John 19:1-8 The crowning of The King

John 18:38-40 and the Rejection of Barabbas

Those are very, very beautiful songs to be singing and worshiping God with today. So, church, we're going to be in John chapter 19. And just as a prefix, before we open up and read that text and pray today, this is literally right before the cross.

In fact, if we were to keep on reading in this chapter from the text that we're in today, we're right there. We're going to see Christ walking up to Calvary here soon. We're going to see Him pierced and nailed to a cross, and so on and so forth.

And so, this is with a great weight and heaviness that we are going to be looking at this text here today. So, let us open up in a word of prayer as we are just getting ready to look at this text.

So, let us pray.

Lord God, once again, we lift up this worship today to you, Lord, that through the reading and the preaching and the hearing of your word that you might be glorified. Lord, I would pray that through this, that everyone here, including myself, that we just might have a deeper and deeper theology today, Lord.

That we just might know more about you, that we might love you more, that we might seek you more, and that today we would be better fitted vessels unto your glory, Lord. That we might be willing to go out and share this kind of a message with the world around us.

And Lord God, as we come before you today, Lord, let us do this in abounding means. That we just might not be like the Jews of this day, that staled out, crucified, crucified. Lord, that we might worship you as you are.

And so, Lord, let us be bowing before you in humility and in love and in adoration. And Lord, we just lift these things up to you today in your holy name, Jesus Christ, amen. So as I said, we're going to be in John chapter 19.

We're going to be looking at verses 1 through 8 today. And as a reminder, last week, I do want to read for us verses 38 through 40 of the previous chapter, just to kind of help set the scene of what we're reading today.

So we're going to be in John chapter 18, verses 38 through 40 to begin with right now.

So please follow along.

It says in here, Therefore they cried out again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now, Barabbas was a robber. And as we read last week, we see that he was not just a robber, but that he was a murderer, and that he had caused the entire city to erupt over what he had done, whatever that was.

And so, let us continue now into our selected text for today, verses 1 through 8. It says in here, Then Pilate therefore took Jesus and scourged him. And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and arrayed him in a purple robe.

And they began to come up to him and say, Hail, King of the Jews, and to give him blows in the face. And Pilate came out again and said to them, Behold, I am bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no guilt in him.

Jesus therefore came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, and Pilate said to them, Behold the man. When therefore the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify, crucify.

Pilate said to them, Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no guilt in him. The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by the law he ought to die, because he made himself out to be the Son of God.

When Pilate therefore heard this statement, he was the more afraid.

Let us pray.

Lord, we thank you for this kingdom that we see from previous texts, Lord, that we are a part of your kingdom, a kingdom that is not of this world. And Lord, today we do not in a mockery way, but in a true and sincere means say, Hail, the King.

So Lord, let us recognize you as such, and let us throw our crowns to your throne, to your feet, Lord. You are our righteousness. You are our Lamb, our High Priest, and you are our King, God. And so Lord, let us not forget these things and continually remember that you are to be crowned as the Supreme King that you are.

And so Lord, we just raise these things up to you in your name, Jesus Christ. Church, once again, this is a difficult text to be not only reading, but to be having the privilege of this last week of sitting down and truly deeply studying what's going on here.

What does this imply? How did Pilate go about doing this? And so on and so forth. And I hope that you see that today.

I hope that you, as we look at this text and we look at it,.

And I hope that throughout this last week you've been looking at this text.

And seeing that weight of what's going on here. Just as a reminder of what we've looked through already,.

Jesus has been betrayed by his friend, Judas. He's been forsaken. He's been denied by Peter. And now, before Pilate, Pilate's going back and forth between him being in the Praetorium and the Jews that are outside because they're not willing to go in.

Pilate's going back and forth, and in this means we're going to see today that it's not enough that Christ has been denied and forsaken, but now he's going to be bruised. He's going to be placed with a crown of thorns.

He's going to be in this severe pain. And I want this to ring out in your ear. Pilate says this three times. I find no guilt in him.

Just remember this.

Very, very important. But let us examine verse 1 here. Verse 1 says, This comes right after verses 38 through 40 that we just read.

Before we prayed here.

Pilate has said, I have found no guilt in this man. I have no reason to do anything to him. In fact, the only thing I should do is release him right now. He's not guilty, is what he's saying to the Jews.

And the Jews have now seen Pilate and said that we have a custom that you release one person for us. We don't want Jesus, we want Barabbas. Give us Barabbas over Jesus. Give us the murderer and robber and this evil vile man.

Give us him over Jesus Christ. This perfect lamb. Give us him over the Messiah. Give us him over the king of the Jews. Give us Barabbas, not Jesus. We don't want anything to do with him. Give us Barabbas.

And so Barabbas, as we read from other texts, he's been released, he's now a free man. And this is totally in reflection as you and I, that we are the Barabbases and Christ has stood in our place and taken our judgment, and so we go free.

This is absolutely true in our own lives that we have been released from the captivity of our own sin. And so Barabbas is now a free, physically free man. And Pilate, after just saying to the Jews, I find no guilt in him.

This is the first time Pilate has said this and we're going to see two more times that he says this. But this is the first time he says, I find no guilt in him. And seeing that the Jews hate him so much and wanting to suffice their wishes, which the wishes of the Jews were to kill Jesus, Pilate thinks, well, he has no reason to kill him, so maybe if I scourge him and hurt him, that will suffice this crowd's plea.

And so that's what we see Pilate do. He says he took Jesus and he scourged him. Now this, to us today, just to put this in perspective, some of us might know what a scourging is,.

Some of us might not,.

But I want us to understand what is taking place here. A scourge would be a lashing, a whip, and there's many different relics that we have found today from the Romans in that time, but it's commonly thought that what this would have been would have been a rope made out of leather that would have had bone fragments on the end of it, many, many of these whips on one handle.

And how a lashing would take place is a person would be tied up and there would be usually two people on each side of this person and they would whip across the body of the prisoner and it would tear flesh, tear skin, cause tremendous amounts of pain and it would start all the way from the neck and it would go down to your knees.

It was a full body whipping that would take place here. And this would leave scars, tremendous scars, and people would know when they saw your back that you had been scorched. There was no healing from this.

There was no way that somebody could not see these wounds inflicted upon you. And so this is the beginning, and we're gonna see more and more of what Jesus goes through, but this is the beginning of Isaiah chapter 53, when it says that he grew up before them as a tender shoe and he had no visual that was pleasing to our eyes.

I need you to remember that in this text, when we look to Jesus, he is marred beyond recognition. There is no reason that you would want to come to Jesus because of his beauty that he has upon his face at this point.

There's no reason.

So we see Pilate scourging Jesus for no reason.

No reason whatsoever.

This whipping, that bone fragment on the end of this whip that I'm talking about, no reason that that's going across the back of our Savior. Absolutely none whatsoever.

He's not guilty.

He's free of guilt.

There's no guilt in him.

He's got nothing wrong. He's sinless and perfect. This is so, so important to remember. And just as a reminder, that comes from verse 38, that he goes out to the Jews, Pilate, and said to them, I find no guilt in him.

I find no guilt in him.

But to suffice and please them, he scourges them. So church, as I was reading this week through commentaries 500 years ago, one of my favorite commentaries I enjoy to read when I'm trying to study these things out, asked a great question, and I want to ask it today.

How do people of today scourge Jesus Christ? Because this kind of treatment of Jesus happens even to today. And this might not be in the physical way, but it's absolutely done in the theology and spiritual sense, 100 so.

We scourge Jesus by denying the way that he's revealed himself to be. We physically attack Jesus when we deny how the word is described him. We physically do this to Jesus Christ when we look at a text and we say that's not true, and we don't take it for what it has to say about him.

This is done by those that consider themselves Christians daily who are really not Christians. This is taking Jesus Christ and saying, I don't accept him as who he's revealed himself, and you're attacking him by doing so, by teaching something completely contrary.

There are so many examples I'm sure that you can think of in your head today about false religions, cults, so on and so forth that do this. So Jesus is not God eternal, he's our spirit brother. That's one way that we attack the deity of Jesus Christ.

It's wrong and it should not be done. So let us remember that we today, by denying Christ, are scourging him in that sense, 100%.

So I think that's a great question.

So by distorting Jesus, that's how that's done. And so let's now look into verse 2 here. So Jesus has been scourged, and as the soldiers have done this to him, it says in verse 2, and the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head.

And arrayed him in a purple robe.

What is this crown of thorns that's talked about? We talk about this quite often. It comes from a tree that I can't pronounce the name of. But this is a common tree that was found in the valleys near Jerusalem, so the Valley of Hinnom and the Valley of Gethsemane.

This would have been a common tree down there. And so they take this branch from it that has these thorns on it. And it doesn't say here whether they wove it three times around or eight times around or they made a whole dome.

There's a lot of different depictions of what this would look like, but we don't have any true detail in here about how it looked or what it looked like. But that would have been the common crown of thorns that they would have made in those days.

And so they take this crown of thorns and they place it upon the head of Christ, and this would have caused swelling, bleeding, so on and so forth. But there's something that we need to realize in here that just is beyond the physical pain that takes place on Jesus right here in this text.

Why are they putting a crown of thorns on our Savior? It's because in verse 36 and 37, Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then my servants would be fighting that I might not be delivered up to the Jews.

But as it is, my kingdom is not of this realm. Pilate therefore said, So you are a king. And Jesus answered, You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness of the truth.

Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice. And then Pilate goes on to say, as we read before that prayer,.

What is truth?

And he goes out to the Jews.

They're mocking Jesus because he said, I am king. And they see this supposed king before them, and this supposed group of followers that should have accepted him, the Jews that are saying, Crucify, crucify him.

They see this physical man before them, and they say, You're not a king. We're going to mock you now by putting a crown upon your head, and it's not going to be a crown of gold or any sort of precious stones.

It's going to be one that causes you pain and mocks you for what you have said. Do not just think about the physical pain that Christ is going through right here in this text. Think about the implications of what that is.

It's a crown that should not have been placed upon our Savior's head. It's not a crown that Christ was deserving of. And he goes beyond just this. I do want to, if you would like to turn with me there, I would encourage you to, but Genesis chapter 3, there's what I would argue is some biblical prophecy that's taking place with Jesus being placed a crown of thorns.

But Genesis chapter 3, verses 17 through 21, and we're going to read this, and as we're turning there, I just want us to remember the foreshadowing and the typology and the reflections that take place all throughout the Bible and the fulfillment of Jesus Christ dying upon a cross.

This whole thing started with the sin of man eating from a tree, partaking in a tree. That's where this whole story starts. It started with a tree, and it ends with a cursed tree. Adam partook of a tree.

Christ partook of a tree. It's through the first tree we have fallen with Adam, and it's through the second tree that we are redeemed in Christ. Remember this type of shadowing that takes place on here, and here's just another example of something along those lines.

Verses, we are going to read from verse 17 through 21 in here. This is after Adam has been found sinful. God is speaking in this text. He says, Then to Adam he said, Because you have listened to the voice of your wife and eaten from the tree, about which I commanded you, saying,.

You shall not eat from it.

Cursed is the ground because of you. In toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow from you. And you shall eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, because from it you were taken, for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

Let us continue on to verse 21 here. Now the man called his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. And the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. And it's quite obvious in verse 21 that just in the same way we were covered by the blood of Christ, so he used a foreshadowing and a typology of what he himself would do 2 ,000 years ago to Adam many, many years ago, he covers them in the sacrifice of most likely a lamb.

He covers them in the garments of the skin, reflecting what he would do on the cross. There's so much here of correlation. We see that from the dust of the ground Adam was made.

To the dust he will return.

We see Jesus being God in flesh. He comes from the heavens and to the heavens he returns.

He ascends.

We see this reflection all throughout the text, but what I see here that reflects what the crown of thorns was in verse 18,.

It says,.

Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you, for Adam, for us. What sin had Christ ever committed, yet he received the thorns and thistles on his brow? He received that crown of thorns. I totally see a reflection here from Genesis 3 in what is taking place for Jesus here.

It's not just out of randomness or chance that they just happen to make a crown of thorns for Jesus. It's reflecting the sin that we have had, that we do, and what we deserve. We deserve the thorns, but Christ received them on our behalf.

Let's turn back to John chapter 19. As we go through our Bible study throughout the week, we ask those kind of questions. How do these things point us to the cross? That's a clear example in Genesis chapter 3.

How do these things point us to the cross? So John chapter 9, we're going to read it one more time in verse 2. And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head and arrayed him in a purple robe.

There's no question in the mind that this is coming from Pilate.

To do such a thing.

And so they've wove this crown of thorns,.

They've placed it upon his head in a way of mockery and shame. And it says now that they arrayed a purple robe for him. I want to read a verse from Matthew chapter 27.

If you'd like to follow me there.

Matthew 27, verses 27 through 31. This is just another account of what we're reading here in John chapter 19, but verses 27 through 31 says this,. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium and gathered the whole Roman cohort.

So this adds a little bit more picture to what's going on. That Roman cohort, as a reminder, would have been a group of about 600 soldiers. So this isn't like 10 soldiers that are around Christ. This is the full Roman cohort that's around him.

How silly.

This man that's bound before him, the one that has just received lashes and whips, are being escorted around, being mocked by 600-plus soldiers. Absolutely devastating when you think about it in this context.

And so this Roman cohort that's around him, they strip him and put a scarlet robe on him. And after weaving a crown of thorns, they put it on his head in a reed in his right hand. And so it adds another depiction of this supposed king that's not of this world.

They mock him even more. They put this reed in his hand, this staff that's made from a reed in his hand. And they kneeled down before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. And they spat on him and took the reed and began to beat him on the head.

And after they had mocked him, they took his robe off and put his garments on him, and they led him away to crucify him. I want to turn back to John 19 now, as we see a little bit more details being added in from Matthew's perspective in this text.

It says in verse 2 once again,. And the soldiers wove a crown of thorns and put it on his head and arrayed him in a purple robe. And they began to come up to him and say, Hail, King of the Jews. This is at the same time that they placed the reed in his hand.

And had taken it from him.

They're bowing before him, and they're beating him with him. They're spitting on his face. And it goes on to say in verse 3, it says that they gave him blows in the face. So they're hitting our Savior.

They're bruising him continually. This is, once again, we can't, when we look at Jesus Christ and we understand that he's fully God and fully man, we have to understand that being fully man, he felt each one of these blows.

He felt the very blood running down his face. He felt all these things. We cannot forget about the physicalness to this as well. But we have to also remember that he is fully God.

Fully God.

He could eliminate these people right then and there with the blink of his eyes if he wanted to. But he doesn't stop them at any point. And we're going to talk more about this next week when Pilate says that he has authority over Christ and Christ says, No, you don't.

The only authority you have is because I have authority to give it to you. Jesus Christ is doing this willingly in a sovereign way and we just cannot forget either the physicalness of this and the supremeness of what's going on here.

Christ is taking these punches in the face and taking the wreath that's being hit upon him and the robe that has now been placed upon his back. I want you to think about that for a moment. These scars that have been placed upon the back of our Savior have now been covered in a garment.

That would cause excruciating pain to be placed upon and then to be taken off here as we see in a second. This should cause shivers to go down our back to think about that much pain that Christ was in.

This by far, church, this is the hardest text for me to be studying through because it depicts such pain and such mockery of the ultimate supreme being that should be receiving nothing but praise and worship.

In this text.

This is terribly difficult. And to him, they gave him blows to the face, it says here in verse 3. So they're mocking Christ, they're hitting him. Verse 4 goes on to say, and Pilate came out again. So once again, to remind us of what's going on here in the silliness and sovereignty that we see in this text, Pilate is acting as this middleman going back between Jesus and the Jews.

The Jews see themselves as too holy, as going in with Christ. And Pilate would never have done this with anything else. Pilate being this governor of Jerusalem right now in this time, this area, he's walking back and forth between the Jews and Jesus.

I'm sure you've seen a trial happen this week. Can you imagine the judge going back and forth, going in and out of a building to go and talk to people? That wouldn't happen. It doesn't happen except for in the case of Jesus right here.

And so Pilate walks back and forth, he comes back to the Jews right in this text, and he says, behold, I am bringing him out. And I want you to realize that Pilate in this text doesn't want to crucify Christ.

He doesn't want to do this because he understands from verse 38 of the last chapter, he finds no guilt in him. So he comes out to the Jews and he says, look, I'm going to bring him out so you can visually see what I have done to your supposed king of the Jews that you are rejecting.

I'm going to bring him out, and you're going to see him physically. Behold, I'm bringing him out that you may know that I find no guilt in him. This is the second time Pilate has said this. I find no guilt in him.

So before he escorts Jesus, he's found no guilt in him. And after placing a crown of thorns on his head, he still finds no guilt in Jesus.

No guilt.

And so it goes on to say that after Pilate has said this to the Jews, Jesus therefore came out. So he comes out to the Jews wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Now, once again, we need to remember the mockery of what's going on right now.

Jesus deserves nothing of this. And he goes to the Jews in such a way of this mockery, of this crown of thorns that's on his head and the purple robe, and no doubt the blood that is running down his face all the way to his toes.

And they're seeing this.

The Jews, every Jew there that's going to cry out here in a moment, what we're going to see, are seeing Jesus Christ right here being escorted by 600 plus Roman soldiers. To remind you again from John 1, it says that God, the Word, became flesh and dwelt amongst us.

He came unto his own. He was a Jew. He comes unto the Jews. His own did not receive him. We see that in this text, they did not receive Christ. He comes out in this crown of thorns and in his purple robe.

And Pilate said to them, behold the man. And I want you to remember that, behold the man. Because we see the Jews respond back to Pilate about behold the man here in verse 7, but let us go on to verse 5.

Or verse 6, excuse me.

When therefore the chief priests and officers saw him, they cried out saying, crucify, crucify. Pilate said to them, take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no guilt in him. This is the third time Pilate has now said, I find no guilt in him.

The Jews, the ethnic Israel, the ones that God has been so gracious towards throughout the entire Old Testament, his chosen people in the way of this is the ethnic Israel, these are the people I'm going to come unto, the ones that he has spoken to from prophets in the past, the ones that he has cared for for so long are now looking to that same Yahweh God and saying crucify, crucify.

See, it wasn't enough for the Jews to see this sinless Lamb of God before them covered in a robe, beaten and bruised, with a crown of thorns on his head. That wasn't enough to satisfy this sinful group of men in this text.

It wasn't enough. Crucify, crucify. And Pilate, being a sensible and reasonable man in this text, he has beaten Jesus without their permission, without them wanting that. He sat here, and just once again, this is not a political statement, but can you imagine being before a judge today and having the jury say, he's not guilty, we should let him go.

The judge saying, you're not guilty. But he can hear the cries of the people on the outside of his courtroom, and he's worried about how the people are going to perceive him being the judge, and he says, I find no guilt in you, but we're going to beat you now.

We're going to place a robe on your back, we're going to scourge you. Can you imagine that taking place today? That's no justice whatsoever. That's corruption and evil that's taking place here. This is Pilate being more fearful of man than he is of God in this text.

Pilate, being a reasonable and sensible man, should have never done any of those things to him. But hearing the cries of the people, he has done it just to satisfy their cries, and it doesn't satisfy them.

They continue on in their effort to kill Christ by saying, crucify, crucify. Pilate said to them, take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no guilt in him. And as more context, as we've talked in the past about this, the Roman governor at that time has been given the privilege, maybe this might not be the right word, but they've been given the responsibility of capital punishment.

And Pilate's saying, look, I can't do that.

I can't enforce this death upon this person. I just did X, Y, and Z to him. That should have satisfied you. Look, you now deal with this, because I can't. And the Jews respond in this way. They say, the Jews answered, we have a law, and by that law he ought to die, because he himself, he made himself out to be the son of God.

And so the Jews are saying, look, Pilate, you have the responsibility of capital punishment. This is not something that you can put on our shoulders anymore. This has now been put upon your shoulders.

This is something you have to deal with. And according to our law, that comes from Leviticus chapter 24, verse 16, I believe. Let me look here. Leviticus chapter 24, verse 16. Blasphemy of God is deserving of death, according to the Old Testament law.

Now, if Jesus Christ was not God in flesh, is he blaspheming God by saying that he is the son of God, is the question. The answer is yes. If he's not God in flesh, that would be blasphemy. See, many today look at this title as son of God, and they make it into something that it ought not to be.

And the reason that they're saying the son of God is because Pilate said, I found no guilt in him, and behold the man, he's pointing to Jesus, behold the man, and the Jews are saying, no, no, no. It's not because he's a man that we're wanting to crucify him, but because, in our opinion, him being a man is claiming deity.

That's why we want him gone. In fact, the Jews have said this several, several times. They have said this in John chapter 5, 17 through 18 and 10, 3 through 33. I'm going to read those real fast for us so we can remember what the Jews have been seeking this entire time for Jesus.

John chapter 5, verse 17 through 18 says this. It says, This is him taking equality with the Father. And the Jews recognize this, rightfully so, and they say, but was also calling his own Father, or calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

Okay? And then it goes on to say, so the Jews understand that by him calling God his Father, that's making himself equal with God. They understand this, and we ought to understand that as well. John chapter 10, verse 30 through 33 says this.

It says,.

Now Jesus had not yet come into the village. I'm reading from chapter 11. That's why it doesn't look right to me. Verse 30 goes on to say in John chapter 10,. And the Jews answer him,. And this is important that we say this, because in verse 7 of John 19, they call Jesus this title that Jesus has been taking upon himself throughout his whole public ministry, that he is the Son of God.

And there's another title that he has, which is called the Son of Man. In our weekly Bible study right now, we're in the book of Daniel, and we see, we haven't gotten there yet, but we see in the book of Daniel, there's a title that is given to this future Messiah, and that is that he's going to be the Son of Man.

And I want us to understand these two terms, Son of God and Son of Man. Is Jesus Christ literally born of a man?

No, he's born of a virgin.

So literally speaking, physically speaking, he is not the Son of Man in that sense. There's a reason, though, that he has that title of the Son of Man. One, if you were to be called a son of man, you would say that by nature I am a man.

I have this nature of being a man, and according to the Old Testament, that was the title that was going to be given to the Messiah. And so by Jesus saying, I am the Son of Man, we can assume many things.

One, he's claiming that he is the Messiah from the Old Testament, and two, that he has the nature of being fully man. So now let's think about that being the Son of God. Is he literally and physically the offspring and son of God?

No.

Likewise, how we see that the title of Son of Man does not mean that he was physically born from a man. Likewise, the Son of God does not mean that he was physically born of God. So just as we assume with the Son of Man that by nature he's a man, when you say that you are the Son of God, that means by nature you are God, fully God.

And so, likewise, we see that the Jews were not okay with somebody saying they're the Son of God because they understood that that made you equal with God, because one of the attributes of God is that you're uncreated.

How could a son that was physically offspring of the Father be not created? It doesn't work. It's a logical issue that many false religions have. To be God means that you are immutable, uncreated, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, so on and so forth.