I recently heard of a woman named Ruth Snowden, a
Christian leader in New Zealand, who was once bothered by all the interest
that people showed in relics and souvenirs of famous people. And she said
it this way, “Such an amazing assortment of things have been generated in
England. At the cathedral in Canterbury for example there was some of the
clay from which Adam was made; several pieces of Aaron’s rod; and the right
arm of Saint George. And Caversham also possessed a very strange relic
which is described as a piece of the holy halter that Judas was hanged
with. The church at Trimingham had the head of John the Baptist, which by
the way was also a prized relic at Amiens, at Anchair and Constantinople.
The Church at Charing had the block on which the Baptist was beheaded and
the Cathedral at Lincoln had a bone of St. Stephen and a tooth of St.
Paul’s.”
“But enough,” she wrote, “there is a danger in the
possession of too many things. As a Christian of the 21st
century I am glad that our Lord left to his followers of the 1st
century nothing of a material kind. I think he knew how easily they and we
might venerate it, quarrel over it or lose it. I am so glad that he left us
instead something to do. And it is so simple that even the poorest, the
humblest of us all can do this in remembrance of him.”1
And so this morning we gather around this table in
remembrance of our Lord Jesus Christ.
We come to call to mind all that Jesus is and all that
He has done for us on the cross. The bread and the cup remind us of His
life and his death. And the fact that we celebrate this meal until He comes
reminds us that the grave did not hold Him but that He is alive
forevermore. So we celebrate His life, His death and His resurrection.
But specifically this morning I want us to think of
three truths concerning Jesus Christ as we share in this meal – the first
two truths I will share before the bread, and the third truth before we
share in the cup.
The first truth I want us to call to mind this
morning is that Jesus Christ went to the cross because of us.
The prophet Isaiah put it like this, “He was pierced
for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment
that brought us peace was upon him …” (Isaiah 53:5)
We were the ones who were supposed to die. Our sin is
so horrible, our sin so horrendous that we were to die for it.
We don’t like to think this way. By our own estimation
we know that we aren’t perfect, but we certainly aren’t that bad. We pay
our taxes, we haven’t harmed anyone. We go to church certainly above the
national average – a pastor friend of mine emailed me this week and told me
that the recent statistic for church attendance in Canada is 1 out of 3
weekends. Some of you have got that statistic beat. Some of you don’t.
But we aren’t bad people.
The people who tried Jesus – that was a group of bad
people. In our text today we read of a group of religious leaders who bring
Jesus to be judged by Pilate, the Roman governor. The first thing we notice
about these leadesr is their hypocrisy. Verse 28 - “Then the Jews led
Jesus from Caiaphas to the palace of the Roman governor. By now it was
early morning, and to avoid ceremonial uncleanness the Jews did not enter
the palace.”
Talk about hypocrisy – here they were bringing a man to
trial who had done nothing wrong. They could find no one to would speak
against Him, He was denied the privilege of a fair trial – notice that there
is no hint of witnesses for the defense. They were determined to have an
innocent man killed, yet they will not enter Pilate’s house just in case
there happens to be some leven in the home and they would be declared
unclean for the rest of the feast.
Hypocrisy. Jesus would say “woe to you, teachers of
the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices –
mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of
the law – justice, mercy and faithfulness.” (Matthew 23:23)
They were bad people, willing to crucify the Lord Jesus
Christ but all the while they had the appearance of being pious, righteous,
and living for God. Following the law to such a degree that they even
tithed their spices. But they neglected justice, mercy and faithfulness.
They were bad people. And we think, “Surely I am not that like that”.
But then we read scripture in Romans 5:6-8 “You see,
at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the
ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for the righteous man, though for a
good man someone might possible dare to die. But God demonstrates his own
love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Notice how we are described there – powerless, ungodly,
sinners and if that’s not bad enough you keep reading to verse 10 you read,
“for if, when we were God’s enemies we were reconciled to him through the
death of his Son …” God’s enemies.
It means that we were opposed to God, we were His
enemies. We were so opposed to God that we would attack Him, slander Him,
and do everything in our power to destroy Him. We would actually seek to
drag God from His throne and cast Him down to death and place our own selves
on that throne. We were enemies of God.
And I am made to realize that there are times when I am
frightfully like those religious leaders. So ready to keep up appearances
but at the same time ready to throw the Lord down from His rightful place on
the throne of my life. He died because of us. That’s the first lesson.
The second lesson is that Jesus is able to forgive our
rebellion through His death on the cross. This is significant. You will
notice in our text how history plays out. The religious authorities bring
Jesus to Pilate and Pilate comes out and says at verse 29, “What charges
do you bring?” They say, “If we didn’t have any charges we wouldn’t
have brought him to you.”
But Pilate won’t play their games. He won’t
immediately condemn Jesus without a trial. So he says at verse 31 – “You
take him and judge him by your own law then.” There is a tinge of
mockery in his voice, he is saying, “Why don’t you stone himself?”
They reply, “We have no right to execute anyone.”
Which was true, and Pilate knew it. Capital punishment was an act reserved
by the state of Rome. There was an exception to the rule – if someone
defiled their temple – but it was a minor exception, not worth mentioning
here. Essentially they had no right to execute anyone, so they had to
persuade Pilate to find Jesus guilty of a capital crime.
At verse 32 Scripture tells us – this was the hand of
God. “This happened so that the words Jesus had spoken indicating the
kind of death he was going to die would be fulfilled.”
If Jesus was condemned of a capital crime by Rome then
he would die by crucifixion not stoning and our Lord’s words would be
fulfilled:
John 3:14 – “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in
the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes
in him may have eternal life.”
John 8:28 “When you have lifted up the Son of Man,
then you will know that I am the one I claim to be.”
John 12:32 “But I, when I am lifted up from the
earth, will draw all people to myself.”
Jesus died on a cross – it’s significant. He didn’t
die by stoning. He didn’t get thrown from a cliff. He wasn’t decapitated.
No, He died on a cross - it verifies His words and His person.
But more, it was only by dying on the cross that Jesus
could deal with your sin and my sin. For it was on the cross that He bore
the full curse of God - for sin - for us. Deuteronomy 21:23 “Anyone who
is hung on a tree is under God’s curse.” Jesus Christ died on a cross
and He bore the full measure of our sin. All the hypocrisy, all the pride,
all our rebellion - Jesus bore it all on the cross.
Let’s not fool ourselves by thinking that a new
relationship with God can be received by simply trying to live a good life,
by doing good works or trying to be better. If that was the case, there
would be no need for God to send His Son to die on the cross for us.
2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “For our sake he made him
who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the
righteousness of God.” And Galatians 3:13 says, “Christ redeemed us
from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.” He was made sin,
He became a curse, not just bearing the curse, but became cursed.
It’s incredible. The cross is God’s way to deal with
your sin and my sin, with our powerlessness, our ungodliness, our outright
rebellion.
On the night when He was betrayed Jesus took bread and
when He had given thanks, he broke it and said, “this is my body which is
for you, do this in remembrance of me.” And He took a piece of broken
bread and placed it into each of His disciples’ hands and then similarly the
cup saying, “for you, for you, for you.” Twelve separate times. Not
one of them was missed.
John had a temper like you and me and he was not passed
by. “For you,” said Jesus. Peter was impetuous and would deny Jesus
vehemently. Yet he received it. “For you,” said Jesus. Judas had dark
things in his mind. “For you,” said Jesus, putting it in his hand as a last
generous appeal.
All of them were disappointing and heartbreaking, all
had walked into that room wanting to be first, their faces hot with anger at
one another and temper in their eyes, but not one of them was left out.
“For you.”
And so He looks to us today. This is my body which is
for you. It was broken because of you. It is broken for you.
He died on the cross and in so doing made it possible
for us to know forgiveness of sin. 1 John 1:7 “…the blood of Jesus,
[God’s] Son, purifies us from all sin.”
There is one more truth to take in about Jesus, not
only did He die because of our sin. Not only did He die on the cross for
us. But he did all this as King. Verses 33-40 make it plain that Jesus
Christ is king.
Pilate directly asks Jesus if he is the king of the
Jews in verse 33. Clearly the religious leaders needing some kind of
evidence against Jesus to warrant a capital offense told Pilate that fact.
We can imagine them saying, “He claims to be king of the Jews.”
And so Pilate asks, “Are you?” Jesus doesn’t answer
right away. It’s not the kind of question you can say, “Yes or no,” to
because of the many ideas of what a king was and what a king would do. The
Jews had one picture of what a king was, and the Romans had another idea of
what a king was.
But Jesus will go on to say in verse 36 that He is
indeed a king, a king that is not of this world. A king who is far above
this world, a king whose ability and legions are beyond this world. He is
in fact the King above all kings. He is a king, He says at verse 37, who
has come to disclose the truth about God, of salvation and of judgment.
And we say, how can this be? If He is king then surely
He should not be in this situation. If He is king then He should not be on
trial – though as you read through the trial manuscripts it never appears
that Jesus is on trial but those who are doing the accusing. But still,
He shouldn’t be in this situation.
How can this be? Even Pilate recognizes the dissonance
and later will present Him mockingly dressed in purple, a crown of thorns on
His head, and will finally hang a sign over His head on the cross which
reads, “The King of the Jews.” How can this be?
And yet the fact remains, here is the King of kings.
Here is the King of glory. Here is the one who has planned all this – the
hour of His death is His plan, it’s under His control. He did say that He
lays down His life of His own free will, no one takes it from Him. Jesus
the King is in control. He asks the questions and makes the judgments. He
alone has the power that comes from above. He is the King.
But if that is true then why is He the one on trial? We
realize that if He is King, then He is on trial voluntarily, willingly.
John Calvin when speaking of Christ’s kingship said,
“He reigns more for us than for himself.” Power and dominion mean nothing
to Jesus Christ, except as instruments He can use on behalf of the
brokenhearted, the desperate, and the defeated.
And so it is today. He meets us here today and says to
us, as you take this cup to your lips, take it in, remember that I gave my
whole life for you. All that He has as King of kings, all that is at His
disposal as King is yours. All that He is – is yours.
And we realize that this is a King worth serving. This
is a King worth bending our will and knee to. This is a King worth giving
our lives to. This is a King worth identifying with.
John Gossip said long ago that Jesus Christ applies the
same test to us that Thomas used. Thomas said “Unless I see the nail
marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand
into his side, I will not believe that Jesus has risen.”
Jesus says the same thing to us, His followers, “Unless
I see in your hands the print of the nails, I will not believe.” And Gossip
asks, “Where are they? In our soft white palms, and easy pampered lives and
comfortable characters, where are the nail prints of service to the king?
Where are the marks of obedience to the one who is the King who gave his all
for you and for me.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the King above all kings. In
drinking this cup may we demonstrate our willingness to follow Him in
devotion as His disciples.
Do you know that in Romans 5 we read that at one time
you and I were considered to be enemies of God. That is, we were opposed to
God, in the sense that we would attack Him and destroy Him if we could. We
would actually seek to drag God from His throne and cast Him down and place
our own selves on the throne.
Let us remember His death. We remember
that He died for our sins. We remember that he is the king.
Copyright MBC and Rev. Dr. Tom Cullen -
April 2009
