Shall we turn now in our Bibles to John chapter 19, verses 1 through 15. John 19, 1 through 15. And it's a long passage, so we will pick up together from verse 10. I will read the first 9, and then we will read 10 through 15. hear the words of the Lord through the Apostle John. So then Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. And the soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe. Then they said, Hail, King of the Jews! And they struck him with their hands. Pilate then went out and said to them, Behold, I am bringing him out to you, that you may know that I find no fault in him. Then Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, and Pilate said to them, Behold the man. Therefore, when the chief priests and officers saw him, they cried out, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate said to them, you take him and crucify him, for I find no fault in him. The Jews answered him, we have a law and according to our law, he ought to die because he made himself the son of God. Therefore, when Pilate heard that saying, he was the more afraid and went again into the praetorium and said to Jesus, where are you from? But Jesus gave no answer. Together, then Pilate said to him, Are you not speaking to me? Do you not know that I have power to crucify you and power to release you? Jesus answered, You could have no power at all against me unless it had been given to you from above. Therefore the one who delivered me to you has the greater sin. From then on Pilate sought to release him. But the Jews cried out, saying, If you let this man go, you are not Caesar's friend. Whoever makes himself a king speaks against Caesar. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus out and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called the pavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. Now it was the preparation day of the Passover, and about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, Behold your king! But they cried out, Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him! Pilate said to them, Shall I crucify your king? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar. That is the word of God. Abused, accused, and abandoned for your salvation. Well, brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, even before Jesus went to the painful and shameful cross. In order to die for you, he had to endure many horrible things. He had to obey throughout his life, but then he had to suffer even before the cross and you will see why this part of suffering was important as well. We know from that time he was cruelly abused for you. He was falsely accused for you and then he was totally abandoned for you. And you notice what the key word there is. For you. And you'll hear this about Jesus' suffering for you again today. And I pray you never ever get tired of learning what He did for you. It was all done for you. You had no one else who could do it for you. You had no one else who was willing to do it for you. You couldn't even do it for yourself. And He did it for you. Let this story always be exciting and a source of inspiring you, not just to rejoice, but to obey Him. Our headings then are three. Jesus is abused for you. Jesus is accused for you. And then third, Jesus is abandoned for you. And our goals are that you will rejoice that Jesus suffered and died in your place and fully earned your salvation. and that you will introduce this sin bearer to others so they can receive these benefits as well. First, let's focus on what Jesus endured in his abuse for you. Jesus is abused for you. Verse 1, so Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. Jesus, the one who created heaven and earth, things seen and unseen, things in heaven and things on earth, was stripped naked and tied on to a pillar and severely whipped across his bare back. And this was done at Pilate's order. And this wasn't just a regular beating. This was a beating with a cord with hooks. So it would go into the flesh and then be dragged. That's what the prophet Isaiah said. His back became furrows. Like when you're planting and you have these grooves in the raised part. That's what his back looked like. That's what Pilate wanted for Jesus. Of course, he did that because he thought if he had punished him a little bit, then he would please the Jews, and then he would be in good shape. He didn't care about the innocent one who suffered. Of course, it didn't work. And yet, there was something important that was happening here. Pilate was doing God's work of legally proving that Jesus was innocent, which was a requirement for the sacrifice. Remember the Old Testament? The priest would have to open the mouth of the sheep to make sure its teeth was okay, make sure it wasn't sick, it wasn't lame, it wasn't spotted, it wasn't sickly. And that's what Pilate was doing here, was to show that Jesus was innocent. But he didn't end there. He then had his men twist the crown of thorns and put it on Jesus' head to mock him as a fake king. And yet, as the soldiers did and as Pilate did that and the Jews supported it, they didn't realize that they were showing the marks of Adam's curse on his head. Thorns came as a result of the curse. Remember when God cursed the land? He said, there'll be thorns and thistles and the Lord took that on himself, head on. What a beautiful picture. He faced it all. Oh, the crown of thorns must have been painful. There's so many nerves that are there. And those thorns hitting those nerves would have been extremely painful. But he took them because he was taking the curse of Adam. And then again, with Pilate's approval, the soldiers then put on that reddish purple robe on Jesus to mock his claim further, mock his claim to be king. They didn't realize that reddish purple robe signified the scarlet sins of the whole world. What did Jesus come to do? He came to bear the sins of the world. And the soldiers were unwittingly picturing this great work that he came to do. And then the people nearby, including the soldiers, then mocked him as king. How? By bowing down before him to mock him. And they started shooting verbal insults to him. And yet, what they were doing was quite remarkable. Because they were doing what they should have done, willingly, instead of to mock him. Because he was the king of the Jews, and he deserved to be bowed down to. But I wonder, sometimes, why didn't God zap those people who were insulting him? You know the crown of thorns would have been bad, the hooks on the back and making furrows on his back was painful. But you know sometimes the insults, the fake mocking, those could hurt a whole lot more than the physical pain that he experienced. The God of glory, the one who made heaven and earth, the one who only did good things was mocked. And then the people hit him. It wasn't a hit to cause pain. He was in enough pain. This was a mocking type, slapping him. They hit the God of glory. But he had to endure that. Why? He endured the slaps and the punches because that's what you deserve. Again, he had to go through all of these things for you. It wasn't just at the cross. And moving on to verse 4, Pilate then declared that Jesus was innocent. And you think, why would you let someone who was so innocent go through all of this? What a barbarian he was. And this was contrary to Roman law. You couldn't punish somebody unless you prove that they were guilty. And he went further. He says, okay, you take him and kill him. I find no fault in him. You take him and kill him. This further confirmed the innocence of Jesus, making him the perfect sacrifice for sins. But Pilate did something very interesting. At the end of verse 5, he put on this purple robe and crown of thorns, bring him out, bring him out to the public, and then he said one of the most remarkable things. He said, behold, the man. He didn't probably know what he was doing. Maybe he was just trying to pacify the Jews in some ways. But he was acknowledging that since man sinned, man had to die. And there's no question now that Jesus was the pure one. He was a fully, fully man and therefore he would be that fit sacrifice to die for man's sins. So he endured all of this abuse and then was presented as the man. What can we learn from this first point of all the abuse that Jesus faced? Well, all of this innocent abuse had to be done as punishment for you because you were guilty. It's a glimpse of what you really deserved. You deserve to be beaten, to have a crown of thorns put upon you, to be insulted, because of your sin. You deserve to be covered with blood and have furrows in your back, but Jesus took it for you. But what do you do for someone who did this for you? I mean, you understand that you are kind to your mother and understand Mother's Day is coming up soon. And you think your mother cooked and took care of you and helped you when you were sick. And you say, oh, God, I have something special for my mother. And if you didn't, it's a good reminder. It's coming up. But what do you do for someone who did something like this for your eternal life? All the more, shouldn't you praise them? Shouldn't you passionately worship the one who endured all this for you? He took that punishment for you and his punishment was not just in his body. Remember, the punishment was in his mind. He had to suffer all the rejection of his own family members. The mocking, the spitting on him, that didn't hurt him physically. But it was a suffering that was intense, knowing his own purity, and yet to have people spit upon you. He took that for you. You should be passionate and worship that one who did so much for you. But then he didn't stop there. It's one thing that Jesus endured these abuse. Then he became He started to be accused, accused of the most horrible things. Blasphemy! So verse 6 we pick up then. Then the stone-hearted Jews, unmoved by Christ's suffering and by Pilate's attempt to set him free, demanded that Pilate execute Jesus. All the more they screamed, crucify him, crucify him. This was the work of the mob. They weren't interested in justice. The mob wanted him executed and they wanted it done in the most horrible and painful and shameful way. Pilate became sarcastic in a way and he said, well, you want him dead, you crucify him. Because he didn't want to execute an innocent man. He was literally saying, if you want him dead, you kill him yourself. But when that didn't work, because the Jews were demanding that Pilate do that, The Jews then falsely accused Jesus of breaking Jewish law and demanding the Pilate execute him for doing so. The mob aspect, kill him, kill him, kill him, didn't work. He said, well, he's guilty of blasphemy. What an accusation of Christ. The charge was that he made himself the Son of God. He was speaking the truth. He was the Son of God from the beginning of times. Now, the Jews thought he was making a false claim to be equal to God. Now, if Jesus claimed to be just a simple son of God, by adoption, like all people who believe in God, that might have been okay. But this was a significant charge. This was a charge of blasphemy. No mere man was allowed to claim that he was God. So when Jesus claimed that, they just immediately assumed this man deserved to die. As you'll see in the second sermon, this is the problem when you don't take the whole Bible, when you don't take time to read the Word of God, all of it. Jesus claimed unequivocally That he was David's son, and yet he was David's God. Quoting from Psalm 110. He was the natural, essential son of God, claiming equality with God. Jesus wasn't claiming to be a nice teacher who will give you good morals, like we view Jesus today in North American Western society. Wrongly, by the way. He didn't claim to be an adopted son like we claim to be. And there's something significant here. Because even if the charge of blasphemy were true, and it wasn't, Jesus should have been executed by stoning. Why? Stoning was less painful. What they would do in stoning, they would take a big stone, crush your chest, and pile of... so you die very quickly, and they'll make a pile of stones on top of you. But they wanted the worst, most torturous way to die inconsistent with Jewish law. Now Pilate became afraid because he thought, I better do something, they might start a riot. Because Jesus, claiming to be God, kicked it up a notch now. How do we deal? How would he deal with this? He became more afraid. So he began to question Jesus about his origin. But Jesus refused to answer, and rightly so. Jesus saying, look, you already condemned me. You said I was innocent. And yet you allowed me to be tortured. So Jesus ignored him. Pilate continued to pester him. When Jesus finally responded, it's because of the arrogance of Pilate, because Pilate says, do you not know I have the power to crucify you? And then Jesus had to set him straight. Jesus silenced him by reminding him of a few things. First of all, Jesus said, Pilate, your power was delegated to you from God. In other words, you, Pilate, will have to give an account to God for everything you do, including what you're doing now. You don't have unlimited power. You may think that in your head, but that power is delegated. Second, Jesus said to him, you know, if I wanted, I could call for 12 legions of angels to destroy you, the Roman army all around you, and all the Jewish peoples for good measure. And this put fear in Pilate as he heard this. Because this wasn't one who, you know, if you were in a threat of death, you will start to beg for mercy. Jesus didn't. He spoke the truth. He said, I could destroy you if I wanted to. Your power came from me. And furthermore, Jesus called out the Jews as well. He tells Pilate, you know, the Jews who brought you to me, they're worse than you are. Because they should know better. If they had read their Bible, they would have known better. But they were calling for the destruction of an innocent man. And as you will see, they even threatened Pilate so that Pilate would kill an innocent man. The accusation didn't cause Jesus to hide and say, wow, they're accusing me. Blasphemy. I better make a plea deal. Jesus stood up and said exactly who he was. And then he talked down to Pilate, and he talked down to the people, showing exactly who he was. That's what he came to do. Well, what can we learn here? First of all, there are many who claim to be God today, and they want to exercise dominion and control of your life. But you must reject them, because they're not gods. Pilate thought he had power of life and death and Jesus said, no you don't. Are there so many people today? Look at our society. The state wants to be the god of society and make laws contrary to God's law. In fact, so many laws in the last little while have been directly in contradiction to what God has called us to do and how to live. You must stand up to the state and tell them when they're wrong, just like Jesus did. The state is only a creature with delegated authority, and it's limited in what it is able to do. Now, it's true in our modern society, we like to think of the state as the one who will take care of us, and the whole goal of socialism is, we'll take care of you from the cradle to the grave. There are people now who are promoting taking babies and taking care of babies from 10 days after birth. So the mothers can go off to work and the state can continue to have dominion. Look at the talk about providing like $10 a day daycare. You can't even work, an hour you work is more than $10 now. And they want to do that. Why? Because they want control. And you need to be able to say, whenever the state, or the church, or anyone else for that matter, takes on authority, does not have, you need to speak up. Second, those who twist God's law for personal vendettas, or personal gain, will be tossed into hell, and not be vindicated. This now is addressing the church. The Jews, they were the ones who were saying, well, he is guilty of blasphemy. He should die. What an ignorant bunch. If they had read their Bible, you'll see more of this in the second service, they wouldn't be making, and believed it, they wouldn't be making this type of mistake. But they wanted to twist this for personal advantage. They want to use Pilate and make him feel threatened so that he would kill an innocent man. There are people who twist the scriptures the same way today. watch television, you will see. Well, don't watch television. You don't have to see. There's so much of this where people twist the scriptures. And they made the gospel into do unto others as you would have them do to you. That's not the gospel, but that's popular. I just heard this past week The Pope, who's supposed to be leader of over one billion people, said one of the most ridiculous things I've heard ever from a Pope, where he said the illegal immigrants are like Jesus. And you try to put that into your head. Now, you can have whatever view you want about people who are immigrants or illegal immigrants. That's different. But to equate them with that, you see what he's doing there is a very dangerous thing. He's making Jesus about being a man of just moral principles. And he came to teach us nice things. And if you follow Jesus and do what Jesus did, You'll be okay. I don't think he will ever talk about Jesus going in the temple with a whip and start beating people. Then he will say, don't be like Jesus. But that's the problem. They forget what Jesus came to do. He came to save sinners. He didn't come to say, let me give you some moral lessons and everything will be good. That's where we have to be careful how people can manipulate the scriptures. And that's what they were using to even kill Jesus. Third lesson. So, man, it's tied in with all that. Jesus was not a mere human teacher of morality. He was much more. He had to be much more. If Jesus were an ordinary man, they would have put him in a mental institution because of the claims he made. He claimed to be fully God. He claimed to be fully man. And he said he'd come to save the world, that whoever believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life. That's what Jesus came to do. Fourth, the accusation of Jesus of the most heinous sin was necessary. Blasphemy, there was no worse sin. That's a direct attack against God. If they'd accused him of murder or adultery would have been bad. But there's nothing worse than that. Claiming to be God. That's a violation of the first command according to the accusation. So he was guilty with the worst possible sin. Not because he committed it, but because you committed it. That's why he had to endure that. And the testimony of the court, guilty. Because he was guilty with your sin and mine. And then finally Jesus was abandoned. The Jews joined in one chorus to demand the murder of Jesus by manipulating and threatening Pilate to report him to Caesar Tiberius. And he was a very jealous man. And Pilate himself hated being in Palestine. He thought this was the most backward place and these people were always causing trouble. Apparently he wanted one of those nice Mediterranean place where he could be the leader. But he wasn't getting that. And he didn't want to do anything to threaten that possible promotion. So the Jews knew that and they used that as a means of getting him to do their wicked act. But in reality, what the Jews were doing there, they were abandoning Jesus, their king, and embracing that king, Tiberius, Caesar Tiberius, who was the head of that city upon the seven hills, that city called Rome. They hated Jesus so much that they seared their consciences. They had no empathy for an innocent man. So the Jewish leaders went about manipulating the people, so they would abandon God. They manipulated Pilate by threatening him, and it showed what was in their hearts. You know, one would show compassion or show tolerance for someone who showed compassion like Jesus did. What did he do? He healed the sick. He raised the dead. He walked on the water. He embraced people who were looked upon as the downtrodden in society. He called people to worship God in a pure way. He didn't manipulate people to get rich like the Jewish people were, who said, look, give us the money to the church. Don't bother with your parents. It's better to give the money to the church rather than take care of your needy parents at home. Jesus didn't do that. In fact, even on the cross, he tells John, look, take care of my mother. even when he knew he was going to die. There was nothing wrong that he did and these people abandoned him and they abandoned him and ran to the foreign beast. This is where the picture becomes even more beautiful. Sad, but beautiful. They chose to wear the scarlet robe on themselves. And then she appears, the scarlet harlot, appears again where? In Revelation, where she's sitting on that beast's lap. She conspired with Rome to kill the innocent one. What a sad picture. She wore the scarlet robe. What was she saying? I'm going to bear my own sins. Because that's what the robe represented. They didn't want Jesus to wear it for them. They abandoned him. Pilate tried one last time to free Jesus, but the Jews continuously screamed for his murder. The Jews, including their leaders, pledged allegiance to Caesar, whom they hated, in order to kill the innocent Savior, whom they hated more. This confirmed their abandonment. And by the way, this is very important. This was really a fulfillment of God's promise through Jacob in Genesis 49. When Jacob was about to die, he called his sons together and he blessed them. And then he promised them that someone would come, his name would be Shiloh, a name for Jesus. And it says there very clearly, that Jesus would come or Shiloh would come when there would be no more kings in Judah. Up to this time, the Jews were saying, well, we got this half Jew Herod as our king. But here they promise to Caesar, Caesar will be our king. In other words, there will be no more Jewish leaders on the throne in Israel forever, except the one they were going to kill. And thank God that after Good Friday, there was Resurrection Sunday, when Jesus would be raised up again and would be the king of the true Jew, not just the one who was circumcised in body. And on top of the people abandoning Jesus, remember who else abandoned him? His own brothers. the ones who should have stayed closest to him, his family, his friends. They abandoned him for fear of being punished. He had to be abandoned. Why? Because you should be abandoned. You deserve to have no friends, to be on your own, because you turned away. Remember Jesus in the Garden of Eden? Used to meet with them every day, and then he stopped. Why? They had to be abandoned because of sin. And so Jesus took that abandonment for you. Jesus had to be abandoned because you deserve to be abandoned for your inherited and your personal sin. Second lesson, never abandon the one who gave his life for you then. He brought you back. Don't ever leave him again. Remember too, at the end of the world, Jesus will be sitting on the throne as Pilate did. And who would be declared innocent on the great day of judgment? That great white throne judgment, you will be. Why? Because you will say, of course I'm guilty, but someone took the full punishment for my sins. I don't have to die. And you can say that with confidence. because Jesus was guilty with your sins. Now it may be popular, thirdly, to worship modern gods. And there are many. Many people worship health. Many people worship wealth. But neither of these can save your soul. It doesn't matter how much money you've got, you're going to die. And your money will not be your ticket out of hell. It doesn't matter how healthy you are. And there's nothing wrong in wealth. There's nothing wrong in good health. But it can't save your soul. The state too. Many people put their trust in government thinking the government will take care of us. We love our Canadian healthcare system because it's free and we love this and we love that. Well, you're going to die. and the system can't save you. And how bad it is right now, I just heard on the news coming here, we've got the most inept for first world countries healthcare system in the world. So they definitely can't save you. People are dying waiting for treatment and all. It's not gonna save you. So whether it's your health or wealth or the state, they will all fail you. The cradle to the grave thing, it doesn't work. It's false hope. Who can save you? Only Jesus can. Let's conclude. Pilate and the Jews sacrificed their consciences to sacrifice Jesus. But the Jews were worse. They abused the Lord physically, mentally, and spiritually. They turned against the Lord and they falsely accused Him of hating Rome and blaspheming God. And the Jews hated Jesus because he would not be their earthly king. You see, that's why they turned against him. They wanted that military kingdom that would be established like David and Solomon before, and that they could kill the Romans and make themselves great. So they joined the Romans, whom they hated, and tried and succeeded in killing Jesus. The Jews were the murderers of Jesus. But he came to die for sinners. So what can we learn here, brothers and sisters, in conclusion? First of all, Christ died in this most horrible way to save men from their sins. And these are events leading up to his death that we've looked at today. And he wanted to bring them into his eternal kingdom. Christ didn't come to make men healthy and wealthy. Oh, he didn't come for himself. He didn't come to make men healthy and wealthy, but he came to die. He didn't come to remake society and make everyone equal and bring in socialism. He came to regenerate the spiritual dead, to give them life. He knew that salvation was your greatest need. Ephesians 5.2 says, and walk in love as Christ also walked in love and give himself for us as an offering, as a sacrifice to God. That is a sweet smelling aroma. That's what pleased God for you. So what do you do? Crown him. We sing that song, crown him, crown him, Lord of all. Crown him with many crowns. See his eternal kingship now. Don't ignore him like the Jews did. How do you crown him? Does he want a physical crown, beautiful gold, golden jewels? No, he wants you to crown him with worship. He wants you to crown him with obedience. You show that he is your king when you bow down to him in worship. When you bow down to him in obedience. You crown him Lord of all. Not Ford, not Trudeau. Jesus, He is the one who is over all. Then wouldn't you want to make the introduction between the sin bearer and those who are still trapped in sin, so that they will bow their knee to Him and receive all His blessing? That's the only way they'll be saved. The world is still fighting with health and wealth and trusting in the state for their salvation. They need to know those things will not save them. Best you can take care of your health, you're still going to be dead. Your money will be gone. Your beautiful house will burn down or fall down one day. But your treasures in heaven will never be taken away, because you'll be in the presence of Jesus and will be able to enjoy them. And finally, if you're not a Christian, do you realize that if you reject Jesus Christ as your Savior, you're only condemning yourself? and your children? Do you realize that you are abandoning the only grace that could save you and them from hell? May you recognize that you need to submit to the Lord. Bow the knee to Him. He came to save you from death. May you receive Him. Let's pray. Thank you Heavenly Father for your words. So much to mull in this But even in this, these few minutes, that we'll be refreshed with how much you loved us and how you had to fulfill all of these things that we deserved so we could go free. You met God's justice perfectly. Let us now rejoice and crown you Lord of all. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.