The Crucifixion (John 19:16-30)

Announcements

No Bible Study & Prayer this Wednesday (4.13.22); join us for a Good Friday service (4.15.22) at 7pm

T-shirts should arrive from Custom Ink this Friday—if they do arrive, we’ll be sure to have them here for pick-up after the Good Friday service. At the very latest, they should arrive by Resurrection Sunday.

I want to again thank those of you that were able to be here yesterday who volunteered your time to serve the church and the community during the PRC Spring Fling event. Despite the crazy weather, you were willing to come and show the community that you care for them—I’m not completely positive on the statistics for the event because the PRC isn’t positive on the statistics, but it seems as if we have about 80 children come through our door to collect eggs and get their faces painted by the PO cheerleaders, which means we also handed dozens of flyers to children and adults. Let’s pray for fruit in that outreach effort.

Please be aware of the following dates:

No Wednesday Bible Study & Prayer this week or on April 27th.

Let me remind you again, that there is a Good Friday service this Friday at 7pm, please prepare to partake in the Lord’s Supper during that service.

This coming Sunday is Resurrection Sunday (4.17.22) -- Breakfast at 9am; Worship at 10:30am—please be sure to invite your friends and family for both breakfast and worship. We’d love to have as many people as we can to join us for the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection.

Let me remind you to continue worshiping the Lord through your giving. To help you give, we have three ways to do so, (1) cash and checks can be given at the offering box. Checks should be written to Grace & Peace; debit, credit, and ACH transfers can be done either by (2) texting 84321 with your $[amount] and following the text prompts or (3) by visiting us online at www.gapb.church. Of course, everything you give goes to the building up of our local church and the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Call to Worship (Psalm 48:9-14)

Our Call to Worship is Psalm 48:9-14. Remember that Psalm 48 is a song about the city of God and the great King. The people are praising God who loves Jerusalem and in the first part of the psalm, he focuses on how God delivered the city from the hands of the enemies. In our section for this morning, the focus is on praising God and rejoicing in God’s steadfast love. Please stand and read with me psalm 48:8-14—I’ll read the odd-numbered verses, please join me in reading the even-numbered verses.

Congregational Singing

My Jesus Fair

There is a Fountain

The Power of the Cross

Scripture Reading (Isaiah 53:7-12)

Our Scripture Reading this morning is Isaiah 53:7-12. It is a familiar passage for most of us, which we started reading last week. I’ve asked Tara to read it and because it is so familiar, I’m not going to give much detail other than to remind us that this is a prophecy concerning the Messiah’s crucifixion. Keep in mind the prophecies that Jesus fulfills as we continue in our worship this morning. Tara can you read Isaiah 53:7-12 for us?

Isaiah 53:7–12 NASB 2020

7 He was oppressed and afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. 8 By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off from the land of the living For the wrongdoing of my people, to whom the blow was due? 9 And His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. 10 But the Lord desired To crush Him, causing Him grief; If He renders Himself as a guilt offering, He will see His offspring, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand. 11 As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, For He will bear their wrongdoings. 12 Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, And He will divide the plunder with the strong, Because He poured out His life unto death, And was counted with wrongdoers; Yet He Himself bore the sin of many, And interceded for the wrongdoers.

Sermon

Introduction

If you have your Bible with you this morning, please turn it to John 19:16-30.

Now, I’m sure if you’re familiar with the traditional church calendar, that you’ll notice fairly quick that we aren’t following the traditional church calendar. Traditionally, today is celebrated as Palm Sunday, which is a reminder of Jesus coming into Jerusalem the week before his death, burial, and resurrection. Clearly, because of the series that we’re working through, we actually discussed Jesus’ triumphal entry all the way back in October of 2021. On October 24, 2021, we spent the whole message discussing the meaning and the purpose of the triumphal entry and since we’ve been working through this text in a verse-by-verse manner, it really wouldn’t make much sense for us to go back to discuss the triumphal entry again just to return to our text for this morning after Resurrection Sunday. I do think that knowing that it’s been several months since we worked through the triumphal entry and that in real-time, Jesus’ triumphal entry occurred just one week before his death, burial, and resurrection does speak to how much Scripture we’ve covered as we’ve worked through the text over these past few months.

Instead of following the traditional church calendar, we chose to continue following the text and with the exception of a brief break for a few weeks, it lined up just right to where we’ll celebrate the Resurrection on Resurrection Sunday at the same time that we’ll study the resurrection in Scripture. Because of this, today’s message isn’t that of a triumphal entry, but of the death of Jesus on the cross.

This morning’s focus is on the crucifixion, but notice that John doesn’t give us significant detail of the crucifixion. He doesn’t mention the conversation between Jesus and the criminals that were crucified with Jesus (though he does mention that there were two others crucified with him), John doesn’t mention the words that Jesus cries out, the “Eli, Eli, llama sabachthani,” “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.”

Much like last week’s message, John is focusing on something, in particular, and its being driven by the purpose of his book, which is found in John 20:30-31 “30 So then, many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that by believing you may have life in His name.”

He’s writing his account of the crucifixion with the mindset that he’s trying to convince people to believe and we need to keep that in mind as we read John 19:16-30.

John 19:16–30 ESV

16 So he delivered him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus, 17 and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. 18 There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them. 19 Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It read, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” 20 Many of the Jews read this inscription, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and it was written in Aramaic, in Latin, and in Greek. 21 So the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The King of the Jews,’ but rather, ‘This man said, I am King of the Jews.’ ” 22 Pilate answered, “What I have written I have written.” 23 When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his garments and divided them into four parts, one part for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom, 24 so they said to one another, “Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.” This was to fulfill the Scripture which says, “They divided my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.” So the soldiers did these things, 25 but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” 27 Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. 28 After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” 29 A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. 30 When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

As we study this passage together, we’re going to take it in two parts, though I will be honest, the last section, we’re not going to spend a lot of time on today because we’ll spend more time on it this Friday during our Good Friday service. The two parts are this: (1) Vss. 16-22, The Crucifixion of Jesus Christ, (2) Vss. 23-30, The Fulfillment of Scripture. As we study this passage together, we’re going to be struck with the intensity of the crucifixion, but we’ll be reminded again that Jesus was in control of the whole situation and that he intended for these events to happen for the fulfillment of his mission on earth. This hopefully, will cause us to reflect on God’s sovereignty and what we call God’s providence.

Prayer for Illumination

The Crucifixion (16-22)

The text starts by recording the event itself and again, remember that John is writing this text with the mindset that he’s trying to convince people to believe in Jesus as the Messiah, so he actually doesn’t give too many details. Vs. 16 starts with “So he delivered him over to them to be crucified.”

Of course, this connects us back to the previous passage in which Pilate interrogates Jesus one final time. This is the same paragraph in which Jesus makes it clear that he’s really the one sovereign in this situation, he is the one in control.

Jesus is completely sovereign in this whole situation, which is why he can plainly tell Pilate that Pilate wouldn’t have any authority, if it wasn’t given to him from above.

And that idea of Jesus being the one in control continues through our passage for this morning as well.

We need to keep this truth at the forefront of our minds, otherwise, we’ll miss the truth of the text.

So, Pilate, gives Jesus over the them to be crucified and then “they took Jesus, and he [meaning Jesus] went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. There they crucified him.”

Now John does give a number of details here, but I’m sure you noticed that they’re pretty basic details. He doesn’t give much more information other than when and where these events took place.

Again, he doesn’t bother with fine details like the fact that Matthew, Mark, and Luke all mention that they had someone else carry the cross for part of the time because Jesus couldn’t physically keep going.

And he doesn’t bother recording what Jesus says in Luke 23 to the crowd of people.

Rather, John is very pointed and very simple with his record. Jesus carried his cross and they took him to a place called Golgotha and they crucified him.

He does give a few more details in vs. 18, that there were two others, “one on either side, and Jesus between them.”

But it isn’t until vss. 19-22 when we start seeing more specific details concerning the nature in which Jesus was crucified.

When we think of the death penalty today, we think of private the death portion or the punishment being private. It’s usually just the criminal, their immediate family, a spiritual leader, and the guards (and typically legal council).

But in first-century Rome, most of the death sentences were very public events. They wanted people to witness these events and the reason for it was quite simple.

Rome was an empire and empires controlled other countries and regions. In their thinking, what better way to convince people to behave than to publically show them what happens when you break the law?

Thus, in Jesus’ crucifixion, it was a public event, that people watched. So, it makes sense then that Pilate would make it abundantly clear what the accusation against Jesus was.

He makes this abundantly clear in vss. 19-22, “Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It read, ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.’”

The accusation that convinces Pilate to actually crucify Jesus is the claim of Jesus to be the King. Remember, back in vs. 14-15, that’s precisely how the Jewish people convince Pilate to kill Jesus. “He said to the Jews, ‘Behold your King!’ They cried out, ‘away with him . . . crucify him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Shall I crucify your King?’” And the chief priests respond with “We have no king but Caesar.”

And it’s directly after that exchange that the Bible says Pilate delivered Jesus over to be crucified. It makes sense then that the primary accusation that causes Pilate to crucify Jesus would be his claim to be the king.

So, Pilate writes this inscription over the cross, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.”—whether Pilate actually believed this to be the case isn’t of any consequence. More than likely, he didn’t believe that Jesus was the king of the Jews because remember, he’s only crucifying Jesus to placate the Jewish people.

The only reason that Pilate would write this then, is because this is what Jesus was accused of. Gerald Borchert suggests that the reason Pilate wrote it the way he did, instead of taking the chief priests’ suggestion in vs. 21 to write “This man said, I am King of the Jews” is because he wrote it out of disgust. Disgust in what the Jewish people did and disgust in how the Jewish leadership forced his hand, but this is purely speculation.

Regardless as to why Pilate wrote it the way that he did, it’s clear that he wrote what he wrote intentionally.

He intentionally chose to accuse Jesus of claiming to be the king of the Jews and he did it in such a way that was completely public.

In first-century Rome, the primary language spoken was latin. Latin was the language that Rome chose to utilize for all their governmental and economic needs.

Thus, it makes sense that he would write this inscription, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” in Latin, but he chooses to go a step further in vs. 20. He not just writes it in Latin, but in Aramaic and in Greek, as well.

“Many of the Jews read this inscription, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and it was written in Aramaic, in Latin, and in Greek.”

Latin was the language of the Roman government and they utilized Latin for official declarations.

Greek was the language of the people—in fact, the Greek that was utilized in the first-century is called koine Greek, which literally means common Greek. Everyone spoke it.

Aramaic was the language of the Jewish people during the first century.

Thus, Pilate wrote the accusation against Jesus in the three most spoken languages in first-century Israel

So far in the text, we’ve studied about the crucifixion of Jesus itself. We don’t get very many details concerning the crucifixion, but we do see that John emphasizes how public the crucifixion of Jesus was—Jesus was crucified near the city, the accusation was written so that all could read it and it was during one of the most important feast days of the year, thus, everyone knew it happened and anyone who cared to see it in-person could do so. But again, we don’t get very many details concerning the crucifixion and like I said during the introductory material, that lack of information is intentional.

John is writing his gospel account to prove that Jesus is the Messiah and he doesn’t need to dig into the fine details of the crucifixion in order to prove that Jesus is the Messiah. How do we know? Because John doesn’t give us the fine details and he doesn’t talk a ton about the crucifixion itself; instead, in vss. 23-30, he moves on. Jesus is now crucified on the cross, but he isn’t dead yet. But instead of focusing on Jesus hanging on the cross, John writes of three different events that occurred while Jesus was on the cross. Let’s re-read vss. 23-30.

The Fulfillment of Scripture (23-30)

John 19:23–30 ESV

23 When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his garments and divided them into four parts, one part for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom, 24 so they said to one another, “Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.” This was to fulfill the Scripture which says, “They divided my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.” So the soldiers did these things, 25 but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. 26 When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son!” 27 Then he said to the disciple, “Behold, your mother!” And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home. 28 After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), “I thirst.” 29 A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. 30 When Jesus had received the sour wine, he said, “It is finished,” and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

The first event that John writes about seems as if it comes out of no where. We see Jesus being crucified, we see Pilate writing about Jesus being the King of the Jews and we see how that statement angers the high priest.

And then, all of a sudden in vss. 23-24, we completely change gears and John writes about something seemingly random. While Jesus is hanging on the cross, John focuses in on the soldiers that had crucified Jesus. Vs 23 says, “When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his garments and divided them into four parts, one part for each soldier; also his tunic. But the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom.”

Now, you might read this and think: “why on earth, would they want Jesus’ clothing?” Why would they want the clothes of a person they just put to death?

And it’s actually quite a simple reason when you remember that they’re soldiers. When soldiers go to war and they fight an enemy and win; what do they do? They collect the spoils of war.

For the soldiers, a crucifixion wasn’t a big deal, it was part of their job. They could really care less about the persons hanging on the cross, they’re really more concerned with what their rewards are for crucifying the persons on the cross.

Jesus isn’t even dead yet, but the soldiers aren’t concerned with him, they’re more concerned with the spoils of war.

And because Jesus’ tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom, the soldiers determine not to cut the tunic up, but in vs. 24, “they said to one another, ‘Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.”

Now, we could think of this as just another random detail that really isn’t important, but this detail is actually the first time a certain idea is presented in this text outrightly.

It is this idea that undergirds or lays the foundation for the meaning of this text. The soldiers are unknowingly doing something that actually confirms Jesus’ claim to be the Messiah.

And it is this idea that John is emphasizing in this passage and that he continues to emphasize throughout the passage.

We see it in the second half of vs. 24 for the first time in this text, “This was to fulfill the Scripture which says, ‘They divided my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.’ So the soldiers did these things.”

John’s point that undergirds this text is the fulfillment of Scripture. That Jesus, even in the crucifixion, fulfilled Scripture that the Messiah was supposed to fill. In vs. 24, it’s this idea that the soldiers were to cast lots for his clothes.

Vs. 24 quotes from Psalm 22, which is a Messianic psalm. David wrote Psalm 22 as a prophecy concerning the coming Messiah, you can tell because it starts with a sentence that ought to sound familiar; Psalm 22:1, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”

The psalm continues to describe this situation in which the person being written about feels as if God has completely been separated from him.

It speaks of how the enemies around him deride him and sneer at him. How they make the accusation that if he knew God; God would rescue him.

John, with hindsight, remembers the crucifixion and it occurs to him that the casting of the lots for Jesus’ clothing was a fulfillment of what David writes about concerning the Messiah.

The Messiah fulfilled Scripture and that’s vitally important for us to remember concerning Jesus and his death, burial, and resurrection. We’re going to return to this idea of Jesus fulfilling Scripture in a few minutes, when we return to the idea of Jesus fulfilling Scripture, but first, we need to talk about vss. 25-27.

Vss. 25-27 actually does look as if it’s a completely different topic. We read about the crucifixion and we read about how the soldiers casting lots fulfilled Scripture, but then John spends three verses wedged in-between two sections concerning Jesus’ fulfillment of Scripture, to talk about Jesus’ mother, Mary. And again, it seems a bit out of place, vs. 25, “but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciples whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son!’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother!’ And from that hour the disciple took her to his own home.”

I’m sure, you’ve noticed how unusual it is that John would wedge this in-between two sections talking about Jesus’ fulfillment of Scripture, but let me remind you of the author of the book.

John has a masterful way of taking two ideas and contrasting them in a drastic way to make a point. Starting all the way back in John 1, he contrasts light with darkness.

He contrasts the difference between the love of the world and the love for God; The Samaritan woman, who sought the truth, and his disciples who were too distracted to seek truth at the time; time and time again, we see Jesus contrasted with the religious leaders of the day; and John’s doing the same thing in vss. 25-27.

He’s contrasting the mother of Jesus and the other two Marys with the soldiers—and really, what he’s doing is contrasting those who believe in Jesus with those who refused to believe in Jesus.

The soldiers who didn’t believe, didn’t even bother to watch as Jesus suffered and died on the cross; they were too concerned with reaping the reward of his death in a materialistic way.

Those who genuinely believed, watched and they observed and they weeped and they mourned.

Do you see the contrast? John contrasts these two people groups on purpose.

In addition to the contrast, there is a detail that’s of note in vss. 26-27. Jesus sees the disciple whom he loved, whom we know to be John himself and he tells his mother to “behold [John as her] son.”

Most scholars are in agreement that by this time of Jesus’ life, Joseph was no longer living. As such, because Jesus was the oldest, Jewish custom dictated that Jesus ought to take care of his mother.

Even in his crucifixion, Jesus is careful to fulfil his familial duty to take care of his mother, but he does it in a way that might seem surprising to most people during that time. Typically, if the eldest brother passed, the responsibility would pass then to the next oldest son.

Jesus had other brothers, but he passes on the responsibility of caring for his mother to someone who actually isn’t his brother.

He passes on the responsibility of caring for his mother to the apostle John.

Gerald Borchert, “The significance of [these] statements is further defined by the evangelist’s editorial note . . . The traditional role of the oldest son in a Jewish family was to provide for the care of the mother when the husband or father of the house was no longer around to care for the mother. It seems clear that Jesus here fulfilled his family responsibility as a dutiful son.” (NAC, 269)

But this situation poses a significant question. Why did Jesus pass this responsibility to someone that wasn’t technically part of the family?

And I think Colin Kruse explains it best. “The reason why [Jesus] entrusted [his mother] to the beloved disciple instead of one of his own brothers was probably because at that time they did not believe in him . . . and [they] were not present at the crucifixion.” (TNTC, 363)

Why did Jesus chose to have a disciple care for his mother rather than his own flesh and blood? For the same reason that the soldiers could care less that Jesus was on the cross dying when his disciples watched, observed, and weeped.

The soldiers didn’t believe, but the disciples did; Jesus’ brothers didn’t believe, but John did.

John interjects these few verses with the intent of contrasting belief with unbelief, because remember; his whole purpose for writing this book is to convince people to believe.

And in doing so, he shows us just how differently people viewed Jesus even in the midst of Jesus’ crucifixion.

The unbelievers could care less (for the time being); the believers cared significantly. In a way, it confirms Paul’s statement in 1 Corinthians 1:18, “For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing [those who refuse to believe], but to us who are being saved [those who genuinely believe] it is the power of God.”

The unbelieving soldiers, unbelieving siblings, and unbelieving spectators are watching the event thinking that it’s just a regular crucifixion, so they don’t care. The believing disciples of Jesus are watching the event, but they don’t have the understanding that Jesus is going to return, to they show their concern with grief and mourning.

There’s a vast difference in how people respond to the cross based on their belief or lack thereof and John emphasizes this difference by contrasting unbelievers with believers before moving onto one last statement.

Vss. 28-30 finishes this text with, “After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said (to fulfill the Scripture), ‘I thirst.’ A jar full of sour wine stood there, so they put a sponge full of the sour wine on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the sour win, he said, ‘it is finished,’ and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.”

Now there are a number of significant details that we can work through in these last three verses, but we aren’t going to spend a significant amount of time working through these details today.

The reason for that is simple, we’re going to focus more on Jesus’ death and burial on Good Friday, but there’s another statement in this section that I want to emphasize in conjunction with this morning’s passage. “After this, Jesus, knowing that all was now finished, said . . ., ‘I thirst.’”

Notice that small phrase wedged in between those words in parenthesis, “to fulfill the Scripture.”

Again, John emphasizes the fact that Jesus fulfilled Scripture even in the midst of his crucifixion and that idea continues all the way through to the end of John.

We’ll read that Jesus fulfilled Scripture again in John 19:36-37 and John 20:9 and John isn’t the only one who emphasizes that Jesus fulfilled Scripture.

Even prior to Jesus’ crucifixion, John emphasized that Jesus fulfilled Scripture.

Time and time again as you read the Gospel according to Matthew, Matthew writes that Jesus fulfilled prophecy after prophecy, he fulfilled Scripture.

There have been a few estimates at determining just how many prophecies Jesus fulfilled. Alfred Edershein determined that Jesus fulfilled 456 Old Testament verses referring to the Messiah; J. Barton Payne determined that Jesus fulfilled 574 verses in the Old Testament. Most conservative scholars believe that Jesus fulfilled at least 300 prophecies during his time on earth, which is why the Gospel writers repeatedly point out when and how Jesus fulfilled various prophecies.

And you might hear all that and thing, why does it matter that Jesus fulfilled Scripture?

Because if he didn’t fulfill the prophecies in Scripture concerning the Messiah, then he wouldn’t have been the Messiah and we wouldn’t be worshiping the right person.

But since Jesus fulfilled all the prophecies that he did during his lifetime, it is proof to those who genuinely believe the Scriptures to be God’s Word, that Jesus is truly and genuinely the Messiah who came to save the people from their sins.

It’s no wonder than that John undergirds and uses the fulfillment of Scripture as his foundation for this text. How important is it that Jesus fulfilled all these prophecies, it is of utmost importance, because if he didn’t fulfill these prophecies, then he wouldn’t be the Messiah.

John recognized this truth, the other disciples recognized this truth, and the New Testament authors recognized this truth.

Jesus validates his Messiahship by fulfilling the Old Testament, which is utterly important to our belief in him.

Without the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy concerning Jesus, he wouldn’t be the Messiah, we’d be worshiping the wrong person, and our faith would be in the wrong person, which means that if Jesus wasn’t whom he said he was, then we wouldn’t be saved. But the fulfillment of prophecy by Jesus validates who he is. That is why John writes repeatedly that Jesus fulfilled prophecy, which brings us to our application for this morning. How do we apply the crucifixion the way that John meant us to apply the crucifixion? Typically, when we do application, we continue into the application by looking at the divisions that we created in the text to study through it, but in a case like this, it’s far better for us to look at it in one piece.

Application

John 19:16-30 gives us John’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion. But unlike some of the other Gospel writers, John doesn’t really give us too many details concerning the crucifixion itself. Really, it’s almost as if the crucifixion is the setting for what John is trying to point out because he mentions the crucifixion, but then focuses on three different events that occurred during Jesus’ death rather than the crucifixion itself. Whereas, our tendency is to focus on the crucifixion itself and to focus on the tremendous suffering that Jesus faced (both physically and spiritually), John doesn’t do that. And his lack of focus on the suffering that Jesus faced is intentional because he’s trying to drive home a specific point. What is that point?

It’s that Jesus, even in the death on the cross, fulfilled the Old Testament Scriptures. And that fulfillment of the Old Testament Scripture through Jesus’ death on the cross is evidence that Jesus is who he says he is—that he is the all-sovereign ruler of the universe, that he is the Creator who created all things. That he is genuinely God and that he is actually the Messiah.

The fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures through Jesus on the cross is the argument that John is focusing on in vss. 16-30 because, again, he’s writing the book of John with one main purpose, to convince people to believe in Jesus.

And the fine details of the crucifixion, the tremendous physical pain, the separation of Jesus from the Father, isn’t necessary to know in order to know that Jesus’ crucifixion was necessary for your salvation.

You don’t need to know all the fine details to realize that Jesus’ crucifixion is the turning point for those who needed to be saved from their sins. You just need to understand that through the crucifixion—Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection and your repentance from sin and belief in him, you are saved.

But you wouldn’t have been saved, if Jesus wasn’t genuinely the Messiah, which is the point that John is making. Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection is only of consequence if Jesus was truly the Messiah.

And by pointing out again and again that Jesus fulfilled all these different prophecies, that Jesus claimed to be divine, which he proved through his miracles, and that Jesus taught salvation through faith in him alone, John is making it abundantly clear that Jesus had proved himself to be the Messiah. It only takes a cursory look at the life of Jesus to understand this truth. I’ve asked Natalie to place this on the screens for you, but you’ll notice that with the exception of Jesus’ birth, every other reference given is from John:

Through his birth, he shows that he is the Messiah (Matthew 1-2; Luke 1-2)

Through his life, he proves that he is the Messiah (John 2:1-12; 4:1-54; 5:17; 6:1-21; 9:1-41; 11:1-16, 38-44; 12:12-19; 13:36-38; 14:15-24; 18:1-11, 25-27)

In his teaching, he explains how he is the Messiah (John 2:13-25; 3:1-21; 4:1-44; 5:18-47; 6:22-71; 7:1-24, 37:39; 8:12-38, 48-59; 10:1-42; 11:17-44; 12:27-36, 44-50; 13:1-35; 14:1-14, 25-31; 15:1-17; 16:1-33; 17:1-26; 18:33-40)

And now, even in his crucifixion and his death, he validates his Messiahship (John 19)

John’s point is that Jesus is genuinely the Messiah, which brings us to his point and our application.

Since Jesus is clearly the Messiah, what should we do?

I think the clearest application comes from what Jesus himself taught. He taught that the kingdom of God is at hand, so we need to repent from our sins and believe in him.

Paul reiterates this point in Romans 10:9-10 “9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 10 for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.”

And quite frankly, from a purely logical standpoint, if we actually understand that Jesus is the Messiah, then the only proper response is to believe in him.

Seeing how Jesus through proved that he was the Messiah through his birth, life, teachings, and death really means that the ball is now in your court. You’ve seen the biblical evidence for who Jesus is, now it is up to you to determine whether you believe and whether you’ll repent from your sins and follow Jesus.

The first application of Jesus’ crucifixion is that it ought to draw us to repentance and genuine belief—repent and believe.

Now most of us, if not all of us are already genuine believers and we read the crucifixion understanding that Jesus is genuinely the Messiah—we’ve already repented and believed, so what should we do when we read passages like John 19:16-30? And there’s really two applications that can be made from a text like this:

First, for those that genuinely believe, John’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion and his sacrificial atonement on the cross for our sins should cause us to well up in praise and worship of God through Jesus.

If we genuinely believe in Jesus, then when we read passages like John 19:16-30, the first response that we should have is to praise God for all of it—knowing who Jesus is, knowing that Jesus was sovereign over the whole situation—that he was in control; knowing that he planned his own death and burial, should cause us to well up in praise and worship.

It shows us the lengths that God through Jesus would go to bring his people into reconciliatory relationship with him. And it reminds us again and again, that what Jesus did for us on the cross is something that we couldn’t do ourselves—we couldn’t live that perfect, sinless life necessary for salvation, we couldn’t endure the wrath of God on the cross, and we couldn’t provide a means for our own way to God.

These were all done for us as a free gift because God loves us. Ephesians 2:8-9 “8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

The second application of Jesus’ crucifixion is that we need to acknowledge what was done on the cross—reflect on it and praise Jesus for it.

And finally, for those that genuinely believe, the crucifixion of Jesus in John 19:16-30 teaches us to have hope—Jesus proved his Messiahship by fulfilling prophecy in the Old Testament. If Jesus was able and willing to fulfill prophecy in his birth, his life, his teachings, and his death, isn’t it completely believable that he is trustworthy enough to fulfill the prophecies concerning the end times and what he promises for us?

The Old Testament prophecies concerning Jesus’ initial advent on earth are the only prophecies in Scripture. There are still prophecies that haven’t been fulfilled, yet.

Jesus promised to return, to take up his people, to provide a place for them to permanently dwell with him forever—the whole book of Revelation is a prophecy of how Jesus would return, how he would judge sin and evil, and how he would reward his own people.

There are more prophecies that throughout the Scriptures are yet to be fulfilled and there are promises from God to genuine believers that have yet to be fulfilled—your completed sanctification, your glorification, the fact that you are going to be made like Christ.

And what the crucifixion of Jesus does for us is it proves to us that our God is trustworthy enough to fulfill his words the first time around, thus, we can have hope for the promises that he has made because he will fulfill his words the next time around.

Jesus’ crucifixion and the fulfillment of the Old Testament in Jesus shows us that God always keeps his word, even when it seems as if it’s taking quite some time for it to happen.

Many of the prophecies concerning Jesus’ life on earth were given 750-3,000 years before Jesus actually fulfilled those prophecies and yet, Jesus fulfilled all of them.

It’s been 2,000 years since Jesus fulfilled those prophecies and yet, because he fulfilled those prophecies, we can have hope that he will fulfill the other prophecies—whether he fulfills them today or in another thousand years, we can be certain that he will eventually fulfill them.

As Hebrews 10:23 says “23 Let’s hold firmly to the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful;”

Our final application of Jesus’ crucifixion is that the cross and the fulfilment of the Old Testament give us hope for the future—Jesus will return, he will take us up, he will complete our sanctification, he will allow us to dwell with him. We can be sure of this because the cross proves that our God is faithful—have hope for the future because our God keeps his promises.

Put simply, what we learn from John 19:16-30 concerning the crucifixion is that even in the midst of his crucifixion, Jesus was at work to providentially fulfill Old Testament prophecies in such a way that it proves who he truly is—the Messiah. Because Jesus is the Messiah, we should: (1) repent from our sins and believe in him, (2) acknowledge what Jesus did for us on the cross—reflect on it and praise him for it; and (3) have hope for the future because our God keeps his promises.

Pastoral Prayer

Congregational Singing

Complete in Thee