John 18:33-19:11, "Who's in First?"
Notes
Transcript
“Life is full of questions. Idiots are full of answers.”
“Religion is like drugs. It destroys the thinking mind.”
“Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.”
“Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
“Silence is the ultimate weapon of power.”
“The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.” Ken Blanchard
“Nobody trusts anyone in authority today. It is one of the main features of our age. Wherever you look, there are lying politicians, crooked bankers, corrupt police officers, cheating journalists and double-dealing media barons, sinister children's entertainers, rotten and greedy energy companies, and out-of-control security services.” Adam Curtis
“The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis.” Dalai Lama
We are living in a cynical society. No one trusts authority, but everyone is obsessed with power. And truth is relative, down to every individual. The best any of us can do is look within, find our truth, live by our own reason, and don’t trust anyone else.
Meanwhile, Christians claim that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. This is a narrow gospel. We say eternal life is found in giving up your life and submitting to God through faith in Jesus Christ. Let Jesus run the show and your life will flourish.
How do we relate with our relativistic, cynical society? Today we’ll listen in on a conversation between Jesus and a government official about truth, authority, and God’s sovereign plan of redemption. We’ll see the cynicism and relativism of our society is not new. And we’ll see that Jesus is uniquely able to deliver truth and life, even using the injustice of evil people to accomplish it. Everyone needs to answer two questions that come up in our passage.
Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus to you?
Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus to you?
For the last two thousand years, without doubt, no one has changed more in our world than one person, Jesus of Nazareth. He is the most important person who has ever lived. But when you ask, “Who is Jesus?”, you get more answers than there are people. What people are really answering is, “Who is Jesus to you?” But it is essential that everyone know Jesus as He is, not as we wish Him to be. And then we can ask, is the Jesus that is the same Jesus you know?
This is what Pilate was confronted with at the very beginning. The Jewish chief priests said that Jesus was a blasphemer, worthy of death, because He claimed to be the Son of Man, making Himself equal with God. But they could not lawfully carry out capital punishment, so they brought Jesus to the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate.
Pilate is looking for justification. He needs to know if Jesus is a threat to Roman power and the authority of Caesar. So, Pilate gets political.
So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?”
Who is Jesus? Pilate approaches the question in terms he can understand. And unwittingly, he has asked a good question. He has begun a gospel conversation. So Jesus engages. But Jesus starts with a clarifying question. What are Pilate’s presuppositions? Is he seeking truth?
Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?”
What are some questions we can ask people to understand their point of view when we start a gospel conversation?
Pilate, you have asked a good question, but where is it coming from? Where is Pilate getting his information? Is he watching Fox News or CNN? Is he asking a straightforward question seeking truth, or a cynical question based in the media spin? Jesus seeks to understand Pilate’s presuppositions before answering back.
Pilates’ response,
Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?”
is cynical and pragmatic. Is Jesus a threat to Roman rule and the authority of Caesar? He doesn’t really care about the truth.
Jesus answers both the question Pilate is asking, and the question Pilate should have been asking all at once.
Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”
Is Jesus a threat to Roman rule? In a sense, no. He will not raise an army to fight Roman dominance. But in another sense, Jesus raises the stakes by answering the question Pilate should have asked. Who is Jesus?
Jesus is indeed king. But not in any sense Pilate can conceive. We have seen over the last few weeks that Messiah is a different kind of king than any ruler we have ever known. If you are cynical about authority because of all the abuses, Jesus is the one for you. He does not take advantage. He uses divine power to give life to the lifeless and the disadvantaged. He cultivates fruitfulness in others.
Jesus says His kingdom is not “of this world (it does not share its nature), and it is not from this world. (it doesn’t originate here)” We saw from Daniel 7 last week that Jesus’ authority comes from God the Creator. He will not rule in the way other human kings do because He needs nothing from His subjects.
Speaking of His subjects, what does Jesus’ answer to Pilate tell us about how Christians should represent Jesus in our society?
Jesus is a threat to Roman rule in the sense that Jesus’ kingdom does not derive it’s authority from human rulers and laws. It is not answerable to Rome. Pilate heard the message loud and clear.
John 18:37 (ESV)
Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?”
Jesus has answered the question Pilate was asking. But then He comes back to the question He should have been asking.
Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.”
If you only knew the person in front of you, you would not be so worried about who sits on some throne in Rome or Jerusalem. You would have access to the Truth that wove together the fabric of the universe and can give you eternal life. All you have to do is listen to the voice of Jesus.
Pilate’s response?
John 18:38 (ESV)
Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”
Cynicism. As the profound Robert Crosby once said, Pilate claimed truth doesn’t exist while Truth is staring him in the face.
What is John hoping we will get out of this exchange so far? What have you gotten out of the exchange so far? Who is Jesus?
Jesus is Truth incarnate. Truth is linked with authority. He has come from another place to build a kingdom on truth. Everyone who honestly seeks truth will give him a hearing. And if you do, you will find out that what Jesus had said is true,
John 14:6 (ESV)
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
Jesus has made a truth claim. The next question is,
Can Jesus Deliver?
Can Jesus Deliver?
The next question Pilate asks is about Jesus’ authority and power. Truth is connected to authority. Truth has power. But can Jesus deliver on His truth claim?
Pilate is a cynical pragmatist. He sends Jesus outside to be beaten, humiliated, and mocked, which tells us what he really thinks of Him. Who is Jesus to Pilate? He is a hick from Galilee, not worth getting worked up about. Then he is ready to let the chief priests determine Jesus’ fate, but he’s ignorant of the finer points that led to this encounter in the first place. Finally, the chief priests say something that truly troubles Pilate.
The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has made himself the Son of God.”
He entered his headquarters again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer.
Putting the pieces together. Jesus had already told him His kingdom was not from this world, and that He had come into this world to bear witness from the truth. Now the priests are talking about a claim that Jesus is the Son of God. Just where is Jesus from? The fact that Jesus will not answer him unsettles Pilate.
So Pilate said to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?”
Jesus’ answer is so loaded. Here is Jesus, standing before Pilate, beaten and bloody, still wearing the symbols of the humiliation Pilate has inflicted on Him. Jesus won’t entrust the glorious truth of His origin to such a man. But now He will answer Pilate’s question about authority.
Jesus answered him, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.”
Jesus tells us so much. Pilate and the Jewish officials are concerned only with maintaining their authority, and they will use any means necessary. Which should tell us something. Their authority is not innate, so it can be lost. They receive their authority from God. Human rulers measure their authority according to their military or economic power, or the number of followers they influence, or their educational attainment, or the number of people they can subjugate. They don’t understand authority at all.
The kingdom of God is superordinate and the kingdoms of men are subordinate. There is no authority on earth apart from the authority God has determined to delegate.
What are the implications?
The kingdom of God is not answerable to human government. All authority comes from God. All human authorities are subordinate to God’s authority. We obey God first. Also, God has a different purpose for the authority of government and the authority of the church. Government bears the sword to protect citizens and punish evil. The Church bears the means of grace for salvation of souls and the keys to the kingdom of God to edify believers and protect them from false teachers, sin and error. When one of these institutions deviates from its proper authority, they become corrupt. But for Christians, our citizenship in the kingdom of God is superordinate to our citizenship in our home country in our allegiance, affections, and obedience. Jesus first, then America.
This does not mean Christians are allowed to break the laws of their land and disrespect civil authorities. Jesus doesn’t say to Pilate, “you do not have the authority you think you have over me.” He simply says Pilate would not have it if God had not given it to him. Jesus establishes a precedent for all of His followers that both Paul and Peter use to explain our response to civil authorities.
Titus 3:1–2 (ESV)
Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work,
to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, and to show perfect courtesy toward all people.
1 Peter 2:13–17 (ESV)
Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme,
or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good.
For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people.
Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.
In fact, Jesus demonstrated this on the night He was arrested. He subjected Himself to the human institutions. You can read about this earlier in John 18. When the officers come to arrest Him in the garden, Peter drew his sword to protect Jesus from injustice.
So Jesus said to Peter, “Put your sword into its sheath; shall I not drink the cup that the Father has given me?”
The church should never bear the sword to accomplish the plan of redemption for Jesus. It will not work. When the church has done this, it has created generations of pain, suffering, and misunderstanding of the gospel.
But what happens if the government becomes so corrupt as to promote evil, unjustly punish the good, and oppose God? Jesus is very clear. He would drink that cup of suffering to accomplish our redemption. Obedience to God sometimes requires disobedience to human authorities, and we bear the consequences.
Can Jesus deliver? Can He reveal the truth of God even when He is subjected to the injustice of humans who are ruling as animals? Can He live up to His identity as the Son of God who came to seek and save the lost and restore the kingdom of God to the needy even when He is misrepresented as a fool? Can He accomplish redemption and establish the kingdom of God even under an unjust regime? Can He deliver us from our sins when He is suffering opposition from sinful men?
Communion
The gospel of Jesus Christ is how we relate to a cynical society.
Questions for Discussion
What are you celebrating this week? What are you finding challenging this week?
What are some challenges to living as a Christian in a cynical and relativistic society?
What are some sources people you know use for information about Jesus? Who do they say Jesus is?
What are some ways Jesus bore witness to the truth?
What are you learning from Jesus as you listen to His voice right now?
How do we as Christians relate to the authority of the institutions in our society? How should we?
How does the gospel inform our relationship with those in authority?
How does the gospel address the cynicism of people in our society?
How will you respond to this passage this week?
Who is someone you can share this passage with this week?
