Barabbas or Jesus?

 

 

“They cried out all together, saying, “Away with this man, and release for us Barabbas!” (He was one who had been thrown into prison for an insurrection made in the city, and for murder.)” Luke 23:18 – 19.

 

“The chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to put Jesus to death.” Matthew 27:20.

 

From Palm Sunday to Good Friday is less than a week, we can measure the days. Can we measure the chasm between shouting, “Hosanna. Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” and then crying out, “Crucify Him! Give us Barabbas and crucify Jesus!”? Can we plumb the depths of this chasm…the depths of our own souls?

 

How is it conceivable that the crowds who were shouting “Hosanna” on Palm Sunday and rolling out the red carpet for Jesus to enter Jerusalem, within less than a week were ushering Jesus out of Jerusalem onto the blood red way of the Via Dolorosa to Golgotha?

 

And what shall we say of the priests and elders? These holy men were, on the one hand, preparing to celebrate Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and on the other hand were lying and scheming to ensure the murder of Jesus.

 

These leaders of the people were inciting the people to cry, “Give us Barabbas! Crucify Jesus!” The religious and civil leaders were teaching the people to choose between the Lamb of God and a murderer and insurrectionist – they were calling the people to choose death over life, murder over peace, hate over love.

 

Pilate saw the insanity. Do we?

 

The challenge of celebrating Palm Sunday is to look in the mirror on Good Friday. Those who were shouting “Hosanna!” on Palm Sunday were crying out, “Give us Barabbas and crucify Jesus!” on Good Friday.

 

When we choose insurrection, we reject the Lamb of God. When we justify insurrection, we align ourselves with Satan. Jesus tells us that Satan is a murderer.

 

The chief priests and elders taught the people to cry, “Give us Barabbas and crucify Jesus!” on one of the holiest days of the year, Passover. How is this possible? How could they not see what they were doing?

 

Jesus says that “My Kingdom is not of this world.”

 

We say, “We have no king but Caesar.”

 

The spirit of Barabbas, the spirit of insurrection, is the spirit of the “man of lawlessness” (2 Thess. 3:3).

 

“Another horn, a little one, came up among them, and three of the first horns were pulled out by the roots before it; and behold, this horn possessed eyes like the eyes of a man and a mouth uttering great boasts” (Daniel 7:8).

 

“He will speak out against the Most High and wear down the saints of the Highest One, and he will intend to make alterations in times and in law, and they will be given into his hand for a time, times, and half a time” (Daniel 7:25).

 

“Out of one of them came forth a rather small horn which grew exceedingly great…It grew up to the host of heaven and caused some of the host and some of the stars to fall to the earth, and it trampled them down. It even magnified itself to be equal with the Commander of the host; and it removed the regular sacrifice from Him, and the place of His sanctuary was thrown down…and it will fling truth to the ground and perform its will and prosper” (Daniel 8:9 – 13).

 

“A king will arise, insolent and skilled in intrigue, his power will be mighty, but not by his own power, and he will destroy to an extraordinary degree and prosper and perform his will; He will destroy mighty men and the holy people, and through his shrewdness he will cause deceit to succeed by his influence; and he will magnify himself in his heart, and he will destroy many while they are at ease, he will even oppose the Prince of Princes, but he will be broken without human agency” (Daniel 8:23 – 25).

 

“Then the king will do as he pleases, and he will exalt himself above every god and will speak monstrous things against the God of gods…” (Daniel 11:36).

 

“Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God (2 Thess. 2:3 – 4).

 

“There was given to him a mouth speaking arrogant words and blasphemies…and he opened his mouth in blasphemies against God, to blaspheme His name and His tabernacle, that is, those who dwell in heaven” (Revelation 13:5 – 6).

 

I am puzzled how professing Christians can cry, “Give us Barabbas,” ignoring the fact that to do so is to also cry, “Crucify Jesus!”

 

On the Feast of Passover the religious leaders led their people to crucify Jesus by the hands of the Romans. The same thing can happen with professing Christians.

 

All but a few worshipped the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 3). Do we seriously think things are different today?

 

Can we not hear Jesus saying, “My Kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36)?

 

Perhaps the only real question on Good Friday is whether the Christ of the Cross and the Cross of Christ is enough for us, whether He is our All in all. Perhaps the question is whether we belong to Jesus, and only to Jesus.

 

Yes, I think that is it.

 

Our Great Temptation

 

 

“From that time Jesus began to point out to His disciples that it was necessary for Him to go to Jerusalem and to suffer many things from the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and to be killed, and to be raised up on the third day. And yet Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You!” But He turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; for you are not setting your mind on God’s purposes, but men’s.”” Matthew 16:21 – 23.

 

The things we think are good can be bad, very bad.

 

“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate” (Genesis 3:6).

 

Suppose Jesus had heeded Peter’s words and gone along with Peter’s plan to spare Him suffering and death? Where would we be?

 

Look closely at Peter’s words. “God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You.” Peter is both rebuking God and invoking God. In the Name of God Peter is opposing God. In the Name of God Peter is playing the role of Satan.

 

Consider that this passage is preceded by Peter’s glorious confession of Jesus as the Christ. “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16). This was revealed to Peter by the Father (16:17).

 

One minute Peter is receiving revelation from the Father and confessing that Jesus is the Messiah, the next minute Peter is playing the role of Satan invoking the Name of God.

 

Peter was tempting Jesus and Jesus responds, “You are a stumbling block to Me.” We may think of Jesus’s temptation in the Wilderness (Matthew 3), we may think of Jesus struggling in Gethsemane, but do we think of Jesus facing the temptation that Peter presents Him with in the words, “God forbid!”?

 

The temptation is to spare Himself. The temptation is to think that perhaps the Father has another way, a way other than the Cross. Maybe Peter has special insight, after all the Father has just given him revelation concerning Jesus as the Christ, maybe the Father is giving Peter insight into a way other than the Cross.

 

But Jesus knows the Way of the Father, the Way of the Cross; from before the foundation of the world He has been the Lamb slain, destined to be both Priest and Sacrifice. Jesus loves us too much to love Himself more. Jesus will become a curse for us so that we might be freed from death and live by the life of God. Jesus will be made sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5:21). Jesus will “taste death for everyone” (Heb. 2:9) so that we may “pass out of death into life” (John 5:24).

 

Are we tempted to say to Jesus, “God forbid!”?

 

Is the idea that Jesus must suffer and be rejected by the religious leaders too much for us? Is the thought that Jesus is rejected by the national, political, military, economic, and social powers of this present age too much for us? Have we deceived ourselves into thinking that Jesus can be made palatable to the powers and authorities and peoples of the world – including to our own nation?

 

Let us be clear, “The word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1 Cor. 1:18). The Gospel is a message of “foolishness” (1 Cor. 1:21); to some it is a stumbling block, to others it is foolishness (1 Cor. 1:23).

 

If we think that the economic and political and national powers of this world, if we think that any system in this world is endorsing Jesus, is following Jesus, is adhering to Jesus, then we are deceived. The Cross of Christ and the Christ of the Cross bring an end to all things, most especially our egos, our self-centered agendas, our self-glorification, our wars and fightings, our vitriol. The Cross is self-sacrificial, those who follow Christ live cruciform lives – this is not the way of the world, it is not the way of politics or worldly economics or the way of an imperial cult.

 

Nor is it the way of the world’s religion – just as the religious leaders who were supposedly the heirs of Moses engineered the crucifixion of Jesus, so those who are supposedly the heirs of the Gospel often do the opposite but with the identical motive – they seek to keep Jesus off the Cross so that they may keep their lives (and ours!) off the Cross, so that Jesus might not be an offense to them, to us, or to the world.

 

For what follows Jesus’ words, “Get behind Me Satan!”?

 

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what good will it do a person if he gains the whole world, but forfeits his soul? Or what will a person give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and will then repay every person according to his deeds.”” (Matthew 16:27).

 

In other words, Jesus is saying that just as He is going to the Cross, so we are to go to the Cross (Galatians 2:20). And let us make no mistake, there is shame associated with the Cross of Christ, shame that is repulsive to the world and the powers of the world – shame that offends our religious self-righteousness. Hence the writer of Hebrews exhorts us to “Go outside the camp, bearing His reproach” (Heb. 13:13).

 

Our great temptation is to spare ourselves the Cross. It is to avoid the Cross. The temptation of pastors is to spare themselves and their people the Cross, to avoid the call of Jesus that we must deny ourselves, lose our lives, and follow Him. We do not want the Cross to be our way of life, we want success and prestige and comfort and affluence and glittery self-affirming religion to be our way…why we may even fall prey to desiring theological constructs that appeal to our desire for knowledge but avoid the Cross and the Cruciform Life. 

We do not want a Jesus who hangs on a Cross in shame, who eschews the wisdom of the world, who serves the poor, the stranger and immigrant, the unclean, the disenfranchised. We do not want a Jesus who is not a showman.

 

Our great temptation this Holy Week, as it is every week, is to say with Peter, “God forbid it!”

 

“May it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Galatians 6:14).

 

 

 

 

The Cross - Our Way of Life (7)

 

 

“Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Having said this, He breathed His last” (Luke 23:46).

 

We see fellowship restored, our High Priest has offered Himself (Hebrews 9:11 – 10:14), He is both Priest and Sacrifice. We cannot see what transpired when darkness covered the land, but we can see fellowship restored, for the Father has accepted the offering of the Son. Let us always be clear, that on the Cross Jesus was the perfect and complete sacrifice and reconciler, that “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them” (2 Cor. 5:19).

 

“He [God] made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that we might be the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor. 5:21). O dear friends, there has never been anything written as precious as this, never anything that so communicates the mystery of the Cross and those dreadful hours when holy darkness covered the land, never anything that comes so close to communicating, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”

 

To think that “while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son” (Rom. 5:10). To think that “having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life”! (Rom. 5:10).

 

O dear, dear friends, the love of God is overwhelming in its depth, its vastness, its Nature…no wonder Paul writes that he desires us to “know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (Eph. 3:19).

 

One day you and I will breathe our last. We do not know where we will be, we don’t know the day, we cannot discern the circumstance, we don’t know if the experience will be sudden or prolonged. We don’t know if we will be with friends and family.

 

But we do know two things. We will not be alone, for our Father and Lord Jesus will be with us, as will the blessed Holy Spirit. We also know that we can say, “Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

We know this because of God’s Nature, His character (if we can use such a word), His Essence. We know this because Jesus is our perfect and eternal High Priest. We know this because God is love (1 John 4:16).

 

When Jesus says, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit,” He says this not just on His own behalf, but He speaks for us all; He speaks with assurance of His Father’s love so that you and I may speak with assurance of our Father’s love. Does Jesus not teach us to pray, “Our Father”?

 

Paul writes that “We groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven…so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life…Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge” (2 Cor. 5:1 – 5). In other words, we long for that moment when we too will say, “Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

As our lives move deeper and deeper into intimacy with God, we sense what Paul was feeling when he wrote, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain…having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better” (Phil. 1:21 – 24).

 

Let us not think that we can be so heavenly minded that we are of no earthly good, this is foolishness. It is only as we are heavenly minded that we can be of true earthly good, for this world desperately needs to see heaven, to taste heaven, to sense heaven – which is all to experience Jesus. We are citizens of heaven (Phil. 3:20), and as citizens of heaven we are called to live. We are children of another world, and as the children of our Father we are to live and we are to die, and dying is but a portal into our eternal home and glorious destiny.

 

One day the Spirit of our Father will call us home; whenever that day is, wherever we may be, whatever the circumstance, it will be a glorious call from the One who loves us beyond measure, from the One who desires us to be with Him and with our brothers and sisters, from the One who has prepared both individual and collective destinies for us – and we will see the Lamb and be enveloped in His glory and love and peace and joy, and every tear will be wiped from our eyes, and there will no longer be any pain…NO PAIN! O hallelujah!

 

And the Name of our God will be written on us, and the Name of the Lamb, and the Name of the Holy City…and O dear friends…O dear dear friends…and we will see His Face! O my, O my, O my…we…you and I…we will see His Face.

 

Now I ask you, how can we not look forward to that day? How can we not long for that glorious day?

 

When Jesus said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit,” He said it for Himself, He said it for you, He said it for me, He said it for us.

 

Let this be our daily prayer of consecration, and our daily prayer of expectation…yes?

 

“Father, into Your hands I commit my spirit.”

 

AMEN.