Luke 22:63-65
Before we come to Lord’s table, I would like us to perhaps maybe deepen our appreciation for the gift of Christ and for the gift of this communion with him by turning to Luke 22 once again, look at a parallel text to what we have read in Matthew 26. We have as a church been studying the passion of Christ in our study of Luke’s Gospel. And in our study of the passion, we find our place in Luke 22 where Jesus has been arrested. He’s been betrayed by Judas Iscariot, his friend, one of the Twelve.
And after his betrayal and his arrest, the arresting party has returned from the scene of the arrest, which was at the Garden of Gethsemane, and they’ve brought Jesus to the house of the high priest, which is near the temple and Jesus has been brought there to be examined by the Jews, and by the Jews, I mean the Jewish leadership, the Sanhedrin, which is the ruling body of the Jews, the council. It’s comprised of chief priests; most of them are Sadducees of the Sadducee party and then also the elders of the people, many of whom are Pharisees. And that body, the Pharisees, Sadducees, 70 elders are presided over by the acting high priest. In this case, it’s Caiaphas.
The purpose of the examination, which is really a series of several examinations before the Jews, is not, here, to give Jesus a just and fair hearing. It’s not to conduct a proper trial in any sense at all. The purpose is rather to search for, and then define sufficient reason to condemn him to death. But the examinations before the members of the Sanhedrin, they provide for the Jews the pretense of justice, just enough to satisfy their collective conscience. They’ve done enough. They have followed the most proper procedure possible considering the urgent situation and how fast this had to move.
And having determined Jesus is worthy of death, they now have the right and the, they would say in their own minds, the solemn duty to go to Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, to seek the death penalty because it’s the Roman governor in the Roman province of Judea. He is the only one with the power over life and death. So for Jesus, on a human level, you would, you would say, certainly say that what we find here is Jesus is in the high priest’s house. This is what you call a hostile environment. Those who are deciding Jesus’ fate, they’ve really already decided. They’re deeply prejudiced against him. They have feelings of extreme animus against Jesus. Their thoughts, their feelings, their sentiments are all fueled by religious pride.
It’s their, their mentality is driven by greed, and they’re, they’ve insulated themselves from any rebuttal, any reprise, because they’ve surrounded themselves with the scholarly opinions of the scribal class, the, the studied theologians of their day. They’ve got, they, they’ve given themselves insulation by the legal justifications of the lawyers, consider themselves in a very strong position, and here on their own turf in the high priest’s house, and that refers to Annas, who was the former high priest. He’s father-in-law of Caiaphas, the current high priest.
We find Jesus, here, really in the belly of the beast. Both these men, Annas, Caiaphas, are politically savvy. These men are very well-connected in their day, and yet they are morally vile. They are thoroughly corrupt, and they are literally able to get away with murder, as we have just read in Matthew 26. And that means, as we’re going to see in this text, that these men are heartless, they’re cold, they’re cruel, and we’re going to see that they’re abusive as well. Those who ascend to great heights of power and authority, who have immense amounts of wealth, while at the same time also being in their character immoral and corrupt and enslaved to greed, they are not only abusive, but they create an environment all around them that perpetuates abuse at the hands of sinners.
On a human level, I would imagine for Jesus as he’s here, we heard his words on the cross, “‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’” That’s the first line out of Psalm 22. And on the cross, he was calling all of those around the cross to maybe revisit their Bible and read Psalm 22. If they hadn’t memorized, many Jews did, they had to memorize, to consider the words of Psalm 22, which is a messianic Psalm, which actually portrayed everything that they were seeing before them. All the events of the past twelve hours were portrayed right there in Psalm 22.
But there’s a line in Psalm 22 where Jesus must have found comfort, as he’s here, surrounded, in the belly of the beast, under the authority of Annas and Caiaphas and all the officers and the elders and the Sanhedrin. He must have taken comfort in the experience of David in Psalm 22, praying his prayer after him, “Be not far from me, O God, for trouble is near, and there’s none to help. Many bulls have surrounded me. Strong bulls of Bashan have encircled me. They open wide their mouth at me as a ravening and a roaring lion.” So there, as the bulls close in to smash and stomp him, as the lions eye their prey, encircling around him, ready to pounce, these animals do what no hungry predator would ever do.
We find in Luke 22:63 and following, we find that they delight in and they find joy in abusing him. They relish in this opportunity to taunt him as he’s in pain, and suffering abuse and scorn. Take a look at your Bibles in Luke 22:63 and following. “Now the men who were holding Jesus in custody were mocking him while they beat him and they blindfolded him, were asking, saying, ‘Prophesy! Who is the one who hit you?’ And they were saying many other things against him, blaspheming.”
That is the very picture of sin’s depravity. If you’ve ever been the victim of a crime, or the victim of some form of abuse or, God forbid, but some kind of torture, some terrible thing that’s happened to you; or maybe it’s happened not to you personally, but to a loved one, you know the vileness of sin, and especially when it happens to someone you love very dearly, and you can’t do anything about it, and it leaves a pit in your stomach, a hurt and an ache that you can’t get rid of because you’re powerless to help. Something’s been done and some, someone has been victimized and abused and has suffered oppression and hurt and pain. That’s what’s going on here.
And I want to tell you with all sympathy to whatever you may have suffered in your life, whatever someone has done to you or to a loved one, whatever evil you have seen and whatever evil perplexes you, and the wickedness of sinners is something horrible to behold, what I want to say with all sympathy that whatever we have experienced, it really pales in comparison to what we see portrayed here before us, because there was no one except Jesus and Jesus alone who was innocent. He is the only innocent, perfect, righteous, sinless, majestic, holy human being ever. And so if anyone didn’t deserve what was coming to him, it’s him.
And this text portrays sin’s depravity, that sin and sinners rejoice, we should just say it, rejoice in death, in marring the image of God, in shaming a man and not just any man, but the best of men, the only one since Adam, who bore the image of God in perfect innocence and maintain that image throughout his life unto this very moment in unblemished righteousness. All of us, by contrast, are sinners. We’re worthy of death. We’re under God’s condemnation. Any suffering that we experience, whether we count it just or unjust in the moment, it pales in comparison to what we deserve before a holy, righteous God. Our sins sinned against an eternal Person. They merit for us an eternal punishment. That’s what eternal, conscious suffering in Hell is. It is the due penalty for our sins against a holy, eternal, infinite God. But not him, not him.
So folks, as we have a few moments this evening to contemplate the death of Jesus for our sins, what we need to see in this text before us is the sinfulness of sin, the vile wickedness of depravity that Jesus not only endured, but willingly, freely took upon himself when he died on the cross. And I’ll give you several points to guide us through the verses and help us reflect on really what are some of, I have to say, there’s some very dark themes that we’re looking at this evening.
First of all, number one, let’s look at the sin of religious tolerance. Number one, the sin of religious tolerance. Luke tells us that it was the men who were holding Jesus in custody who were mocking and beating him, that it was his captors, you could say officers, officers of the temple, the temple guard. They were, whether bodyguards of Caiaphas and Annas and the high priest’s household, guards, watchmen there, or they probably very likely, or also temple guards and worked for the temple. They were officers with arrest power and authority in Jewish matters and these are the men who were there holding Jesus in custody, mocking and beating him. But what we need to see is behind them is really a religious mockery, fomented and encouraged by the religious leaders. And to see how this started, turn back to what we’ve read just earlier in the service.
Turn back to Matthew, Matthew 26. As I said earlier, when the arresting party brought Jesus back to the high priest’s house, the first stop that the arresting party made to bring Jesus before him was to Annas. He’s the retired high priest, John 18:13 says that. Annas tried without really any success to examine Jesus and try to find some, some chink in the armor, some reason that, some, some strategy that he could use so he could pass it on to his son-in-law, Caiaphas. Then really after failing to do that, in John 18:24 it says that Annas sent Jesus bound to Caiaphas, and this entered into a second phase of examination with the Jews.
Well, we’re going to return to this chapter, Matthew 26, on Sunday. We’re going to see the third phase of the Jewish examination, which Luke records in Luke 22. But for now, we want to take a closer look at this second phase of examination, and this is Matthew 26 starting, as we’ve read already, but starting in verse 59. The first phase, examination by the Jews, we can call that the inquiry of Annas, that produced nothing. In this second phase, led by Caiaphas, attended by the chief priests, attended by the Sanhedrin, though it’s informal and kind of technically unofficial, this is necessary for them to find guilt in Jesus.
Look at verse 59, Matthew 26, “Now the chief priest and the whole Sanhedrin, they kept trying to obtain a false testimony against Jesus so that they might put him to death. They didn’t find any even though many false witnesses came forward. But later on two came forward and said, ‘This man stated, “I’m able to destroy the sanctuary of God and rebuild it in three days.”’” We know from what Jesus actually said in the first temple cleansing, he’s speaking of his own body, not the physical temple. Nonetheless, that’s what these witnesses said, misinterpreting him.
In any case, and especially in a capital case, that is, one that could result in the death penalty, these men, by bringing Jesus before their tribunal and in, before their examination, these men are violating all rules of jurisprudence, and they’re violating not only the law of Moses, but they’re violating their own rabbinical law and all their law traditions.
They are for their sin without excuse. Theirs is a culpable ignorance, depraved, vile, and it’s one for which they will give an account. Travis Allen
Jesus, ought to, in this moment and in this examination and all the way through, he ought to be afforded the presumption of innocence. He ought to be considered innocent until proven guilty. You say, But that’s an American jurisprudence principle, and I say yes, it is. Where do you think we got it? We got it from Scripture.
He ought to be afforded the presumption of innocence. He’s not. He ought to be protected by, against any self-incrimination, but he’s not. He ought to have the right to representation, to have a defense attorney there with him. None is provided for him. Many other violations of the law and law tradition are there as well. This is not happening at a legal time, for instance, but in the middle of the night or in the early hours of the morning before the sun’s up. It’s not happening in a legal place, a fitting venue to hear legal testimony, to have a record of it, to take good minutes and notes.
The witnesses give, according to Mark 14:55-59, they give false, inconsistent, contradictory testimony. They should have been cast out. If this were done before the public eye, that would have happened. So this is a sham, and everybody knows it. They sought false testimony, as it says here in the first place, “so that they might put him to death.”
So finally, as he’s frustrated by the ineffectiveness of his witnesses, as he’s concerned about the, the inefficiency of this trial and how things are going, as time is ticking away, the high priest, it says in verse 62, he takes over the proceedings to move things along. “The high priest stood up and said to him, ‘Do you not answer? What are these men testifying against you?’ And Jesus kept silent.” He’s not going to be cajoled, manipulated into answering a false charge.
The high priest said to him, “I put you under oath by the living God, that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You yourself said it. Nevertheless, I tell you,’ Let’s put this on my own terms here, here’s my answer, ‘hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven.’”
You know what he’s saying? We’ll see this more on Sunday, but you know what he’s saying? You think you’re sitting in judgment of me. Oh, no, no, no. It’s the other way around. I’m the judge, and I am witnessing in real time your abuses of power, your violence against the law, your rejection of all sound principles of justice and law. Stand-by to stand by.
According to rabbinic legal tradiction, tradition, this is all wrong, as here Jesus says to him, “‘You know, you’re going to see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power coming on the clouds of heaven,’” and the, the high priest shrieks, tears his garments. He, he says, “‘He has blasphemed! What further need do we have of witnesses? Behold, you’ve now heard the blasphemy. What do you think?’” He’s looking to all his fellow Sanhedrin members, chief priests, elders of the people. “‘What do you men think?’ And they answered and said, ‘He deserves death.’” All wrong. All wrong.
Alfred Edersheim says, “The voting was to begin with the youngest, so the juniors might not be influenced by the seniors.” That’s just one of many violations. That point of order goes right out the window, too. Since the high priest is on a schedule, he will not be deterred. He pressures the accused. He appeals to the authority of his office. He puts Jesus under oath before God, and when he hears the answer, he resorts to histrionics, a bit of drama and theater, making a show of his moral outrage and his shock. Shocking! Just shocking, I say! He’s simply aghast.
The message is clear here, Men, let’s kill him. What say you? There are no dissenting voices allowed, not under that kind of pressure. We do know of one member of the Sanhedrin, Joseph of Arimathea. He’s the one, you’ll remember, that retrieved Jesus’ dead body from the cross, prepared him for burial, and buried his body in his own tomb. Luke tells us in Luke 23:51, “Joseph had not consented to their plan or their action.”
The record, we know of another Sanhedrinist, who’s named Nicodemus. We meet him in John chapter 3 and later on in the account as well. The record’s ambiguous about Nicodemus. We don’t know exactly where he stood. Later on, he did become a follower of Christ, was a disciple of his, but secretly, both Joseph and Nicodemus, both intimidated. But here, in this moment, in this informal, technically unofficial hearing or examination, the politically expedient vote at this moment, which most if not all of them cast, he’s guilty of death. All in favor, say aye, all opposed.
If that’s not troubling enough, keep reading. The kind of religion that tolerates this injustice, that suppresses evidence, that intimidates the accused, that violates prescribed, accepted traditions of jurisprudence, it will tolerate all manner of evil. Look at verse 67, “Then they spat in his face; they beat him with his, their fists. Others slapped him and said, ‘Prophesy to us, O Christ, you Christ.’” It’s in a mocking tone. “‘Who is the one who hit you?’” Who’s the they, there, who spat upon him? Who’s the they, there, who beat him?
The closest reference seems to be those who are deliberating with the high priest, chief priests, elders, scribes. Amazing. These are otherwise dignified, respectable men, venerable men, men you would want to let your kids follow as models and examples. What are they doing here? Spitting on Jesus? Beating him? Matthew indicates that “some started slapping Jesus in the face and saying, ‘Prophesy to us, you Christ. Who hit you?’” The opposition of the religious leaders, it was in, it was from the very beginning, from the very start. And we cannot just go to here in the, in this moment, but go back years, ever since the beginning of his ministry.
This is an unjust position to take against this man. He’s been truthful. He’s been righteous. He’s been compassionate. He’s been gracious. He’s been kind. He has power. He has authority. He interprets the Bible like nobody’s business. He understands the Scripture in ways that the legal scholars, the scribes, do not understand themselves. He corrects all their false interpretations. He puts profound truth into stories and parables that a child can understand. He’s absolutely amazing. This is an unjust position from the very start, going back years, to take against the innocent Christ.
Any doubt about the injustice of their position is cleared away when we see the injustice of the proceedings. And if there’s any lingering doubt, we see the religious tolerance of sin and injustice by those who were there and failed to speak up. That leads to tolerance of absolute cruelty and abuse. Shockingly, the decorum and dignity of these venerable men, or at least some of them, can no longer mask their enmity. The high priest’s hatred of Jesus and the tolerance of that hatred by the rest leads to this unmitigated abuse.
Mark it down folks: Every religion in the world, every other religion in the world, every non-Christian religion in the world is at its heart a death cult. At their core, all religions except for biblical Christianity rest upon foundations of injustice and unrighteousness since they do not accept the triune God of the Bible. That’s their first error, is idolatry. And from idolatry, every malice and every sin and every wickedness and every abuse flows. They don’t accept his Word. They don’t bow in worship. They don’t submit to his truth. They don’t honor him as God and give thanks. No submission to the truth of God revealed in his Word. No consistent principles of restraint against evil.
The path of every non-Christian religion is depravity. It results in the degradation of the image of God in humanity and leads to certain death. Go back to Luke 22:63 because that’s exactly what we see on display in this scene, moral depravity at work, degrading the image of God which is perfect in Jesus, a celebration of death, cruel abuse and mocking. And do not forget, don’t ever forget, this started with the religious tolerance of sin, failing to speak up against these men’s animus, against their hatred, against their malice, against their, their mocking, their slander, blasphemy. This is where it leads.
Luke pictures Jesus in the hands of officers, men holding Jesus in custody, and then mocking him while they are beating him. So there’s a, an imperfect verb that shows like a continuation. There’s a, there’s a start of it, and it, there’s an iteration, a continuation of their mocking while beating going on. This isn’t just a one-time thing. It’s not just one smack in the head. This is a continual, it’s a beat-down.
And then the blindfold game. It’s like some kind of a warped combo between pin the tail on the donkey and piñata, where the victim is the one that gets blindfolded. Or it could be, the word that’s used here it’s, to cover over. So it could be hooded. He may have been hooded completely and then beaten senseless, then laughed at. Another way to illustrate the cruelty of the abuse going on, here, and the mockery that’s accompanying it, is to consider the Levitical protections against, against cruelty to the, to the disabled, those who have disabilities. Luke 19:14 says, “You shall not curse a deaf man nor place a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God. I am Yahweh.”
A deaf man may not hear your curse, but the all-knowing God does. A blind man may not see your stumbling block. He may not be able to see when you laugh as he’s falling because you tripped him, and you think that’s good fun. But God sees it. For any of those cruel people who have no compassion for the disabled, who have no gratitude for their own whole-bodied condition, they’re to consider the nature of Yahweh and fear him because he hears and sees all things.
These officers, they’re responsible for the safety and security of this man that they have in custody, taking away his ability to see and then pummeling him and then mocking and laughing when he can’t defend himself, when he can’t see it coming, when he’s, when he’s sent reeling, falling to the ground. He is to them nothing more than entertainment, their cure for boredom. The abuse and mockery, here, is just sport to them, a bit of fun. But they’re marring an image-bearer; they’re treating him with contempt. But for those of us who love the Lord Jesus Christ dearly, this is gutting, isn’t it? Think about anybody you love dearly, and imagine them in this hood, cuffed, tied up, defenseless, spat upon, beaten, laughed at, pushed around.
If for your loved one you would want to run to their defense, protect them, throw your body in the way, chastise and rebuke every single person there, go after them; if you don’t feel the same sense of indignation about your Lord, question your relationship with him. The abuse, mockery, a bit of fun to them, but they’re treating him with great contempt. And all that starts with the sin of religious intolerance, or religious tolerance.
Let’s go to a second point, number two, the sin of religious ignorance, the sin of religious ignorance. The fun that these officers are having at Jesus’ expense, there’s a there’s an irony, an ironic twist in the game that they play in verse 64. How funny, isn’t it, that a blindfolded prophet, a hooded prophet reputed to be a supernaturally gifted seer with prophetic vision, oh, he had no idea who kept hitting him. Isn’t that funny? Get it?
But what’s more profoundly ironic, here, and totally lost on the officers and the servants who were there watching this in the high priest’s household, and then going from them all the way up to the chain of command through members of the Sanhedrin, to the high priest Caiaphas himself; the real irony, here, is that while they mock and scorn, while they have fun at his expense, while they embarrass him, showing he’s inept, powerless, a blind prophet, thus a false prophet, they’re unwittingly fulfilling prophecy.
Go back in Luke 22, go back all the way to Luke chapter 9, and just, I’ll just take you through just a couple of predictions that our Lord made, Luke chapter 9, some of the prophecies that Luke has recorded in his Gospel. Peter in Luke Chapter 9 verse 20 made the good confession that Jesus is the Christ, and then we read this in Luke 9:21-22. But, so Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ of God.” And then Luke 9:21, “But he warned them,” warned the disciples, directed them not to tell this to anyone. Okay, so right now, let’s keep this messianic thing a secret. I don’t want to be pushed ahead into the, the kingdom by zealous but ignorant people. Don’t do that. Keep the secret. Let’s keep it quiet.
He warned him not to and directed them not to tell this to anyone, saying, “‘The Son of Man,’” you got this all wrong. We’re not taking Rome right now. We’re not taking over the earth. It’s not your day in the sun right now. Listen, “‘the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed and be raised up on the third day.’” Let your eyes go down the page to verse 44 or just before that. While everyone’s marveling at all he was doing, he said to his disciples, he said, “‘Hey guys, put these words into your ears, for the Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men.’”
I could have you also look at Luke 12:50 or Luke 13:32-33. I could have you look at Luke 17:25, but just go to one more, all the way up to Luke 18, chapter 18 in verse 31. Luke 18:31, “But when he took the twelve aside, he said to them, ‘Behold, we’re going up to Jerusalem, and all the things which are written through the prophets about the Son of Man will be completed. For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and mistreated and spit upon. And after they’ve flogged him, they’ll kill him. The third day he will rise again.’” Says here the disciples didn’t understand this at this time. In fact, it’s not going to be until after the resurrection that they look back and they understand, Oh, that’s what he was saying. Everything he said about his own suffering and abuse and rejection came true. Well, let’s just port that over to everything else he said. It’s all true. It’s all going to happen. He is truthful as a prophet. Everything he predicted came true.
Aside from those prophecies of Jesus, we have prophets of the Old Testament, who he alluded to, who also foretold the abuse in the mockery of the Messiah. We already cited David in Psalm 22:11-13, at the start of the sermon. But let’s also add this from Isaiah 50 verses 5 and 6. It says this, “The Lord Yahweh has opened my ear.” It’s also the Messiah speaking, Jesus in a sense, speaking. “The Lord Yahweh has opened my ear. I did not rebel. I did not turn back. I gave my back to those who strike me. I gave my cheeks to those who pluck out the beard. I didn’t hide my face from dishonor and spitting.” Isaiah, 700 years or so before Christ.
The cruel abuse, joking, insults, scorn, mockery, all that intended to shame him and degrade him and ridicule and dehumanize him as a victim. I mean less in our day, we get squeamish when we see a video of police officers taking down truly violent criminals when they make lawful arrests on the street. Looks violent to us. We’re not used to that kind of violence in our polite world.
But to see officers doing what Luke records here? Folks, this is police brutality. We ought to demand an inquiry. We want to see someone fired. There’s this systemic problem here, isn’t there? And if we see that, we, we know that there’s got to be institutional accountability. None of that here. Why not? Because in spite of social standing and respectability, these religious men, from the high priest at the top to the officers and the servants at the bottom, all of them alike, they’re sinfully ignorant.
The abuse, mockery, a bit of fun to them, but they’re treating him with great contempt. And all that starts with the sin of religious tolerance. Travis Allen
And yet their ignorance does not excuse them. They’re culpable, here. They’re guilty. Treat one so majestic and glorious as this, one who is so sinless, who is perfect in all his ways, who possesses sagely wisdom, who uses divine power and never for himself. But his power is used never to abuse anyone, certainly, but rather quite the opposite: to heal, to show mercy, to revive and bring back from the dead, to drive out demons, to feed. This is unjust. And their ignorance is culpable ignorance. We can’t say, Oh, we didn’t know.
Herod and his soldiers, Pontius Pilate and his soldiers, they’re all subject to this religious ignorance. We read about some of that earlier. Paul writes about all of them in Ephesians 4:17-19, “They’re darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance in them, because of the hardness of their heart.” These men have become callous. They’ve been giving themselves over to sensuality. They just do what feels good. They’re practicing every kind of impurity with, and with greediness for more.
Herod with his soldiers, Luke 23:11 says that “after treating him with contempt and mocking him, they dressed him in a gorgeous robe and sent him back to Pilate.” Ha, ha. Here’s the king of the Jews. Luke tells us in the very next verse, Herod and Pilate became really good friends that day. They’re united in abuse, united in the disdain for this so-called king of the Jews. Pilate’s soldiers, also, John 19:2-3. They weave a crown of thorns, put it on his head, array him in a purple robe. “They began coming up to him and saying, ‘Hail, King of the Jews,’” and then start giving him blows in the face with his own scepter. That’s Herod, that’s his corrupt officials, that’s Pilate and his pagan soldiers, so obviously under the darkness of sin and ignorance and callousness and cruelty.
But the Jews, the Jewish people, this is their Messiah. This is the promised one. This is Christ the anointed one. And here they are, from the top religious leaders all the way down through the rank-and-file. And as we read earlier in, in our reading, even the people walking by the cross, “‘He saved others; can’t even save himself. Hey, I’ll tell you what, climb down off that cross and I’ll believe you. I’ll worship you then, ha ha ha.’”
They mock him, here, as a false prophet. They reject him as a pretender and a false king. So ironic that these, the Jews, the people of God, his chosen people, beneficiaries of his revealed Word, recipients of his gracious covenants, the, the object of his precious promises, and now recipients of this man, the chosen king, and they don’t want him. They’re sinning in religious ignorance, refusing Jesus, who is the prophet that Moses promised, Deuteronomy 18:15 and 18:18. They refuse the king that God promised them in 2 Samuel 7 and Psalm 2, and they are for their sin without excuse. Theirs is a culpable ignorance, depraved, vile, and it’s one for which they will give an account.
It’s one for which they suffered terribly, historically, as the Romans destroyed Jerusalem in AD 70. In fact, the Jewish people continue to be harried and hurried and chased and persecuted to this very day. And it’s not until they bow the knee and put their faith in the Christ that they rejected and admit their sin, at that day, they will be saved. And we pray for that. We’ve seen the sins of religious tolerance and religious ignorance. Let’s reflect on what God is doing in this. What’s the divine purpose of Jesus suffering this, all this abuse and this mockery?
Leads us to a third point, final point, the beauty of righteous endurance. The beauty of righteous endurance. Because that’s what Jesus did. He endured. He endured for the sake of righteousness. And it is beautiful. It’s understandable, though, when we ask, Why did Jesus have to suffer in this manner? I mean, we know, of course, that all of this is the sovereign plan of God. It’s the plan of God all along from before the foundation of the world. As these men play their sinful games of beat the prophet, they play right into Acts 2:23 and other texts like it, Acts 22, er, Acts 2:23 says that this is “the predetermined plan in the foreknowledge of God.”
Also, Acts 4:27, “For truly in this city they were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your purpose predestined to occur.” There’s a sovereign plan of God going on, here. We understand that. Theologically, we’re right to say that it’s his actual death on the cross, as in his physical death and the cessation of life from his body, evidenced by his body being buried in the tomb three days.
That’s what secured our salvation: his death for sins. He the innocent one, taking upon himself the sins of all who would ever believe. God imputing the sins of all those who would ever believe throughout time, imputing those to Christ, reckoning them to him, and treating him as if he committed all those sins, and then killing him for it, causing him to be put to death. That secured our salvation.
But what purpose, what possible purpose does this cruelty and the mockery serve? I was, I was struck again as we read through Matthew 26 and Matthew 27, how much that theme kept repeating. I mean, even mothers of Israel. Can you imagine? Moms, get your little kids, “crucify him and let that man’s blood be on me and my kiddos.”
Why does he have to suffer these indignities and insults and mockery? Isn’t the very bitterness of the bitter cup that he drank in the fact that this only wholly innocent, sinless one died the death of a sinner, that that he died the death of that he didn’t deserve? Why must he also suffer the added bitterness of these indignities, of this dehumanizing abuse being made fun of, turning all this into a big game?
Why? Why, why, why the spitting, which is not just, not just repulsive, but it really is meant as an insult, as a grave insult in that culture. Middle Eastern culture? Try that. Go over to Middle Eastern culture and try spitting on someone. See what happens. It isn’t pretty. Why the slaps in the face? Try that in Middle Eastern culture. Slapping somebody in your face, such a grave insult. Why? Why defile the Savior? Why make him stand before a jeering crowd with spittle in his hair, dripping down his beard, dried blood caked all over his face?
Several answers to that. First, we need to see, as I said from the very beginning, this is a picture of the sinfulness of sin. This is what it looks like. It takes someone so perfect as our Lord and degrades him and defiles him and then laughs while doing so. This is satanic, isn’t it? The devil, he is jealous that God chose mankind to bear his image and not angels, men, men and women and so he delights in marring that image and defiling it, degrading it, polluting it, distorting it. He loves to take what’s holy and to shame it and to mar its beauty because he hates God. He hates his image and he hates the fact that it’s on us.
Second, this shows the end of sin, or where sin leads. As I said, the wickedness of sinful tolerance, this, the, the wickedness of, of religious ignorance. So ugly is the abusiveness of bad religion, all non-Christian religion. We’re grateful, aren’t we, that by common grace, very few of us, we have to say, would probably have the stomach to join in with what these officers did in abusing Jesus and mocking him. Many of us are far too refined, polite, squeamish. Rightly so. I think that’s a good thing.
Truth is, these officers, those chief priests, those scribes, those elders, all them are respectable members of society. They attend dinners, PTA meetings, they play with their kids. They’re good parents, they’re faithful in their religious attendance. But all these so-called good and upstanding people, given a set of circumstances, under certain conditions, under certain influences and following certain examples, good people have the capacity to behave very, very badly. Make no mistake, friends, about the evil that’s resident within the sinful human heart. It can come out, given the right set of circumstances.
A third reason that Jesus suffered all this abuse and mocking and joking and all that is it portrays, thirdly, it portrays graphically and very vividly the reason Christ came to die. Sin is just this wretched. Make no mistake, it’s, it’s vile, it’s hateful. When God sends his one and only Son to take on flesh and bear his image and manifest himself to us through his Son, this is how we respond. Sin is vile. Let the justice of God have its vengeance.
Let me just add one more, a fourth reason that Jesus had to endure this abuse and mocking and the scorn. It portrays the beauty, as I said, of righteous endurance. It causes us to glory in our Savior, that we give thanks that he drank the bitter cup for us, that he didn’t call time on the game of beat the prophet and call down twelve legions of angels to just completely wipe these guys out. He didn’t stop it. He endured.
You and I, if we suffer abuse and we’re held captive and we’re suffering this, we have no power. He had power, but he didn’t stop it. It says in Hebrews chapter 12 verse 2 that he “endured the cross. He despised the shame in order that he could sit down at the right hand of the throne of God.” This portrays the beauty of righteous endurance, and the beauty of Christ’s righteous endurance encourages us to endure our own shame for his sake.
What we see portrayed in Luke 22:63-65 is truly sickening to the stomach. It’s depraved and it’s vile, but in, in its portrayal of sinners, it tells the truth, doesn’t it, about the sinfulness of sin, about the cruelty of sinners. Heartless, in a, in a loveless state of mind, those who do what’s right in their own eyes and do not submit themselves to God.
Whenever I hear stories of rape or torture or incest or all the different kinds of cruelties that people commit against the innocent, when you hear about the evil that’s resident in the human heart, the pain, the suffering that sinners inflict on one another, I’m, I’m often left speechless. I’m often feeling disturbed inside, troubled in my soul, bewildered, puzzled with the mystery of sin and sinners. I’m angry.
But folks, God has provided us with a Savior like this. One who knows pain, one who really does know suffering, one who does know what it’s like to have his liberty taken away from him, his gift of sight taken away from him, to not know where the next blow’s coming from, to be laughed at, ashamed, scorned, derided. He really is, as we sang earlier, “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” Isaiah 53, “He alone bore our griefs, He carried our sorrows.” He knows. He knows what it’s like to suffer at the hands of powerful people.
He knows what it’s like to be subjected to cruelty, suffer humiliation, his shame being exposed to the public as he’s virtually naked on the cross. He knows what it’s like to have his flesh ripped, torn, and instead of any sympathy coming from anybody, people laughing at him, making jokes about him, mocking him.
As I said, at any point Jesus could have appealed to his Father, who at once could’ve deployed more than twelve legions of angels, annihilate all these chief priests, all the officers, the Herodians and the Romans as well. He chose not to deliver himself from the scorn, the abuse, but to endure it for your sake and for mine. He’s the prophesied prophet whose word is faithful, whose predictions come true. He’s the King of kings and the Lord of Lords. He’s the Messiah chosen by God, anointed by God, whose reign is eternal, always benevolent, always wise, and who always provides for and protects his people.
And he’s our “merciful, faithful high priest, one who sympathizes with all of our weaknesses, one who’s been tempted in all points as we are” and beyond us, beyond anything we could ever understand, Hebrews 4:15 says, “and yet he’s without sin.” He came to die, yes, to secure our salvation, but he came to endure these indignities of all kinds, to teach us to endure, to find our strength and our hope in him. Because he has granted us, as we repent of our sins and put our faith in him, he’s granted us life eternal, power that comes from God himself by the Spirit and the Word to do anything he commanded us to do, he’s there to help us in our time of need.
If you’re here and you do not yet know this Savior as your own Savior, if you don’t know this, this King of kings and Lord of Lords, who doesn’t stay perched up on a high throne somewhere away from you, but he enters into your misery and your suffering, he endured it for you, you don’t know him as your friend, I invite you today, oh sinner, come repent of your sin.
Because any religion, and you are religious, God made us all religious by design, any religion that you’re in is based on unjust principles. It’s grounded in unrighteousness. It’s falseness, not truth. And left to itself, it will produce the kind of abuse and mockery and scorn that we see depicted here. But sinner, you can be saved if you put your faith in him, if you trust him and trust in his atoning work on the cross. Would you bow with me?
Father, we’re reminded of the hymn, “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded,” and some of the words in that hymn that are our words, “What, what thou, my Lord, has suffered was all for sinners’ gain. Mine, mine was the transgression, but thine the deadly pain. Lo, here I fall, my Savior, ’tis I deserve thy place. Look on me with thy favor, vouchsafe me to thy grace.” We pray, Father, that you would look upon us through your grace, and because of the completed work of Christ on the cross, who provided this atoning sacrifice for our sins, that you would accept us in him. For the sake of your glory, and in his name we pray. Amen.