Sermon manuscript:
We are continuing our series tonight on the witnesses of
Christ with the person of Barabbas. There is not much more known about Barabbas
than what you heard tonight. The crowd asked Pilate to release Barabbas instead
of Jesus.
Barabbas is called a robber. We tend to use the word
“robber” and “thief” somewhat interchangeably. There is a difference, however.
A robber uses violence to take away your stuff whereas a thief uses stealth.
The only other thing we know about him is that he was
involved in a revolt, and that he had committed murder during that revolt. The
word for “robber” in Greek can also be used to describe a “revolutionary.” That
is why the translation we heard tonight called Barabbas a “rebel.” He was
probably part of a group of Jews who resented the foreign occupation of the
Romans. They wanted to be free to have their own Jewish state like they used to
have back in the days of David and Solomon.
This brings up something that is in the background of the
New Testament that we don’t often talk about, but is nevertheless important. It
is important in Jesus’s trial before Pontius Pilate. And that is that the Jews
really hated the Romans.
They had some good reasons to hate the Romans. The Romans
were the big bullies of the ancient world. They acted as though they owned the
planet. The Romans thought that they and their culture were better than
everybody else’s. They would set up places to worship the Roman state and the
Roman gods all over the place. They even tried to do this with the Temple in
Jerusalem. A couple Sundays ago you heard about how Pilate had killed some
Jewish worshippers in their very act of worship. Unless you were on the Roman
government’s payroll, if you were a Jew, you probably didn’t have any time for
the Romans.
With all this dissatisfaction in the air, it isn’t
surprising that there would be movements afoot to throw off the hated Roman
yoke. This is an important force at work during the time of Jesus. It’s even
important for how people saw Jesus and the hopes they might have placed in him.
Some placed earthly hopes in him. It was earthly hopes that made people most
interested in Jesus. The only thing that worries Pontius Pilate is that Jesus
claims to be some kind of king. Jesus being king is what was written over
Christ’s cross: “Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews.”
There was a lot of interest in revolution at that time. Barabbas
was a revolutionary. He is a true believer in the Jewish state. He believes in
it so much that he is happy to be violent and hard about it. He had taken life
in his quest for a free Jewish state.
Ultimately the Jewish thirst for independence is going to be
the means by which God brings down his heavy hand upon the Jews who rejected
the Christ. About 20-30 years after Jesus was crucified, died, rose from the
dead, and ascended into heaven, the political agitators were finally able to
get a powerful enough movement together. The Jews pushed the Romans out and took
over in that territory. However, soon the Romans came back and they absolutely
destroyed the place. Not one stone was left upon another. The slaughter and
misery was unprecedented. The temple was destroyed in 70 A. D. like Jesus said
it would. It has never been rebuilt to this very day. The Jew’s hatred of the
Romans would have dramatic repercussions.
So during Pilate’s examination, he is especially interested
in understanding what kind of man he is dealing with. Pilate was the Roman
governor. What is this Jew, Jesus, really about? Is he a political threat? Is
he one of the insurrectionists?
Our reading tonight clearly
shows that Pilate did not think much of Jesus. Pilate asked Jesus, “Are you the
king of the Jews?” (a very important question to him).
Jesus responded, “My kingdom is
not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would fight so
that I would not be handed over to the Jews. But now my kingdom is not from
here.”
“You are a king then?” Pilate
asked.
Jesus answered, “I am, as you
say, a king. For this reason I was born, and for this reason I came into the
world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my
voice.”
Pilate responded, “What is
truth?”
Immediately after that Pilate
goes out to the Jews and tells them that Jesus is not guilty. The implication,
as far as Pilate is concerned, is that Jesus is not guilty, he’s just crazy.
Jesus, to Pilate, is a nobody.
He doesn’t even have the Jewish officials on his side. His disciples are a
bunch of poor fishermen. He comes from the sticks of Galilee. He imagines that
he can command an army of angels if he were so inclined. If there was one thing
that was certain to Pilate, it was that Jesus was no king, regardless of what
he might say.
He has lots of fun at Jesus’s
expense in this regard. He dresses him up kind of like a king. He has the title
written on Jesus’s cross, “Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews.” The soldiers
at the cross make fun of him, “How’s it going up there king? How’s that throne
feeling?” They think that Jesus’s kingdom is nothing other than a figment of
his own imagination.
The shortest creed, or statement
of faith, for us Christians is that Jesus is the Christ. That is to say, “Jesus
is the king.” The very heart of our faith is that Jesus is the king. However,
it is very easy for us to act as though Jesus’s kingdom is imaginary so far as
we are concerned too. Other things in life can seem to be vastly more
important. Politics, economics, progress—these are the hard and fast, truly
important subjects. What does Jesus’s kingdom have to do with such things?
Seemingly nothing. And so maybe we shouldn’t be so hard on those folks who were
crying out for Barabbas. Maybe we would do the same thing.
Think about it. If you were
interested in the welfare of your nation, if you were interested in
independence and freedom, if you wanted to take a chunk out of the evil-doers
of the human race, which of these two, Jesus or Barabbas, would appear to be
the more effective superficially speaking? Barabbas was a Jewish patriot. He
had shed blood in defense of his country. Jesus appears to be nothing other
than a distraction. He’s getting the people to think about other things besides
the Jewish independence movement. He’s pointed out the hypocrisy of the Jewish
leaders. He is not making the nation stronger. He’s making it weaker. These are
things that could be said about Christ and his Christians up to this very day,
and there is an element of truth to it.
As Christians it is important
for you to understand that you already have a king. You already have a God.
There are many high and noble things that might want you to follow them with
your whole heart, but you have already given your heart to another. Christ is
king of an eternal kingdom that is not of this world. You are members of this
kingdom. Jesus reigns and rules in the hearts of his people by his Holy Spirit
from the right hand of God the Father. This kingdom takes precedence over
everything else.
Jesus says, “Seek first, the
kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these other things will be added
unto you as well.” People understandably have earthly concerns. We are
concerned about our government, our society, our family, our job, what have
you. We do not do well when we make these things our gods. They were never
meant to be gods. They are created things that are here today and gone tomorrow,
even though they are very important. To our flesh they appear to be the most
important things.
The most important thing to us,
however, is Jesus of Nazareth, king of Jews. The most important thing to us is
the cross upon which that title was placed. God the Father sent his Son on a
mission which culminated in this cross. It is at the cross, and the battle that
was fought there by our king, that we were won for his kingdom. We think
politics, economics, and so on are the big and important things. That is only
because we are so near-sighted that we are almost blind. We care about the
things that are passing away. The bigger and more important things are the
eternal things—our relationship with God, whether we are holy or unholy,
whether we know the truth, or whether we sneeringly say with Pilate: “What
is truth?”
Jesus truly is king. He came. He
conquered. He reigns and rules in the hearts of his people from the right hand
of God the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. Jesus is
at his most glorious when he is suffering in our place at the cross. God
suffered for his creatures. God suffered for you. Let the world have its
Barabbases. You put your trust in the king whose kingdom is not of this world.
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