In this sermon series, we are tracing the biblical story as carefully as we can even, as we try to summarize it as succinctly as we can in these five weeks. So far, we’ve said:

1. That the Creator God made the heavens and the earth to be his temple in which he would dwell with human beings whom he made in his image in order that through them his glory might be seen and worked out in creation. Human rebellion against their divine vocation has not only brought death upon themselves but has also thwarted God’s purposes for his creation.
2. That God promised to bring salvation to his creation through a covenant he made with Abraham, a covenant which became the inheritance of the ancient nation of Israel. Through Israel’s long history, it is God’s covenantal promise to them that remains the hope of Israel and indeed the hope of all creation.
3. That In the first century, Jesus of Nazareth announced that the time had come for the promise made to Abraham to be fulfilled. Anyone who wanted to be in on this fulfilled promise could do so, but only if they would follow Jesus into his vision of what this eternal kingdom of God would be like.

That’s where we pick up the story today. And what we are considering today is what happened to Jesus and his message that the kingdom of God had come. How this story goes is based on how Jesus’s story went. And this is how it went: to a crisis, and to a cross.

The long story of Israel reaches its climactic moment as Jesus heads to the cross. Let’s examine this climactic moment on this Palm Sunday with three pictures of Jesus in this passage: Jesus on trial, Jesus in our place, and Jesus with authority.

Jesus on Trial

First, consider here the picture of Jesus on trial before Pontius Pilate. “What accusation do you bring against this man?” is Pilate’s question. What is the crime that Jesus is being accused of committing?

King of the Jews

“Doing evil” is the only answer we get at first (v. 30). Pilate’s disinterest in the case is seen in verse 31, and when he asks Jesus in verse 33, “Are you the King of the Jews?” he seems to be asking the question with ridicule: Pilate doesn’t care much about what Jesus thinks of himself or what his accusers think of him. “The king of the Jews” isn’t much of a threat to the emperor of Rome.

Except that Jesus’s accusers sure hope Pilate will think so.

So, when Pilate tells them to “judge him by your own law,” they respond, “It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death.” This fits with what we know of how the Roman government and Jewish law interacted at the time, but John’s interest in how this fulfilled Jesus’s prophecy about “what kind of death he was going to die” (v. 32).

Back in John 12, Jesus spoke of being “lifted up from the earth” as a word about the “kind of death he was going to die” (Jn 12:33). Crucifixion was, of course, that kind of death. But this is not merely a way of showing that Jesus could predict the future. It is a way of showing the meaning of the cross. Crucifixion was the sentence carried out on those accused of treason against the Empire.[1] And Jesus was not crucified because some thought he was a threat to the Empire when he really wasn’t. The crucifixion of Jesus means he was, in fact, a threat.

Challenging the Empire

So, when Pilate interacts with Jesus in verses 33-38, we start to see this play out. “What have you done?” Pilate wants to know. And Jesus’s response is to talk about his kingdom (v. 36). “So you are a king?” Pilate says.

Even though Pilate may scoff at the “king of the Jews,” for the Jews this was a serious matter. The belief in the coming kingdom of God would be enough to spark an all-out war, “the Great Jewish Revolt” against the Roman Empire in AD 66-70. The historian Josephus tells us that what incited this war more than anything else was the Jewish belief, “found in their sacred scriptures,” that at that time one from their country would become ruler of the world.”[2]

The Jews in the first century were reading texts like Daniel 9 and concluding from that text that seventy weeks of years was up, and it was time for their God to do what he had promised. And what he had promised was the fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant: Israel (Abraham’s family) would be blessed and thereby become the source of blessing to the rest of the world. “The Bible said it; they believed it; that settled it—and off they went to fight God’s battles.”[3]

This is what was “in the air” in Israel in the first century. This is the important context in which we must read and understand Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus of Nazareth

Jesus of Nazareth is, by anyone’s standards, a very consequential person. It is a shame that so many Christians seem to know very little about the actual person. I’m not referring to some Christians’ ability to know various parts of Bible trivia. That’s a good place to start of course. What I’m talking about is more about what we can assume about Jesus of Nazareth, given his place in the biblical story.

What was Jesus trying to do? How was he being perceived?

Here we are on our best footing if we don’t forget the biblical story. Jesus believed he was bringing into reality the long-awaited kingdom of God, and this would of course be a threat to all other would-be kingdoms, starting with Caesar’s.

Keeping that in mind leads us to read the Gospels quite differently than perhaps we were used to. For example, when Jesus said “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s,” he was not advocating a nice balance and distinction between politics and religion. For Caesar’s image to be on a coin was in itself blasphemous to the Jewish worldview—what is Jesus suggesting the idolatrous Caesar is, in fact, owed?[4]

The trial of Jesus, which leads to Jesus being crucified, as the Creed says, “under Pontius Pilate,” is our indicator that Jesus did have royal aspirations, that he had come to inaugurate the kingdom of God on earth, and that this kingdom would be a threat to all other earthly kingdoms.

Jesus in our Place

But, next, not only do we see Jesus during Holy Week on trial; we also see Jesus in our place. What Jesus does he does for us.

Take Me, Let Them Go

That Jesus died “for us” and “for our sins” is basic to the Christian faith. And it is something to see and ponder again and again.

At the beginning of this chapter, when “a band of soldiers” came to arrest him, Jesus asked, “Whom do you seek?” The answer, “Jesus of Nazareth,” prompts him to say, “if you seek me, let these men go” (Jn 18:4-8). Jesus, even in his own demise, is the Great Shepherd of the Sheep, willing to take the hit so that he doesn’t lose any who belong to him (Jn 18:9).

At the end of this chapter, when Pilate, observing a local custom, offers to release “the King of the Jews,” the people cried out, “Give us Barabbas instead!” (v. 40). Again, Jesus in the place of another.

Go back to chapter 11 of John’s Gospel, where the Jewish high priest, Caiaphas, said more than he knew when he argued that it was better for one man to die than that the whole nation would perish. This, John tells us, was a prophesy “that Jesus would die for the nation, and not for the nation only, but also to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad” (Jn 11:49-53).

Thus, Jesus died for us, in our place, for our benefit. It is what the prophets had predicted. And it is at the heart of what makes Jesus our Savior.

The Problem of Sin

But here again I want us to see the entire biblical scope of what Jesus’s death “in our place” is all about.

How would you answer the question, “Why did Jesus die in our place?” Or rather, the question might be put in the context of Galatians 3, “Why did Christ become a curse for us by dying on the cross?” The typical answer probably is more or less this: “So that we would be free from the penalty of sin and granted fellowship with God in heaven for all eternity.” But here is how Paul answers the question why Christ become a curse for us “so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles,” and “so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith” (Gal 3:13-14).[5] These two answers are not the same. Do you see the difference?

If you know what Paul means by “the blessing of Abraham,”—and since we’ve been studying Genesis, we ought to know what it means—then you’ll see the difference.

God made a promise to Abraham, that through him, through his family, the problem of sin would be dealt with and blessing would flow to the nations. The problem of sin, then, is not just the moral problem of violating God’s laws. It is the vocational problem of not being the image bearing creatures God meant for us to be, so that God’s creation would be taken forward toward its intended goal.

So Jesus’s death on the cross was “for us” in more ways than we might have thought. But it is at the heart of the Christian message that Jesus’s death on the cross did not merely assuage divine wrath so that we would be permitted into heaven; the message is bigger than that, without ignoring any of that important point. Focusing only on that is like focusing on Christmas without Easter. Jesus had to be born to die and be raised from the dead of course, but he was born precisely for this dying-and-rising act which is the basis of real salvation.

In the same way, Jesus’s death for me, sinner that I am, is important, but it is important because of how it fits into the larger story. Paul says that God sent his son so that sin itself would be condemned in the flesh of Jesus. It is because sin itself has been defeated (the larger picture) that there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.[6]

Criminal or Conqueror?

Let us not lose sight of the larger picture of how Jesus has defeated sin and what that now means. Let us keep our eyes on Jesus—exactly as Pilate himself would have us do.

After having Jesus flogged, crowned with a crown of thorns, and dressed in a purple robe, Pilate brought Jesus out and said, “Behold the man!” What do we see when we look at him? Is he, in fact, a king? Has he achieved what he set out to do? Has sin and evil been defeated in his death on the cross, in our place? Has God’s promise to Abraham finally been fulfilled? Has the kingdom of God arrived?

These are crucial questions for understanding the Christian message and whether or not we actually believe it. These are crucial questions for understanding the Christian life and whether or not we actually live it.

As everyone knows, Jesus’s own people largely denied that Jesus was the promised king of the Jews, the Messiah of Israel. The cross is proof enough for them that Jesus was an imposter. Here’s the irony: many who say they are Christians are in danger of ending up in the same place. How does this happen? If we make the achievement of Jesus on Good Friday all about “me and my salvation” or “my relationship with God” or “securing my place in heaven,” then we are effectively saying that Jesus failed in his mission. Of course we wouldn’t say that. But if, in a valiant effort to defend the scandal of the cross we spiritualize the kingdom of God, turning it into a non-historical reality, we will end up in the same place as those who flat-out deny that Jesus is the Messiah.

Let’s not make that mistake. Keep the story straight: the Bible is telling a story about how God’s promise to Abraham as the solution to the problem of sin and what sin has done to human beings and to the world he made will at last come to pass. The distinctive Christian belief is that God has brought it all to pass in Jesus of Nazareth, precisely through his life, his death, his resurrection. Jesus did what we could not do: he defeated sin. Sin was defeated in his flesh, right there on the cross.

So, then, what does that mean?

Jesus with Authority

Well, let’s look at one more picture of Jesus in our passage today: Jesus with authority.

Who’s in Charge?

We see Jesus on trial, in our place, standing before Pilate who says to Jesus, in John 19:10, “Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” Pilate says he is in charge. Is he?

“You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above,” Jesus says. Clearly, for Jesus, God is in charge over Pilate. Pilate finds himself in his position of authority over Jesus at this particular moment only because of divine appointment and for divine purpose. And that divine purpose, a purpose which Jesus willingly submits himself, is to be crucified.

That’s why Pilate, even though he claims to possess such great authority, is ultimately unable to release Jesus from the condemnation of the cross. Verse 12 says, “From then on Pilate sought to release him,” but verse 16 shows Pilate did not succeed: “So he delivered him over to them to be crucified.”

What’s the Plan?

Alright. God is in charge here, Jesus would have us believe, even as Jesus stands on trial and is condemned to crucifixion. It’s all according to the divine plan. But what’s the plan?

Here again, if we are going to be good Storytellers, we must not be thrown off track. We must not suppose that God’s promise to Abraham as the solution to the problem of human sin that has thrown all creation into crisis has been thrown out of play for some different promise. We have come now to the Bible’s climactic moment,

the very thing for which the entire history of Israel from Abraham onward, the entire history of Israel under Torah from Moses onward and indeed the entire history of humanity from Adam onward, had been waiting. . . . God had a single plan all along through which he intended to rescue the world and the human race, and that this single plan was centered upon the call of Israel, a call which Paul saw coming to fruition in Israel’s representative, the Messiah.[7]

Here, finally, we see it happening, but it is happening in ways no one ever imagined. And it is deeply subversive to all earthly powers, not because it is a “religious” power that runs on a parallel track to “political” power. Right here, the two intersect, come into the conflict between two competing kingdoms which was inevitable.

Yes, Jesus is a king. But, as Jesus said to Pilate, “my kingdom is not of this world” (Jn 18:36). Jesus is not saying that his kingdom is a spiritual kingdom that might as well leave the world behind. Jesus is talking about the origins of his kingdom, saying that the power with which his kingdom is established is different from all earthly powers which can only maintain their power by fighting with the weapons of war. Jesus’s kingdom is different. “The way in which he would defeat evil would be the way consistent with the deeply subversive nature of his own kingdom-announcement. He would defeat evil by letting it do its worst to him.”[8]

Where Are We Going?

And so, where does this take him? Where does the way of this kingdom lead? To the cross.

Do not think for a moment that the way of the cross is less powerful than the most powerful kingdoms of earth, nor must we think that the way of the cross has nothing to do with such kingdoms. Had anyone known the power of the cross of Christ, 1 Corinthians 2:8 says, “they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.”

History bears that out. The same empire that had Jesus crucified eventually converted to Christianity. No one could have seen that coming.

Now, I ask: have we forgotten all this? Have we left the story behind? Have we abandoned the way of the cross?

It’s easy enough to do, because it is simply not intuitive. We need to remember, which is one of the many reasons for the Lord’s Supper. The broken body of Jesus, the blood he shed on the cross, is the greatest power the world has ever known, and will ever know. Why? Because it is the power of divine, self-giving love. The same power that made the world is the power that saves the world.

And Jesus invites us to share in that power, to walk the same way he walked, to enter into his kingdom.

He invites us to come and die with him. That sounds morbid and powerless, I know.

But wait just a moment: the cross may be the climax of the story, but it is certainly not the end. Easter is coming, coming to us next week. And what that will mean to the biblical story is absolutely revolutionary. If you thought the cross was a surprise, just wait until we explore the significance in the biblical story of what happened “on the first day of the week.”

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[1] Craig S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 1109.

[2] Josephus, Wars of the Jews, 6.312.

[3] N. T. Wright, Justification: God’s Plan and Paul’s Vision (London: SPCK, 2009), 40.

[4] N. T. Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God, Christian Origins and the Question of God (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1996), 502-507.

[5] The contrasting answers to this question are spotlighted by Michael F. Bird, The Saving Righteousness of God: Studies on Paul, Justification and the New Perspective (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2007), 109.

[6] N. T. Wright, Pauline Perspectives: Essays on Paul, 1978 - 2013 (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2013), 372-73.

[7] Wright, Justification, 18-19. Emphasis original.

[8] Wright, Jesus and the Victory of God, 565.