Biblestudy: John (Part Twenty-Seven)

John 18:29 - 19:24 Pilate's Futile Attempts to Acquit an Innocent Man
#BS-JO27
John W. Ritenbaugh (1932-2023)
Given 02-Jun-87; 85 minutes

listen:

playlist:
Go to the John (Bible study series) playlist

download:

Let us get back to the book of John, the 18th chapter. Just very briefly, a summary of what we covered in the last Bible study. At the beginning of the 18th chapter, Jesus and His companions left the room that they were in, went to the area of Gethsemane, which was not a very long distance away from where they were.

I think that one of the more interesting things in regard to that is the number of people who came to, or let us say, possibly the number of people who came to take Him into their jurisdiction. Remember the word that is used there. The Greek spira is the equivalent of the Roman cohort. And it could have been anywhere from 60 men at its very lowest number to all the way up to 1,000 men at its extreme. Now, we do not know how many there were, but apparently there were enough of them to be intimidating because they were certainly treating Jesus as a malefactor of gigantic proportions.

But all through the beginning of this (and we are going to see this continuing all the way through tonight's Bible study as well), Jesus gives every indication that He is in charge. That even though He is the one who is on trial, He is the one who has control of things. And it is really an example of the fulfillment of a prophecy, all that He said there all the way back in John the 10th chapter, that no man was going to take His life from Him, but rather He was the Good Shepherd and He was going to lay down His life. So He was actively doing that.

And I am sure that He reminded (we will see that again a little bit later this evening), Pilate on a couple of different occasions that he could not do what he was doing except the authority were given to him from above.

Then a little bit later in the chapter, we have the example of the denial of Simon Peter. And I told you there that I think that Peter got a bum rap; that he at least denied Christ doing something that the others did not even dare to do. The others all fled and apparently Peter (and maybe also John) at least trailed into the background, the wake of the party that took Jesus into custody. And when he finally did fail Him there in verse 27, where it says that Peter then denied again and immediately a rooster crowed, that he at least denied Him in the midst of the enemy. So Peter, I think, got a bum rap on things and he did what he did, denied him while he was being braver than the others.

We are going to pick up there (from verse 28) a little bit more detail than we have been going through here. Where we left off the last time, I was trying to give a bit of an overview between here, let us say, verse 28 of John the 18th chapter all the way up to around verses 12, 13, 14 of chapter 19. And I wanted to do this so that we could at least look at some of the actors in this drama that was unfolding. And of course, the first of the group that we are going to be looking at here are the Jews.

Now, the thing that comes to our attention right at the very beginning is in verse 28, where the Jews had to take Jesus from Caiaphas to Pilate. And I gave you a little bit of the background of how that came about and we are going to get a little bit more of that as we go into this. But the Talmud makes the remark (I quote this from it), where it says, "Forty years before the destruction of the Temple, judgment in matters of life and death were taken away from Israel."

That would have meant that since the Temple was destroyed somewhere around 70 AD, 40 years before would have been 30 AD, so that in 30 AD, which was right in the midst of the ministry of Christ, judgment in matters of life and death were taken away from the Jews and kept in the custody of the Romans entirely.

What this meant was, that if Jesus died a death at this time, and of course He did, it would have been a Roman death. If He had died a Jewish death, the law required that He be put to death by stoning. However, the Roman death was by crucifixion. Now, it had to be this way because Jesus said that He would be lifted up. The lifting up was undoubtedly a reference to a crucifixion. It is interesting that He made that lifting up prophecy apparently before the judgment in matters of life and death was taken away from the Jews and held entirely by the Romans. It is just an interesting example of the extent that God would go to back up the utterances of His Son. So indeed, He was lifted up.

The Jews began by accusing Jesus of blasphemy. That was their original charge. Now, if you want a reference on that, that is in Matthew 26:65. But blasphemy was not a capital offense as far as the Romans were concerned so they had to change their charge when they brought Christ before Pilate. And so they changed their charge to one of insurrection, of treason; that this fellow is someone who is dangerous as far as unseating the government in Judea and perhaps even of Rome itself. See, because in John 18:29, "What accusation do you bring against this Man?" And they immediately tried to get around it, that if He were not an evildoer, which is rather vague, we would not have delivered Him to you. After the blasphemy charge they moved on to sedition and from sedition to revolution. You can check that out in Luke 23:1-4.

John 18:31 Then Pilate then said to them, "You take Him and judge Him according to your law."

And then we get into that explanation right there.

It is good to follow, at least, maybe not in a great deal of detail at this time, but it is good to follow the attitude of the Jews and what it did to them. I say it is good because there is something to learn from it. The Jews' fear and hatred of Christ just twisted and perverted their minds so that we see in verse 28 that they would not even go into the Praetorium, which was the residence of Pilate whenever he was in the area of Jerusalem, for fear that they would be defiled because the place was not unleavened. But on the other hand, they could be plotting the death of another person all the while keeping themselves ceremonially clean. Now that is pretty twisted! But the twisting, which we will see in more detail when we begin to go through here, goes all the way (I want you to see this just in an overview sense anyway), in chapter 19, verse 15,

John 19:15 But they cried out, "Away with Him, away with Him! Crucify Him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" And the chief priest answered, "We have no king but Caesar!"

Now that was blasphemy right out of their mouth. Their mind was just so twisted by their feelings of hatred for this Man and for the fear that He put in them, for fear, you see, that they were going to lose their positions, that now they were claiming (we are going to see how they flipped back and forth here a couple of times), that that they had no king but Caesar!

The next character in this drama is Pilate and he is very interesting one indeed. I think it is abundantly clear from what John writes here in John 18 and 19, that Pilate felt that Jesus was innocent. In fact, we might even go so far as to say that that he was impressed by Him, you know, that he felt that he was in the presence of Somebody of quite a bit of majesty. But yet he would not really lift a hand to save Christ from this predicament. That he actually kind of fishtailed away and left Jesus to be condemned.

We can see here, one of the first things that that Pilate tried to do was to refuse to deal with Christ by telling the Jews that they had jurisdiction over this matter. And then when they raised the charge of sedition and revolution, he then tried to pass the buck on to Herod, and he actually sent Christ off to Herod and then Herod also fishtailed out of it as well.

When that failed, he then tried to release Jesus on the grounds that it was Passover and that they had this tradition that they would release one criminal at Passover time; and he really did not want to condemn Him. And then when he was met with such outcry that he had to take Him back, then he tried to compromise with the Jews by having Jesus scourged, hoping that they would be moved to pity, that this would be a compromise; that if Jesus were scourged, then they would be moved to drop their charge of sedition and then he could be out from under it.

Now why? Why did he act the way that he did? This is really intriguing because there is no doubt that nobody in the land had more power than Pilate. Why did he seem to be afraid of the Jews? Was he afraid that there was going to be a riot? Very possible. But I think maybe there was a little bit more to it than that.

How did Pilate even get to be in the position that he was? Well, this is what happened. The sequence of events worked like this. In 4 BC Herod died, and when Herod died, he left the land over which he was ruling to his three sons. Part of it went to Philip, part of it went to Antipas, and part of it went to Archelaus. Now, the part that we are most interested in is the one that went to Archelaus. Whenever Herod died, Archelaus was only 18 years old, and he inherited Judea, Samaria, and Idumea.

Well, Philip and Antipas did a reasonably good job, but Archelaus did a lousy job and the Jews became so frustrated with him that they appealed to Caesar, who was still over all. You see, up until this time, there was no Roman governor, no procurator like Pilate in the land. The Jews were essentially self-governing under Herod and his family. Archelaus did such a lousy job, had the people in such terror and anger, that the Jews appealed to Caesar and Caesar's response was to send a governor. Now the first governor took over in Judea and Samaria and Idumea in 6 BC.

It was in 26 BC that Pilate was appointed to that area. Now, for him to have been appointed to that area gives one the idea that he was a reasonably good civil administrator. Because even though one might consider Judea to be a rather minor province, it really was not. It was very important in the scheme of things because it sat astride the main trade routes that went between Egypt, up around the whole eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, as well as over into the Tigris and Euphrates Valley. So a great deal of commercial wealth passed through the land of Judea. And so, if for no other reason, it was important for that. An awful lot of money passed through the area so they would not send someone there of, let us say, minor importance, but rather they would send somebody who was a reasonably experienced and responsible bureaucrat, which apparently was what Pilate was.

Now how did he ever get into the position where he was actually at the control of a mob like this? Well history, by this I mean Philo and Josephus (and there is one other fellow whose name I have forgotten), record a series of incidents that occurred during Pilate's period of rulership over Judea that are very interesting.

When the procurator was sent there, he was given authority to rule over the land. However, there were certain restrictions on it. Number one was he was not allowed to raise taxes. Another one was that he was absolutely forbidden to accept any kind of a gift for fear of bribery. He could collect taxes but like I said, he could not raise taxes. Now, in order to counterbalance some of the power that the procurator was given, there was an ordinance established that the locals, in this case, the Judeans, the Samaritans, had the right to appeal to Rome if they felt that they were being abused by the procurator.

Here is what happened. The very first time that Pilate came into Jerusalem, he did a no-no. He apparently either did not understand or woefully underestimated the fanatical zeal of the Jews in regard to their religion. And so what he did is, he came into the area with all of the soldiers carrying the standards of their battalion. At the top of their standard was a bust of Tiberius who was the emperor. He was god. Now, some people actually intercepted Pilate before he came into the city and they warned him that if he came into the city with those things on the top of their standards, why, there would be trouble. Well, he decided that he was not going to back down in the face of this threat. And so he came into the city anyway and the Jews were incensed.

This lends a little bit of background for this thing about the Jews saying we have no king but Caesar, see, which is really a hypocrisy of the nth degree. So they riot. Now Pilate backed down to the extent that he pulled out of the city, but he still would not take the bust of Tiberius off the top of the standard. So he went back to Caesarea, which was actually the capital of the province. Jerusalem is not, Caesarea was. And so when he got back there, a whole group of Jews dogged his heels all the way back, appealing to him to take the bust off the top of the standard. Well, he still refused to do it.

Several days went by and they are still pounding on his door there and he was losing his patience. And so he told them, "Okay, I'm going to meet you at the amphitheater there in Caesarea and we will hold a public hearing on this thing." Actually, what he was doing was setting a trap. So the Jews went into the amphitheater and when they got in there, the Romans surrounded it and then Pilate laid down the law, "Either you quit dogging my heels or I'm going to cut your heads off." Well, the Jews called his bluff. They stuck their heads on the block so Pilate backed down.

Then a couple of years later he did another no-no. (That was strike one, by the way.) The second one came a couple of years later whenever he decided that Jerusalem needed a new water supply and so he had an aqueduct built; and they really did need the water. But where was he supposed to get the money? He took it from the Temple and the Jews did not like that one bit. He took it from the Temple treasury. They revolted again. That was strike two.

Then a few years later, he still had not learned his lessons about the bust and he came into the city with his armed group, only this time they had a bust of Tiberius on their shields. Well, this time there was really a riot and a lot of Jews died. Well, that was strike three.

Now, the Jews still had not appealed to Caesar yet. Remember I told you that they had the right to appeal if they felt that they were being mistreated. They still had not yet appealed to Caesar. I will just toss this out to you for a thought, and that is that I feel that underlying this might very possibly have been some blackmail. I do not see where Pilate had to fear very much from the Jews, except that he already had three very black marks against him. If he were reported to Caesar, it is very likely that his career as a governor, as a procurator, as a civil servant, as a bureaucrat, would end.

I think I can say this confidently because it happened three years later. In 34 AD, he did another no-no. And again, it involved idolatry as far as the Jews considered it. This time, the Jews reported him to Caesar. And Tiberius recalled Pilate and Pilate was on his way back to Rome to stand trial for what he had done, and Tiberius died. So he is just lost to history from that point on. He just disappears from view. And so he never was called before the Caesar, but he was recalled, he was removed from his position because of that.

At any rate, it is entirely possible that something like that weakened Pilate's position before these people, and that fearing a riot and knowing already that the people had three things over him that they could have reported him to Caesar for, I think that it very greatly weakened Pilate's position there.

The next character there is Jesus Himself. I think that what is outstanding here is Jesus' courage, His calmness, and as I mentioned before, it seems as though He is not the one who is on trial, that Pilate is the one who is on trial. It seems as though He is in control of all that is going on—and He is laying down His life.

Then there is two groups—one group and one person. The group is the soldiers and we will get to them just a little bit later. But the other character here is Barabbas. Now, Barabbas was no ordinary thief. The Greek indicates that he was a desperate brigand. John calls him a robber. Matthew or Mark, I do not know which one it is right now, calls him a murderer. Now, maybe he was a zealot. Maybe he was somebody that was definitely considered to be somebody who was well worth crucifying, even by the Romans. But he was let loose and Jesus, the Messiah, was the one who was crucified.

I only bring Barabbas up because there is an interesting thing about him and that is that the name that you see there is a last name. It is Barabbas, Bar Abbas. Now, there are two possibilities regarding his name. Bar means son. It was Simon Bar Jonah, Simon the son of Jonah. Barabbas here could be son of the father, Abba, Abba father, or there could have been a letter dropped in his name and it could have been by Bar Abba, son of a priest. He might have been the son of a priest who went bad or became part of a zealot group and became then a brigand and a murderer.

But anyway, I do not know whether it is any more of a legend or not. It actually appears in many old manuscripts of the Bible that his first name was Jesus. Joshua, Joshua Barabbas. Now, what is so interesting to me, just a little sidelight here, is that once again, mankind chose the wrong Jesus! That when it came to a choice between the real Jesus and the fake, mankind once again chose the fake; that he cannot apparently see the reality because he is blinded by whatever.

Let us go back here to John the 18th chapter.

John 18:28 Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas to the Praetorium, and it was early morning. But they themselves did not go into the Praetorium, lest they should be defiled, but that they might eat the Passover.

As I mentioned before, the irony here. That they would keep themselves ceremonially clean all the while they are plotting murder; actually participating in the real Passover.

There is another interesting thing here and that is in regard "that they might eat the Passover." The interesting thing is the timing. Now, Jesus ate the Passover meal before He ever got into this spot. He ate the Passover meal according to what it says there in Exodus the 12th chapter in the evening of the 14th. Now, according to the biblical reckoning, the evening of the 14th would put it at the beginning of the day. Jesus therefore, kept the Passover at the proper time, at the beginning of the 14th day. Now, the Jews here still had not yet eaten the Passover. It was still ahead of them sometime later on the 14th or at the latest at the beginning of what we would call today the 15th.

Now, how did it get that way? Why were they a day behind? Well, right at this moment, I do not know. I know that we have some literature on it, but I just did not have the time to look it up. I am almost positive that Dr. Hoeh (one time way back in the past, in the 60s there sometime), wrote on why that kind of a discrepancy and did it at least partly cause them to reject the Passover lamb. It certainly may have played a part.

John 18:29-32 Pilate then went out to them and said, "What accusation do you bring against this Man?" They answered and said to him, "If He were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him up to you." Then Pilate said to them, "You take Him and judge Him according to your law." Therefore the Jews said to him, "It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death," that the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled which He spoke, signifying by what death He would die.

If you want some scriptures in regard to that they are Leviticus 24:16 and Deuteronomy 17:7. Both of those show that if Jesus were guilty of blasphemy, according to the law of the Old Testament He would have been stoned.

John 18:33 Then Pilate entered the Praetorium again, called Jesus, and said to Him, "Are you the King of the Jews?"

Now, according to the emphasis that is given in the Greek, if I can paraphrase it, it is saying something like this: "Can You, poor creature, be King of the Jews." There was a streak of contemptuousness in Pilate that we are going to see come through here and it really kept him from being the kind of adequate ruler that he could have been.

John 18:34-35 Jesus answered him, "Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you this concerning Me?" Pilate answered, "Am I a Jew?"

Of course he was not a Jew, but that was not a very good answer for a ruler to give.

We have to remember here that a man was on trial for His life and a ruler, if he is going to be just, should have done some research himself in order to find out whether or not this Man really was what He claimed to be. Now, you can tell by this that Pilate really does not have a great deal to go on in his trial of Christ. Where was he when all of this was going on? I mean, where was he all the while that Jesus was preaching? Was he aware? Were people telling him, were there couriers coming to him from Jerusalem to Caesarea saying that there was somebody down there that the Jews were getting all excited about and maybe you better look into this thing?

Was he being told that there were at times large crowds of people that were following this Man? Was he told about the time up there around the Sea of Galilee where the Jews wanted to make Jesus a king when they came to take Him? What was Pilate doing? What kind of lines of communications were open? Had he ignored all of the things that were told him?

John 18:35-36 "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. What have You done?" [What he is saying there is, "Be specific."] Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, My servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews. But now My kingdom is not from here."

What Jesus is speaking of here is two things and they are related. "My kingdom is not of this system or not of this way." Now, it is interesting that in the middle of the verse, "My servants would fight," He is making a contrast (and this is the second part) of the nature of His reign. His reign is not something that is going to be executed by violence, it is not something that is going to be held in place by the force of threat.

Now, those two are directly related. If He were of that system, then He would use the same methods that the Romans and the Jews and every other nation on earth use, and that would be the methods of violence, of going to warfare, and have the fear of threat hanging over people's heads. So the nature of His reign is not one that is based upon the ways of this world. Now, that should have satisfied Pilate and indeed, it seems to have satisfied him at least to some degree because then he understood what Jesus was saying. "I am not trying to overthrow the government." That was a direct answer.

Incidentally, that phrase, "My servants would fight," the tense in the Greek there is: He said, "My servants would now be fighting." In other words, we would not have gotten this far. With Me taken captive, they would now be fighting. If My system, if the nature of My kingship were the same as yours and everybody else's, My servants would already be fighting. They would not have allowed Me to even be taken. But now My Kingdom is not from here; and Jesus had once refused it. That is all the way back in John the sixth chapter in verse 15, where they came to make Him a king and He got out of there.

Pilate understood at least partially what Jesus was driving at. So in verse 37,

John 18:37 Pilate said to Him, "Are You a king then?"

Now there is surprise implied in that. If we were to turn that and paraphrase it, then Pilate would be saying, "You are then a king." Jesus said, "Yes." That is what He said in verse 36, "My kingdom is not from here." That was an admission. Yes, I am a king, and Pilate understood, "You are a king." And then Jesus extrapolated a little bit further.

John 18:37 Jesus answered, "You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice."

What He did there was was to say that, yes, He came into this world to be a king. But His Kingdom was not of this system, this way. If it was My servants would already be fighting. So therefore, I did not come for political reasons. I came to bear witness to the truth. But He is a king. Well, then He says, "Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice."

John 18:38 Pilate said to Him, "What is truth?"

The very fact that he had to ask that question shows that he was not of the truth because Jesus had just said, if you hear My voice, you are of the truth. Because those who hear His voice know what the truth is. Well, Pilate did not know the truth. Therefore, he had to ask the question.

Now, how did he ask the question? Was it in sarcasm? It might have been because certainly he was a man who was always dealing with people who were trying to squirm their way out from under having to face up to the governor because they had some offense against them. And indeed, I am sure that there were all kinds of commercial ventures that were passing through his office because people wanted to be free to pursue money. And so they were asking for favors from him. And he understood in dealing with the public that there was an awful lot of lying being told.

You know, I think he asked this, really, in a state of weariness mixed with sarcasm. I think that anybody in public office gets that way after a while because everybody, it seems, is trying to twist everything their own way so that they have the favor. But Pilate was impressed.

John 18:38 And when he had said this, he went out to the Jews, and said to them, "I find no fault in Him at all."

Now, fault is a little bit too broad. The word really is "crime" because that is why He was there. He was there because He had supposedly committed a crime that was a capital offense. But what he said was, "I find no indictable offense in this Man."

John 18:39 "But you have a custom that I should release someone to you at Passover. Do you therefore want me to release to you the King of the Jews?"

I am sure that Pilate thought that that was going to be a pretty good move because if indeed he was somewhat under the threat of blackmail here because the Jews had three things against him for which he could have been reported to the emperor, but they did not report him, to give clemency to the King of the Jews would make it seem as though Pilate was turning the other way, that he was becoming merciful and that he was becoming sensitive to the Jews and to their religion, to their way.

John 18:40 Then they all cried again, saying, "Not this Man, but Barabbas!" Now Barabbas was a robber [or a desperate brigand, a murderer, Mark 15:7].

John 19:1 So then Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him.

He did this, I am sure, for either one of two reasons, or both. He either did it in an effort to get more direct evidence from Christ Himself, to break down the witness, that is, Jesus, break down the accused so that He would tell the truth. Or he was doing it in an attempt to appease the Jews in the hope that if he beat Jesus enough they would be appeased. I feel it was one or the other.

John 19:2-3 And the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe. Then they said, "Hail, King of the Jews!" And they struck Him with their hands.

They undoubtedly did this in order to ridicule Him and to make Him a subject of mockery. Now in verse 2, I did a bit of research on the crown of thorns. There is at least one interesting angle to this in a book that was written within the last couple of years. The traditional idea is that they put on Him some thorns that they wrapped into sort of like a halo-like affair, and that they jammed it down on His head. Well, they could have put upon Him what this one author said is a radial crown, and a radio crown was something that was customarily done with people of fairly high rank. There is apparently some kind of a bush that grows over there that does have very long thorns on it. However, it is actually a crown of distinction rather than being one of torture.

That seems to fit a little bit better. The torture came in the scourging and certainly there could have been torture in the crown of thorns. But it seems more likely that it was part of the regalia that they put on Him, mocking Him as a king—the purple robe, the crown of thorns, and then the calling Him, "Hail, King of the Jews!" And where it says that they struck Him with their hands, the Greek indicates that it was something that was repeatedly done. You know, it was not something that somebody came up and gave him one slap across the side of the face, but rather it was something that was repetitiously done over and over again. They kept coming up to Him and striking Him.

John 19:4 Pilate then went out again, and said to them, "Behold, I am bringing Him out to you, that you may know that I find no fault in Him."

Again, repeating what is given up there in verse 38. He says, I can find no indictable offense in this Man. So how many times is that? That is two times already that he has said that He is innocent of the charges that have been made against Him.

Now, I want to take a bit of a digression here before we go on because I want to look into what Christ's death saves us from. Let us go back to Acts the second chapter, beginning in verse 22 in Peter's sermon on the day of Pentecost. He says,

Acts 2:22-23 "Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know—Him, being delivered by the determined counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death."

Acts 2:36-37 "Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ." Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and to the rest of the apostles, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?"

I wanted to emphasize verse 23 here. "Him, being delivered by the determined counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death."

Now, those men to whom Peter was speaking were certainly closer to the scene than we were. But yet those people were no more guilty than we were, in the sense that they did not participate directly in the death of Jesus Christ. If there was anyone who participated directly in His death, it was of course, those men who were involved with the high priest, those men who appeared before Pilate and made the accusations. And yet from God's own Word in Acts 2:23, Peter's accusation is against all. You have taken and you have crucified.

What this means is that nobody can divorce themselves from the responsibility for the death of Jesus Christ, that all of us share in that responsibility. And all of us have to recognize that we have a part in it. We cannot divorce ourselves from it. That even though we live 1,900 some years after it, we are nonetheless just as guilty as those who were there witnessing what was going on.

Now, back in the book of Matthew in chapter 1, verse 21, where the angel was prophesying, it says,

Matthew 1:21 "And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."

From means out, away. It means that we will be saved from the effect of sin. It does not mean that we will be saved in our sins, that is, while we are still sinning, but we will be saved out, from, away. Now, that effect of sin is death. That is the effect of sin—death.

Let us go back to Hebrews 9.

Hebrews 9:27 And it is appointed for men to die once., but after this the judgment.

All of us are to die and it is God's will for those even who love Him to die, and those whom God loves. God simply did not make us to live forever. It is given to all men once to die. Now what connection does this have to sin? What connection does this have to Matthew 1:21 where we are to be saved out, away from, our sins and the effect of sin is death? Are we saved from the first death? The answer to that, of course, is no.

Let us go back to Romans 3.

Romans 3:21-25 But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth to be as a propitiation [or a payment] . . .

Incidentally, the word there literally is mercy seat. That propitiation, whom God set forth to be a mercy seat or a propitiation is what its real intention is, a payment.

Romans 3:25 . . . by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God has passed over the sins that were previously committed.

At the time of the acceptance by faith of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in our behalf and the carrying on through with that of baptism, God says that He forgives our sins. He passes over our sins and we stand justified, that is, clear before Him of those sins that are in the past that brought upon us the death penalty. Not the first death because it is given unto all men once to die. But the second death, of which the wage or the effect or what we earn is death. That is, a death from which there is no resurrection. That is the death that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ saves us from.

Now from there, let us go back to Romans 5.

Romans 5:6-10 For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified [that is, cleared] by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. [That wrath is the second death. We are not saved from the first death. As a result of His death, we shall be saved from wrath, the second death.] For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.

That is equally important because the crucifixion of Christ, the death of Jesus Christ, we just read in Romans 3:25, only saves us up to this point from sins that are past. That clears us of guilt, we are reconciled to God, that is, our fellowship is established with God through Jesus Christ. But then we go on and we commit other sins, do we not?

Let us go to I John 1.

I John 1:8-9 If we [Christians, part of the Body of Christ] say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

I John 2:1-2 My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation [there is that word again] for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world.

The sacrifice of Christ then provides a reconciliation to God by providing a means of justification, that is, clearing of guilt. Fellowship is then established with God. And what we are saved from is having to face the second death. However, even after becoming Christians, we continue to sin and as long as we confess our sins and repent of our sins, God will continue to forgive our sins by that same sacrifice that originally reconciled us and justified us before God.

Now, that is what makes salvation possible—the fact that Christ is alive and that we are able to continue to receive the forgiveness of sin.

Let us go back to John the 189th chapter again. You know, it is interesting to notice Jesus' attitude toward Pilate. This was something it would take a little bit of time to do, but if you would maybe get out a harmony [of the gospel] and compare Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John's accounts of the crucifixion of Christ, you will find that in most every case He answered Pilate. He answered him tactfully, discreetly, honestly, forthrightly, and it seems in a gentle way. But with the Jews, He rarely even answered at all. Now Pilate was in ignorance pretty much of what was going on. There were no scathing denunciations of Pilate as there was for Herod, as there was for the scribes, the Pharisees, and the Sadducees. It almost seems as though there is a note of compassion in Him for what Pilate was being put through.

In verse 5,

John 19:5 Then Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And Pilate said to them, "Behold the Man!"

Again, the Greek was written in an emphatic way. And what I mean is that they would emphasize certain words by capitalizing, by writing them in a somewhat different style than the script that they would be using otherwise. Now, what this did is it drew attention to either to certain words and emphasized them. What we can see here is this: there is a drawing of pity toward Christ. Remember, He was wearing this crown of thorns. He had this ragged purple robe on. He was beaten virtually beyond recognition. As Isaiah 52 says, He did not even look like a man. He was just a bloody pulp, the way I get it, so disfigured and so marred. And so here He comes out standing before the people, and Pilate says, "Look at this poor fellow. Look at the way He looks. Can you really consider that this Man is a threat to Israel or to Rome?"

Then verse 6,

John 19:6 Therefore, when the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, "Crucify Him, crucify Him!" Pilate said to them, "You take Him and crucify Him, for I find no fault in Him."

That is the third time now that he said to them that I can find no crime that is indictable in a capital way. And he is saying to them, "You do your own dirty work."

John 19:7-8 The Jews answered him, "We have a law, and according to our law He ought to die [That is that law in Leviticus 24:6. They considered Him guilty of blasphemy because Jesus said, "I am."], because He made Himself the Son of God." Therefore, when Pilate heard that saying, he was the more afraid, . . .

Now, that is very interesting. This was right after it said that "He made Himself the Son of God."

They are changing their story again. That was the original charge, one of blasphemy. When they came before Pilate, they changed it to treason in order that Pilate could put Him to get to death. And now when Pilate finds that there is no fault in Him, they turn it back again to blasphemy because He made Himself the Son of God. You know, when Pilate heard this, he was afraid. Did Pilate fear God? What did he have to fear? Certainly it could not be anything more than superstition. Did he really consider Christ, after what it says there in verse 5, to be a rival to Caesar?

John 19:9 . . . and he went out again into the Praetorium, and said to Jesus, "Where are You from?"

He did not mean, are you from Galilee? He knew He was from Galilee. He was Jesus of Nazareth. When he said, "Where are you from?" he was asking Jesus, "Who is your Father? Are you really God? Are you from heaven?" Jesus did not answer.

John 19:10 Then Pilate said to Him, "Are You not speaking to me?"

That amazed Pilate because he had the power of life and death, and here was this Man standing here with calm strength, with courage, forthrightly saying what He needed to say. And here He had a wonderful opportunity to defend Himself and He did not take it.

John 19:10-11 Pilate said to Him, "Are you not speaking to me? Do You not know that I have the power to crucify You, and the power to release You?" Jesus answered, "You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given to you from above. Therefore the one who delivered Me to you has the greater sin." [That could have been either Judas or Caiaphas, the one who delivered Him.]

That is Romans 13:1. You see there is no power at all except from God. Well, whenever Jesus said that, that encouraged Pilate.

John 19:12 From then on [or upon hearing this] Pilate sought to release Him [Here comes time number four.], but the Jews cried out [it means they kept on crying, they shouted, "crucify Him, crucify Him!"], "If you let this Man go, you are not Caesar's friend. [and brethren, that broke Pilate's will right there] Whoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar."

Now there they hit Pilate where it hurt because Pilate did not want to appear to be disloyal to Tiberius because that was a capital offense on his part. If he already had three strikes against him, because of what the Jews considered to be idolatry in the bringing of the bust of Tiberius into Jerusalem in the first place, and they did report him because they wanted to hold it over his head, he was as good as gone and that would be the end of his bureaucratic career.

John 19:13 When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus out and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha.

There is another interesting thing there. The verb, "he brought Jesus out and sat down," can be either transitive or intransitive. Now, it can be translated either he sat down, meaning Pilate sat down, or it could mean that he sat Jesus down, which is probably not likely. But it is interesting because it sets up an interesting thought. If he sat Christ down in the judgment seat, which is really where it belonged, then we have the unusual scene of the real King, the real Judge, facing the one who was the pretender judge sitting in the seat of judgment. We have the One who is going to be coming as King of kings and Lord of lords and is going to judge the whole earth, sitting in the seat, in that sense, that He belonged in. It is not likely that it was that way. It was probably that Pilate himself sat down.

John 19:13-14 When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus out and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called The Pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, "Behold your King!"

There is a minor controversy over verse 14 about the sixth hour, and I will read to you some alternatives. This is from Alleged Discrepancies of the Bible. Now there seems to be a discrepancy between John's account and Mark's account because John says it was the sixth hour and Mark says it was the third hour. Now, what time is it?

It is kind of a dumb thing. People jump on the dumbest things but I will read what this guy says.

There are three leading explanations of this case. First, that the two evangelists, Mark and John, give the extreme limits of time. Mark, referring to the beginning of the preparations and John pointing to the completion of the dreadful tragedy. The words of the former, "it was the third hour" may denote indefinitely that the third hour was passed, while the phraseology in John about the sixth hour may mean simply that it was approaching the sixth hour.

And then he lists a number of experts who say that this is the way it ought to be.

Now, the second explanation is that John, writing in Asia Minor, may have used the Roman official mode of computation reckoning from midnight so that the sixth hour would be 6 a.m. From this time to 9 a.m., the third hour according to the Jewish reckoning, was occupied by the preliminaries and by the passage of the procession forth to Golgotha.

And then he lists all of the experts who say that this is the way it ought to be.

The third explanation is that it is a copyists mistake. In John of [and then they give the figure and there is a slight similarity between the Greek number for three and the Greek number for six.]

I will tell you what I think it is. It is the second explanation. That John simply used the Roman reckoning of time and the sixth hour would correspond to 6 a.m. (in the morning), which seems to fit the events that occurred all during that evening. And that is, about how much time it would take to take Jesus into custody, to ship Him off to Herod, to ship Him back to Pilate, to go through all the rigmarole of gathering everybody together until finally we arrive at 6 a.m. And that Mark simply gives the time according to the Jewish time reckoning at which the preliminaries were all under way and they were at the place of the crucifixion. So there was a three hour span between John 19:14 and Mark the 15th chapter (I forget the verse right now). But I think that is what it was. It was simply 6 a.m. by Roman reckoning. And when Mark gave the third hour, it was the third hour according to Jewish reckoning.

John 19:15 But they cried out, "Away with Him, away with Him! Crucify Him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" [Here it comes.] The chief priest answered, "We have no king but Caesar!"

And now we have blasphemy from the accusers because they did not recognize any king but God. I mean, officially in their religion, that is the way it was. So they have completely turned around.

John 19:16-17 Then he delivered Him to be crucified. So they took Jesus and led Him away. And He, bearing His cross, went out to the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha, . . .

Now there was nothing unusual about a condemned criminal having to carry the instrument of his death. It was apparently a common Roman practice that that had to be done. Nothing unusual about that at all. But there is an interesting biblical parallel and that is with Isaac. Isaac, who was a type of Christ, Abraham who was the type of the Father. And you read the account back there in Genesis and Isaac carried the wood upon which he was going to be sacrificed. And also just another thing, an aside actually, and that is, according to Jewish tradition, Golgotha was the traditional burial place of Adam, which is also kind of interesting in the light of the Bible identifying Christ as the second Adam and Him being buried, possibly, in the same general area as the first Adam, who was given the same potential or the same possibility as Christ being the king of the earth there.

John 19:18-20 . . . where they crucified Him, and two others with Him, one on either side, and Jesus in the center. Now Pilate wrote a title [or rather an inscription] and put it on the cross. And the writing was: JESUS OF NAZARETH, KING OF THE JEWS. Then many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin.

Well, that is kind of interesting because here are the three languages representative of the three peoples who have contributed very much to man's cultures. It was the Greeks who are kind of leaders in beauty, in the form of thought, beautiful writing. And then there is Latin, which was the language of the Romans and they of course, were renowned for law and government and authority, at least as far as the world is concerned. And then there is the Hebrew, which was the language of the people who gave much to this world in regard to religious thought. And there, up on the cross, on the stake was the One who represents the epitome in every one of those things: beauty and form and language, and also in law and government, as well as the epitome in religion.

So maybe "title" is the right word. My Bible has title. Some Bibles have inscription. But He certainly was King of the Jews and of all of mankind.

John 19:21-22 And then the chief priest of the Jews said to Pilate, "Do not write 'The King of the Jews,' but, 'He said, "I am King of the Jews."'" Pilate answered, "What I have written, I have written."

Is that not something? Here was this man who vacillated so much in regard to the life of a human being and finally, telling everybody that He was innocent, still washed his hands and turned the man over to be killed, and then he turns right around and he was as firm as a piece of granite when it came to a superscription or whatever that you put over top of a man's head! And he would not change, he would not budge, he would not give an inch. You know, it is really strange that we can be uncompromising, unbending, unyielding in things that maybe do not matter at all, and things that are really important we vacillate and we change our mind and we switch back and forth and we play both sides of the street. But that is human nature.

John 19:23-24 Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments and made four parts, to each soldier a part, and also the tunic. Now the tunic was without seam, woven from the top in one piece. And they said therefore among themselves, "Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be," that the Scripture might be fulfilled which says: "They divided My garments among them, and for My clothing they cast lots."

There is something here that is really interesting. There were four soldiers and He had four pieces of clothing. There were His shoes, there was His girdle, or the undergarment. There was an outer robe and his tunic, kind of a headpiece. And so they divided the four parts and the tunic was left, His seamless robe. And to me, there is hardly a picture that illustrates, maybe, mankind's attitude toward Christ. Or maybe we can expand that out toward God, toward His purpose, toward what was happening, or whatever. Because here were these men, gambling! while God died right above their heads! And you know, they were not openly antagonistic. They were indifferent, just simply passing the time of day away.

It reminds me of something that is back in the book of Lamentations. Maybe we can apply this; in the first chapter, verse 12. Here is Jeremiah beginning to describe what he is seeing envision happening to Jerusalem and it just tears him up. And he says,

Lamentations 1:10-12 The adversary has spread his hand over all her pleasant things; for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, those whom You commanded not to enter Your congregation. All her people sigh, they seek bread; they have given their valuables for food to restore life. "See, O Lord, and consider, for I am scorned. [But what is the world doing?] Is it nothing to you, all who pass by? Behold and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which has been brought on me, which the Lord has inflicted on me in the day of His fierce anger."

Indifference. "Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by?" That is what these men—God died and they gambled! It meant nothing to them. It was just another death; just another man; just another part of their work. Nothing unusual, it did not mean a thing. All they were interested in was their pay for the day. And so they gambled.

To me, that kind of summarizes all of mankind there in a microcosm. We gamble away life while God dies for us. And I wonder how many of us are gambling away eternal life and consider it nothing that Christ died for us. Do you understand that that is what the unpardonable sin is?

Turn with me back to Hebrews 6.

Hebrews 6:4-6 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and I tasted the heavenly gift [that is the forgiveness of sin], and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away [just gambling their life away], to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.

That is the one thing that God will not forgive. And that is the failure in one's life to pay homage to what His Son did by submitting one's life to God in obedience as a result of that gift. Putting Christ to an open shame, just gambling our lives away.

JWR/aws/drm