Luke 23:36-38 - This is the King of the Jews

23:36,37

The rulers mocked, the soldiers also mocked. When rulers and those with power mock and do evil things, there will be all sorts of underlings who join in with the mocking and evil. The most terrible example is the Nazis. Ordinary Germans did unspeakable things because the rulers instigated an utterly evil regime. And when the tables turned, the Russians did equally unspeakable things.

23:38

“This is the King of the Jews”. The person who was being crucified had a placard beside them proclaiming the crime for which they were being crucified. John 19:19-22 tells us that the inscription was written in three languages. The Jewish leaders objected, wanting it to be changed to “claimed to be king of the Jews”, but Pilate refused to change it. Why did Pilate refuse? Was he mocking Jesus too, or was their a gnawing fear that Jesus actually was someone special? The latter would seem the most likely.

Luke 23:32-35 - Let Him save Himself

23:32-4

There were two other men being crucified at the same time, both of these were indeed criminals, and, at least within the justice system of the time, deserved to be there. This was a fulfilment of Isaiah 53:12, Jesus was “numbered with the transgressors”.  In Matthew the “Skull” is called “Golgotha”. There was one criminal on His right, and one on His left. Jesus then said “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing”. There is actually some doubt about this statement, with some manuscripts not containing these words. However, they are entirely consistent with Jesus’ teaching, and Stephen uttered similar words when he was being stoned to death (Acts 7:60). The soldiers divided up His clothes, fulfilling Psalm 22:18.

23:35

The people watched and the rulers sneered. The rulers mocked that Jesus , who saved others, could not, as they saw it, save Himself. How could He be the Messiah? Today we see our rulers and the elites mocking Christianity. But where did this mocking start? It started in the church, in the liberal theological colleges, with people doubting the word of God, doubting the divinity of Jesus Christ, doubting the virgin birth, doubting the atoning sacrifice, doubting the resurrection. And so it spread to society as a whole. Yet on the cross, the Son who was dying, who was suffering, was paying the price for our sins. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit were working together to rescue us from the mess we have got ourselves into. Jesus did not come to save Himself, but to save us.

Luke 23:26-31 - Do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves

23:26

It was normal for the condemned man to carry his cross, hence Jesus’ earlier statement that if we wanted to follow Him we need to be prepared to carry our own cross. Following Jesus is no bed of roses. As we read in the other gospels (Matt 27:26; Mark 15:15; John 19:1), Jesus had been whipped and scourged, and so greatly physically weakened. So Simon of Cyrene was commandeered to carry the cross. Cyrene was a region in North africa with a significant Jewish population.

23:27-31

Earlier we read of crowds calling for Jesus to be crucified. We need to realise that that crowd consisted largely of the various religious leaders and their supporters. Here we read of other people who were mourning and wailing for Jesus, especially the women. Expression of mourning are a lot louder in middle eastern culture than ours. Desperately weak as He was, and walking towards His death, Jesus still taught the people. “Do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and your children”. Jesus knew the spiritual state of the people, and what was to come in AD 66-70. Often we can seek to avoid the problems and issues in our own lives by focusing on something or someone else. The suffering that was going to come upon Jerusalem in thirty to forty years time would indeed be terrible.

In verse 31 the “green tree” is Jesus. Jesus is completely righteous, yet these events were unfolding. How much worse things would be when God’s judgement fell upon a sinful nation? There is an interesting lesson here for us. We have a tendency today to focus on the physical agony of the cross. Crucifixion was indeed a very cruel manner of death, but the New Testament does not focus that much on the physical suffering, though it certainly does not hide from it. The key element of the cross was the righteous, holy, Son of God laying down His life to pay for our sins.

Luke 23:20-25 - Crucify Him!

23:20-22

Pilate wanted to release Jesus. Elsewhere we are told of his wife warning him about Jesus in a dream. Pilate knew that crucifying Jesus was not the right thing to do, but he did not have the heart conviction to carry this through. Yet again the crowds cry “Crucify Him”, and yet again Pilate declares that he finds no reason to put Jesus to death.  So one more time he tries to appease the crowd by saying he will have Him punished then released. At some point authority will let us down, unless it is dedicated to doing God’s will.

23:23-25

There was no pacifying of the crowd. Today we see secularists, or some LGBT activists, or pro-abortionists making insistent cries (though, obviously, not to the point of demanding death!) against anyone who does not go along with their agenda. Pilate gave in to their demands, and today civic authorities will eventually give in to the demands of the activists. So the insurrectionist (the crime Jesus was accused of!) and murderer was set free. Jesus was given over to the will of the people.

Luke 23:13-19 - Away with this man!

23:13-17

Pilate calls the religious leaders to come before him and again tells them that he can find no basis for their claims. He also tells them that Herod could find no basis either. This agreement between Herod and Pilate on the nature of the case is presumably the reason for the new friendship between the two of them. They both recognised that Jesus was not inciting rebellion. Luke emphasises this point because the Roman authorities were starting to become the prime source of persecution of the Christians, and accusing them of the sorts of charges the Jews were bringing here. There is no rebellion against the state.

“Therefore, I will punish Him and then release Him”. This might seem rather strange to us, if He is innocent why not just release Him? We need to remember that we are talking about less politically correct times, and justice was much rougher! You won’t find v17 in most Bibles, but will see a footnote. The best manuscripts don’t have v17.

23:18,19

So Pilate has made the “right” decision, but he is driven by pragmatic reasons, not reasons of justice. Making right decisions, and making them for the right reasons are important. If we make right decisions for pragmatic reasons we will be easily turned from them given enough pressure, and that is what happened here. “The whole crowd” shouted ... Barabbas was a genuine troublemaker, genuinely guilty of the charges they had brought against Jesus. “The whole crowd” were the religious leaders, and anyone else they had managed to get to come along with them. So we see the depths of human sinfulness.

Luke 23:5-12 - Before Herod

23:5-7

This was not at all the answer that the Jews wanted. So the religious leaders stressed the point that Jesus “stirs up people all over Judea”. Note that Jesus did this by “His teaching”. They stressed that He was working His way from the borders of Israel to the capital. Pilate essentially wanted an easy life, certainly no trouble. So on hearing the mention of Galilee he sees an opportunity to pass the buck and get Herod to sort things out. We sometimes look to civil authorities to protect “religious freedom”. Up to a point they will, especially when there is a Christian foundation to a nation. But when that foundation is non-existent, or is starting to crumble, civil authorities will be more concerned about a quiet life. So we should not be surprised if they make seemingly illogical and wrong decisions when pressurised by secularists.

23:8-12

Herod was initially pleased. He had heard about Jesus and was intrigued by Him. This wasn’t out of any religious devotion, but out of a desire to see Jesus perform a miracle or two. Herod also asked Jesus many questions. However, Jesus gave Him no answer. The religious leaders were also there, hoping to get Herod to do their dirty work for them. So they vehemently accused Jesus. Herod and his entourage thought they were in the position of power, so they mocked Jesus, even dressing Him in an elegant robe. While Jesus had said little or nothing, the religious leaders had probably “accused” Him of being the king of the Jews. Herod sent Jesus back to Pilate. Although it seems that little had been achieved, and Pilate still had his problem, Herod and Pilate became friends. Previously they had been enemies.

Luke 23:1-4 - Before Pilate

23:1,2

The Jewish council did not have any authority to have Jesus killed, and that is what they wanted to do. This is a sad indictment upon them, and indeed upon all humanity. We complain that God does not make His presence obvious enough, yet when He came as a human being, doing many obvious things, we killed Him. we need to realise that the problem is not with God but within us.

The Jewish Council was playing political games. They knew that the last thing the Roman leaders wanted was any uprisings, so they claimed that they were concerned about Jesus leading a rebellion against Rome, or inciting a rebellion. So they accused Him of opposing payments of taxes. We know of course, that when they had questioned Him on this Jesus had actually said quite the opposite.

23:3,4

Pilate was the Roman Governor at the time. He asked Jesus directly if He was indeed the King of the Jews. Jesus does not deny the charge.

Verses 4 and 5 are unique to Luke. He was probably wanting to stress that Jesus was not a political rebel. Pilate declares that he could find no basis for any charge against Jesus. The Jews reacted against this , claiming, without any foundation, that Jesus stirred up trouble wherever He went. The truth was that Jesus stirred up trouble only for the Jewish leaders, highlighting their hypocrisy. We always seek to put the blame on someone else when the problem is us.