There’s not a daily devotional post today, but instead here are the sermon notes from my 7am Good Friday Sermon.
Reading: John 19:1-30
When Jesus and His disciples left the Upper Room after the Last Supper that final Thursday night, Matthew 26 tells us that they sang a hymn, and then went out to the Mount of Olives.
The interesting and little-remembered fact is that right across the City, in every single Jewish home, the same hymn was being sung by all the faithful Jews as they ended their meal. Throughout the Passover week, every night, they closed their meals by singing what was known as “the Hallel” – which is basically Psalm 113-118.
And whenever they would end the Hallel, they would sing the following words as a closing prayer. In every Jewish home in Jerusalem that night … including the homes of Annas the previous high priest, and Caiaphas the current high priest; every member of the Jewish Temple Guard; in the homes of Joseph of Arimathea and of Nicodemus … and in the upper room of Jesus and His disciples … these words were sung to end the Hallel:
“From everlasting to everlasting Thou art God!
Beside Thee we have no King, redeemer or saviour!
No liberator, deliverer, provider!
None who takes pity in every time of distress or trouble.
We have no King but Thee.”
Fast forward about 15 hours or so. if you leave the video of these events playing, you’ll see them speed by in triple speed … Jesus prays in Gethsemane … is arrested … is put on trial by the High Priest and the Sanhedrin … the sun rises as he is sent to Pilate … is sent to Herod … is sent back to Pilate … is flayed with a lead-tipped whip … is bay-ed for by the crowd … is handed over to be crucified … is mocked and beaten … and paraded in degrading humiliation out of the City … stripped naked and nailed to a Cross.
And then we slow down the video to normal speed again and there He is … hanging on a Roman Cross beneath a sign Pilate put there saying, in the 3 written languages of the Empire, “Jesus of Nazareth: King of the Jews”.
Jesus, it appears, has been crowned and enthroned as king.
But He cuts a strange figure, this King:
- His throne is two planks of splintered wood.
- It sits on a pedestal of gravelly rock
- The only red carpet has been left in the gravel by His own bleeding body
- His red royal robe is His own flayed flesh and blood
- He holds no sceptre in His hands but only two six-inch nails
- The cries of the crowd are not “Long live the King”, but the mocking taunts, “If you’re the king come on down”.
- There’s no royal choir singing other than the cawing of crows and the buzzing of flies laying their eggs in his wounds.
He’s very strange king, this Jesus!
Why is He here … like this … under this sign we wonder?
The first person responsible is Pilate.
1. Pilate
When Jesus was on trial in front of Pilate, things were looking quite good.
Jesus had told it straight … to Pilate. He said, in effect:
Pilate, you really have nothing to fear from Me.
My Kingdom is not of this world – that’s why no one is fighting for My Freedom.
My Kingdom is from another place.
I am a King … in fact for this very reason I was born!
But it’s not a Kingdom like yours … not at all.
So he explains to Pilate. I was born to be King … of a Kingdom that is not earthly.
Jesus had explained this to others before, saying, “The Kingdom of God is within you and among you. (Luke 17:21)
Jesus came to establish a Kingdom through ruling and reigning in human lives and in human communities through the power of truth and love.
His Kingdom was never going to be a military or political threat to the Roman Empire.
And Pilate believed Jesus. He really did.
When Jesus said, “Pilate, I’m not afraid of you … because actually you’re not even in control of all of this … you would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above.” (John 19:11) … When Jesus said that, Pilate was afraid. He desperately tried to get the high priests and the crowd to back off and allow him to release Jesus without a fuss.
He tells them, “I find no basis for a charge against this Man.”
And in fact, when Pilate brings Jesus out onto Gabbatha, the Stone Pavement of Judgment at his palace in Jerusalem, he introduces Jesus to them with the conclusion to which he has come for himself … in these magnificent words: “Behold your KING!”.
Pilate affixes that sign to Jesus’ Cross … yes in some ways just to irritate the Jewish authorities … but actually because he, Pilate, has come to his own conclusion after looking Jesus in the eye and hearing Him with his own ears: This MAN is a KING.
And yet Jesus is hanging on a Cross under that sign … because although Pilate believes He is a KING … Pilate is not ready to surrender to Jesus as HIS KING.
Pilate’s king is Pilate … and his own lust for power and position under Caesar.
SO, despite what he has come to believe about Jesus … nothing will be enough to convince him to change kings.
Secondly, Jesus is on that Cross under that sign because of the Jewish priests.
2. The Priests
The Jewish priests had grown up correctly believing that God was King of Israel. That was how it had always been meant to be. When the people of Israel in 1 Samuel 8 asked for a human king, God consoled their ancestor Samuel by telling him, “Hey Samuel, don’t be sad, they’re not rejecting you. They are rejecting ME as their King.”
But when God indeed allowed His people a human king, they understood that the human king was exercising kingship on God’s behalf.
King David himself had acknowledged in 1 Chronicles 29: 10-12:
““Blessed are You, Lord God of Israel, our Father, forever and ever.
11 Yours, O Lord, is the greatness,
The power and the glory,
The victory and the majesty;
For all that is in heaven and in earth is Yours;
Yours is the kingdom, O Lord,
And You are exalted as head over all.
12 Both riches and honour come from You,
And You reign over all.
In Your hand is power and might;
In Your hand it is to make great.”
God was King of Israel.
And yet … when Pilate brings Jesus out and declares: “Behold your King!” the high priests do not object by saying … with the utmost passion and certainty … the words they sang in the Hallel the night before: “We have no King but God.”
They do not say, “We have no King but Yahweh, the Adonai, the Lord God of Israel.”
They say: “We have no king but Caesar!”
In point of fact, God was NOT their king. THEIR own power and position and comfort was their KING.
So they say whatever they know will force Pilate to crucify Jesus.
They do not say, “We have no King but Yahweh, the Adonai, the Lord God of Israel.”
They say: “We have no king but Caesar!”
If there was any blasphemy spoken that day, it was not by Jesus. This was deep blasphemy. Declaring a pagan, immoral man who was a self-declared god … to be THEIR King????
All in the name of expediency.
Jesus was not their king … that’s for sure. That day, not even the Great I Am was their king. That day, their own selfish will and hunger for power was king.
And so they screamed: “We have no king but Caesar, and if you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar.” And with this thinly veiled threat to tattle on Pilate to Caesar, these feeble, selfish men convinced a feeble, selfish man to crucify an innocent man … who was in fact, truly King.
So, Jesus was on that Cross because of Pilate’s decision and because of the Priests’ decision … but ultimately … Jesus was on that Cross under that sign because of Jesus.
3. Jesus – The King of Love
This is actually the ultimate answer. Jesus is on the Cross not because of anyone else’s decision … but because of His own.
Profoundly calm and quiet throughout His arrest, various unjust trials and vicious punishments, Jesus is absolutely resolute. He carries His cross resolutely through the streets until His body won’t anymore. Strung up on the cross He prays in astounding love for the forgiveness of His torturers. As His life ebbs away he pours out love to the criminals beside Him, to His beloved disciple John and His mother Mary beneath the Cross. He is quiet … He is calm … and He is divinely loving.
Jesus is on the Cross because Jesus is the King of Extravagant love for YOU.
- John 3:16 _ He’s on the Cross because God so loved the world … that He sent Jesus.
- John 10:11 _ He’s on the Cross because He’s the Good Shepherd who lays down His life for the sheep whom He loves and knows by name.
- John 10:18 _ He’s on the Cross of His own accord … because no one takes His life from Him but He lays it down of His own free will.
- John 13:1 _ He’s on the Cross showing us the full extent of His love for us.
- John 13:34 _ He’s on the Cross because that is how much he loves us
- John 15:9 _ He’s on the Cross because He loves us as much as God the father loves Him.
- 1 John 3:16 _ He’s on the Cross as the perfect demonstration of love.
- 1 John 4:9-10 _ He’s on the Cross because … and I quote the apostle John, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit … The Holy Spirit’s words, not ours: “9 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. 10 In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
Jesus Christ is on the Cross under that sign because He is the King of LOVE … the King of LOVE who dies on that Cross in OUR place … accepting into Himself both the guilt for our sins against a holy God and the painful yet righteous consequences of those sins … and bearing those sins and their punishment away from us.
Jesus was there on that Cross under that sign because of His love for me and His undying, extravagant love for you.
CONCLUSION
There is, of course, one critical decision we each have to make.
Is this my King?
Pilate very clearly decided: He’s not my king!
The Priests very clearly decided: He’s not our king!
BUT is this your King? Will you receive Him as your King?
He hung there out of love for you.
He hung there to carry the guilt for your sin.
He hung there to bear the righteous punishment for your sin.
He hung there to make a way for you to be forgiven and brought home to God.
He hung there in order to be able to stand before you today and extend the invitation to enter His Kingdom by surrendering to Him as the King of your Life.
Is this your King?
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