Mark 15:22 - Meaning and Application

We have here the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus.

The place where he was crucified was called Golgotha, which means “the place of a skull.” Some think it got that name because the heads of criminals were cut off there. It was the common place of execution, like Tyburn, so in every way he was counted among lawbreakers. I do not know how much trust to place in it, but several early writers mention a tradition that Adam, our first father, was buried there. They thought it fitting that Christ should be crucified in that same place, because as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ. Tertullian, Origen, Chrysostom, and Epiphanius, all respected early Christian writers, mention this. Cyprian even adds that many good people believed Christ’s blood ran down onto Adam’s skull, since he was buried there too. A more believable tradition is that Mount Calvary was the mountain in the land of Moriah, which certainly included the area around Jerusalem, where Isaac was to be offered and a ram was offered instead of him. Then Abraham was looking ahead to Christ’s day when he named the place Jehovah-jireh, meaning “The Lord will provide,” expecting that it would be seen in the Lord’s mountain.

The time when Jesus was crucified was the third hour, as Mark 15:25 says. He was brought before Pilate about the sixth hour, according to the Roman way of counting time, which John uses in John 19:14, and which matches our way of counting today, around six in the morning. Then at the third hour, according to the Jewish way of counting, about nine in the morning or soon after, they nailed him to the cross. Dr. Lightfoot thinks this detail shows the priests’ guilt even more clearly. They were pushing Christ toward death after the third hour, when they should have been serving in the temple and offering the peace offerings. It was the first day of the feast of unleavened bread, when there was to be a holy assembly. At the very time when they should have been leading public worship, they were showing their hatred against the Lord Jesus. These were the same men who acted so eager for the temple, yet condemned Christ for speaking against it. Many people claim to support the church, yet they care little about actually going to church.

When they nailed him to the cross, they added insult to injury. It was the custom to give wine to those about to die, and they mingled his with myrrh, which made it bitter and unpleasant. He tasted it, but would not drink it. He was willing to take its bitterness, but not its relief. Since the clothes of the crucified became the executioners’ fee, the soldiers cast lots for his garments, as Mark 15:24 says. They threw dice for them, making themselves laugh over his misery while he hung in pain. They also placed a sign above his head, meaning it as a shameful insult, but it actually gave him both justice and honor: “The King of the Jews,” Mark 15:26. No crime was named, only his kingship was admitted. Pilate may have meant to shame Christ as a defeated king, or to shame the Jews for forcing him, against his conscience, to condemn Jesus. But God meant it as a public proclamation of Christ on the cross, the King of Israel, though Pilate did not know what he wrote, just as Caiaphas did not know what he said in John 11:51. Christ crucified is the king of his church, his spiritual Israel, and even on the cross he was acting like a king, defeating his enemies and his people’s enemies and triumphing over them, as Colossians 2:15 says. Then he was writing his laws in his own blood and preparing his gifts for his subjects. Whenever we look at Christ crucified, we must remember the sign over his head, that he is a king, and we must give ourselves to him as loyal subjects, true Israelites.

They also crucified two thieves with him, one on his right and one on his left, and put him in the middle as if he were the worst of the three, as Mark 15:27 says. They meant to heap shame on him by that. No doubt it was a burden to him as well. Some who have been jailed for testifying about Jesus have said that the worst hardship was being housed with cursing and swearing prisoners. Our Lord Jesus was crucified in the middle of such men. While he lived, he kept company with sinners to do them good. And when he died, he was joined with them for the same purpose, because he came into the world and left it to save sinners, even the worst of them. Mark especially notes how this fulfilled Scripture in Mark 15:28. In Isaiah 53:12, it was foretold that he would be numbered with the transgressors, because he was made sin for us.

The spectators, most of them, did not pity him in his suffering. Instead, they added to it by mocking him. Never was there a clearer example of cruel hatred shown to the vilest criminal. The devil showed his fullest rage against Christ, and Christ submitted to the deepest shame that could be done to him. Even those who passed by, though they were not personally involved, hurled insults at him, as Mark 15:29 says. If their hearts were too hard to feel compassion at such a sight, they should at least have been satisfied just to stare. But that was not enough. As though they had lost all humanity and were acting like devils in human form, they mocked him with deep hatred and contempt, striking him with bitter words. The chief priests, no doubt, put these taunts into their mouths: “You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself and come down from the cross.” They acted as if, once they had him on the cross, there was no longer any danger of his destroying the temple. Yet the temple he spoke about was the one he was then destroying, and within three days he would raise it up again. And the temple they meant, he would destroy through the hands of men, who were his weapon and his hand, not many years later. When secure sinners think danger is over, that is often when it is closest. The day of the Lord comes like a thief on those who deny his coming and say, “Where is the promise of it?” Much more will it come on those who challenge it and say, “Let him hurry and do his work.”

Even the chief priests, who were taken from among men and appointed to act for men, should have had compassion on those who had gone astray. They should have shown tenderness to those who were suffering and dying (Hebrews 5:1, Hebrews 5:2). Instead, they poured vinegar into his wounds instead of oil. They added to the sorrow of the one whom God had afflicted (Psalm 69:26), and they mocked him.

They said, “He saved others, healed and helped them, but now it seems he cannot save himself.” They challenged him to come down from the cross if he could (Mark 15:32). If they had seen that, they said, they would believe. Yet they would not believe even after he gave a stronger proof than that, when he rose from the grave.

These chief priests might have thought about other work at that moment. If they would not go and do their duty in the temple, they could at least have done something that fit their calling. Even if they would not offer Jesus any comfort or counsel, they might have shown some care to the thieves in their dying hours. But they did not think that was their concern.

Even those who were crucified with him reviled him (Mark 15:32). One of them did so, showing how hardened a human heart can become, even in the deepest misery and at the very edge of eternity.