John xix. 38 — 42. And after this, Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus : and Pilate gave him leave. He came therefore, and took the body of Jesus. And there came also Nicodemus, which at the first came to Jesus by night, and brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about an hundred pound loeight. Then took they the body of Jesus, and wound it in linen clothes with the spices, as the manner of the Jews is to bury. Now in the place where he was crucified there ivas a garden ; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus therefore because of the Jews preparation day ; for the sepulchre was nigh at hand.
THE smallest circumstances relative to the life and death of our blessed Lord may well be supposed to deserve peculiar attention : but the mere interment of his body one would imagine might be passed over as a matter of no moment. Yet we find our Lord himself repeatedly referring to it, during the course of his ministry. He mentions the indispensable necessity of his interment, in order to complete the purposes of his grace a : he specifies the term of his intended continuance in the heart of the earth b: and he commends the fervent love of Mary in pouring ointment on his head, as a prophetic, though not an intended, preparation for his burial0. In fact, the inspired history does not record any thing more minutely and circumstantially than the funeral of our Lord : and the more carefully we attend to what is spoken respecting it, the more interesting and in- structive it will appear. Let us consider then, I. The peculiar circumstances of his interment —
[In the moment when our Lord seemed abandoned by all, except a few women and his beloved Disciple, and when, as it should appear, no motive could any longer exist for shew- ing a regard for him, God raised up two persons of eminence and distinction to pay that respect to him when dead, which had been refused to him when living. One of these persons
3 John xii. 24. b Matt. xii. 40. c Matt. xxvi. 12.