More Than The Eye Can See (John 19:1-16)

The response of Pilate to the desire of the crowd to release Barabbas was to have Jesus flogged. Why he did this is not obvious since he had concluded that Jesus was innocent. Perhaps Pilate thought that Jesus was hiding something and that a physical beating would cause him to reveal it. Or maybe he imagined that a lesser form of punishment would satisfy the accusers of Jesus and they would not pursue their demands against him.

It is obvious that the flogging was more than a painful experience. The response of the soldiers was to demean Jesus and treat him with contempt and further cruelty. This response was the first of two responses by the soldiers because after Pilate condemned Jesus to death the soldiers gathered the entire cohort to mock him (Matt. 27:27-30). And yet as we look at their behaviour, we can sense that John is asking us to see something deeply symbolic here. Thorns were the consequence of the curse imposed on creation by God when Adam sinned. Instead of wearing a crown that indicated he was the king of glory, Jesus now wears a crown that indicates he is about to become a curse.

Behold the man!

Pilate was still determined to release Jesus, but he wanted to do so in a way that would please the accusers of Jesus. So Jesus was brought out to the accusers and Pilate said more than he realised when he asked them to ‘Behold the man!’ Perhaps he meant to show that Jesus was not a king as they alleged. Instead he was only a man, and given the appearance he now had he did not look like anything special, and therefore was not a threat.

Yet again John is asking the readers to heed directions from the words of Pilate and look carefully at the man Jesus. What will they see, not only from this incident, but also from what John has already written about him in his Gospel? To begin with, they would recall that Jesus was more than a man, that he was the eternal Word who had become flesh, and now they would be getting insight into why he became a man.

They would also recall that John the Baptist had been told that a man would come to him for baptism and a dove would at the time rest upon him as a sign to John that the man was receiving the Spirit in a special way. Of course, this anointing of and with the Spirit equipped Jesus for his three years of public ministry, and some of what he did is recorded by John in his Gospel. The possession of the Spirit in such a manner was evidence that Jesus was the Messiah.

Moreover, John the Baptist had pointed Jesus out as the Lamb of God who was bearing away the sin of the world to his listeners. As they looked at Jesus they should have realised that he was going to be a sacrifice for sin, but they should also have realised that his sacrifice would produce new creatures delivered from sin. So we can see that John’s readers would have a lot to think about as they applied this information to the description of Jesus dressed up as a king that John gives.

They would also surely realise that Jesus was prepared to go very low in order to accomplish his goals. Here is the one who is God being abused verbally and physically by those whom he could have easily dispatched into eternity. We see his humility and his gentleness, his submission to God’s will and his dedication to finish the work that he was given to do.

The accusation

The response of the Jews to the humiliated Jesus was one of unbridled hatred. All they wanted was for him to be maltreated even more. So they cried for his crucifixion and even Pilate’s affirmation of the innocence of Jesus did not pacify them. Instead they insisted that he was guilty of blasphemy.

I suppose there are many ways of considering those Jews, but one striking realisation about them is that they show that mere possession of God’s Word is not enough. They could read the divine law logically and deduce that a person guilty of blasphemy should die. But they had not read that law with divine help, because if they had they would have realised that they needed a Saviour to deliver them from their breaking of the law. If the Bible is not read with the aim of looking for Jesus, then we will miss its main message, which is about the salvation of God.

The dignity of the divine

Pilate was finding himself in deeper dilemmas. The assertion of the Jews that Jesus was guilty of blasphemy had a strange effect on Pilate. Each piece of information that he received told him that the prisoner was not an ordinary person. Usually, if someone claimed to be divine, it would be easy to recognise that such a person was unbalanced. Yet such an assessment could not be made about Jesus. Pilate realised that he would have to get more information from Jesus about his origins.

Pilate was astonished that Jesus refused to answer his questions. We can see who the person in control of the situation is. Jesus knows all about Pilate and Pilate knows very little about Jesus. John informs us that Jesus spoke when Pilate tried to enforce his imagined authority over Jesus. We can see in the Saviour’s explanation another example of how he was able to say a great deal in a few words.

Here are some implications of the words of Jesus to Pilate. First, Pilate received his position as governor from God and not from Caesar; second, God can give civil authority to a man who vacillates about providing justice – God is not to blame for what a person does in his God-given position; third, although Pilate disobeys the revealed will of God, he cannot avoid the secret will of God; fourth, although Pilate had greater authority than the Jews, he was not guilty of a greater sin because they sinned against the truths revealed to them in the Old Testament.

It is not surprising that Pilate was overwhelmed by Jesus’ words. The governor recognised that he was in the presence of one who could analyse the situation better than he could. But he did not have the courage to act on his convictions. So when the Jews suggested that by siding with Jesus he would be opposing Caesar, Pilate realised a decision had to be made.

Behold Your King

Again Pilate makes a statement that John uses to make his readers think about Jesus. The readers’ thoughts would go back to the words of Nathaniel in John 1:49: ‘Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!’ That confession was made by an Israelite in whom there was no guile. In contrast to him, the readers would know that the Jews to whom Pilate was speaking were full of guile and deceit.

The readers would also recall that Jesus had refused an attempt by some Jews to make him a king (John 6:15). Jesus had resisted their attempts because he knew that they were not genuine believers in him. Later in that incident, those would-be subjects turned away from recognising him as a real king because he did not do what they thought he should. Now they were reading about another group of Jews who had made the same decision about Jesus and wanted rid of him.

Another incident that John’s readers would recall about the kingship of Jesus was when he rode into Jerusalem, as recorded in John 12:13: ‘So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”’ The readers would have recalled that the entrance so described was a fulfilment of prophecy indicating that Jesus was indeed the promised King. John is encouraging them to believe in Jesus as the Saviour and to recognise that the rejection of him by the Jews only confirms that he did not wish to the King of the realm they imagined. But that did not mean that he was not a King.

The Jews made their choice between Christ and Caesar. Without realising it, they and Pilate made the same choice. Rejecting Jesus has a strange way of making people equal. Because neither Pilate nor the Jews would put Jesus first, they both put themselves where they would not receive his salvation. Both spoke with Jesus on his way to the cross, both arranged for him to go the cross, but neither understood why he was going to the cross. But the readers know, and among them are you and I.