The Guilty Live, the Innocent Die Luke 23:1-25 It Was an Early Morning Encounter
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The Guilty Live, the Innocent Die Luke 23:1-25 It was an early morning encounter. The sun was just beginning to peep over the horizon casting a faint light on the cool morning. Out and about early in the morning was an innocent one. It had been a long night. There had been little, if any, sleep the night before for the innocent one as if preparing for the final of all exams. Then the innocent one was confronted by guilty ones. The guilty ones had the power of the sword, the power to kill or to release. It wasn’t a legitimate power. It was cruel and arbitrary. Previous cruelty was already documented and known by others. But soon they would be known by a far worse cruelty. The innocent one was more than innocent. For the past 3 years this innocent one had become a leader, established a network of friends that would rave about the innocent one’s charisma, intelligence, and pure goodness. No one could think of any moral defect in this innocent one. People followed this innocent one. Some say the innocent one was a natural born leader, destined for greatness. Early teachers from the innocent one’s hometown marveled at the wisdom of this precocious leader. They knew great things would come in the future. The innocent one came face to face with the guilty one that morning. I wonder what that was like to be face to face with a murderer. The innocent one knew life was about to end in a violent way. The guilty one, the murderer, would walk away that morning free, set loose by the powers of distorted laws and easily manipulated people. The innocent one would die that day, a violent death, one that should have been prevented if this world was a just and moral place. But it’s not. The blood of the innocent was spilled. The murderer was free. The one who had so much to offer the world, so much goodness, demonstrated in countless ways in reaching out to the poor and young. The guilty one had demonstrated nothing more than an ability to kill and incite others to kill. The guilty lived, the innocent one died……….. That was Good Friday 2000 years ago, but it sounds as if it could come right off the front page of the newspaper, doesn’t it. The guilty live, the innocent die. The Gospel of Luke, like the other 3 biographers of Jesus’ life, record the last few hours of Jesus’ life in more detail than any other part of it. In Luke 23:1-25 we have the early morning trial of Jesus before Pilate. Already Jesus has been up the entire night being betrayed by Judas, denied by Peter, and arrested by the Sanhedrin. As we come to the 23rd chapter of Luke’s Gospel we see Jesus, the innocent one, standing before Pilate the cruel governor of Judea, and later standing with Barabbas, the murderer, insurrectionist who would be set free in place of Jesus. There was no jury. As a non-Roman citizen, Jesus would be completely at the mercy of Pilate. Today I’d simply like to walk you through this trial so you might capture a glimpse of what Jesus experienced before he went to the cross a few hours later that same day. There are 5 distinct scenes in this trial. Scene One: Pilate Declares Jesus Innocent (Luke 23:1-5) In the first scene Jesus is brought to Pilate by the entire Sanhedrin. Evidently they wanted to demonstrate to Pilate the seriousness of their concerns with this large contingent. No sub-committee would do. All 70 members of the Sanhedrin would go to Pilate who was in Jerusalem to oversee the Passover festival. We know from the gospel writings these religious leaders had long been looking for a way to accuse him and kill him. When they arrested Jesus, their charges were religious in nature. Namely, they accused Jesus of claiming to be the messiah and the Son of God. They considered this religious blasphemy and they wanted to kill him for it. But they had no legal right to do so. They needed Pilate and the Roman government for that. So when they bring Jesus to Pilate they conveniently bring a political charge against Jesus. They cite 3 particular crimes of Jesus. 1. First, they say he is subverting our nation. They are accusing him of being a rabble-rouser, a trouble-maker, one who is upsetting the apple cart. They are hoping that Pilate’s desire to maintain peace and stability will lead him to accept their accusations as true. Surely, if all 70 members of the Sanhedrin are making this claim, it must be true. 2. Second, they claim he is telling people not to pay taxes to Caesar. Of course, this is patently false for Jesus had explicitly told them to pay their taxes, to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. Pilate’s main responsibility is to collect taxes from this district. If Caesar were to hear there is an insurrectionist telling people not to pay taxes in the Judean district, and Pilate did nothing about it, …let me tell you, there would be a price to pay. 3. Third the religious leaders tell Pilate Jesus is proclaiming himself king. This was a flimsy charge. Jesus was presenting himself as the Messiah, which had royal overtones. Unlike worldly kings however, Jesus didn’t seek to lord it over the people, but rather to serve them. He demonstrated this the previous night as he stooped down before his disciples and washed their feet like a servant. Pilate didn’t have the knowledge of Jewish theology to understand the role of the messiah. The Sanhedrin exploited this ignorance to win a conviction against Jesus. Upon hearing the charges from the Sanhedrin, he flat out asked Jesus, “Are you king of the Jews?” Jesus gave an equivocating answer, “You say that I am.” The NIV translates the words in the affirmative, “Yes, it is as you say.” But the original text leaves the ambiguity in place. If Pilate asked other questions of Jesus, they are not recorded in Luke’s gospel. He declares Jesus innocent saying, “I find no basis for a charge against this man.” The Sanhedrin didn’t like this verdict so they persisted, “He stirs up the people all over Judea by his teaching. He started in Galilee and has come all the way here” (v 5). II. Scene Two: Jesus Before Herod Antipas (23:6-12) Galilee! The name caught Pilate’s attention. Jesus started in Galilee. Pilate seizes the opportunity to pass the buck. He’s not the Governor of Galilee. He’s the Governor of Judea. So Pilate sends Jesus to Herod, the Tetrarch of Galilee, who happens to be in town at the time. Herod is a Jew, not a Gentile administrator like Pilate. He doesn’t have the same authority as Pilate, but Pilate is simply trying to get rid of the problem. If there’s some kind of insurrection or problem with this Jesus fellow, he wants to be able to blame the problem on Herod the Jew. Luke informs us that when Herod saw Jesus he was very pleased because for a long time he had been wanting to see him. Why? Because he wanted Jesus to perform a miracle! He wanted a show. Herod didn’t want a miracle to confirm the truth of his teachings. He simply wanted some entertainment. Today there are still countless people inside and outside churches who simply want Jesus to entertain them. They want a show, a titillation that will ease the monotony of their lives. They’re not interested in following Jesus. They just want to watch Jesus from afar. Herod was like this. The son of Herod the Great, he was given the region of Galilee to rule by his father. He was a despicable man who stole his brother’s wife in Rome, divorced his own wife, and married his brother’s wife. For this adulterous affair he was publicly condemned by John the Baptist. But Herod and his stolen wife had the last word. They threw John the Baptist in prison, and later had his head cut off. Jesus, the cousin of John the Baptist, didn’t like Herod one little smidgen. He called Herod a fox, correctly implying he was a ravenous and cruel leader. So it’s no surprise that Jesus was less forthcoming with Herod than he was with Pilate. The text tells us Herod plied Jesus with many questions. But Jesus gave him no answer thus fulfilling the ancient prophecy of Isaiah, “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth” (Is 53:7). Herod and the soldiers at his disposal ridiculed Jesus, dressed him mockingly in a royal robe, and sent him back to Pilate. It was all a big joke to them. Jesus wouldn’t entertain them so they decided to entertain themselves at Jesus’ expense. And then we learn something very interesting in verse 12. We’re told on that day Herod and Pilate became friends—before this they had been enemies. Perhaps Herod didn’t like the way Pilate had killed some of his soldiers without charge years earlier. Perhaps it was some kind of Jewish-Gentile ethnic prejudice they held against each other.