Strathalbyn Church of Christ

John 18.12-19:16. Theme: The Trial.

Sermon by Pastor David Williams. Strathalbyn Church of Christ. 28 March 2021.

John Trial Context

It’s a dark night - just before the first Good Friday. Roman soldiers and servants of the Jewish high priests are about to arrest Jesus. Peter, his disciple, tries to stop this by cutting an ear off one of them. Jesus rebukes Peter. Jesus knows he is about to die. But he goes willingly to his death. Jesus came forward and offered himself up for arrest. He did it to fulfil God’s plan – a plan to deal once and for all with the problem of evil. We will hear more about this plan as we follow today’s readings.

Today’s passage is all about the trial of Jesus that followed his arrest. A trial that led to his death by crucifixion. Another disciple, John, wrote today’s story. John covers the trial of Jesus through several stages. We’re going to do things a little differently today. As each stage of the trial is read, I’ll offer some comments – and then draw things together at the end.

Arrest - John 18:12-14

There is great evil here. The very ones who should have fought for justice were hell bent on killing an innocent man. The high priests knew that God would never “put to death the innocent along with the guilty”. God, “the judge of all the earth”, will always “do what is right”, Gen 18:23, 25_._ These priests should have stood up for God’s justice and protected the innocent. Instead, they were happy to sacrifice an innocent man to avoid trouble with the Romans.

Yet despite this evil, God had a plan – and was using this evil to bring a far greater good. Without knowing it, the high priest was speaking the words God had put into his mouth. He said, “It is better that one man should die than the whole nation perish”. Let’s kill Jesus so that the Romans won’t trouble us, was what the High priest thought. Remarkably, God went along with this evil plan! God’s amazing plan was to defeat evil – their evil and all evil – by a unique act of goodness. This act is what I call, the Great Swap – Jesus the innocent dies in place of the evil doers. “It’s better that one man should die for the people.”

Denial I: John 18:15-18

A little while before the arrest, Peter said, 37 “Lord, … I will lay down my life for you.” 38 Then Jesus answered, “Will you really lay down your life for me? Very truly I tell you, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times!” Peter had just been flashing his sword before the soldiers hoping to lead with Jesus in armed battle. But now Peter cowered before a servant girl.

Priest Trying Priest: John 18:19-24

Kids, do you know what irony is? It is like when the fire station burns down. I wonder if you can pick all the ironies in this story. Here are two. The High Priest is putting on trial the true High Priest. Also, in the dark and secretly, they arrested Jesus and put him on trial. Yet when Jesus had been teaching openly in broad daylight, no one had dared to touch him. They were using darkness to trap the very Light of the world.

The fact is, the Jews needed to pin something on Jesus to get the Romans interested, and they were struggling to find anything. The High Priest was fishing around to find something that would stick but found nothing.

Denial II: John 18:25-27

Evil shows itself in many ways – denial of Jesus is one. Jesus had warned, “Whoever is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them”, Lk 9:26. Are you ever ashamed of Jesus? Peter represents all of us in our weakness and failure. But in the Great Swap, we will see how Peter and all of us can be forgiven.

There are two trials going on here – John weaves in one with the other. Jesus stands innocent and courageous. But Peter is tested – and fails 3 times. But in the Great Swap, Jesus will die for Peter, and after Jesus rises from the dead, he will restore Peter with another 3-fold test, 3 times he will ask Peter, “Do you love me?” Jn 21.

No charge! John 18:28-32

The most significant event in the Jewish calendar was their annual Passover. For them to celebrate the Passover, they had to avoid contact with non-Jews – the Romans. The Passover celebrated an escape from death when years before, the Jews escaped from another overlord – the Egyptian Pharoah. That escape began with the sacrifice of a lamb. By that death, the Jews escaped with their lives. That lamb was a picture, a prediction of an even greater Passover. Jesus would soon die as that Passover lamb, so the Jews could escape an even greater tyranny – from sin and death. See there is another irony here: The Jews sacrificed the true Passover so they could eat their Passover – a Passover that would now be out of date and unnecessary.

To choose the right lamb, it had to have one thing - it had to be “without fault”. Again and again in this story, we see that Jesus is innocent, without fault – and so was able to be that Passover lamb. The Jews brought Jesus to the Romans – but what is the charge against him? Was there ever a more hopeless charge? This is no charge at all. Imagine taking some poor sod to the police and telling the police to lock him up. “Why?” the policeman asks. And you reply: “Well would I have brought him in if he wasn’t some sort of criminal??” Imagine saying that to the police? Jesus is clearly innocent.

This non-charge didn’t interest Pilate. Jewish religious disputes were of no concern to the Romans. “Judge him yourselves”, Pilate said.

Are you a King? John 18:33-40

The Jews must have told Pilate that Jesus claimed to be King of the Jews. Now here was a charge that really interested the Romans – King Caesar didn’t want any other Kings running around his empire. He didn’t want any rebellion arising.

But as soon as Jesus said, “My Kingdom is not of this world”, you could see Pilate losing interest. He thought: this Jewish religious quack is clearly no threat to Caesar. Again, his innocence is shown – Jesus has no plans of rebelling against Caesar. Pilate went out to the Jews and declared him “Not Guilty!”

Again see the ironies: the very king of heaven being judged by a local governor. Pilate mockingly asking The Truth, what is Truth. The robber is saved by the innocent one who dies in his place. The Great Swap again.

Flogging: John 19:1-3

The Romans had a rough approach to justice – trial by torture. If they couldn’t find the truth by trial, they had the prisoner flogged. Many died from this but it might have helped Pilate out of a problem. If he executed an innocent man without proof, Caesar might be angry with him. This was a neat way of keeping both the Jews and Caesar happy. Even though Jesus had been declared not guilty, Pilate still had him flogged. Pilate was a cruel ruler.

The evil of both the Jewish priests and of the Romans are seen again. Together, they represent the evil of us all.

Son of God! John 19:4-11

Unfortunately for Pilate, Jesus survived the flogging. After all, he must have been very strong and fit – as a carpenter who had spent 3 years on long walks throughout Palestine.

The Jews were on the verge of losing their case – Pilate again declared him not guilty. That is now 3 times. In desperation they blurted out what was their biggest gripe – this man called himself Son of God - that is, he thinks himself equal with God – that was blasphemy. For the Jews, Blasphemy deserved death. But that is not an offence under Roman law. Caesars were often declaring themselves as gods. However, Roman dictators could be very superstitious. They were keen to avoid upsetting any local gods or spirits. So Pilate panicked when he heard this new claim about Jesus. Jesus was not just another Jewish religious nutter but maybe some strange demi-god. So Pilate panicked. Crucifying the son of some local god could bring curses on him. And he found Jesus’ calm acceptance of death and his strange words about who is really in charge here even more unsettling.

Capitulation: John 19:12-16

The Jews forced Pilate’s hand. They were threatening to report him to Caesar for allowing treason to go unpunished. So Pilate gave in and had him crucified.

Thanks readers, please take a seat.

There are two points I’ll draw out briefly from this passage. God’s plan and the Great Swap.

God’s plan.

This story is about the greatest act of evil that has been committed and the greatest act of good that came through it. At every point, we see the evil plans of men as they serve their own egos and ambitions while an innocent man is being set up for the most painful death. All play their own evil role: the disciples, the Jews and the Romans.

Just before Jesus was arrested, he was betrayed by his disciple Judas and abandoned by his other disciples. Even Peter denied him 3 times. The Jewish leaders were meant to guard God’s law. But they showed their contempt for his law in putting to death an innocent man – in fact, their own King. The Romans were brutal. Pilate despite declaring him not guilty had him whipped to the point of death and then crucified simply to save his own job.

Despite these evil plans, God’s plan was being put into effect. As Peter was later to say, “God knew what would happen, and his prearranged plan was carried out when Jesus was betrayed. With the help of lawless men, you [Jews] nailed him to a cross and killed him”, Acts 2:23.

This echoes Joseph in Genesis. Joseph was also an innocent victim – at the hands of his own brothers. But Joseph was able to say to them, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it all for good. He brought me to this position so I could save the lives of many people”, Gen 50:20.

Our God is good and great. He is at work in our lives. He is able to bring good out of evil. If God can turn the greatest act of evil into good, there is nothing that he cannot do for you. Because God is at work, even through evil, we can give thanks to him in all situations.

“Praise God for the fleas!” This is the hard lesson Corrie Ten Boom learnt in a German concentration camp. “Praise God for the fleas!” Because their cell was crawling with fleas, the guards would not come into it and so left them alone. God is able to use the most evil situation and bring good out of it. As Paul wrote: “we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God …”, Rom 8:28.

The greatest act of good came out of this evil. What was that act? I call it the great swap. You may have heard of it as substitution or atonement. The great swap is where Jesus died in our place – he died for the evil that I do and the evil you do.

You remember the high priest’s accidental prophecy “It’s better that one man should die for the people.” Well, that prophecy was true – Jesus died and he died for the people – for us all. The Jews were about to celebrate the Passover by sacrificing the lamb without fault. Jesus knew that he was that lamb. Again and again, we find that Jesus was innocent.

All of us have rebelled against our creator. We have gone our own way. We deserve to die for this evil. Despite all those Pearly Gates jokes, there is not a single human who could stand before God and demand entrance to heaven. We have all failed – we fail by our own standards let alone God’s good standards. Imagine you died tonight – could you really look Jesus in the eyes and say, I deserve to enter heaven? But Jesus has taken our punishment already. The slate is wiped clean. He is the Passover lamb who died to pay our debt. We are freed by his blood and can know God’s forgiveness today simply by trusting in his death.

As John said earlier in his story, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life”, Jn 3:16. If you have never trusted in God’s son, won’t you put your trust in him today. Trust in his death for you and know God’s forgiveness. Come, enter today into eternal life.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you that you died – an innocent man. You died for our evil. You died to set us free. You died so that by believing in you, we can have eternal life. Amen.

Sources:

Barnett, Paul. (2005). The shepherd king: reading John today. Sydney: Aquila Press.

Series: John

Topics: #John