THE SIX MIRACLES OF CALVARY
WILLIAM R. NICHOLSON

The Miraculous Darkness

“Besides, it occurred during the festival of the Passover, which always was observed at the time of the full moon, when an eclipse of the sun is impossible.”

“In the ordinary course of nature, darkness being the negation of light, it is light which is antagonist of darkness, and which always banishes it.”

“…it was not twilight. It was a frightful darkness.”

“The very narrative speaks but one word – ‘darkness,’ and then is itself silent. The time from twelve o’clock till three is a blank in the narrative, and the reader is made to feel how hushed was the scene.”

“At the moment of Christ’s death, the light departed from the sun, and the land was darkened at noonday, which wonder is related in your own annals and is preserved in your archives to the day.” — Tertullian

“This was a visibility of God was that darkness, for none but He, the Great First Cause, can interfere with the regular course of His own established natural causes.”

“Creation had within itself no cause which could have produced the darkness. Yet creation itself with its every law at work, was the scene of the darkness.”

“Jesus, the Son of God, was dying. God was appearing. There stood the cross, and there came down the darkness.”

“The heavens did give forth a sign, and the very frame of the universe bent in reverential obeisance to the crucified Sufferer on that place of a skull.”

Our pardon, our peace, our eternal life, should be secured to us only through Himself, in His blood.”

“‘Smitten of God’ was what the darkness attested. The Father’s own Son wounded, bruised, chastised, beaten with stripes, by the very Father.”

“Yes, God was there in the darkness, and yet, for the time being, in the comfort of His communion He had forsaken His Son.”

“Peter, James, and John were admitted into His privacy of suffering in Gethsemane, but God at Calvary drew the drapery of darkness around Him to hide Him from human gaze.”

“None but a person of spotless righteousness, having no sins of his own, for which to answer, could be made responsible for sinners.”

“To suffer for men’s sin He was indeed appointed.”

“At the same time it shows us that God’s love is so much stronger to save us than our sin is to destroy us.”

“At His birth, when the grandeur of results would be especially thought of, the night became light; but at His death, when the process of reaching those results would be the prominent thing, the light became night.”

“It shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord God, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in clear day.” — prophecy of Amos

“Oh, by the fearfulness of that scene at the crucifixion, all rejectors of Christ shall perish!”

“Brethren, true believers in Christ, the Calvary darkness is gone, and the true light now shineth. In that light, the path of the believer is itself as the shining light, which shineth more and more to the perfect day. Then our sun shall never go down, and the days of our mourning shall be ended.”

On this day...

• The More You Love, the More You Hate - 2011
• When Decays of Grace Prevail - 2011
• One with Christ and the Fellowship of Righteousness - 2011
• How Should We Approach Worship Today? - 2011
• A Richer Understanding of Jesus Christ - 2011
• Preaching Practical Holiness - 2011
• Consubstantiality - 2009
• Jonathan Edwards – Famous Sermons - 2009
• Genesis 1:4 - 2008
• 1 Peter 5:7 - 2008