2BC BIBLE STUDY NOTES

Wednesday in the Word

Second Baptist Church

May 27, 2026

John 19:24-20:14

1. Verses 23-24. John’s underscores the fulfillment of prophecy in the events surrounding our Lord’s death. Three times in our text John specifically informs his readers that prophecy has been fulfilled (verses 24, 36 and 37). When our Lord’s garments are divided according to lot, John informs us that this fulfills the prophecy of Psalm 22:18. The soldiers only see Jesus as a way to enrich their material needs. Even today people miss the Christ who died for their sins only to see a way for their material needs to be met.

2. Verses 25-27. There are four women who are standing by mourning the death of Jesus. Jesus sees them and instructs one of his disciples to take care of his mother who is one of the four women.

3. Verses 28-30. Jesus utters the words, “I am thirsty” which prompts one of those standing nearby to dip a sponge into sour wine and convey it to the lips of our Lord. This is not the same offer of wine that was made as the crucifixion began (Matthew 27:34; Mark 15:23). The “wine” that Jesus refused at the outset of His crucifixion was mixed with a narcotic-like pain killer. Jesus refused this because He insisted on drinking the “cup of God’s wrath” to the full (John 18:11). The “wine” Jesus now accepts is a cheap wine. It did not deaden any of His pain. Our Lord’s thirst and His partaking of this “wine” seems to have served a purpose. It fulfilled Scripture: (Psalm 22: 15, NKJV) (Psalm 69:3, NKJV). (Psalm 69:21, NKJV). The hyssop is also connected. The significance of the hyssop in relation to the blood of the Passover lamb: (Exodus 12:22). When Jesus took the wine, he closed his eyes and said it is finished. The Passover lamb has been slain.

4. Verses 31-37. Time was running out for the Jews. They had been forced to go through the formalities of a trial. Because it was the day of preparation; they must finish with this crucifixion by evening so they could begin to observe the Sabbath by evening. In Jewish tradition, the Day of Preparation is the day immediately preceding the Sabbath or a holy day, during which households and communities prepared for the upcoming day of rest or festival observance. This included cooking meals, cleaning, and completing tasks that could not be performed on the Sabbath, as work was prohibited during the Sabbath itself (Exodus 20:8–11). During this time the Jews would eat the Passover meal that night, which meant they couldn’t work. Jesus had to crucified before then. (this week had two sabbaths). Jesus ate his meal with the disciples on Wednesday night, he is tried and crucified Thursday morning which is the Passover day, the Jews eat the Passover meal that night after sunset. Normally, death by crucifixion would take much longer, and this was no problem to Rome. While the Romans liked to leave the bodies of those crucified exposed for some time, to serve as a warning to all, the Jews could not allow these bodies to remain exposed after nightfall. The men would have to die more quickly than normal so that their bodies could be taken down. Rome had a solution for this situation. A heavy hammer was used to crush the bones of the victims’ legs. This would make it impossible for those being crucified to push up with their legs to facilitate the breathing process. The soldiers therefore set out to break the legs of all three. When they came to Jesus, it was apparent that He was already dead. There was no need to break His legs. One of the soldiers must have wanted to make sure that Jesus was dead, so he thrust his spear into our Lord’s side. Immediately, both blood and water gushed out, a fact to which John gave special significance.

5. Verses 38-39. In these two verses we are introduced to two men Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. These two men obtain the body of Jesus at approximately 3 in the afternoon. They had just a few hours before nightfall to bury the body of Jesus prior the beginning of the Sabbath and Passover. Joseph request the body of Jesus and Nicodemus acquires the necessary funeral spices. Joseph of Admathea was from the hill country of Judea. He was well known among the early Christians as "a good and righteous man" (Luke 23:$0), and he is honored and mentioned in all four Gospels. He was a member of the Jewish parliament (Sanhedrin) and very wealthy (Matthew 27:57). He probably belonged to the Sadducee party who did not b61ieve in the resurrection of the body, and their main interest was in promoting the political interests of the Jewish people.. We don’t know how he had become a secret disciple of Jesus, but as a result he "was waiting expectantly for the Kingdom of God" (Mark 15:43, Luke 23:51). Nicodemus. He also was a member of the Sanhedrin, but he belonged to the opposing Pharisee party. Unlike Joseph of Arimathea he taught that there was a resurrection from the dead for those who became righteous by obeying all the Old Testament laws and customs. He had become the leading Rabbi in the city, but he was fascinated by Jesus’ teaching and he came to him secretly by night to find out more. Jesus told him he needed to be born again and learn to live by the Holy Spirit rather than by the hundreds of Pharisee rules (John 3:1-8). Nicodemus brings the amount of spices that would be used for royalty.

1. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus were men of position and power, and at least Joseph was a man of wealth. God used them to provide for our Lord’s royal burial. God uses the weak and foolish things of this world, but He sometimes uses the rich and the powerful, as He does here in our text. God always uses just the right instrument to accomplish His purposes.

6. Verses 40-42. Joseph and Nicodemus take the body of Jesus and prepare it for burial by wrapping it in linen and applying the necessary spices to the body. They place the body in a tomb that Joseph had custom-built. (Matthew 27:60). This fulfills the scripture. The Old Testament had prophesied that the Messiah would be buried in a rich man’s tomb: “He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth” (Isaiah 53:9, NIV). Somehow, the Messiah would be put to death as a criminal (Isaiah 53:3-4), with criminals (53:9), and yet He was also to be buried with the rich (53:9). It appears from the text that they used the tomb because of its proximity to the crucifixion. They needed a tomb that was close because they needed to be finished before the Sabbath arrived at nightfall.

7. Chapter 20:1-2. John skips to the early morning hours of Sunday. The Sabbath is over and Mary Magdalene has arrived at the tomb only to find out that the stone had been rolled away. John skips some of the details that the other gospels include. John’s only desires is to show that Jesus was not in the tomb and the roman guards were no where to be found. All the Gospels honor Mary Magdalene by naming her as the first woman to come to the tomb to anoint the body of her Lord. Matthew also mentions the “other Mary” (27:61), Mark refers to “Mary the mother of Joses” (15:47), and “Mary, the mother of James and Salome” (16:1). Luke includes “Joanna” and “other women” (24:10). These women came prepared to anoint the dead body of Jesus. They did not come with the intention of becoming witnesses to His resurrection, but that is precisely what happened. John chooses to focus only on Mary Magdalene. This woman is the first one to arrive at the empty tomb. She came to the tomb while it was “still dark” (20:1), and when she got close enough she saw that the stone had been removed. That was all the information she needed. She jumped to the wrong conclusion. She was right, of course, in assuming that the body of her Lord was gone. She was wrong to conclude that someone (“they”) had taken the Lord’s body from the tomb. Exactly who “they” are is not indicated. She may have been thinking in terms of thieves, but more likely she was thinking of the Romans, or perhaps the Jewish religious leaders. Mary first ran to where Peter was and then to where John (and Mary, the mother of our Lord) was staying. She repeated the conclusion she had reached. The body of Jesus had been taken, and she had no idea where His body could be found.

8. Verses 3-9. Peter and some other disciples go to see about Mary’s claim. They all find the tomb empty with the graves clothes still inside. Most who showed up did not know what to think of the sight, but one of the disciples saw and believed. Sometimes it is easier to think that God can’t do something than to think he can. Everything that was associated with death was still in the tomb. The only thing that wasn’t in the tomb was the only thing that was living, Jesus. The tomb and the grave clothes are reminders that you can never have a resurrection without a death. Some of our greatest comebacks will come on the eves of our biggest loses.

9. Verses 10-14. When Peter and John left the tomb, Mary remained behind. At first she stood outside the tomb, weeping. She stooped sufficiently to be able to see inside the tomb. Two angels were inside, clothed in white. An angel was sitting at each end of the place where Jesus’ body had been laid. From Mary’s response to these angels, one can hardly avoid the conclusion that Mary did not recognize these angels as angels. But then why should she? It is true that in Matthew’s account the one angel who sat on the stone had an appearance that was like lightening (28:3), and this fellow was so awesome the guards were terrified (28:4). But John does not tell us that these two angels were as awesome in appearance as the first angel was. And this should come as no surprise. Often in the Bible, angels simply look like men, so that their appearance alone would not reveal their true identity (see Genesis 18 and 19; Acts 1:10-11 ; Hebrews 13:2). It would seem that the two angels made no effort to identify themselves as angels, nor even to inform Mary that Jesus was not there. The angels asked Mary, “Woman, why are you weeping?” The inference is that her tears were not really called for. They were tears of love, and of sorrow, but they were also ill-founded. In Mary’s mind, this was the darkest moment of her life, and yet her tears were based upon false assumptions: that Jesus was dead; that His body had been stolen; that she would not be able to find His body. If Mary had known the real reason why the tomb was empty, she would not have been crying. Have you ever cried any premature tears?

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