Cross
Transcript
Good morning. I had a teacher in high school who once said that transfer of the blame is like America's favorite pastime, which is ironic because he's my baseball coach as well. And he was right. That's just what we do. It's our nature to just want to blame someone else. There's this thing going on with my wife and I right now where I come home and I have something to tell her.
Maybe it's like we're trying to schedule a date night or there's something on the calendar we need to talk about. And I have a conversation with her and tell her kind of what's up. And then a week later I'm like, honey, do you remember the thing that I told you about? And she goes, no, that did not happen. And I vividly remember I was in the kitchen and you were sitting down and I walked you through it. And she goes, no, you may have had that conversation in your head, but that actually did not happen.
And this has happened multiple times recently. And I'm just like, honey, I get it. Like, you've been crushing it lately. We've had two kids in the past three years. And we know that science says when you have children, you lose brain cells. So you've got me to remember.
And that's why I'm here. And she's thankful for that. We do. It's just like our gut instinct. We just want to blame one another. I remember growing up when I was a kid, my brother and I, he's 18 months older than I am.
And, man, we just would blame each other. If anything would happen, we'd point fingers. And there was this one time that he really got me good. He was pretty sneaky and conniving. He saw how I was in elementary school and I was learning how to sign my name. And I had like a specific way that I had practiced signing it.
And he watched and he's like, I think I can copy that. So he took a black Sharpie marker. My parents have this white brick fireplace. And he went up to the white brick fireplace in Sharpie and signed my name. My parents came to me and they were like, they were upset. I was like, I didn't do it.
I didn't know who did it. I was like, I didn't do it. And something happened in that moment in the years to come. I guess I like believe that I did it. I actually remember me actually doing this. Like I have like an invented memory in my head.
And then about a year ago, my brother said, hey, remember that time that I forged your name on the fireplace? And I was like, what? No, I wrote that. He goes, no, you didn't. He's like, I did. I set you up, man.
I got you good. And I was like, man, like I'm questioning reality now. That may explain the conversations I have with my wife. And we do that. That's our gut instinct is to blame someone else and let them be the fall guy. Like we don't want to sacrifice.
That's just not in our nature. And this time every year we slow down and we remember the one who took the fall for us. And we are in week two of our three-week series in Easter. And we are focusing on the death of Christ this morning. And specifically we're going to look at one scene from the death of Christ. When Jesus is crucified and a man who is supposed to get that penalty is released.
When a murderer is set free. We're going to look at the story of how Barabbas was set free and Jesus is sent to the cross. It's in Luke 23, verses 13 through 25, which is on page 515 in your blue Bibles. If you don't have a Bible, please take one of those Bibles home. That is our gift to you. I'm going to pray for us this morning.
And then we're going to dive in. God, thank you so much for this week. That we get to prepare for Good Friday. That we get to prepare for what you have done for us. God, I pray that you would help us be present this morning. As we look upon one of the more painful and beautiful scenes we have in the Bible.
We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Alright, so last week we talked about the Last Supper. Which was the Thursday night before Jesus was betrayed. And if you didn't get a chance to listen to that sermon, I encourage you to go back and listen to it. It's helpful as we practice the Lord's Supper, as we practice communion.
It's helpful to prepare us for that. But during that Last Supper, Jesus calls out Judas, the disciple who was going to betray him. And at this point, Judas has decided in his heart that he's going to betray Jesus. So Judas leaves the meal. Jesus takes his disciples. They go up to the Mount of Olives, which is the hill right above the city.
And in that hill is a garden called the Garden of Gethsemane. And Jesus gets away to pray. And this is one of the more powerful scenes we have of the humanity of Christ. He prays so intensely that he starts to sweat blood. Which is an actual medical condition for someone who is under extreme duress. And the reason why he's under such extreme duress is not just because of what's about to happen.
That he's about to have a painful death on the cross. It's also the spiritual overtone of what's happening here. Is that God the Father, the Father whom he has enjoyed eternal fellowship and joy with, is about to pour out the full cup of his wrath on him and turn his back on him. So he's preparing for this. And then eventually Judas comes with the chief priests, their guards. And he comes and he arrests Jesus.
And they take him to the chief priests. At this point, nine of the other disciples, they just bounce in fear. They leave. We know that two followed. One of them was Peter. So as Jesus is being tried, and it's a kangaroo court trial.
He's being tried by a group called the Sanhedrin. This is the council of the religious leaders who helped rule the nation of Jerusalem. It's a joke of a trial. They've already decided they want to put him to death. They're just looking for some reason they can take him to have him put to death. And as this is going on, Peter is in the courtyard outside.
And Peter is asked three times if he is a follower of Jesus. And all three times he denies him. And the third time, there's a powerful scene when Jesus looks out into the courtyard, makes eye contact, and a rooster crows, just as Jesus had predicted. And then Peter weeps and he leaves. We only know there's one disciple who actually was there. We don't know how much of it he was there.
We do know that John was there at the foot of the cross when Jesus died. But at this point, he's been abandoned. And he's before the Sanhedrin, before the religious leaders. And they finally find cause that he says he's the son of God. And that's what they needed. So they go.
They can't actually... In Jerusalem, they don't really have the authority to put him to death. Nor do they really want to because Jesus is a popular figure amongst the people. So they go and they take him to two people who can do the dirty work for him. They first take him to Pontius Pilate. Pontius is the governor.
He's the Roman governor of the region. He's the one that's really in control of the region of Jerusalem and Judea and Galilee. And they take him to him. And he doesn't really know what to do with this. And he's like, why don't you take him to your Jewish king? Why don't you take him to Herod?
So then Jesus is taken to Herod. And King Herod basically says, I don't want anything to do with this. Take him back to Pontius Pilate. And it's at this point we pick up in the text in verse 13. It says, Pilate then called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people and said to them, You brought me this man as one who is misleading the people. And after examining him before you, behold, I did not find this man guilty of any of your charges against him.
Neither did Herod, for he sent him back to us. Look, nothing deserving death has been done by him. I will therefore punish and release him. And it's at this point that they are going to torture Jesus. This is something that the Romans were really, really good at. They're going to scourge him.
And if you've ever seen The Passion of the Christ, this scene is actually depicted fairly accurately. And if you haven't seen The Passion of the Christ, honestly, it would be a great week to watch as we prepare for Good Friday. And in the scene that shows this, they tie Jesus up to a post. And they take what is called a cat of nine tails. It's a special whip that has, at the end of it, shards of bone and rock. And the whole point was that it would latch in to your back and rip out chunks of flesh.
And Jesus is scourged in this manner, and it is painful, and his back is mutilated. And at this point, Pilate's plan is that I can torture him. If they can see to almost the point of death how bad he's been tortured, maybe they'll give up. And then you get from 16, and then if you read in your Bible, it skips down to 18. So you might be wondering, where's verse 17?
What happened? To get a little bit nerdy for a second, because this will be helpful going forward. This only happens a few times in the Bible. But if you look at the footnote, which is the little, tiny, little letter A that follows verse 16, that is going to tell us what's going on. And if you're not a fan of footnotes, like I'm not a huge fan of footnotes. I know some of you have research backgrounds, and you're like, I love footnotes.
There's something wrong with you. I had a friend in seminary that we took a class together, and we were reading this book together. And I was like, dude, do you see this book? It's got three lines, and every page has tons of footnotes. This is awful. And he's like, no, I love it.
That's where the meat is at. I'm like, okay, fine. But footnotes are helpful. And in the ESV, in the version that we use, there's a few footnotes that tell us what's going on. And this specific footnote, it tells us that this verse 17 was not a part of the earliest manuscripts. And what that means is there's a field called textual criticism, and the people who have organized the ESV have looked and seen that verse 17 wasn't a part of the earliest manuscripts.
The numbering system we have came around the time that the King James Version came around. And the King James Version, which doesn't really base most of its stuff off of the earliest manuscripts, it had verse 17. And it's not saying that 17 isn't true. It's just saying it's not inspired scripture. Verse 17 says, Now he was obliged to release one man to them at the festival. Now we know that's true because that's pretty much what Mark 15.6 says about this.
Mark 15.6 says, Now at the feast, he, Pilate, used to release for them one prisoner for whom they asked. So Pilate had a practice, a practice of releasing prisoners during this time, specifically at big festivals like Passover. It was kind of his way of saying, I'll give you one of your people back, one of your prisoners. I'll give them back to you. You just need to calm down. No riots, no rebellions.
Here's the trade-off. You all just remain calm. And if you look at history and you look at how the Romans did stuff, this is not normally what they did. Like they didn't have prison release programs. They ruled with an iron fist. Like this doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
So to understand what's going on here, you need a little background to what is happening in this scene. The Roman government ruled over this land and the Jews hated it. They couldn't stand it. And there was rebellion after rebellion to try to take back the land. And a lot of these rebellions would happen at major festivals like Passover. Because this is when all the Jews from around the world would come together at once.
And that's when if you want to do a rebellion, you had the Numbers and you could take them out. So there was a lot of tension in this moment as Passover is happening. And Pilate is feeling the tension. In fact, Pontius Pilate is pretty close to losing his job as governor. He loses it a few years later because he can't control the people. So he needs to have this release program to kind of ease the tension.
But he also needs the Sanhedrin. He needs the religious rulers. Because this is a theocratic state, meaning this is a state that is ruled by God. And the religious rulers are the ones who help rule it. And he needs them to keep the people in line. So he's got this group of people coming up to him.
And they want Jesus dead. And Jesus is a celebrity at this point. He is. He's one of the most popular people in the land. This is the traveling miracle worker. This is the preacher.
This is the one the people love. He feeds the people. This is the traveling sage, the wise man. He has a big following. And this group of people that Pilate needs to keep the people in check has brought someone the people love. And it's a messy, messy situation.
And that's why Pilate's first move is if I can just torture them and they'll see what I've done to them. Maybe they'll calm down. And then I can use my release program to release them back to the people and we'll get by. And that is not at all what they want. Verse 18 picks up. It says, But they all cried out together, Away with this man and release to us Barabbas, a man who has been thrown into prison for an insurrection, started in the city, and for murder.
So having Jesus tortured is not enough. Now they want Barabbas, who we'll get to in a minute, but he's a notorious criminal and they want him. And as you look at this scene, like if you look at the political maneuvering, you take a step back. This whole scene is jacked up. They're using Jesus, the God of the universe, as a chess piece, as a pawn. And they, I mean, it's, it's, the very God who ordained that these leaders be there in the first place.
They're, they're using him like a chess piece. It is, it is sick to watch as these vile cast of characters have come around Jesus. It kind of feels like, like, like one of the biggest scenes from Harry Potter, when Dumbledore dies. Like I know, I mentioned Harry Potter. And some of you are like, man, this is awesome. You just talked about textual criticism and history, and I'm dying inside.
All right, like this, I'm back on board. And then some of you are like, are you serious? Did your generation read another book? Like, are there any other movies that you watch? Listen, I gave you Terminator last week, and I heard crickets. It's, so sorry, Gen Xers, we're back at Harry Potter.
It's like one of the craziest scenes from Harry Potter, the most climactic scene when Dumbledore dies. And Dumbledore is, is the, is the greatest wizard, one of the greatest wizards of all time. And he's a good wizard. He's helped raise Harry. And, and there's a scene when he's getting ready to die, and he knows it's coming. And he has Harry Potter with him, and he tells him to hide.
Like, hide, get away. Don't say a word. You're going to see this, but I don't want you to come out at all. And, uh, Voldemort, who's the evil wizard, the one who must not be named, he has a group of, a band of thugs called the Death Eaters, and he has sent them to come and kill Dumbledore. And they come, and they surround Dumbledore, and they're the vilest characters in the entire series. And Dumbledore just stands there.
He offers no defense. I mean, he's Dumbledore. Like, if he wanted to just abracadab his way out of this thing, just kill them all, and just fly off in a blaze of glory, he could. He has the power to do that, but he doesn't. He stands there, offers no defense, and lets them kill him, because there is a greater plan in place to save the wizard world, and is going to require his death. But as you're watching it, you're just watching it, furious, watching it, frustrated.
In the same way, like, we're watching as the king of the universe is in front of these people that are so vile, and he stands silent, does not offer a defense. And then Barabbas enters the scene. Now, we don't know much about Barabbas. We know that he's notorious enough that they asked for him as a criminal to be released. We know that he was in prison for insurrection. He was in prison for trying to overthrow the Roman government, which was what, that was the biggest enemy of the Romans, was people like Barabbas.
We know that he's a murderer, and we don't really know the circumstances of it. We just know he's guilty of murder, and he's guilty of the punishment that is coming. So Pilate gives them an option. You pick up in verse 20. It says, Pilate addressed them once more, desiring to release Jesus, but they kept shouting, Crucify! Crucify him!
The third time he said to them, Why? What evil has he done? I found in him no guilt deserving death. I will therefore punish him, release him. But they were urgent, demanding with loud cries that he should be crucified.
And their voices prevailed. So Pilate decided that their demand should be granted. Now we know from Mark's Gospel, that in this scene, the chief priests are in the crowd, stirring up the people, chanting Barabbas, and chanting for him to be crucified. Which is one of the most brutal ways that the Romans would kill people that rebelled against the government. And it was reserved mostly for people that would rebel against the government. reserved for insurrection, it's just like Barabbas. There's a book called Out of Egypt.
It's called Out of Egypt. It's written by Anne Rice. Anne Rice is an author. She writes fiction. She wrote Interview with a Vampire, Queen of the Vampire, Interview with a Vampire, was a 90s movie with Tom Cruise and I think Brad Pitt. And she's a good writer.
It's good vampire fiction. Not like really bad vampire fiction. I don't have a dog in that fight. I just wanted to mess with Twilight fans. But she wrote this book called Out of Egypt because she's Catholic.
And it's a fictional retelling of Jesus' return from Egypt back to Galilee, back to his hometown. And it's fiction, but she uses historical events. And it's actually, when you read it, it gives you a picture of what the land, what it would have been like back then. So Jesus, his family, they leave Egypt and they go to Jerusalem first because in Jerusalem, there's a major festival that they want to take part in. And when they get there, a rebellion breaks out. An actual historical rebellion that you can look back in history and study.
And during this rebellion, they take back some of the land. They take back some buildings. But the Roman government comes in and absolutely destroys it. And there's a scene when Jesus and his family are walking down this country road. And there is a line of crosses, crucifixion after crucifixion after crucifixion, lining the entire road, lined with all of these rebels. And they are naked.
They are dying slowly. You would suffocate to death. That was how crucifixion worked. And each one of them is a picture of what the Roman government does when you mess with them. If you're going to rebel against us, you will get the most brutal, shameful, humiliating way to die. And it's a helpful picture of what kind of punishment was awaiting someone like Barabbas.
And instead, it is reserved for Jesus. And they want crucifixion. At this point, like Pilate, I mean, he's got to be, what are they doing here? They want the traveling miracle worker, the preacher, the one who like almost a week ago they were shouting, Hosanna, Hosanna, as he came to the city. They want him crucified. That's what we do to insurrectionists.
That doesn't make any sense. And if you read Matthew's account of this, Matthew adds a part that says that his wife is disturbed by this. She's having nightmares. And she comes to Pontius Pilate and says, you've got to let him go. Like this, you don't want to be a part of this. But the chief priests, they know exactly what they're doing.
They don't just want Jesus dead. They want him cursed. That's why they want crucifixion. You look at Deuteronomy from the Old Testament, the Old Testament law. There's a section on capital punishment. And in Deuteronomy 21, 23, it says this, His body shall not remain all night on a tree, but you shall bury him the same day.
For a hanged man is cursed by God. Or as other versions say, cursed is a man who's hung on a tree. So they think that if we have the Romans do our dirty work, all right, and we have them put them on a tree and have them cursed will kill his rebellion or will kill his movement. And if you look at this, it is so insidious and evil. They don't want just Jesus dead. They want him cursed.
They want him damned. I mean, it is an awful scene. And Pilate, he gives in. And he frees Barabbas. And I want you to picture with me what that would have looked like, Barabbas being freed. He's spared.
And the cross that was meant for him is now passed over to Jesus. And he's probably sitting in his cell awaiting. He's on death row. So like any movie or any television show, you've seen someone on death row. He's on death row awaiting a brutal form of death. And the guards start coming down the hallway.
And they take him out. At this point, he's probably breathing heavier. His heart's pounding faster, preparing for what's about to happen. And they step out and they take his chains off. And they say, you're free to go. I mean, what would he have felt like?
What was that scene? What would it look like? Like, you're going to let me go? Yeah, yeah, you've been released. You're the prisoner that's being released for Passover. There was this movement to get Jesus.
You remember Jesus, the miracle worker has been traveling around for a few years? There was a movement to get him released, but they're actually going to have him take her cross. So you're free to go. And then Barabbas walks away as Jesus walks up the hill to be crucified. And it is at this point that you are supposed to feel the overwhelming sense of irony of what's happening here. That the chief priest, they knew the Old Testament law better than most people.
They had the whole Old Testament memorized. They can't see what's going on here. They can't see that what this picture of Barabbas being set free and Jesus being sacrificed, they can't see what's happening is a visual fulfillment of one of the biggest festivals that they would take part in, Yom Kippur, which means Day of Atonement. So Passover is the feast that's happening now. And a few months after this is going to be the second biggest feast, which is the Day of Atonement. And at the Day of Atonement, it was a festival that the chief priests would organize and do.
And it was a way for them to, they had sacrifices throughout the year that would cover sins, but this was the one event, the Day of Atonement, when everyone would come together as a nation and all the sins that they may not have covered could be covered right now. And at the pinnacle moment of Yom Kippur, they would take two goats and one goat, they would cast lots and they would take one goat and it would be set aside and this goat would be sacrificed. The second one, which they called the scapegoat, that goat would be set free and it would be taken away and it would go into the wilderness and it was free to go. And that is a picture of what's happening here as Barabbas is set free and Jesus is taken away to be sacrificed.
And Hebrews 9 teaches us that Jesus perfectly fulfilled the Day of Atonement. He perfectly fulfilled the sacrificial system. This is all playing out right in front of their very eyes and they can't see it. This visual fulfillment of Jesus fulfilling the Day of Atonement on this Day of Atonement, that is our story. That is the story of what Jesus does for His church. That we were sitting on death row but Jesus came and swapped places with us.
That we, that we were sitting in the cell and we're set free and Jesus goes and takes the cross. that Jesus was nailed to a tree that we are set free. That we get His goodness and His grace and His mercy and Jesus takes our punishment that we deserve. And for those of us that have trusted in Jesus as our only hope, this is the picture that we have. This is the picture that Paul plays off in 2 Corinthians 5.21 when he says, for our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. This is the picture that we get. That not only that Jesus becomes our substitute and He takes our place, that we get the riches of Christ that come with it.
His righteousness. And we might read stories and see movies that capture parts of this. Like you can think of stories of substitution like the Hunger Games when Katniss steps in for a sister. Her sister gets called into the Hunger Games where she is going to die and Katniss comes in and takes her place to sacrifice herself for her. We get glimpses of that but we don't get the other part. There are other stories like you can look at Les Mis where Jean Valjean has been in prison for 20 plus years and he's set free, he's on parole and he quickly breaks his parole when he goes to a priest's house and he's treated like a human and he's given a meal and then when they all go to sleep he goes and he takes the silver and he runs.
He steals. And he's caught and he's brought back and as he's brought back he knows at this point he will go to prison for the rest of his life and the priest steps in and says, oh no, no this is a gift. In fact, you missed the finest silver. You can take this with you and make for yourself a better life. Make for yourself a better man. Like we get pictures of that, the riches, we get pictures of the substitute but we don't get it all together like we get in the gospel.
That's the hope of the gospel that we have. And the chief priest, man, they can't see it. All they can focus on is we're going to curse them. We're going to curse them and they can't even see that the very God who inspired Deuteronomy, the very God who inspired this text is fulfilling it. Paul says in Galatians 3.13, he says, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.
So the religious leaders, yeah, their plan worked. They had Jesus cursed. But they didn't realize that they were a tool. They were clay in the hands of a potter. And what they meant for evil, God meant for good. And Jesus takes on our curse on the cross, the curse that we deserve.
That's the picture of what's happening here. And in verse 24, it picks up. It says, So Pilate decided that their demand should be granted. He released the man who had been thrown into prison for insurrection and for murder and for whom they had asked. But he delivered Jesus over to their will.
And we can piece together the story of what happens after this from the other Gospels and from Luke. At this point, Jesus, he's mocked. They take a purple robe which signified royalty and they put it on and they mock him and they take a crown of thorns. Not like rose thorns. Like think desert long thorns and they force it into his skull. And after he's been tortured and after he's been mocked, they put a cross on his already mutilated back.
And he goes as far as he can and he collapses. Maybe the cross falls on him. Maybe it falls on the crown of thorns. We don't know. But he collapses.
And he can't even make it any farther. His body is starting to fall apart. So they bring in a man named Simon, a guy who's just passing by and watching. And he helps them carry it up the hill of Colgolgotha. And they take his hands and they stretch them out and they take nails, stakes, and they drive it through his hands into the cross. And some people get hung up.
Was it his hands? Was it his wrist? I mean, the ancient concept for hand is the wrist and the hand. Does it matter? They take nails and they drive it through his hands and they take his feet. They overlap it and they drive a stake through his feet into the cross and they raise him up and he starts to slowly suffocate.
He would have to force himself up to take deep breaths, which means he's forcing his feet up through the nail. And he's slowly bleeding out and he's slowly suffocating until finally he gives up his life. And a soldier comes with a spear and cuts him open and the water and the blood comes pouring out. And when you read this, when you read this story, like there's a part of us that just screams, like this isn't fair. It's not fair that Jesus goes to the cross and a murderer is set free. Like that, that's not even a choice.
Like the God who created beauty and babies and love and goodness is humiliated to death on a cross and this guy gets to go? Who's shouting Barabbas at this point? This isn't even a choice. And oftentimes, I feel like I'm reading this as an outsider. I feel like we do this. We read this as an outsider.
And sometimes, we've got to press in and read this from a different perspective. And we've got to read this from the perspective of Barabbas. Barabbas has been set free. He's walking away, dumbfounded, not understanding what just happened as Jesus goes and takes the cross that he deserved. Because we are captives. We who came into this world as captives to sin.
And Jesus came to release us from our sin and to give us freedom. It's not fair. Fair is getting the punishment that we deserve for rebelling against God. But the good news of the gospel that Jesus loved us so much that he stepped in for us. He stepped in for us and he said, release Spencer and crucify me. That's the hope of the gospel that we get to celebrate.
And that's the hope of the gospel that we get to celebrate next week on Easter Sunday as we hear baptism stories. We have five baptism stories. And they're going to be stories that echo what happened at the cross. And each story is going to be a picture of that. Of Jesus saying, release Dakota and crucify me. Release Sarah and crucify me.
Release Kale and release Cambria and release Kaelin and crucify me. And we're going to get to celebrate next Sunday the hope of the gospel that sinners are set free because of what happened on Good Friday.