Good Friday: Numbered Among Sinners

John 18:1–19:30 NIV

1 When he had finished praying, Jesus left with his disciples and crossed the Kidron Valley. On the other side there was a garden, and he and his disciples went into it. 2 Now Judas, who betrayed him, knew the place, because Jesus had often met there with his disciples. 3 So Judas came to the garden, guiding a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and the Pharisees. They were carrying torches, lanterns and weapons. 4 Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to him, went out and asked them, “Who is it you want?” 5 “Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “I am he,” Jesus said. (And Judas the traitor was standing there with them.) 6 When Jesus said, “I am he,” they drew back and fell to the ground. 7 Again he asked them, “Who is it you want?” “Jesus of Nazareth,” they said. 8 Jesus answered, “I told you that I am he. If you are looking for me, then let these men go.” 9 This happened so that the words he had spoken would be fulfilled: “I have not lost one of those you gave me.” 10 Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.) 11 Jesus commanded Peter, “Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?” 12 Then the detachment of soldiers with its commander and the Jewish officials arrested Jesus. They bound him 13 and brought him first to Annas, who was the father-in-law of Caiaphas, the high priest that year. 14 Caiaphas was the one who had advised the Jewish leaders that it would be good if one man died for the people. 15 Simon Peter and another disciple were following Jesus. Because this disciple was known to the high priest, he went with Jesus into the high priest’s courtyard, 16 but Peter had to wait outside at the door. The other disciple, who was known to the high priest, came back, spoke to the servant girl on duty there and brought Peter in. 17 “You aren’t one of this man’s disciples too, are you?” she asked Peter. He replied, “I am not.” 18 It was cold, and the servants and officials stood around a fire they had made to keep warm. Peter also was standing with them, warming himself. 19 Meanwhile, the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching. 20 “I have spoken openly to the world,” Jesus replied. “I always taught in synagogues or at the temple, where all the Jews come together. I said nothing in secret. 21 Why question me? Ask those who heard me. Surely they know what I said.” 22 When Jesus said this, one of the officials nearby slapped him in the face. “Is this the way you answer the high priest?” he demanded. 23 “If I said something wrong,” Jesus replied, “testify as to what is wrong. But if I spoke the truth, why did you strike me?” 24 Then Annas sent him bound to Caiaphas the high priest. 25 Meanwhile, Simon Peter was still standing there warming himself. So they asked him, “You aren’t one of his disciples too, are you?” He denied it, saying, “I am not.” 26 One of the high priest’s servants, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, challenged him, “Didn’t I see you with him in the garden?” 27 Again Peter denied it, and at that moment a rooster began to crow. 28 Then the Jewish leaders took Jesus from Caiaphas to the palace of the Roman governor. By now it was early morning, and to avoid ceremonial uncleanness they did not enter the palace, because they wanted to be able to eat the Passover. 29 So Pilate came out to them and asked, “What charges are you bringing against this man?” 30 “If he were not a criminal,” they replied, “we would not have handed him over to you.” 31 Pilate said, “Take him yourselves and judge him by your own law.” “But we have no right to execute anyone,” they objected. 32 This took place to fulfill what Jesus had said about the kind of death he was going to die. 33 Pilate then went back inside the palace, summoned Jesus and asked him, “Are you the king of the Jews?” 34 “Is that your own idea,” Jesus asked, “or did others talk to you about me?” 35 “Am I a Jew?” Pilate replied. “Your own people and chief priests handed you over to me. What is it you have done?” 36 Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.” 37 “You are a king, then!” said Pilate. Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” 38 “What is truth?” retorted Pilate. With this he went out again to the Jews gathered there and said, “I find no basis for a charge against him. 39 But it is your custom for me to release to you one prisoner at the time of the Passover. Do you want me to release ‘the king of the Jews’?” 40 They shouted back, “No, not him! Give us Barabbas!” Now Barabbas had taken part in an uprising. 1 Then Pilate took Jesus and had him flogged. 2 The soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head. They clothed him in a purple robe 3 and went up to him again and again, saying, “Hail, king of the Jews!” And they slapped him in the face. 4 Once more Pilate came out and said to the Jews gathered there, “Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him.” 5 When Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, “Here is the man!” 6 As soon as the chief priests and their officials saw him, they shouted, “Crucify! Crucify!” But Pilate answered, “You take him and crucify him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against him.” 7 The Jewish leaders insisted, “We have a law, and according to that law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God.” 8 When Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid, 9 and he went back inside the palace. “Where do you come from?” he asked Jesus, but Jesus gave him no answer. 10 “Do you refuse to speak to me?” Pilate said. “Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?” 11 Jesus answered, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.” 12 From then on, Pilate tried to set Jesus free, but the Jewish leaders kept shouting, “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar.” 13 When Pilate heard this, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judge’s seat at a place known as the Stone Pavement (which in Aramaic is Gabbatha). 14 It was the day of Preparation of the Passover; it was about noon. “Here is your king,” Pilate said to the Jews. 15 But they shouted, “Take him away! Take him away! Crucify him!” “Shall I crucify your king?” Pilate asked. “We have no king but Caesar,” the chief priests answered. 16 Finally Pilate handed him over to them to be crucified. So the soldiers took charge of Jesus. 17 Carrying his own cross, he went out to the place of the Skull (which in Aramaic is called Golgotha). 18 There they crucified him, and with him two others—one on each side and Jesus in the middle. 19 Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: jesus of nazareth, the king of the jews. 20 Many of the Jews read this sign, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the sign was written in Aramaic, Latin and Greek. 21 The chief priests of the Jews protested to Pilate, “Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,’ but that this man claimed to be king of the Jews.” 22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.” 23 When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his clothes, dividing them into four shares, one for each of them, with the undergarment remaining. This garment was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom. 24 “Let’s not tear it,” they said to one another. “Let’s decide by lot who will get it.” This happened that the scripture might be fulfilled that said, “They divided my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.” So this is what the soldiers did. 25 Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” 27 and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home. 28 Later, knowing that everything had now been finished, and so that Scripture would be fulfilled, Jesus said, “I am thirsty.” 29 A jar of wine vinegar was there, so they soaked a sponge in it, put the sponge on a stalk of the hyssop plant, and lifted it to Jesus’ lips. 30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

4/3/2026

Order of Service:

Special Notes:

Opening Prayer:

Numbered Among Sinners

Movement 1: The Suffering Servant (Isaiah 52:13–15)

Isaiah 52:13 through 53:12 has long been considered a prophecy of the suffering servant. It's one of the few places in the Old Testament that direct our attention to the kinds of suffering the Messiah will endure for us. The first verse of that passage says,

"See, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted."

I hear that introduction, and I've been listening with you to the story of Jesus going to the cross. But I have to admit, there isn't anything about this that sounds like "wisdom" to me. Surely there is a safer, cleaner, more efficient way to save us from our sin.

We've seen throughout this season of Lent that sin permeates all of life. It reaches out and corrupts everyone and everything, leading us to devastation and death. But so far, Jesus has been able to transform the lives of people with a word or a small act. What we have heard about him today is something different... something more. What does Jesus do with our sin?

Isaiah's prophecy continues. Right after calling his servant "raised and lifted up and highly exalted," he writes,

"Just as there were many who were appalled at him, his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness, so he will sprinkle many nations, and kings will shut their mouths because of him. For what they were not told, they will see, and what they have not heard, they will understand."

We've already heard tonight what they did to Jesus, so the disfigurement doesn't surprise us. What's shocking is that Isaiah pairs it with exaltation. God's plan for his servant doesn't go around suffering. It goes straight through it.

Yet it gets the attention of people, not just Israel but all the nations. What was intended as a message to his followers and to the Jews in Jerusalem became a message to the world.

Movement 2: The Despised One (Isaiah 53:1–3)

That message would eventually reach the world through everyone who was there that day.

"Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?"

Who, standing there at the crucifixion, could look on Jesus and see anyone worth following?

"He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem."

★ Jesus is not who we wanted or expected. He's who God chose.

The world didn't want God's choice. Give us Barabbas instead. Crucify Jesus. They pounded and tore at his flesh until he barely looked human. Maybe they thought it was okay to do this because he didn't look like much. He wasn't from anywhere important. Not only was he easy to overlook, he was easy to abuse. He was easy to despise. We didn't just miss him; we turned our face away from him.

I wonder why that is. I wonder why Isaiah wrote about the Messiah's appearance and how he would be treated because of it. Perhaps it is because we expect the one who came from heaven to look heavenly, to have a beauty that goes far beyond us, a beauty that's unattainable.

We don't have a problem thinking about Jesus as being spotless, without blemish. We don't have a problem painting a halo over his head in those images we have of him, whether it's him as an adult, a child, or even as a newborn infant. We look at ourselves in the mirror and see our flaws, our spots, our blemishes, and we think it's because we're still sinners. We're imperfect, and we look the part.

When heaven comes down to us and it looks common, when the Son of God doesn't look any more beautiful than we do, what does that mean? Does it mean we don't have an excuse for being who we are, for acting the way that we do? Does it mean the sin that we claim is our birthright, and in some ways our birthmark, might actually be more of a choice that we make every day? We can't have that.

We didn't turn away from him because he wasn't beautiful or strong enough. We turned away because he looked too much like us, and that meant our sin looked too much like a choice we make every day. We would rather get rid of the Savior than admit that we needed him to save us.

Movement 3: The Sin-Bearer (Isaiah 53:4–6)

And he knew that. Isaiah writes,

"Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted."

He did it without asking our permission. We thought he was being punished by God for not being good enough, beautiful enough, talented enough. For not saving more people, healing more people, getting more accomplished in the time that he had here on earth. For not being strong enough to overturn the Jewish leaders and kick out the Romans. For failing.

But as they stripped him and interrogated him, whipped him and forced him to carry that cross up the hill, he wasn't failing. This was God's servant at work, taking our pain, bearing our sins, suffering for us, being broken so that we might know peace and healing.

"But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.

“We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all."

Who put that sin on him? It was not us. It was not the Jews or the Romans. It was the Lord. God put that sin on Jesus and in so doing made him a sacrifice for our sake.

This is how Jesus deals with sin. This is how Jesus deals with our sin. He takes it upon himself. It is punishment, but not his. It is suffering, but not for his own sin. It is his act of love, his act of rescuing us by taking our sin and the punishment that comes with it.

Movement 4: The Silent Lamb (Isaiah 53:7–9)

What he did on that cross got our attention, and it wasn't because of anything he said.

"He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth."

Throughout Lent we have heard Jesus speak with authority to everyone he encountered. He challenged the devil, taught a scholar, offered living water, gave sight to the blind, and called the dead back to life. Now, at the moment it matters most, he is silent. He is no longer engaging sin from the outside. He is taking it upon himself.

"He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth."

"By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth."

Nobody protested. Nobody tried to stop it, and neither did he.

He was silent in the midst of the questions of Caiaphas and Pilate. They gave him the opportunity to defend himself, to walk away from this execution. He refused. There were made-up charges and a mockery of a trial as the world watched and did nothing. When justice tried to prevail and let him go, the crowd demanded his death. They gave him the cross that was meant for the criminal and chose to let the criminal go free.

A perfect lamb. In many ways, more than a lamb, because this lamb had a choice. This lamb had the power to turn it back. This lamb deserved to live.

Movement 5: The Willing Sacrifice (Isaiah 53:10–12)

Seven hundred years before that night, Isaiah saw what no one standing at the cross could see. He wrote,

"Yet it was the Lord's will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities. Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors."

Isaiah saw a victory beyond the suffering, beyond the cross... but we are not there yet.

Jesus had told his disciples this was going to happen, that this was the plan all along. None of them could understand it. Most of them couldn't bear to be near him. They abandoned and rejected him. Judas betrayed him. Peter denied him. I think in that moment, the other disciples lost their faith in him and fled. Even as they scattered, Jesus had already said of them, "I have not lost one of those you gave me."

He was the Lamb of God, come to take away the sin of the world, and he accepted that role for our sake. He poured out his life. He bore the sin of many. He allowed himself to be numbered among sinners, and in so doing, he made intercession for them... for us.

Conclusion

★ What does Jesus do with our sin? He takes it upon himself. He already has.

We talk about the cross as an offer waiting for our response. But that is not what Isaiah described tonight. God put our sin on Jesus. He bore it and paid for it without asking our permission. What happened on that cross was not an invitation waiting to be accepted. It was the act of God, and it is already done.

So the question tonight is not whether Jesus will deal with your sin. He already has. The question is what it costs you to say you believe he has but live as though he hasn't.

What is left for us to do?

In the story of the Exodus, on the night of the first Passover, when the lambs were slain, the Israelites had the same question. God had acted. The lamb had been sacrificed. The blood was available. But they still had to decide how they would respond.

Some could put the blood on their door as commanded but spend the night cowering inside, terrified, living as though they were not forgiven. The blood is on the door, but fear is still in the house.

Some could pretend they had no sin to forgive and refuse to put the blood on their door at all, arrogantly ignoring the angel of death coming through to punish sin.

Some could try to go out and fight the angel of death themselves, punishing themselves for their own sin, doomed to fail.

Or they could put their trust in God, trust in the blood of the sacrifice he provided for them, and leave Egypt and their sin behind.

The sin we see, the sin we know, is sin that's already forgiven. We have been consecrated by that blood, set apart for God's use. The parts of our life that are not for God's use, he intends us to leave behind in Egypt as we follow him today, as we follow him into the promised land.

See your sin. See that it has been taken from you. See that you have a choice of where to go from here.

Tonight, the guilt of your sin has been dealt with. That is what the cross accomplished. If sin still has a grip on your life, if you walk out of here tonight and feel its pull, that is not a sign that the cross has failed. It is a sign that there is more to the story. Easter is coming. But tonight it is enough to know that you are forgiven.

I said at the beginning that none of this sounded like wisdom to me. Surely there was a safer, cleaner, more efficient way. But there is no other way to match the depth of our sin with the depth of God's love. ★ This is what the wisdom of God looks like.

Today is the day. Lent is almost over. Today is the day you can decide what you are going to leave behind for good, knowing that because of Jesus, you have that choice.

In a moment we will sing together and then hear the account of Jesus's burial from the gospel of John. Before we do, I want to give you a moment of silence. Jesus came to forgive you and set you free. As you sit with him, the lamb of God who was slain to take away the sin of the world, ask yourself:

What will you leave behind in Egypt tonight?