Jesus and Pilate
John 19:1-16
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
John 19:1-5 [1] So then Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him. [2] And the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe. [3] Then they said, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they struck Him with their hands. [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.” [5] Then Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And Pilate said to them, “Behold the man.” [6] Therefore, when the chief priests and 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.”7 The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and according to our law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God. 8 Therefore, when Pilate heard that saying, he was the more afraid, 9 and went again into the Praetorium, and said to Jesus, “Where are You from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. 10 Then Pilate said to Him, “Are You not speaking to me? Do You not know that I have power to crucify You, and power to release You?” 11 Jesus answered, “You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given you from above. Therefore the one who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.” 12 From then on Pilate sought to release Him, but the Jews cried out, saying, “If you let this Man go, you are not Caesar’s friend. Whoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar.” 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. 14 Now it was the Preparation Day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, “Behold your King!” 15 But they cried out, “Away with Him, away with Him! Crucify Him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar!” 16 Then he delivered Him to them to be crucified. Then they took Jesus and led Him away.
Dear fellow redeemed in Christ our Lord… Jesus had not been having a very good week. To be sure, it started out seemingly quite well as He was ushered into Jerusalem to shouts of “Hosanna!” with the people almost literally throwing themselves at His feet in worship and honor. Majestically He rode into Jerusalem on a never-before-ridden foal of a donkey – an unused beast of burden which was carrying the burden-bearer. The people were certain that Jesus had come to overthrow the hated Roman rule, and they simply could not wait to make Him their King, something they had been wanting to do ever since Jesus fed the 5,000.
But things began to go drastically wrong. Jesus didn’t play their game; He didn’t act as if He wanted to be their King. He made “political” mistakes, like going to the temple and throwing out the money-changers and those selling doves for temple sacrifices. That wasn’t a very smart thing to do for someone who would be king.
Earlier, Jesus had greatly offended the local politicians and religious leaders by telling them they “belong[ed] to [their] father the devil” (Jn 8:44). That wasn’t very nice; that’s not how to win friends and influence people. That’s not politically correct.
And then He told the Jewish leaders that He, Jesus, was greater than Abraham and that He was before Abraham, and then used the holiest name by which to call Himself: I AM. Well, that was the last straw. No one talks like that and gets away with it. “At this they picked up stones to stone Him.” (John 8:59).
Jesus didn’t act like a King. He met with His disciples and washed their feet which was the lowly task of the lowliest servant; certainly not something a King would do. Kings don’t serve, they rule! Didn’t He know that?
And even when Jesus was arrested, He didn’t even try to defend Himself; He didn’t lift a finger; He spoke not a word. If He was so innocent, why didn’t He make a fuss and prove the that the charges against Him were bogus and grossly overstated? But Jesus offered no defense at all; He passively allowed His captors simply to take Him away in the dead of night. Jesus wouldn’t even allow His disciples to defend Him either. No earthly king ever acted this way.
When Jesus was arrested and brought before Pilate, he baffled the governor by not answering pertinent questions. Pilate asked, “Are You the King of the Jews?” (John 18:33). The all-important word here is king. King means one thing to the Jews – Messiah. It means something else to the Romans – military ruler. Jesus answers Pilate, “You say that I am a king” (John 18:37). This means “Yes, I’m a king, but not the kind of king you’re thinking of.”
Pilate grew increasingly frustrated at this supposed “king” and finally came to the determination that Jesus was not guilty of any of the crimes of which He was accused. Yet the people screamed for His death while demanding that a convicted murderer, Barabbas, go free. The man the crowds wanted to be their King on that very first Palm Sunday, the man before whom they threw their cloaks and spread palm branches just a few days earlier, the man before whom they were throwing themselves in worship and honor, was now the man they wanted dead, and it couldn’t happen fast enough. He had failed in their eyes and they wanted nothing to do with Him. The sooner He is put away, the better.
The chief priests wanted to confuse Pilate into thinking that Jesus is a revolutionary leader, and thus a threat to Rome. But it didn’t work; Jesus told Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). Then He told Pilate, “Everyone who is of the truth listens to My voice” (John 18:37). Pilate cynically asked, “What is truth?” (John 18:38). And Pilate’s heart was becoming as hard as cement.
In an attempt to appease the crowd, Pilate had Jesus scourged, whipped almost to the point of death. But the crowd wanted more. They wanted Christ killed.
And so the Jews played their trump card. They said to Pilate, “If you release this man, you are no friend of Caesar’s” (John 19:12). Pilate knew exactly what they meant. The Caesar, the king, named Tiberius at the time, was sick. He was always suspicious and often violent. Suetonius, a Roman historian, tells us that Tiberius could turn on his underlings in savage ways. Tiberius would not like getting news about a riot in Judea, especially when Judea’s governor was appointed only because of family connections.
The Jews blackmailed Pilate, pure and simple. And it worked. If the choice had been between Jesus and the Jews, Pilate would have let Jesus go free. But that is not how the Jewish leaders framed the issue. Their blackmail made it a choice between Jesus and Rome, which placed Pilate into an extremely difficult predicament. Peoplewill do many things to save their job, their status, their reputation. People will do many things to save their skin. They will even crucify an innocent man.
Pilate asked, “Shall I crucify your King?” (John 19:15). This King isn’t the military type, looking for a battle. No, this King is the suffering and bleeding type, looking for us. He is the King who cleanses sin-stained hearts. He is the King who heals deep brokenness. He is the King who calls us out of darkness and into His marvelous light. He is the King who triumphs over death. He is the King who knows the exact place and time of His execution and still goes there anyway… and He does so for you.
The chief priests answer Pilate, “We have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15). Things are getting out of hand. A Jewish riot would end Pilate’s political career. So he caves to the peoples’ demands and has Jesus executed, nailed to a cross by His hands and feet, lifted up to hang, suspended between heaven and earth.
But the fact was Jesus WAS a king, but certainly not the kind anyone expected. Again, as He told Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world.” So that’s it – He is a king. And yes, He deserves a crown if He is a king; so let’s give Him a crown… So “the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe, and they said, ‘Hail, King of the Jews!’”
But the crown of thorns given to Jesus in mockery of His failed earthly kingship was a most appropriate crown. It was not bedazzled with jewels or precious stones; it wasn’t made of costly metals. It was, instead, made of thorny twigs – constructed not for honor and praise, but for harm and scorn and mockery and injury and intense pain.
Little did the people know, nor did they care to understand, that the very thorns which pressed into and punctured Jesus’ head were willingly accepted by Him and were quite necessary. For those wounds along with the whip marks on His back and the eventual nail holes by which He was hung on the cross would mean healing and forgiveness for all who would believe in Jesus.
Little did the people know that they were, in a fashion, driving their own sins into Jesus. And He was quite willing to bear them, for that is why He came. Indeed, His kingdom was not of this world, but of the world and kingdom to come.
As Isaiah wrote some 700 years before Christ: “He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we are healed” (53:5). The piercing and crushing and punishing of Jesus may seem unnecessarily cruel and harsh, but it was the only way that your sins and mine could be paid for. It happened for “our transgressions, our iniquities, and our peace.”
Jesus Christ, the sinless Son of God, received the crown of thorns, the whipping, the scourging, the mocking, and the nails for YOU, or, as we confess in the Nicene Creed, “for us men and for our salvation.” His cruel and piercing crown of thorns signifies His punishment in your place, His saving you from the eternal punishment and separation from God in hell that all sinners deserve.
Therefore, that same crown of thorns is also a crown of victory. By His suffering, death, and third-day resurrection, Christ defeated sin, death, and hell for you. You are healed and made whole through Christ’s death to sin. And now He continues to deliver to you all the benefits of His saving work through Holy Baptism, Holy Absolution, and Holy Supper, and by His Spirit working through His Word and sacraments keeps you in the faith until you receive the crown of everlasting life. In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
