Friends, thanks for being with us as we start the week day late.
Continuing through the Gospel of John, we're in the 19th chapter.
We are jumping back in at verse eight.
Jesus is again before Pilate and,
we'll start reading here,
come back and have some conversation.
Now, when Pilate heard this, he was more afraid than ever.
He entered his headquarters again and asked, Jesus, where are you from?
But Jesus gave no answer.
Therefore Pilate said to him, do you refuse to speak to me?
Do you know that I have power to release you and power to crucify you?
Jesus answered, you would have no power over me
unless it had been given to you from above.
Therefore, the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.
From then on,
Pilate tried to release him, but the Jews cried out,
if you release this man, you are no friend of the emperor.
Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor.
When Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus outside and sat on
the judge's bench in a place called the Stone pavement,
or in Hebrew, Galba, the.
Now. It was the day of preparation for the Passover, and it was about noon.
He said to the Jews, here is your king.
They cried out, away with him!
Away with them! Crucify him!
Pilot asked them, shall I crucify your king?
The chief priest answered, we have no king but the emperor.
Then he handed him over to be crucified.
So a couple of things here.
As we move through the story.
The first is the Bibles.
Behind the scenes look at what's happening
in pilot's heart, in pilot's head.
And we get maybe more of this expounded on in some of the other gospels.
But even here, John gives us this line.
Pilate was afraid, and it's not clear what he's afraid of.
Maybe he's afraid of harming an innocent person, though that doesn't seem
to be in keeping with what we think we know of Pilate.
Maybe the implication is he's afraid of God, though.
He's going to turn around and and do the thing
that he ends up doing anyway.
There is a little bit of a sense
here in which John, I think is doing two things.
Michael.
One, he's showing us that Pilate perhaps gets back into
the corner,
verse 12, where they say, if you release this man, you're no friend of the emperor.
That's the equivalent of a threat.
I mean, that the idea that Pilate would be doing something
against the emperor, or in contradiction to the emperor,
is a dangerous kind of thing to have out there.
And so maybe John is saying
that Pilate is compelled
or forced to do what he does.
However, on the other side of that, that I think
implies and implicates
some really interesting things, implies some interesting things
and implicates the Jews to a great extent.
Yeah.
No doubt.
In fact, I think this is one of the quizzical
aspects of this part of the text, Clint, is because in one
perspective, on one hand,
John has been laying out this rising rivalry
between the Jews, the leaders of the Jews and Jesus throughout the entire book.
And and it's really gone from,
you know, high to blazingly high.
And we're at this point now where the crowd is really
without any kind of nuance at all.
I mean, ultimately it is just unanimous in a single voice.
It is pointed in such a clear and compelling
way to these people that is, on one hand, clear.
John telling us in John's telling you the story, I just want to
I want point out, though, a line
that should really take us and really push us back in our seats,
because Pilate says here in verse 15, shall I crucify your king?
The chief priest answered, we have no king but the emperor.
But that is an unconscious noble statement.
If you understand some of the history of this place,
if you understand the fact that when Passover is happening,
the Romans have on their calendar year, Passover
will result in thus bringing legions of soldiers
back to Jerusalem and literally surround the temple.
Because there's been so many rebellions, right?
There's been so many people coming and whipping up crowds.
This is a tumultuous time in a very tumultuous place.
The idea that the chief priests would stand before the people
and proclaim that the king that they have is the emperor.
It is unbelievable from historical standards.
So I think these two things living in a an incredible tension here.
On one hand, the hatred for Jesus is so pure and so developed and so mature.
And maybe you would even say the fear of Jesus, of what he represents
and what he could bring if he was to live into this kingdom,
you know that he must be killed, and that the chief priest
must say whatever need said.
On the flip side of it, the fact that they would be willing to say
or that John cast them out, saying something so heretical,
so outside the realm of believability.
It is another side of this difficult, behind the scenes kind of tension.
You speak to you clearly.
There's a lot happening here.
You might just read this and think, man,
Pilate seems like he's got his hands tied.
But I think that the way that John tells the story sums up some of these
previous themes, while simultaneously kind of pushing us to wonder,
like, wow, how is it you end up being able to say these things?
What you couldn't imagine being said in any other context?
I think all the gospels do this, but I think, you know, John follows suit here.
To have these words in the mouth of the priest is akin to blasphemy.
I mean, to appeal to the Emperor and to threaten
Pilate with not being loyal enough to Rome.
Or then at the end, here we have no king.
I remember that just a couple of passages ago they wouldn't go in the palace
so they could stay clean, right, for the Passover.
And and I think this is one of the ways and it seems subtle to us.
But if you're reading this in Jesus day in time, this isn't subtle at all.
This is a baseball bat. This is a club.
We have no king but the emperor, the two Jewish priests are saying this.
It it only feels subtle to us because I think
we don't get the shock value of it.
But I think this is one of the ways the gospel shows us how far out of bounds
these men have to go to bring charges against Jesus,
what they're willing to give up to get their way,
and and the kind of collusion that they're
willing to have with the Roman authority and with the powers
and the way that they're willing to coerce people
in order to do this ungodly thing that they're trying to do.
Again, it's easy to miss
as we read it, but this is
this is a staggering thing to hear from the chief priests.
To the extent that many scholars think that this must have been added later.
I mean, you know, you can make up your own decisions about that,
but it is that stunning that some have suggested.
There's no way they could have said something like this.
It really is remarkable.
There is definitely
a telling of Jesus's story here, but clearly you've said this before.
John is also preaching in so many of these texts.
There's a lesson here.
I think a really good example of this comes in verse ten.
Pilate says to Jesus, do you refuse to speak to me?
Do you not know that I have the power to release you and power to crucify you?
So at theme is the idea of power.
The pilot has earthly power.
And then Jesus response in verse 11, you would have no power over me
unless I had been given you from above.
Therefore, the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.
On one hand, the economy of Jesus using this to turn the guilt back
upon the people bringing him to Pilate is amazing.
I mean, it's succinct and powerful, but don't mess
this idea that Jesus is ultimately saying to the one who is correct
in his assertion that he has the civil
military power to take Jesus's life.
And Jesus's response to that was, well, yeah, you've been given that power.
If you have it from a power higher than yourself.
And and by the way, a military man would understand that idea, a military man.
Well, yeah, the emperor gives me the power to do this. Right.
But we know, readers of John Christians, we know Jesus isn't talking
about the Emperor.
It's not the emperor's power that will take Jesus's life.
It's the fact that God Himself has granted the power.
And you've said so many times in this study it bears repeated here.
Jesus is always in control, even in the moment of this story
where Jesus has the least physical control to the human eyes.
We look at Jesus in that moment.
He's been beaten. He's been bruised.
He's been abused. Now.
Now he stands in front of a man with the power of the military,
the power of the sword.
And he is at the bottom.
And yet, as John tells the story, that's absolutely not the case.
These people do not understand who they're dealing with.
And that's the incredible irony that that's built into this entire book.
But but I think this is the shining heart of it,
because here we have all of these powers combined.
We have the worldly power, we have the religious power, we have God himself.
And the question is, who's it? Who has power?
And and Jesus is saying, you will never have the power that you've been given.
Yeah.
And I think there's a
subtle and and very interesting connection that comes out of that verse.
You know, Jesus says, as you're pointed out here, Michael,
you would have no power over me unless it had been given.
Therefore, the one who handed me over is guilty of a greater sin.
Pay attention when you see words repeated in the Scripture,
because if we jump down here to the last verse,
verse 16, what does it say of Pilate?
Then he handed him over.
Pilate has now done the very thing that Judas has done.
Pilate had doubts.
Pilate tried to release him.
Pilate claimed that he had authority,
but ultimately, when it came down to it, Pilate too,
though we may say John has a softer sentence on him,
Pilate too is guilty because we use the exact same phrase.
Then he handed him over.
So Pilate, like everyone else in this story,
leaves Jesus alone to his fate.
Now that that is, as you said, Michael, that's no surprise to Jesus.
That's no particular,
change in Jesus's plan.
Jesus knew it was headed here.
But lest we be too soft on Pilate,
pilot takes his place in having some guilt of this as well.
And he, in the very words that were used of Judas,
now also becomes one who hands Jesus over.
And I don't think John wants us to miss that because
he uses the exact same phrase.
Well, I'll take one quick step out of the nitty gritty,
the text, and just to look at this from a higher perspective, from the
from the view of motivation, right.
What's motivating the religious leaders here in this story?
We've seen it so many times in John already.
They're motivated by the fact that Jesus is turning people
against the religious order, the the way that things are done
in the religious structuring of of Jewish life.
Jesus is calling people to a new kingdom, to to a new way of understanding God's
working in the world. They can't have that.
Pilate here is
motivated by self from, preservation.
He's motivated by protecting against riots and the idea of subversiveness
and just trying to keep the status quo of the status quo.
Even the man who has the military strength behind him
is caught really circling the wagons for his own benefit.
And that's the thing.
When he hands Jesus over to a mob
who wants Jesus dead, they're really doing the same thing.
They're all trying to preserve self.
They're all ultimately trying to get rid
of this Jesus figure because he's a threat to them.
He he risks the the reality of the
the life that they've come to take for granted being overturned.
And I think that that is this amazing portrayal here in this story that that
yes, we might want one of these groups to bear more guilt than another.
But the honest truth is, Clint, they're all here for the same reason.
And that is ultimately they're just trying to keep everything
as stable as it can be so they can keep on living their lives the way it was.
And Jesus has no interest in that.
He's come to reveal the way of God.
Jesus's revelation is final and complete and perfect
that there's really no turning back
after this first revelation that we see in Jesus Christ.
Every time that follows, that will now forever be changed.
And the reality is, those who encounter Jesus in the judgment seat.
I mean, we literally have this idea that pilots are going to now
just sit in the place of of making a judgment over God at all.
Ultimately, humans are going to fail.
They're going to lose courage, and they're going to no longer understand.
And ultimately, Pilate gives over because he too
is at the end interested in his own self-preservation.
And then the exact moment that every human in
the story is trying to gain and exercise their power.
Jesus is giving his up,
is sacrificing his and,
yeah, I
John, as we've said many,
many times, is a very good storyteller.
And when you
pause to read slowly
and listen between the words and the lines,
I think John paints a wonderful, compelling,
certainly very inspiring picture
of Jesus, who is always in the center.
That's well said.
I just want to illustrate that very briefly
as we come to the end of our time together.
This is a detail you might read by, but verse 14,
now it was the day of preparation for Passover, and it was about noon.
And we've told you this numerous times before the importance of light
in this story.
Who comes to Jesus at night? Who comes that day?
It is striking that at noon that the sun is up and it's bright,
and that in this story, the idea that at noon this is happening,
John, is tipping us off, something revelatory is happening here.
This is a a clear picture of God's intention,
and we should be struck that the sun is up at noon
at the very moment that ultimately
Jesus is being called a king right now.
This that here is your King.
That has about 14 different meanings, right?
Right.
On one hand, it's used as a term of derision here, and on the other,
an accurate portrayal of who Jesus is and who Jesus has called himself to be.
And this is revealed at noon.
And John is going to do something fascinating
with that idea of King in the story that we'll look at tomorrow.
So I hope you'll join us for that.
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