Mocking of Christ
Notes
Transcript
Good Morning
I visited a Monastery once and as I was walking past the kitchen area, I saw a man frying chips. I asked him “are you the friar?”
He replied “no, I am the chip monk”
Please be in prayer for our Association as we are meeting here at Liberty on the 11th to introduce our candidate for DOM and vote on him.
Next Sunday we will be having a business meeting to vote on the budget for 2026.
Today we will be in Mark 15:15-21.
Last week we looked at the Roman trial of Jesus. Pilate did not find any wrong doing in Jesus. He did not see Jesus as a threat to the Roman Empire. We didn’t go over it, but there were three trials that Jesus went through. The first was with Pilate and he didn’t find anything he should convict Jesus of so he sent Him to King Herod. Herod interrogated Him and he also did not find any guilt in Jesus so he sent Him back to Pilate. Pilate and King Herod hated each other. Pilate was not very sympathetic to the Jews or Herod. When Pilate was first appointed ruler over the Jewish area, he march into Jerusalem carrying banners that had the faces of Romans that were held in places of honor. He brought those banners into the temple and that made the Jews and the Sanhedrin furious. They saw it as idolatry to have those faces on the flags and in the temple. They asked Pilate to remove them and he didn’t, they went to Rome and pleaded their case and won. Rome made Pilate remove the flags. Then later Pilate brought golden shields that had an inscription dedicating them to the Roman Emperor Tiberius. This again made the Sanhedrin mad. They got Pilate in trouble with Rome for a second time. Pilate was not a very liked person in Jerusalem. Herod didn’t like him because Rome took his brother’s territory from him and gave it to Pilate. In Luke 23:12 we are told that they became friends after they both couldn’t find any fault in Jesus.
Pilate and Herod could see right through the lies of the Sanhedrin. Pilate knew that they only brought Jesus to him because they were envious of Him. They wanted the people to like them they way they liked Jesus. They knew that Jesus was a threat to their power and money! They lied to get Him killed and Pilate and Herod could see it was obvious. Not only were the Sanhedrin not good leaders, they were terrible liars. Through all these trials that Jesus was put through, He was alone, He had no one by His side and He had no one to try and defend Him. These were not trials, they were formalities, they Sanhedrin had already made up their minds that Jesus was going to die.
Today we are going to look at the scourging and mocking of Jesus. We are going to briefly look back at verse 15 and the scourging of Jesus and then we will look at the mocking that the Romans did to Jesus. None of the gospel accounts focuses on the actual brutality of the scourging and the crucifixion. Instead they focus more on the humiliation and the mocking that was done to Jesus. We get to see how the world treated the Son of God.
Please stand as we prepare to hear God’s Word
15 So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barabbas, and having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified.
16 And the soldiers led him away inside the palace (that is, the governor’s headquarters), and they called together the whole battalion. 17 And they clothed him in a purple cloak, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on him. 18 And they began to salute him, “Hail, King of the Jews!” 19 And they were striking his head with a reed and spitting on him and kneeling down in homage to him. 20 And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the purple cloak and put his own clothes on him. And they led him out to crucify him.
21 And they compelled a passerby, Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to carry his cross.
Pray
Speak, O Lord, as we come to You
To receive the food of Your holy Word
Take Your truth, plant it deep in us
Shape and fashion us in Your likeness
That the light of Christ might be seen today
Speak, O Lord, and renew our minds
Help us grasp the heights of Your plans for us
Truths unchanged from the dawn of time
That will echo down through eternity
And by grace, we'll stand on Your promises
And by faith, we'll walk as You walk with us
Speak, O Lord, 'til Your church is built
And the earth is filled with Your glory
We can see in verse 15 that all Mark tells us is that Pilate sent Jesus to be flogged or scourged. No details are given. We can get details as to what the flogging was like if we look to historians from that time. Josephus and Albinus both talk about the Roman flogging and they even had people themselves flogged. It was a very brutal punishment. If the Romans were good at anything, it was torture and killing. William Lane gave a detail as to what being flogged entailed.
A Roman scourging was a terrifying punishment. The delinquent was stripped, bound to a post or pillar, or sometimes thrown to the ground. The idea was to get the skin on the back to be stretched out so it was tight and would tear better. Then the person was beaten by a number of guards until the flesh hung in bleeding shreds. The instrument indicated by the Marcan text, the dreaded flagellum, was a scourge consisting of leather thongs plaited with several pieces of bone or metal so as to from a chain. No maximum number of strokes was prescribed by Roman law, and the men condemned to scourging frequently collapsed and died from the flogging. Josephus records that he himself had some of his opponents in Galilee scourged until their entrails were visible (War II.xxi.5), while the procurator Albinus had the prophet Jesus bar Hanan scourged until his bones lay visible (War VI. v.3). (Lane, Mark, 557)
After this brutal beating, the Romans called together the whole cohort. That is 600 hardened soldiers, who all came together and mocked Jesus. It was 600 men against 1 man!
We are told that they put a purple cloak on Him. In Matthew 27:28 we are told that they put a scarlet rob on Him. To many this would seem like a contradiction in the Bible. This is not a contradiction, every Roman soldier was given a scarlet wool cloak that they would wear. Over time being out in the hot sun and the years of sweat and washing, it would fade to a purplish color. This is what they put on Jesus. With 600 cloaks to chose from, they probably picked the oldest and most faded, after all it was going to get all bloody from the wounds on the back of Jesus. Just imagine all those tears and wounds on your back and then someone puts a heavy wool cloak on you and it presses into your back. More pain to add to the already unbearable pain He was in.
Next the put a crown made of thorns on His head. The branches that were woven into the crown were from the Jujube tree, a spiny shrub or small, resilient evergreen tree native to the Middle East and Africa. The thorns are up to 2 inches long and they grew in pairs. With one thorn growing straight out and the other curved. The soldiers would have weaved the crown so that the majority of the thorns were facing into the skull and face area. They didn’t lightly and gently set the crown on Jesus’ head, no they pressed it down into the skin and dug the thorns into the skull. We are told that they gave Him a reed as a mock kingly scepter. This wasn’t a flimsy reed like one that grows near the ponds and lakes. The Greek word used here is the same word used for arrow, so this was a strong stiff stick that they put in Jesus’ hand.
They began to mock Jesus. They bowed down before Him as if He were the Caesar. They shouted Hail, King of the Jews! They spit on Him just like the Sanhedrin did. Remember some of these same Roman soldiers were there when the Sanhedrin were spitting and hitting Jesus in the head. They were doing what they saw the Sanhedrin do. They were mocking the Son of God!! They were mocking the one who came to offer salvation for the very ones beating Him and mocking Him! While they were mocking Him, they took this reed and began to hit Him in the head. That would have hurt bad enough alone, but when He was hit in the head, it drove that crown of thorns deeper and deeper into His skin and skull. This whole time they were bowing down in fake homage to Christ. When they had finally had their fill of the mocking and humiliation of Jesus, they took of the purple cloak and put His clothes back on Him. Again, this would have been an extremely painful process, the cloak was probably stuck to the skin with all the blood on it and the pulling on of His own clothes would have reaggravated His wounds on His back. After the scourging, everything that Jesus did and was forced to do was beyond painful!
After they had put His clothes back on Him, they sent Him to be crucified. Just the walk alone was painful, but the one to be crucified had to carry the cross member of the cross to the site. Jesus had no energy left, I imagine that He could barely walk let alone carry a large wooden pole! So they made Simon of Cyrene (a city in Northern Africa) carry the wooden beam for Jesus. Mark makes a point to mention his two sons, Alexander and Rufus, that seems strange. Remember that Mark is writing this letter to the saints in Rome. In Acts 16:13, Paul writes to greet Rufus, a choice man in the Lord. There is a good chance that this is that Rufus.
Completely alone, humiliated, naked, and beaten nearly to death, our Savior endured yet again ridicule, shame, and pain at the hands of sinful men, at the hands of those He came to save. Oh, how heaven must have looked on in disbelief! I imagine even the angels wept that day! The father sent His beloved Son to rescue and redeem a rebel race. Look at what they have done to our Lord! But look, and never forget, what our Lord has done for us!
These are some very difficult verses for believers to study and get through. There will be more difficult verses in the weeks to come as we get to the crucifixion.
12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted
and in Philippians 1:29
29 For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake
We have a King who suffered for us, because of us. It is only right that we should have to suffer also.
12 Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. 13 But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.
Ships, like men, do poorly when the wind is directly behind, pushing them sloppily on their way so that no care is required in steering or in the management of sails. What is needed is a wind slightly opposed to the ship, for then tension can be maintained, and ideas can germinate. We can see from our own lives that when things are going good and we have not a care in the world, we tend to turn from God and begin to depend on self. It is in these times that we get ourselves into trouble.
We need to point our bows toward Christ and the contrary wind. This will mean vigilance and even danger. But we will be sailing as we were meant to, and there will be another countering wind in our sails — the wind of the Holy Spirit.
Have you suffered for your King?
Are you suffering for Him?
Are you truly living for Him?
What have you given up for Him?
We saw some of what Jesus went through and endured for us, because of us. Jesus didn’t go through all of this because He wanted to, He did it because it was the will of the Father and there was no other way for us to be restored to God! He did this for you and for me.
He did this for whom so ever would call upon the name of the Lord! We do not deserve what Jesus did for us, that is what makes it so special, that He loved us first, before we knew Him. Before we repented and believed in Him.
Jesus went through all that so that we would all have the option of redemption.
How is the life you are living now honoring what Jesus did? Jesus gave up so much to come to earth to be humiliated, mocked, spit on, and executed! All so that you can say you accept Him and live like nothing has changed?
NO, we must live a life that is sold out for Christ! The price was too much, too high for us to just say with our words that we call Him King! We have to show it with how we live! Our lives are a living sacrifice to our King!
We must die to self every day! We have to chose to pick up our cross and follow Jesus. If we are not suffering in some way for Jesus, are we truly following Him? We heard the verses from the Bible that says those who follow Christ will suffer with Him!
How are you suffering? What sacrifices are you making for your King?
Liberty, we have to be different than the Christian who only says He is King, we have to show that He is King! We have to be out there telling people, getting rejected and mocked just like He did! Coming to church won’t get you into heaven! Repenting and believing in Christ Jesus will.
If you are heaven bound, you will be producing the fruit of the Spirit! You will be suffering for Jesus! You will be different than you were before! It is your choice, do you want to have the good life now or later? We can’t live a life that contradicts what the Bible says and say that we are saved! Some one is not being honest and it not the Bible, I promise you that!!
Liberty, as we sing and pray, search yourself and see what is lacking! Take it to God and then go and show the world that He is your King, don’t just say it, live it!
Let’s pray.
