John 19:1-37: Master of His Own Death

(1) Sermon Script

Introduction: Miscarriages of Justice

A miscarriage of justice is an awful thing.

When I was at law school in the late 80s and early 90s, we studied the Lindy Chamberlain case. In the 1980s, of course, the case divided the nation. Many said the baby wasn’t taken by a dingo. It was some sort of sacrifice in the wilderness. Half of us thought she must have done it, because she wasn’t sad enough. But in the 90s, at law school we learned that there were serious problems with the evidence. In 1986, Azaria’s matinee jacket was found outside a dingo lair. So Lindy was released, and her convictions were overturned. And in 2012, Lindy was vindicated when a fourth inquest found that the baby had been taken by a dingo. Dingo’s did attack children, and indeed they had attacked children on Frazer Island. So Azaria’s death certificate was amended accordingly.

Galileo Galilei in the 15 and 16 hundreds kept saying that the sun was at the centre of the planetary system, and we actually lived in a solar system. He was persecuted by the Roman Catholic church for it, which held that the earth was at the centre of the universe. For this, he was placed under house arrest, ordered to recant, and faced the inquisition. Yet Galileo kept saying it, even to his death. And now almost everyone now agrees with him (though a small group of conservative Roman Catholics are trying to rehabilitate geocentrism in defence of the Roman Catholic church: http://galileowaswrong.com).

Whistleblowers often suffer for the things they say or know. They face ridicule and censure, imprisonment and torture and even death. They suffer for standing against the crowd, all for the sake of the truth.

In our reading, we see Jesus suffering a miscarriage of justice. And we could itemize his sufferings of physical suffering, humiliation, and death.

Physical Suffering

First, Jesus suffered physically on the first Good Friday. Our reading today makes his physical sufferings clear. Verse 1, Pilate had him flogged. Verse 2, the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on his head. Verse 3, they struck him in the face. That’s the first part of the torture inflicted on Jesus, the entrée.

But then came the main course. Verse 17, Jesus carried his own cross to the place of the Skull. Verse 18, they crucified him, which for the Romans, involved two large nails through the wrists or hands, and a large nail through both feet. The mode of death was asphyxiation. The victims couldn’t breath with their arms outstretched. To hasten death, the soldiers shattered their knees and legs, so they could no longer push up. But this was not necessary with Jesus. His life had given out before he needed to be kneecapped to hurry the whole thing up.

Humiliation

But there was the humiliation as well as the physical torture. It is sometimes said, ‘Stick and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.’ But we know that is not true. We say that to our kids so that they can stand in the face of teasing. But we actually agree with Shakespeare in Othello (Othello Act 3, scene 3, 155–161):

Who steals my purse steals trash … but he that filches from me my good name robs me of that which not enriches him ... and makes me poor indeed.

And what we have before us is the removal of Jesus’ good name.

Verse 2, the mockery of a crown of thorns and a purple robe. They dressed him up as a clown king. Verse 3, they mocked him, ‘Hail, king of the Jews’. All of this is meant to humiliate. Verse 6, the chief priests and officials shout, ‘Crucify, Crucify!’

I do not know what it is like to have someone hate you so much that they want you tortured and killed in front of them. Jesus does. People hated Jesus so much, they called for his violent death.

Verse 18, Jesus was crucified between two criminals. He was numbered with the transgressors, and considered as a sinner. Yet he was completely innocent.

I remember the humiliation I felt in year 4 at Our Lady of Fatima Primary School at Kingsgrove. For some reason, one day my teacher decided that she would have a ‘bad boys’ table. Perhaps she thought that would bring the troublesome boys into line. I don’t know what theory of education or discipline she was working from. I don’t know what frustrations we had caused her to drive her to this.

Anyhow, she started saying the names of the boys to be placed on the bad boys table. Two others, then Glen, and then Matthew Olliffe. Me, marked out as a bad boy, a naughty boy. I couldn’t believe it. Me, placed on this accursed table, at the front, labeled the naughty, to be despised by the good girls and the more fortunate boys. They would look down their noses at us. We were exposed to the ridicule of the class. And those who weren’t designated the ‘bad’ would never let us forget it.

The others designated ‘bad boys’, I recall, sat there meekly enduring their new status. But not me. I refused to sit at the table of shame. I went to the platform next to the blackboard, stood there defiant, and said to my teacher, arms folded, ‘You have favourites in this class’. And she completely lost it. She started smacking my arms to get me to stop folding them. She started screaming hysterically. At least, that’s how I remember it. I couldn't quite believe she had lost it that much. I was sobbing, but I didn’t budge. I think Glen came out to get me to sit at the table, because of all the fuss I was causing. But even then I refused to go to the hated table group. I sat on the side of the platform and wept in anger and humiliation.

Now I pity the teacher. No doubt I was a big, restless, stubborn, wilful and difficult to control boy. Maybe I was a naughty boy. But I can’t condone her strategy.

Jesus knew what it’s like to be put on the bad boys table. Jesus never did anything wrong. But he was put on the ultimate bad boys table. Those in authority nailed him to a cross, between two criminals. Two men, probably terrorists, deserved to be stuck up there and crucified. But Jesus didn’t. Bad boys on each side, and Jesus in the middle. Jesus humbly identified with sinners like you and me.

[He] was numbered with the transgressors. (Isaiah 53:12 NIV) God made him who had no sin to be sin for us (2 Corinthians 5:21 NIV) God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering (Romans 8:3 NIV)

Jesus Christ was labelled a sinner, who had done nothing wrong.

The public shaming continued. Verse 19, Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross, JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS. More mockery. Yeah, great king, stripped naked, whipped to an inch of his life, a bloodied mass of flesh fixed to a cross.

The soldiers took Jesus’ clothes. They didn’t even have the decency to wait till he was dead. This is the vultures coming in to take their share before the body is cold in the grave.

Now most people don’t enjoy being shamed in front of their mum. Observing their mother’s pain adds to their own. But Jesus had to endure this also. Verse 25:

Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. (NIV)

When elderly people can no longer shower or toilet themselves, they feel the shame of their helplessness. They feel it when their relatives or nurses have to help them perform basic bodily functions. And here is Jesus, watching helplessly at his mother, his aunt, the women whom he helped, grieving over his helpless form. Yet through the pain and shame, he thinks of his mother’s welfare. And Jesus provides for his mother Mary after his departure, through the Apostle John.

Death

But none of these things are the ultimate humiliation. The ultimate humiliation is death.

In our society, we try and sugarcoat death. We don’t call it death. We say that ‘he passed’ or ‘she is late’, ‘he has gone somewhere better’. All this is euphemism. What it is is ‘death’, ‘decomposition’, ‘decay’. Sure, we’re happy to see deaths on TV, because we know it’s not real. They are just actors, pretending, with tomato sauce. Those bones are cleverly made props.

Boy they look real. How did they do that. But death and decomposition is real. And there is no dignity in it. It is the ultimate humiliation. Euthanasia advocates say that they want to give ‘death with dignity’. It is a futile quest. For death is the wages of sin. It is a perpetual reminder hanging over us that our first parents, Adam and Eve, forfeited the eternal life that God offered by their sin. And we die because of our sin. And we don’t like it. And nor should we. For death is the judgment of God on our sin. We deserve death, decomposition and decay, and after that, hell.

But did you notice that Jesus died. John, the disciple Jesus’ loved, makes it clear that Jesus was dead. The Muslims reject this. They say, No, there is no way that God would let a holy and good prophet die. But that is not what the witnesses said. In fact, John goes into special detail to say that Jesus was truly dead. Notice verses 33 to 35:

But when they came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is true. He knows that he tells the truth, and he testifies so that you also may believe. (NIV)

John is making it clear that Jesus was dead. And John testifies to the separation of blood from the clearer bodily fluids that marked Jesus as dead.

You can’t get more helpless and humiliated than dead. And that is Jesus, a corpse butchered, pierced, and hung up to drain.

Jesus, Master of his Own Death

But it would be a mistake to think that Jesus has been powerless. At one level, at first glance, Jesus is a powerless victim of a tragic miscarriage of justice. But at another, at a much deeper level, everything is going according to Jesus’ plans. For Jesus’ has come to do not his own will, but the will of God the Father who sent him.

From the beginning of John’s Gospel, Jesus has been presented as the sacrificial lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. His death is not for his own sins, but for others.

He is the Passover lamb, which while slaughtered and it’s blood shed for the redemption of God’s people, it’s bones cannot be broken. His blood will bring about the redemption of God’s people.

Jesus himself said that he is the good shepherd, who lays down his life for his sheep. No one takes Jesus’ life from him, not Pilate, not the Priests, not the People. Twice Pilate declares there is no basis for a charge against Jesus, verse 4 and verse 6. And he tries all kinds of manoevers to stop the death of Jesus. Yet Pilate cannot stop this inexorable process that is leading to Christ’s crucifixion. Because Jesus is the good shepherd, orchestrating events for the sake of his sheep. Jesus lays down his life of his own accord. He has authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. Jesus the good shepherd lays down his life that he may take it up again.

Jesus is in control. And we pick this up in verse 28:

Later, knowing that all was now completed, and so that the Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, "I am thirsty." (NIV)

Jesus is completing the task that his Father gave him to do. It was written about long ago in the Scriptures.

A thousand years before the Prophet David, the Old Testament Messiah, wrote in Psalm 22, ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me, I am poured out like water, you lay me in the dust of death, a company of evildoers encircles me, they have pierced my hands and my feet, and they divide my garments, and for my clothing cast lots.' (Psalm 22)

600 hundred years before, the Prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament declared that the Suffering Servant would give his life as a guilt offering, bearing the punishment that brought us peace, and that after he is assigned a grave with the wicked, he would see light, see his offspring, and prolong his days. (Isaiah 53)

500 hundred years before, the Prophet Daniel wrote in the Old Testament that the Messiah, the Christ, would be cut off, but not for himself (Daniel 9).

400 hundred years before, it was written by Zechariah, that in Jerusalem they would strike the shepherd, and they would look on the one who they have pierced, who is God himself, and weep for him as an only child, and on that day a fountain would be opened in Jerusalem to cleanse from sin and uncleanness. (Zechariah 12-13)

No wonder Jesus said in verse 30, it is finished. For what God the Father and God the Son planned in eternity, and prophesied by the God the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament, came to pass in 33 AD. God so loved the world, that the Father offered up his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him not perish but have eternal life. Jesus is stuck up on a pole, so that everyone might look on him and live.

Verse 30:

When he had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

Jesus is not the hapless and powerless victim of powerful interests. Jesus is the powerful one, fulfilling his eternal plan, and finishing the task his Father gave him to do.

Do not pity Christ. Worship him instead. Because it was for the joy set before him, that Christ endured the cross, scorned it’s shame, and sat down at the right hand of God. Every knee will bow down before Christ because of his death, even the angels, though it wasn’t for their sin that he died. So give Christ the glory as the one name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. Marvel and wonder at the planning, the preparation, and the execution of this great rescue plan. For Christ was taking the place of sinners, bearing their sin, enduring God’s wrath, and descending into hell, so that you and I don’t have to.

Burial (vv. 38-42)

Jesus delayed his return to Bethany to allow his friend Lazarus to die, to be prepared and embalmed, and then be buried. And now the same is about to happen to him. Jesus has died. And his body is taken down from the cross. Joseph of Arimathea is seeking to both honour Jesus by giving him a burial, and obey the Old Testament law of Moses, which said that the bodies of those under the divine curse by being hung on a tree must be taken down before nightfall. Burial honours the body and thus in a sense honours the God in whose image humans are made. In analogy with the burial of a seed, which metaphorically dies and is buried in hope of a new seedling becoming a tree, so too the human body which bore and carried the human soul is buried in resurrection hope, that God will by his power raise the body at the resurrection of the last day. The burial in Joseph of Arimathea's tomb fulfils the prediction of Isaiah 53, in which the suffering servant was buried with the rich.

The burial of the body of the Lord Jesus is also indicative of the descent of Christ into hell, just as the ascension of Christ is indicative of the session of Christ in heaven. While it is a commonly held modern view that the descent was essentially a metaphorical expression communicating that Christ bore the wrath of the Father, it would seem that the descent of Christ to the netherworld between his death and resurrection involved a translation to the prison in which the spirits of the Nephilim were held, where Jesus Christ in the spiritual realm proclaimed his victory: but this did not involve the freeing of the spirits of righteous men, but declaring victory over the spirits of the Nephilim (see 1 Peter 3:19-20, cf. Eph 4:9). This view is consistent with the fact that what became the third article of the 39, about the descent into hell, in its form as the corresponding Article of 1553 written by Cranmer, originally referred to 1 Peter 3:19.

There is no problem with the fact that Jesus promised his presence to the thief on the cross, or that Paul looked forward to being with Christ, anymore that there is a problem that Christ promises to be with with all his disciples unto the ending of the age.

Conclusion

What was the charge against Christ? Verse 7:

The Jews insisted, "We have a law, and according to that law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God." (NIV)

The claim to be the Son of God stuck in the throat of the Jewish leadership. How dare you. Who do you think you are? The Son of God. No way. So they killed him.

Well, when there are miscarriages of justice, there are always courts of appeal. There are higher courts, to whom the case can be appealed. They can uncover the errors of fact and law, expose the biases, overturn the findings, and vindicate the innocent victim.

Jesus has been found guilty by the Jewish leaders, and accused of being the Son of God and the King of the Jews. He will be vindicated on the third day in resurrection. For as Paul says, later:

[He Jesus], through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God, by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord.’ (Romans 1:4 NIV)

But more about that on Sunday. Come back, then, and hear about the verdict of the Highest Court.

For now, let’s pray.

(2) English Translation

My Translation

19:1So then Pilate took Jesus and flogged him. 19:2And the soldiers, having twisted a crown of thorns, put it on his head, and put a purple robe around him, 19:3and they came to him and said, “Hail, King of the Jews”. And they hit him repeatedly.

19:4And again Pilate went out and said to them, “Look, I brought him out to you, so that you might know that I find no cause against him. 19:5So Jesus came outside, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And he said to them, “Look, here is the man!”

19:6Then when the high priests and the attendants saw him, they shouted out, saying, “Crucify him, crucify him.” Pilate said to them, “You take him and crucify him. For I have not found cause against him.”

19:7The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and according to the law, he deserves to die, because he made himself the Son of God”.

19:8Then when Pilate heard this word, he was more afraid, 19:9and went into the Praetorium again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus did not give him an answer.

19:10So Pilate said to him, “Aren’t you speaking to me? Don’t you know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” 19:11Jesus answered him, “You would not have any authority over me unless it had been given to you from above. For this reason, the one who handed me over to you has committed a greater sin.” 19:12From this point on, Pilate sought to release him. But the Jews shouted out, saying, “If you release this man, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who makes himself a king speaks against Caesar”. 19:13So when Pilate heard this word, he brought Jesus out and sat upon the judgement seat in the place called the ‘stone pavement’, but in Aramaic, ‘Gabbatha’. 19:14Now it was the day for the preparation of the Passover, at the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, “Look, here is your king!” 19:15Then they cried out, “lift him up, lift him up, crucify him!” Pilate said to him, “Should I crucify your king?” The high priests answered, “We have no king except Caesar”. 19:16So then he handed him over to them to be crucified.

So they took Jesus, 19:17and bearing his own cross, he went out to the place called ‘Skull’, which is called in Aramaic, ‘Golgotha’, 19:18where they crucified him, and two others with him, one on one side and one on the other, and Jesus in the middle.

19:19And Pilate also wrote a sign and placed it upon the cross. And on it was written, “Jesus the Nazarene, the king of the Jews”. 19:20And many of the Jews read this sign, because the place where they crucified Jesus was near the city. And it was written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.

19:21So the high priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The king of the Jews’, but that ‘This man said, “I am king of the Jews.”’” 19:22Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”

19:23Then the soldiers, when they crucified Jesus, took his clothes and made four shares, a share for each soldier, and the tunic. Now the tunic was seamless, woven from top to bottom. 19:24So they said to one another, “Let’s not tear it, but cast lots for it to decide whose it will be”, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled which said, “they divided my clothes among themselves, and for my garment cast a lot”.

For this reason the soldiers did these things, 19:25but standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 19:26So Jesus, when he saw his mother and the disciple whom Jesus loved standing with her, said to his mother, “Woman, look, here is your son”, 19:27then he said to the disciple, “Look, here is your mother”. And from that hour, this disciple took her into his home.

19:28After this, Jesus, knowing that all things had now been accomplished so that the Scripture would be fulfilled, said, “I am thirsty”. 19:29A container was put there full of wine vinegar. So they presented a sponge full of wine vinegar, placed on a hyssop branch, to his mouth. 19:30So when Jesus took the wine vinegar, he said, “It is accomplished”. And having bowed his head, he gave up his spirit.

19:31Then the Jews, since it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies might not remain on the cross on the Sabbath—for that was a great day of the Sabbath—asked Pilate that their legs be broken and they be lifted up [and taken off the cross]. 19:32So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who was crucified with him, 19:33but on coming to Jesus, when they saw that he had already died, they did not break his legs, 19:34but one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out. 19:35And the one who saw this has testified, and his testimony is true, and that man knows that he speaks the truth, so that you might believe.

19:36For these things happened so that the Scriptures might be fulfilled, “his bones will not be broken”, 19:37and again another Scripture says, “they will look to whom they have pierced”

19:38Now after these things, Joseph from Arimathea—who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because of fear of the Jews—asked Pilate that he might lift up [and take away] the body of Jesus, and Pilate permitted him. So he came and took away the body of Jesus. 19:39And Nicodemus, the one who came to him at the first at night, also came, carrying a mixture of about one hundred pounds of myrrh and aloes. 19:40Then they took the body of Jesus and wrapped it in linen clothes with the aromatic spices—just as is the custom of the Jews in preparing for burial. 19:41Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden was a new tomb in which no one had ever been laid. 19:42So, because of the day of preparation of the Jews, since the tomb was near, they laid Jesus there.

(3) Exegetical Notes

In verse 3, the plural of ῥαπίσματα (‘a hit with the open palm’), together with the imperfect ἐδίδοσαν (‘I give’), suggests an iterative and repeated striking.