-4 “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

Paul said there that “we have been buried with Him through baptism into death”

Paul there says that as Christians we identify in Christ’s burial.

Again:

Colossians 2:8-12 “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ. For in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form, and in Him you have been made complete, and He is the head over all rule and authority; and in Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ; having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.”

Once again you see it, “having been buried with Him in baptism…”

What is Paul talking about?

He is talking about a genuine conversion to Christ.

Those who think you can get saved and live however

Reveal a faulty conversion.

How does a person become a Christian convert?

How does an unbeliever enter the state of salvation?

The answer:

DEATH & RESURRECTION

Matthew 16:24-25 “Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”

Again in:

Luke 17:33 “Whoever seeks to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it.”

In short, you must deny yourself; you must lose your life.

What did Paul say?

Galatians 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”

Or consider:

Romans 6:6 “knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin;”

DEATH IS NECESSARY.

John 12:23-26 “And Jesus answered them, saying, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. “He who loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it to life eternal. “If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me; and where I am, there My servant will be also; if anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him.”

The way we are converted to Christ is through death.

It is death to self.

It is abandonment of our old life.

But that is not something that can be readily seen.

That is not something that is initially easily identifiable.

So we take a man or a woman who claims to have died to self and given their life to Christ and what do we ask them to do?

We ask them, have you really died?

· And they say, “Yes”.

And we ask them to do what?

· Be buried.

BAPTISM IS THEIR BURIAL.

It is the outward verification of their spiritual death.

Baptism is the only outward mark or sign that we perform.

Scripture teaches that burial is important to verify death,

And that is what our baptism is.

Baptism doesn’t save (it is neither the death nor the resurrection)

But it does serve as a sign of genuine death.

Following that we are raised, and that is also what baptism points to.

There is another important aspect of burial.

4) MAGNIFICATION OF RESURRECTION

Once a person is buried, there is only one thing that they need.

They need resurrection.

BURIAL SORT OF NARROWS THE FOCUS.

· A buried person needs only one thing.

· Jesus cried out to Lazarus and said, “Come forth!”

· There was no other need greater than that.

Now go back to Romans 6:4

Romans 6:4 “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

You see of course that we “were buried with Him through baptism into death”,

But don’t miss the application.

“SO THAT as Christ was raised from the death through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

Burial necessitates resurrection, and also pushes for it.

Staying buried is not the goal.

We don’t put people under the water and leave them there,

We bring them up.

And you could actually say there is that one moment of tension while they are under the water.

· Could you imagine if we held people there for a few moments?

· It wouldn’t take long before people started getting nervous.

Burial is not the goal, burial cries for resurrection.

So not only does burial prove death, but burial also pushes for life.

And it magnifies the importance of life.

And that leads us to the 5th aspect of burial.

5) DEMONSTRATION OF FAITH

I often speak of this at the graveside of funerals.

It is a farming analogy.

1 Corinthians 15:35-37 “But someone will say, “How are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come?” You fool! That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; and that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else.”

I like to talk about the cotton farmers of our area

· Who spend an enormous amount of money, even go into debt in order to buy seed.

· And then they do the strangest thing.

· They go and bury it in the ground and walk away.

· They do it in hopes of a future crop.

· You plant a seed to reap a harvest.

Every planting season is an act of faith and every burial is the same.

It is an act of faith that God will raise the dead.

It is the faith that Jesus was demonstrating

As He said, “Into Your hands I commit My Spirit”

He was trusting that God would bring Him back from death.

Our baptismal burial is our way of doing that too.

1) We declare our death

2) We submit to burial

3) We demonstrate resurrection

4) We trust that the Spirit of God has given us new life in Christ.

So you see the numerous theological aspects that we gain from burial,

And ultimately they all stem from the main purpose

And that is that burial proves death.

1) Jesus was buried because He died.

2) Jesus was buried so that He could rise and prove His ministry.

3) We are baptized to join Him in burial to show that our old life is gone.

4) As we are buried in baptism it focuses our mind to the necessity of the new life found only in resurrection.

5) And when we are buried in baptism it demonstrates our faith that we have been given new life that will soon become visible to everyone.

That is the theology behind the significance of burial,

But most importantly to prove death.

Now you know the main points, so now let’s look at Matthew’s gospel and learn the specific points he wanted us to know in addition to that.

We’ll make it simple as we look at Matthew’s gospel, just two main points.

#1 PROPHECY

Matthew 27:57-61

Introduced for us here is the figure known as Joseph of Arimathea.

If you look at all the information about him in the gospels

We get quite a picture about him.

Mark 15:43 “Joseph of Arimathea came, a prominent member of the Council, who himself was waiting for the kingdom of God; and he gathered up courage and went in before Pilate, and asked for the body of Jesus.”

Luke 23:50-51 “And a man named Joseph, who was a member of the Council, a good and righteous man (he had not consented to their plan and action), a man from Arimathea, a city of the Jews, who was waiting for the kingdom of God;”

John 19:38-39 “After these things Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but a secret one for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; and Pilate granted permission. So he came and took away His body. Nicodemus, who had first come to Him by night, also came, bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds weight.”

All 3 of those gospel writers are clear that

· Joseph is a good man,

· a righteous man,

· a God-fearing man,

· And even a disciple of Jesus.

· They indicate that he was waiting for the kingdom.

Mark says he was a member of the Sanhedrin,

Luke said he did not participate in the trial of Jesus.

They also mention his fear of public confession of Jesus.

· John’s gospel makes often mention of the fear of being removed from the

synagogue for confessing Jesus.

· Both in John 9 with the parents of the man born blind, and again in John 12.

John 12:42-43 “Nevertheless many even of the rulers believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they were not confessing Him, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God.”

It seems that Joseph had fallen into that category.

But as Mark pointed out,

After the death of Jesus, Joseph “gathered up courage”.

· No more a secret disciple; no more a man of fear.

· Joseph, inspired by the death of Christ goes public,

· And John includes that Nicodemus did as well.

All of that is good and important information

That each gospel writer used to make their own points.

But there are two pieces of information that only Matthew includes.

· One, that Joseph was (57) “a rich man”

· And that the tomb where Joseph buried Jesus was (60) “his own new tomb”

And with that we are well-aware of what Matthew wanted us to see.

Isaiah 53:9 “His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth.”

Matthew sees 2 very important truths in the burial of Jesus.

1) He is the prophetic redeeming arm of Isaiah

2) He is innocent

By pointing out that Jesus was buried in a rich man’s tomb,

He shows us that Jesus is the One Isaiah spoke of.

He is the one “with a rich man in His death”

And all of those facts we read about in Isaiah 53

About bearing our griefs and our sorrows

Are once again verified in Jesus’ burial.

So not only do you see the redemption of Jesus in His ARREST:

· Defending His own

· Submitting to the arrest, telling Peter it must happen this way

· Healing the servant’s ear

And not only do you see the redemption of Jesus in His TRIAL:

· Testifying that He will be seated at the right hand of power.

· Testifying that He is the Son of God.

· Not seeking to escape condemnation.

And not only do you see the redemption of Jesus in His CRUCIFIXION:

· Bearing God’s wrath

· Interceding for sinners

· Carrying it all the way to death

But you also now see the redemption of Jesus even in His burial:

· He is buried exactly as Isaiah 53 indicated.

Matthew shows you that.

And by showing us that, it opens the door

To another important truth about Jesus.

And that is that the burial of Jesus defends His innocence.

The innocence of Jesus is also a major theme throughout the gospels.

· Pilate publicly declares Jesus innocent 4 times.

· Herod declares Jesus innocent.

· The thief on the cross says “this Man has done nothing wrong”

· The Centurian says, “surely this Man was innocent”

AND NOW THANKS TO THE DOTS MATTHEW CONNECTS

WE ALSO SEE IT IN HIS BURIAL

“Yet He was with a rich man in His death, BECAUSE He had done no violence, nor was there any deceit in His mouth.”

Instead of being buried with the criminals of Rome,

Jesus was vindicated in his death,

· By receiving an honorable burial in a rich man’s tomb just as the prophet’s had proclaimed.

After participating in the “Messiah in the Passover” meal last Sunday night, it’s not hard to see Matthew’s evangelistic purposes as well.

Matthew includes that Jesus body was “wrapped…in a clean linen cloth”

And then hidden away in the tomb.

Now understanding

· The Jewish tradition of that second piece of matza bread,

· How it is wrapped up in linen and hidden away for a time,

· It is not hard to see the point Matthew is making to his Jewish audience.

You see all the symbolism that is important to Matthew.

And certainly we don’t overlook any of that.

Though the ultimate vindication of Jesus

Will come in 3 days when God raises Jesus from the dead,

It is not hard to see that God is already vindicating Him.

God is already declaring

· Jesus is innocent

· Jesus is Isaiah’s “arm of the LORD” who bore our griefs and carried our sorrows.

· Jesus is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

So from Matthew’s perspective, the burial is yet another clear indication

That Jesus is in fact our Redeemer.

So that is the first aspect Matthew shows us.

#2 CONSPIRACY

Matthew 27:62-66

Here we run up against the famous conspiracy of the Pharisees.

We read (62) “Now on the next day, the day after the preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered together with Pilate,”

Something interesting here is that this is the Sabbath.

· This is the day of rest.

Incidentally that is exactly what Jesus’ followers are doing.

Luke 23:56 “Then they returned and prepared spices and perfumes. And on the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment.”

I wonder if they had any idea that they were truly resting on that day for the first time in their life? Probably not yet.

But while Jesus’ followers are resting,

The religious elite are still scheming.

What are they afraid of?

(63) “and said, “Sir, we remember that when He was still alive that deceiver said, ‘After three days I am to rise again.’”

They are afraid of a resurrection.

· They also fear a faked resurrection in the case that the disciples might come and steal His body.

· So Pilate gives them a guard and permission to make the grave as secure as possible.

It has always been humorous to me here the amount of effort

Put into keeping Jesus dead, and even that won’t work.

Psalms 2:4-6 “He who sits in the heavens laughs, The Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger And terrify them in His fury, saying, “But as for Me, I have installed My King Upon Zion, My holy mountain.”

This is a foolish plan, and Matthew exposes it.

They couldn’t kill Him without His help and they can’t keep Him dead.

Peter will say:

Acts 2:24 “But God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power.”

BUT MATTHEW WANTS YOU TO SEE THE CONSPIRACY.

Matthew will show another one with regard to the resurrection.

Matthew 28:11-15 “Now while they were on their way, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all that had happened. And when they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers, and said, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole Him away while we were asleep.’ “And if this should come to the governor’s ears, we will win him over and keep you out of trouble.” And they took the money and did as they had been instructed; and this story was widely spread among the Jews, and is to this day.”

Matthew is vindicating His gospel

By showing you the roots of one of the main deceptions of his day.

He shows you what it means and then verifies that it is true

By debunking one of the chief attacks against it.

All of that to say that Christ’s burial is important.

· It matters that He died.

· It matters that He was buried.

· And certainly it will matter that He will be raised.

One other thing, people often ask:

Where did He go for those 3 days?

Well first we return to Jesus’ words on the cross:

Luke 23:43 “And He said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”

· That should be a pretty definitive answer.

· Jesus went to paradise.

Where is that?

Remember earlier in Luke’s gospel?

Luke 16:22-26 “Now the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom; and the rich man also died and was buried. “In Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom. “And he cried out and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool off my tongue, for I am in agony in this flame.’ “But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your life you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus bad things; but now he is being comforted here, and you are in agony. ‘And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.’”

· There we see the place that the Old Testament refers to as “Sheol” or the place of the dead.

· We see Abraham’s bosom or “paradise” on one side and we see the place of torment or “Hades” on the other.

· This is where Jesus went.

What did He do there?

1 Peter 3:17-20 “For it is better, if God should will it so, that you suffer for doing what is right rather than for doing what is wrong. For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison, who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through the water.”

Jesus declared victory.

“He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison”

He went to all of those demons who have been trapped there since the days of Noah, and any others who have joined them such as the rich man He spoke of in Luke 16.

Jesus went and declared their defeat.

They invited Him into death and that was a mistake.

They were in no way ready for His presence.

Revelation 1:17-18 “When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. And He placed His right hand on me, saying, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.”

Jesus, in effect, descended into death and declared “Game over!”

· He eternally condemned all that were in Hades

· He ushered all that were in Paradise into the presence of the Father.

· They are now free to be in His presence now that Christ has paid their debt.

All of the I.O.U.’s that all the Old Testament saints wrote

As they sacrificed sheep after sheep and goat after goat,

Had now been paid off.

Jesus declared victory.

He went to conquer the grave.

But now, we have set the stage.

1) Jesus has been arrested.

2) Jesus has been tried.

3) Jesus has been crucified.

4) Jesus has been buried.

And now we wait.

All of our anticipation moves now to this one point

As we await the resurrection of the Savior.

And we’ll examine that next Sunday morning.