3-13-19 Grace Tucson Lent Sermon

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, !

Today we continue to look at God’s plan of salvation unfolding before us in the places and words of our Savior’s Passion. We hear today words that perhaps make us shutter. Words that we know are part of God’s plan to rescue the world from sin and death but they are no easier to hear because of what these shouts would mean for our Savior in those next dark hours. The three words we focus on today follow the words of judgment handed down by a puppet governor. And while Pilate claimed to have washed his hands of the whole matter he was just as guilty of sentencing an innocent man to death because of his cowardice. Three little words shouted by the enemies of Christ after they got what they wanted. “Away With Him!”—three words that showed the truth of the prophecy of Isaiah: “He was despised and rejected by mankind”. “Away with him!” Three words that fulfilled Jesus’ own prophecy that one day he would be handed over to the Gentiles to be crucified. !

As we journey to the court of Pilate that late night and early morning you can just about imagine the roar of the crowd. It’s been contrasted with the joyous roar that earlier in the week Jesus had experienced on Palm Sunday. On that day the crowds welcomed him with shouts and songs of Hosanna. But by now much of Jerusalem, the city of God, had turned against Jesus. Earlier in the week Jesus had wept over Jerusalem knowing full well of their rejection and how the devil had been hard at work enslaving them to sin and to eternal death. It was certainly a horrific scene. But in spite of the wishes of the crowd, the cowardice of Pilate, and the work of the devil, God was still in charge and his Son was setting out to do what needed to be done for the salvation of the world. We read today from John 19:14–18 It was about the sixth hour on the Preparation Day for the Passover. Pilate said to the Jews, “Here is your king!” They shouted, “Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them, “Should I crucify your king?” “We have no king but Caesar!” the chief priests answered. So then Pilate handed Jesus over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus away. Carrying his own cross, he went out to what is called the Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. There they crucified him with two others, one on each side, and Jesus in the middle. !

Once again separated by time and situation we might wonder how could Jesus’ own people not have seen what they were doing? How could they kill their best chance they had ever seen to escape the curse of sin? How could they turn against the one they had seen heal their sick, cure their blind, make the lame walk, drive out demons, feed thousands, and even raise people from the dead? How could they reject the one that had taught in their synagogues, ate in their homes, and revealed God’s truth in ways they had never seen before? Why did they now hate Jesus so much that they wanted nothing more than to see him

dead? The answer quite simply is they had no reason. In fact, Jesus told his disciples the night before, “They hated me without reason”. !

And deep down you know that same attitude is their in the dark places of your own heart. The sinful nature left unchecked hates Jesus too. In spite of what people might say that we’re all basically good or that we start out with a clean slate, the fact remains, our sinful nature inherited from our first parents proves otherwise. By nature our hearts and minds are hostile to God and want nothing to do with him and his eternal life making word. That hatred wasn’t just displayed that night in Pilate’s court but is displayed each day in a world that fights tooth and nail against Jesus and his Word. That hatred is displayed in our hearts every time we don’t put Jesus first in our lives. !

But you might say, “I’ve never wanted Jesus dead. I’ve never formed an angry mob in the middle of the night with a thirst for blood. So why the hatred that night for a man who had done so much for their people and their nation?” But just asking that question is part of the answer. Part of the reason they wanted Jesus dead was he had not lived up to their false hopes about the Messiah.

Jesus at first had fit the bill for what a Messiah should look like and what they wanted him to do for their nation. Jesus was powerful and proved it with amazing miracles. And that power and authority had drawn the crowds. Jesus was a welcomed wind of change in a country that was going no where fast. But as the crowds got to really know his message they believed he was endangering their fragile peace, security, and false sense of prosperity under their Roman overlords. Even those who should have known the Scriptures better than anyone else, those who should have been the first to recognize the Messiah became his most harshest critics and enemies. The chief priests should have been pointing people to Jesus and embracing him with open arms as fulfilling their sacred Scriptures. But they along with the other religious leaders of the day convinced the people with their self-righteous morality to turn against Jesus and to embrace their true enemy, the pagan Roman rulers. !

And in a bit of irony only 40 years later under the direction of the Roman government, the true enemy of the people would level Jerusalem to the ground.

Later on the once proud city would be rebuilt by the Romans but her people were not even allowed to step foot into it. And as the events unfolded that first Good Friday morning in the midst of remembering the Passover, the celebration to remember God’s deliverance from their Egyptian slavery, the people of Jerusalem were now allowing themselves to be enslaved to the Romans and ultimately to the devil’s reign over their lives and eternal future. !

So maybe again we haven’t openly attacked Jesus or called for his crucification but what power sin has in our lives. We too often look for something in Jesus that was never promised. Some sort of self serving craving where we want to bring heaven down to earth. Perhaps we crave wealth and all that goes with it as the source of our security. Maybe it is the people we surround ourselves with or the family that we hope will always have our backs. And we cringe a little when Jesus tells us that being a disciples means bearing a cross

which is not the least appealing to the sinful nature. And like the mob shouting for Jesus’ death, we shamefully call out in our hearts, take him away, take him away, I don’t need to go through all this for him. Take him away, I can have more fun without him looking in on my life. But what a price to pay for buying into that dangerous lie! !

But thankfully in spite of us, God has overcome all that stands in the way of our salvation. God overcomes our arrogant thought that it depends on us, that we’ve got what it takes to be better than everyone else. God can overcome all that by the fact that our salvation depends completely on his zeal, commitment, and willingness to die for us. That Jesus who didn’t deserve any of this picked up his own cross and set his face like flint as he was marched out to Calvary to be crucified. This was all part of the plan that God had carefully laid out for Jesus. A plan that was beautifully foreshadowed by Israel’s very first festival, the Passover. God commanded the people to take a spotless lamb and slaughter it.

Then the lamb’s blood went on the doorframes of their homes, and when the angel of death came through the streets that night in Egypt, the blood delivered the Israelites from death. This was pure grace. The Israelites weren’t any less sinful than the Egyptians. But God had claimed them and made them his people.

Through the shedding of blood God provided his people with deliverance. !

And now the innocent blood of the perfect lamb of God would be shed on the place known as the skull. But this blood was different than all the blood of beasts that had been shed over the centuries. This was the precious and holy blood of the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. This blood would have eternal effects as this blood never would have to be shed again. The blood that covers your sins, your guilt. The blood that assures you that your sins have been removed as far as the east is from the west. !

And it is that blood that guarantees a glorious future for you. After all the trials and crosses we ourselves may face for bearing the name of Christ we can look forward to standing the presence of the Lamb for eternity. Standing there because we have been washed clean in the blood of our Savior where are sins and our former way of life is remembered no more. !

“Away with Him!” “Away with him!” Those words still pierce our ears. And yet we know that even though the crowd may have gotten its wish, even this was part of God’s plan. But they could never imagine that the one they killed would prove that even death was no match for him. Jesus would go on to show that in spite of their sinful plans, in spite of the cowardice of Pilate, or the work of the devil, his plan alone would succeed and bring peace and everlasting life to this sin darkened world. On a day where it looked like the devil had won, God ultimately showed his grace and his power. He gave his only Son into death for our sins. And he used his almighty power to do what he does best, to turn evil into good. Amen.