When I was given this passage to cover the trial and the
crucifixion, I knew that it was going to be a little too long to
read all of Chapter 19 and that last little part, Chapter 18,
unless I keep you here till noon.
But at any rate, what I wanted to do was let you know.
I'm going to focus mostly on this on the first part, but I've
got something for you for this last part as well.
When I was thinking about this, I was reminded of one of my
favorite stories. A man by the name of Doctor
Alexander Papaderos, very popular professor who taught a
course in Greek history and philosophy every summer on the
Isle of Crete at the Orthodox Christian Academy, is very
popular. Hundreds of students would come
literally from all over the world to hear this man.
He's listed even in you can Google his name, very famous.
One afternoon, after he had finished a long lecture, it was
time to close. People were gathering their
books together and wanting to head out to the beautiful
beaches of Crete. A little student in the back
raised his hand and he says, Doctor P, can I ask you a
question? And he said, of course.
And he said, what is the meaning of life?
Well, just as you groaned a little bit there, they had worse
grown because they thought, Oh my gosh, now we're going to be
here for another two hours. But Doctor P said this, let me
explain it this way. And he reached into his wallet
and he pulled out a little mirror.
And he said, when I was a little boy, the Nazis in World War 2
attacked our village. We weren't a big place.
And so only a kind of a squadron of motorcycle soldiers came in
firing their guns and everything, he said.
But the men in our of our village, they weren't going to
put up with this. And they attacked back and they
killed a bunch of them and wrecked all their motorcycles
and ran them, ran the rest of them off as little boys.
We stood on the hill amazed at this battle that went on.
And so then we ran down to the bottom of the hill to see if we
can find something that we could keep.
And so he said, I saw this one motorcycle that was turned over,
an old piece of mirror dropped off of it.
And this is what I picked up. And he said I had so much fun
with it because I discovered that I could take the rays of
the sun and I could point it in my backyard to some dry grass
and it would smoke. Boy, that was cool.
And then I found that I could also catch it and then I could
find a rabbit hole and I could shine light down in the rabbit
hole to see if the rabbit was there and other things.
And then I got a little sneaky and I took it into classroom and
in the late afternoon when the sun came through the window, I'd
catch the rays and shine it in the girl's lights eyes, you
know, and laugh. But the longer I live with that
mirror, the more it came to have greater meaning for me because I
realized that I could shine light into the dark places of
the world, and I actually could shine light even sometimes into
the dark parts of men's hearts and maybe change some.
And he said that my young man is what I discovered is the meaning
of life, is that my life is to reflect truth into the life of
this world. Jesus, that I have come into the
world to be a light, but it is a light of a special kind from a
special source. And John, in this section of the
Gospel, brings this to our attention.
John says more things about this part of Scripture, the trial and
the crucifixion, than any of the other writers because there are
specific things that he wants to highlight that give greater
power to the crucifixion. So if you'll stand with me now,
we'll read this passage of Scripture together.
Beginning in John 18, verse 28, then they led Jesus from the
House of Caiaphas to the governor's headquarters.
It was early morning. They themselves did not enter
the governor's quarters so that they wouldn't be defiled.
Because you see, that night, it was the night of the Passover.
So Pilate went outside to them and said, What accusation do you
bring against this man? And they, the Jews, answered
him, if this man were not doing evil, we would not deliver him
over to you. The Pilate said to him, then
take him yourselves and judge him by your own laws.
But the Jews said to him, it's not lawful for us to put anyone
to death. This was to fulfill the word
that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going
to die. Now I'll pause there.
If there was blasphemy in the Jews minds, you were stoned.
But Jesus had already told them before I'm going to be raised
up. He had already prophesied how he
was going to die. So Pilate entered the
headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, Are you
the King of the Jews? Which they had said earlier in
chapter 18. And Jesus answered, Do you say
this of your own accord, or did others tell you this about me?
Pilate answered, Am IA Jew your own nation?
Chief priests have delivered you over to me, So what have you
done? And Jesus answered, My Kingdom
is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this
world, my servants would be fighting that I might be not be
delivered over to the Jews. But my Kingdom is not of this
world. And then Pilate said, So you are
a king. And Jesus answered, You say that
I am a king, meaning that's correct For this purpose.
I was born for this purpose. I have come into the world to
bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth
listens to my voice. Pilate said to him, What is
truth? After he said this, he went back
outside to the Jews and told him, I find no guilt in him.
But you have a custom. I should release one man for you
at the Passover. So do you want me to release
you, the king of the Jews? And they cried out again, Not
this man, but Rabbis. Rabbis was a robber.
He was much more than that. It had to be a very serious
crime for someone to be crucified.
And Pilate took and flogged Jesus.
The soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns, put it on his
head, arrayed him with a purple robe, and they came up to him
saying, Hail King of the Jews, and they struck him with their
hands. Pilate went out again and said
to them, See, I'm bringing him out to you, that you may know.
I find no guilt in him. So Jesus came out wearing this
crown of thorns purple robe, and Pilate said to him, Behold the
man. When the chief priests and
officers saw it, they cried out, Crucify him, crucify him.
And Pilate said to him, Take him yourself and crucify him, for I
find no guilt in him. The Jews answered him, We have a
law, and according to that law he ought to die, because he made
himself out to be the Son of God.
When Pilate heard this statement, he was even more
afraid. He entered the headquarters
again and said to Jesus, Where are you from?
But Jesus gave no answer. So Pilate said to him, Would you
not speak to me? Do you not know that I have
authority to release you and authority to crucify you?
Jesus answered him, You would have no authority over me at all
unless it had been given to you from above.
Therefore, he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.
That's the Jews. From then on, Pilate sought to
release him. But the Jews cried out.
If you release this man, you're not Caesar's friend.
Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar.
So when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out.
Set him down at the judgment seat for final pronouncement.
Place called the stone of the pavement in an Aramaic.
It's Kabatha. Now.
It was the day of preparation for the Passover.
It's about the 6th hour. And he said to the Jews, Behold
your king. And they cried out away with
him, Crucify him. And Pilate said, Shall I crucify
your king? The chief priest answered, We
have no king but Caesar. So he delivered him over them to
be crucified, and they took Jesus.
This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated.
Now before you put your bulletin away, I want you to turn over to
page 11 on the discussion page because I wanted you to see that
the rest of the passage, which would have been another 20
something verses, John gives 8 truths that no other gospel
writer gives. And he's giving it for a purpose
because we know that John states very clearly at the end of his
gospel, I have written all of these things and there's so many
of them. I couldn't write them all down,
he says, But I've written all these things.
So you will truly believe that Jesus is the Son of God.
OK. And so I've listed these eight
things that he mentions, and this could be 8 separate
sermons. So today you're going to get 9
sermons, all right? But I'm just going to list them
for you because the importance that's here is only amplified by
what the discussion Jesus has with Pilate.
Jesus bore his own cross. Love me, He carried his cross.
He died for us. The placard that was a place
above Jesus head was very clearly said to by John, Jesus
the Nazarene. So we know where he's from, the
king of the Jews. And it was written in three
languages that would have been Hebrew, Greek and Latin.
Now if you take the full meaning of that, Hebrew is the meaning
of religion. So Jesus is king of all
religion. If you put it in Greek, that's
about culture, he's the king over everything that happens in
life. And if you put it over Roman
Latin, that's the language of law and justice, he's the king
who brings justice, amazing truth.
Then the soldiers divided his clothes and he says fulfilling
prophecy 3 times. He says fulfilling prophecy
because he wants us to know the truth of this.
Jesus said. Then he provides for his mother
a wonderful sweet time, because in those days if a wife had no
husbands, you had to rely on her eldest son.
And he's now leaving. And so he asked John, will you
care for my mother? Beautiful thought.
And Jesus said, I'm thirsty. Another fulfilling prophecy.
They gave him some sour wine, which he really didn't take, but
he probably moistened his mouth enough, because now he cries out
with the loudest of voice. It is finished and he gave up
his spirit voluntarily. John is remind us crucifixion
didn't kill Jesus. Jesus gave up his life.
See, because God had ordained it.
The shoulders didn't break his bones fulfilling prophecy.
They pierced his side fulfilling prophecy.
The blood and water came out proved that he was dead and it
likely symbolized the water baptism and the blood of
cleansing. And then he makes very sure that
we understand he had a very wonderful burial by his friends.
The bottom says the Apostles Creed symbolizes these key
points from John 19 by saying suffered under Pontius Pilate
was crucified, dead and buried. Now why is that important?
Pontius Pilate is probably the most famous non believer in the
Christian world. And why is that?
Because thousands of churches every week just like we did
mention his name and it has been mentioned for 2000 years.
Why is that the only other name that's mentioned in the Apostles
Creed aside from Jesus? Why did God want Pontius Pilate
to be this well known? And John tells us because he's
the only one that gives this conversation.
It is a prat. It is a profound conversation
that Jesus has that summarizes really the Old and the New
Testament. The whole picture of the Bible
is summarized in this conversation. 2 kingdoms are in
conflict here. The Kingdom of the world?
That's wrong. The Kingdom of heaven, that's
Jesus. And these two kingdoms were
coming together in conflict. You can't read this story
without the sheer seeing, the sheer majesty of Jesus and the
way he handles this conversation.
He has No Fear. He's not intimidated.
In fact, he treats Pilate with respect and honor and that's led
to Pilot to start having some fear in his life and he declares
3 different times this man is innocent.
This man has there's no guilt in this man, and yet he failed his
own system of laws because Roman law was you didn't execute
someone whom you had declared as innocent, but he became a how
coward and he let the Jews have their way.
Now let's look at these questions that Pilate has five
of them. Two of them are pretty much the
same. But he first of all asked what
accusation do you bring against this man and Jesus?
The Jews had said Jesus was said that he was king of he was king,
he was Messiah. He told them they asked him
specifically the high priest, are you the Messiah?
And he said yes, I am, which meant he was king.
And then later they said he made himself out to be the Son of God
and they consider that blasphemy.
What is John saying here to us? That this accusation is actually
Jesus is clearly being crucified for being God, the Son of God.
And John wants us to see that with great clarity.
Second question pilot asks is, are you the king of the Jews?
But Jesus turns the question on the pilot.
He's in control. And he says, are you saying this
for yourself or just because others told you this?
Now, do you actually see where Jesus is actually being
evangelistic right here? He's actually sharing the gospel
with Pilate. Because you see, it's an
important distinction for two reasons.
If he answers it from the Jewish side, he would have to answer
yes, all right, which meant he would be stoned.
But if he answers it from Pilot's side, from Rome as a
king challenging the Rome's authority, his answer is no, all
right. But Pilot comes back and answers
after he tries to release him. He says, what have you done?
For the Jews have turned you over to me?
And Jesus said here he gives, I would say the picture of the
entire Scripture, and here it is, He says my Kingdom, meaning
there is a Kingdom, is not of this world twice.
It's not of this world. In other words, what God came to
establish in Genesis, which ends in Revelation, is a Kingdom that
will rule over everything. He says for this purpose I was
born. I was born to be the king of the
world. Secondly, he says, and I was
born for the purpose of bearing witness to the truth.
That's why I'm here. And he says everyone who hears
my voice of the truth listens to my voice.
And again, Jesus is actually offering Pilate another
opportunity as if he is saying, Pilate, do you hear me?
Pilate didn't listen. He rejects it, didn't even stay
around for an answer. But he knows he still can't
condemn Jesus for saying that he's witnessing to the truth.
But now John, answer, I think, is the true question for all of
us. What is truth?
Pilate didn't believe there was
an answer for him. Truth was only whatever Rome
said. It was the world.
But Pilate again says he sees no guilt.
Twice he tries to release him. So he tries to scourge him in
order to say, look, I punished him, so let's let him go.
No, it fails. And then he goes back in and he
asked one last question, Where are you from?
And how do I understand all of this in essence?
And it says Jesus was silent. Why was he silent?
Because he'd already answered the question.
He'd already said, I'm not of this world.
My Kingdom is not of this world. But pilot resorts to power and
he says, do you not know that I have authority to release you or
crucify you Jesus very, very calmly.
This Pilot, you have no authority over me at all unless
God above gives it to you, and therefore he who delivered me
over to you, which was the Jewish leaders, has a greater
sin. Pilot continued to try to lease
him, but in fact, with all his power, there was nothing he
could do about it. You know why?
Because it was God's authority that prevailed.
You see, it was God's plan for Jesus to die by crucifixion.
Peter echoes that in his sermon at Pentecost.
So what is John trying to bring to our attention again?
He says, I want you to believe Jesus is the Son of God, the
Messiah King, that he has a clear purpose to reveal truth,
that those who listen to him are real of the true followers of
his truth. God alone has authority to do
all of this. That's being done.
And so therefore the crucifixion has been tremendous import
because of why it's being done. It's being done because of who
Jesus is. And then his resurrection proves
it all true, and then we find out what it accomplished.
Now, what does this mean for you and I?
I think John encourages us to ask three questions.
First, is there a source, a final source of truth?
Is there an absolute truth that we can live by?
Or do I live by many truths, the truths of the world?
When someone says something ridiculous like, well, hey man,
the way is at work is you've got to work yourself up the ladder
and get up to the top and make as much money as you can.
That's not the whole truth, is it?
Because that's not so easy and because most people don't make
it to the top of the ladder. And those who do often find it's
leaning against the wrong wall. It didn't take them where they
wanted it to go because they were following the truth of the
world. See, when someone says, while
you have your truth and I have my truth, have you ever heard
that? Ever heard that?
You know, what this does is it shows a very low level of their
discernment about truth, because for them, truth is staying in
the shallow end of life. Because unless you're willing to
move in to the deep, strong truths of this world, if there
isn't a higher truth, absolute truth above us that governs
everything we think and do, then the world's ideas will always be
attractive. But they're not truth there.
And frankly, they're just opinions because they're not
based on anything that will stay.
Why is it in our courtrooms they demand that we get clarity of
truth? What do they say?
Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth?
And then they decided we need to add the whole truth.
And then they decided we need to add and nothing but the truth
don't add to it. Why?
Because they're trying to establish clearly what is truth.
And most people, we'll just stay in the shallow end of life and
not pursue that. Unless you can say with
conviction and facts that what you believe is true, you're only
stating a position, a opinion. I discovered that truth one fall
my freshman year at the University of Texas, which
you've all heard me say, that wonderful spiritual hotbed.
But it was for me, a man set across in a crowded cafeteria
and gave me the gospel. I had heard every part of it,
but that day I heard the voice of Jesus and it became truth for
me and my life changed. It's never been the same since
so much so even my friend said What's happened to you?
As you see, there is an absolute truth that we stand on.
Second question is, can truth be right in one circumstance and
not in another? Many people say, well truth is
relative. That can be true here, but it's
not necessarily true over here. Jesus says I am the truth
doesn't say a truth. He says he's the same yesterday,
today and forever. Truth doesn't change.
And Jesus said I came to bear witness to the truth and his
life and his words proved that He is that source of truth.
As he said, my words are truth. See, truth doesn't resist being
open to discussion. The more you examine it, the
clearer it becomes there's no relativity to the truth of God.
It fits all circumstances, it can be discussed and questioned,
and yet it remains true. And the reason is the stability
of its source, which doesn't change.
He even promises, I will send you the spirit of truth through
the power of the Holy Spirit, who will guide you into all the
truth that you need for life. Even the Pagan philosophers,
Socrates and Plato, his student who wrote 300 years before
Christ, they probably wrote more and spoke more about truth than
just about anybody else. And every class on philosophy
stutters, studies them still today.
But they made this statement. Truth is eternal and it's
unchanging. Isn't that interesting?
They knew it, they saw the purity of it.
And they went on to say truth is for freedom.
Living without truth is not truth life.
It's living death, they said. And they were echoing Jesus as
words that would come later. Who said you will know the truth
and the truth will set you free. When well over a decade ago my
wife died and I was trying to think my way through to
understand what had happened to me and in reading scripture
other people who would explain it, I was led to answer 3
questions. God said, Pete, am I sovereign?
Am I in control of all things regardless of what happens to
you, am I in control of all things?
Yes Lord, you are. You can change anything.
Secondly, am I good? That was harder to answer yes,
for the scripture does say you are good and he said you have to
answer this question, will you trust me with what you don't
understand because God is worth trusting because he's true, it's
true. So the last question I would ask
you how has God changed God's truth changed you as God as
Jesus? Truth changed your loneliness
into contentment. Has his truth changed your worry
into peace? It can.
Has he changed bad habits into freedom?
It can. Has it changed your shyness into
boldness for Christ? It can.
Has it changed your uncertainties and giving you
wisdom? Oh definitely it can.
Promised to do so. Has it changed your distrust and
to love and acceptance? It does.
How does truth do this? I like we see three things here
that John's pointing out to us. First of all, truth that Jesus
brings is confident. It brings us confidence.
It doesn't waver, it doesn't change.
You can stand on it and it's going to always be true.
But secondly, that confidence and that truth encourages trust,
which means you can lean on him and not your own understanding
and whatever it is you're facing that you don't understand, you
can trust him because he's worthy of trust.
And last of all, truth demands action, so you only really
believe what acts. What act activates you.
Truth leads you to make decisions and to act.
Let me make one last statement about Doctor Papadaros.
He said he discovered that light brings truth.
So each day ask the Holy Spirit to bring light into your life
that gives you truth, so that whatever you face, you can face
it with confidence. And then take that same truth
and shine it in the light of other people.
Let me pray, Lord, make us confident to trust You, the
truth that we find in your wonderful life, giving words,
and help us to shine that light of the truth that we've learned
with those with whom we live, with whom we work, with whom we
play, that we might fulfill Your purpose bearing truth to this
world. Amen.