An overview for Sunday school teachers and Bible study leaders of Lifeway’s “Explore the Bible” lesson of Mark 15-16 for Sunday, April 20, 2025, with the title, “Our Savior.” A video version of this overview is available on YouTube at:

INTRO

??? Does anyone have a specific/favorite memory of Easter Sunday from when you were growing up???

(Class members will likely have some things to share, which will hopefully get them “tuned up” and ready to participate in today’s lesson.)

Then after they’ve shared, say that the 4 Gospels convey the memories that the disciples of Jesus had of the events we refer to today as Easter Sunday, and for today’s lesson we’re going to look at what the Book of Mark specifically tells us about the events surrounding Christ’s resurrection.

(ALTERNATE INTRO:

??? Ask your group to share a time they got some really good news???

Then say that this morning, we are going to look at the greatest news that was shared of all time, when the angel said that Jesus was risen from the dead! 

If you don’t use this as an introduction, you might use it in Point IV below …)

CONTEXT

We’re taking a break this week from our study in I Peter, since it is Easter Sunday, and it is the custom of Lifeway publishing to do the Sunday School lesson on the Resurrection of Christ every Easter Sunday. (Same with Christmas as many of you know.)

SO we switch from I Peter 4 last week, to Mark 15 & 16 this week, which teaches the story of the death and resurrection of Jesus, then we’ll return to I Peter the next Sunday.

Although the basic story of the resurrection of Jesus is basically the same in each of the Gospels, and it might be regarded as a challenge to preach from the same texts every year, if you look at them, each one of the 4 Gospels gives just a little different “slant” on the the death & resurrection of Christ. The Gospel of Mark, our text for today, is generally regarded as the first Gospel, and as coming from Peter, who shared his memories with Mark under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. There are several points in this passage you can key in and make spiritual application for your class, as we will see.

OUTLINE

I. The Misunderstood Prophecy (15:33-36)

II. The Finished Work (15:37-39)

III. The Needless Worry (16:1-4)

IV. The Good News (16:5-8)

TEXT

I. The Misunderstood Prophecy (Mark 15:33-36)

:33 “When the [a]sixth hour came, darkness [b]fell over the whole land until the [c]ninth hour. 34 At the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” 35 When some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, “Behold, He is calling for Elijah.” 36 Someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine, put it on a reed, and gave Him a drink, saying, “[d]Let us see whether Elijah will come to take Him down.” 

We pick up the story in 15:33 with Jesus already on the cross: 

:33 gives the time of Jesus’ crucifixion: “When the sixth hour came, darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour.”

What is this “sixth hour” and “ninth hour”?

Many ancient peoples kept time from sunrise or about 6 a.m. So “the sixth hour” was 12 noon. “The ninth hour” was 3:00. So for three hours, from 12-3, while Jesus was on the cross, the earth was dark. 

So :34 says “about the 9th hour” — or about 3:00 in the afternoon — Jesus yelled out “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?” or “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

Now, one might easily understand why Jesus might utter such words from the cross — why had God forsaken Him like that?

But of course there is more to it. These words are a QUOTE from Psalm 22 in the Old Testament, which opens in :1 with those very words, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” This is a very important and strategic quotation by Jesus here.

Hebrew writers often quoted one part of an Old Testament scripture, intending by the quote not just to link the one verse that was mentioned, but to the whole chapter or section.

So here Jesus is linking Himself not only to Psalm 22:1, but to the whole chapter and all it contains. And if you read Psalm 22 you can easily see that it all refers to Him:

— Of course He quoted the very words of :1 “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

— His enemies shared the very words of :8, “Commit yourself to the Lord; let Him deliver him; Let Him rescue him, because He delights in him.” (+x Matthew 27:43)

— :16 “they pierced My hands and My feet” — significantly, there is NOTHING in David’s life we know of, that describes this — but it DOES describe vividly what happened to Jesus 1000 years later!

— :18 “They divide my garments among them, And for my clothing they cast lots.” Just as Matthew 27:35 says.

The prophecies of Psalm 22, fulfilled by Jesus 1000 years later in such a vivid, specific way, are truly amazing. So by quoting Psalm 22:1 on the cross, Jesus was saying, look at what is happening: I am fulfilling this scripture. 

Jesus was very well aware of fulfilling Old Testament scripture with His life.

He did it in Luke 4 when He preached in Nazareth. He was handed the scroll of Isaiah and He read it and :21 says: “And He began to say to them, ‘Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’”

So Jesus was well aware that He was fulfilling scripture all through His life. This was especially true on the cross. He fulfilled all the prophecies of Psalm 22, and Isaiah 53, and many other scriptures.

But did His present company understand this? This passage indicates that they did not.

:35 says: “When some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, ‘Behold, He is calling for Elijah.’”

WHY would they think He was calling for Elijah? 

Look at what Jesus said as He quoted Psalm 22: “Eloi, Eloi …”. 

This is the Aramaic version (Aramaic was an offshoot of Hebrew, the common language spoken in Judah those days). Matthew translates it “Eli, Eli” — which was the Biblical Hebrew of Psalm 22. 

But the point is, you can see how someone hearing “Eloi, Eloi,” might think the person was calling for “Eli-a” — the name of Elijah — both start with “El,” and Jesus was undoubtedly in great agony as He said it. So they misunderstood.

But then their subsequent actions reveal even more, not just about their mental misunderstanding, but also about their heart.

They said at the end of 36, “Let us see whether Elijah will come to take Him down.”

“Let’s see” is not a word of faith. It’s an expression of doubt, of unbelief. “Let’s see …”. It’s not a word of action, it’s not a word of faith. It’s a word of doubt, of skepticism, of unbelief. Truly they missed the whole thing. Let’s make sure that WE don’t miss the whole thing too — the point of what Jesus was really accomplishing on the cross — which is we see unfold in the next verses:

II. The Finished Work (15:37-39)

37 “And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed His last. 38 And the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. 39 When the centurion, who was standing right in front of Him, saw the way He breathed His last, he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”

Verse 37 says He “breathed His last” — Jesus died. A sad, tragic, thing — but also a necessary thing. Over & over the scripture tells us that Jesus had to die in order to pay for our sins:

When I pastored in Louisiana I knew a man who was a hunter, and he had a saying: “For something to live, something else has to die.” You might consider posting this saying on a poster or video screen, and have your class discuss it: 

??? What do you think of this saying? Is it true???

(It certainly is true in many areas of life: for a cow to live, a plant must die; for a lion to live, another animal must die; for humans to live, plants and animals must die — and so on.)

Then point out: this is also true spiritually as well. For us to live spiritually, Someone had to die — and that “Someone” was Jesus. 

(You might distribute these verses to your class as they arrive, and have them read them at this point. Point out how each one indicates that Jesus had to DIE in order to bring about our salvation)

— Romans 15:3 “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures …”

— Matthew 16:21 “From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day.”

— Matthew 20:28 “just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”

— I Peter 1:18-19 “knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, 19 but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.”

— Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”

— John 3:14-15 “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; 15 so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.”

— I Peter 3:18-19 “For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God”

Repeatedly, these verses throughout the New Testament teach us that for us to live spiritually, Jesus had to die. And when He did, His death was not wasted. It accomplished what He came to do. It doesn’t tell us here what Jesus said in that last cry when He died, but John 19:30 tells us that He cried, “It is finished!,” a Greek business word (telelestai) that means “paid in full.” Our sins were paid in full by Jesus’ death on the cross. 

ILLUSTRATION

A couple of years ago, I paid off my 2016 Nissan Rogue, and in the mail I received the loan document, stamped in red that it was “paid in full.” If you have a document like that for a car, or home, or student loan or some other purchase, you might bring it Sunday and share it with your class — and then say, but even greater is that God writes “paid in full” over our sins, because of Jesus’ death on the cross for us! 

One of the most dramatic Scriptural illustrations of the effect of Jesus’ death is given to us here in :38, “And the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.” What is the significance of this?

The veil of the Temple served as the divider between the holy place and the holy of holies, into the presence of God, where only the High Priest could come once a year, with the blood of the sacrifice on the Day of Atonement (we just studied this in Leviticus). But the moment Jesus died, this veil was torn — and it was torn as no mere man could tear it — from top to bottom, indicating that it was a work of God. And this was no mere “veil” like we often think of, like a thin wedding veil. This was a thick, woven curtain, that Alfred Edersheim in his Life & Times of Jesus the Messiah was the breadth of a man’s hand — perhaps SIX INCHES THICK!  That this was torn in two from top to bottom was surely God’s work. 

And most importantly, it symbolized that because of Jesus’ finished work on the cross, the way into the presence of God is now open to all who trust in Him as their Lord & Savior, just as the scripture says in Ephesians 3:12, that now “we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him”! The veil has been torn — and now we each have personal access to God, every day, something even the Hebrew High Priest did not have, because of Jesus’ finished work on the cross!

III. The Needless Worry (16:1-4)

:1 “When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome, bought spices, so that they might come and anoint Him. 2 Very early on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen. 3 They were saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb?” 4 Looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled away, although it was extremely large.

It is very revealing, that here these ladies were, all concerned about how they would get this stone rolled away — a good question, by the way — but in fact, they never did have to worry about it. It was already rolled away when they got there!

But there is a good point of application for us here: HOW MANY TIMES DO THE THINGS WE GET SO WORRIED ABOUT, NEVER HAPPEN?  We’ll stay up all night, tossing and turning, about we are doing to deal with “x” — and “x” never happens! 

??? Can anyone share an instance that you kept worrying about something — what you were going to do/how you would handle it — but then that thing you were so concerned about, didn’t even happen?

ILLUSTRATION from Abraham Lincoln: 

“When I was a young lawyer, and Illinois was little settled, I, with other lawyers, used to ride the circuit. Once a long spell of pouring rain flooded the whole country. Ahead of us was Fox River, larger than all the rest, and we could not help saying to each other, ‘If these small streams give us so much trouble,  how shall we get over the Fox River?’ Darkness fell before we had reached that stream, and we all stopped at a log tavern, had our horses put up, and resolved to  pass the night. Here were right glad to fall in with the Methodist Presiding Elder of the circuit, who rode it in all weather, knew all its ways, and could tell us about the Fox River. So we all gathered around him, and asked if he knew about the crossing of Fox River. ‘O yes,’ he replied, ‘I know all about Fox River. I have crossed it often, and understand it well. But I have one fixed rule with regard to Fox River: I never cross it till I reach it!’”  (Carl Sandburg, Abraham Lincoln, The Prairie Years and the War Years, p. 202)

The point is, we should understand that many of OUR worries are the same way. Most of the things that we are thinking about, scheming about, worrying about — losing sleep over — never even take place. The ladies here in Mark 16 were worried about how they would move the stone. They never had to. YOU may be similarly concerned about dealing with something today, that will never take place. Like Lincoln and his companions, “Don’t cross that bridge until you get to it.” Trust that God will take care of it — maybe even before you get to it!

IV. The Good News (16:5-8)

If you don’t use it for an introduction to the lesson, you might ask your class to open this point:

??? What is some good news you once received, that you remember to this day???

Then after everyone has shared, say, In these next verses we are going to look at the greatest news of all time, shared by the angel at the tomb of Jesus!

:5 “Entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting at the right, wearing a white robe; and they were amazed. 6 And he *said to them, “Do not be amazed; you are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here; behold, here is the place where they laid Him. 7 But go, tell His disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you.’” 8 They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.”

So with the stone already rolled away, they saw “a young man … wearing a white robe” — again, letting scripture be the best interpreter of scripture, the other gospels tell us this was an angel. And what did he say to them? It was the greatest message of all time:  “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who has been crucified. He has risen; He is not here.” 

This is the Greatest News: this is what we celebrate today!

“He has risen, He is not here.”

ILLUSTRATION

R.W. Dale was a pastor in England in the 1800s. In Warren Wiersbe’s Walking with the Giants, he writes: 

“Dale was preparing an Easter sermon when the truth of Christ’s physical resurrection burst in upon him with compelling power. “Christ is alive!” he said aloud; ‘He is alive — alive!’ he began to walk about the room saying to himself, ‘Christ is living! Christ is living!’ Not only that following Easter Sunday, but for months afterward he exulted in the theme of the resurrected Christ. He even began the practice of having a resurrection hymn sung each Sunday morning, just to remind the people that they were worshiping a living Christ.” (p. 45) 

Some of us as Christians today may need to have this same kind of “reminder”: Jesus is really alive! And because He is, our sins are truly forgiven, and we really do have eternal life — and we will really be reunited with our saved ones in glory. “Because He lives, we can face tomorrow”! It truly IS the greatest news ever!

ONE KEY APPLICATION I would make with the text here this week from :7-8:

7 But go, tell His disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you.’” 8 They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

NOTICE THE START CONTRAST between what they were COMMANDED to do, and what they actually DID: 

— :7 They were commanded to “Go, tell His disciples and Peter”

— :8 They DID “went out and fled … and they said nothing to anyone.”

AND YET the other gospels do indicate that the ladies DID eventually share the news of Jesus’ resurrection with others:

(Matthew 28:8, Luke 24:9). So these ladies are EXAMPLES to us, of how we sometimes FAIL to share about Jesus, and sometimes succeed. 

Too often, many Christians today just like the ladies here were initially. We have been commanded, just like them, to go and be witnesses, but many times, sadly, again we are just like them, and “say nothing to anyone”! 

An ILLUSTRATION of this is found in a Lifeway survey:

— Almost 1/2 (47% of lost/unchurched people are open to discussing faith with a friend, while an additional 31% would be willing to just listen:  that’s 78% of lost people who are willing to either discuss or listen to you share your faith! 

— But only 1 in 3 say that any Christian has EVER talked to about their faith!  

— Another LIfeway survey indicated that only 1 out of 10 Christians share their faith with someone at least monthly.

— And the survey indicated that HALF of Christians have never even invited someone to church or a church program, let alone share Christ with them! 

(Lifeway Research Sept. 9, 2021; and 2019 Discipleship Pathway Assessment study) 

You might share with your group: evidently these ladies (or at least some of them) initially did NOT share the Good News, but then they did. Most of us have probably experienced BOTH situations: times when we did NOT share, and times when we DID.

So you might ask your group: 

??? Let’s share some different times recently when we DID/DID NOT share the Gospel when we had an opportunity???

DID:

(For example, I was getting my hair cut the other day, and I noticed the stylist had some books decorating her booth. I asked her about one of them, that talked about “good luck charms” and protection from evil and so on. I was able to share with her that we don’t need “good luck,” that if we ask Jesus to be our Savior, He protects us from those things. I also had an opportunity to share the gospel with one of our grandchildren this week in whom God is working.)

You/your group can share opportunities you may have had.

DID NOT:

(Sadly I have an example of that too! We had a contractor at our house this week, and we asked him if we wanted something to eat, and he said no, that he was fasting for Easter. It was a good opening for me to share, but for some reason I did not follow up on it. I just whiffed!)

So when class members indicate they missed an opportunity, 

encourage them that at least they were thinking about it!  Now let’s ask God to help us be better witnesses for Him.

And you might close with a time of prayer, that God would fill us with His Holy Spirit, and make us bold to share the Gospel — and ask that He might give to each one of us some opportunity THIS WEEK to share the greatest news of all time!

Next week we’ll return to our study in I Peter for 2 weeks, as we’ll finish Chapter 4, and do a lesson in Chapter 5, then move on to II Peter & Jude.

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— These weekly lessons are based on content from Explore the Bible Adult Resources. The presentation is my own and has not been reviewed by Lifeway.

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