Word of Salvation – Vol. 45 No.44 – November 2000
Why Christ Suffered Under Human Justice and Died by Crucifixion
Sermon by Rev MP Geluk
on Lord’s Day 15B (Q&A 38 & 39 Heid Cat)
Scripture Reading: Matthew 27:11 – 26
Suggested Hymns: BoW 392; 398; 300; 242
Beloved in the Lord.
When we dealt with Lord’s Day 15 last time we focussed mainly on the suffering of Christ. We also looked at human suffering in general and tried to understand something of it in the light of sin in an imperfect world. We also saw that the Lord Jesus entered our world in order to end our suffering by His suffering.
But there are, of course, two more questions and answers in Lord’s Day 15, and they deal with Jesus’ suffering under Pontius Pilate and His death by crucifixion. We did not touch on that last time but they should also be looked at, for here also there is a wealth of biblical teaching. So let us now deal with those two issues:
WHY CHRIST SUFFERED UNDER HUMAN JUSTICE and WHY HE DIED BY CRUCIFIXION.
1. Pontius Pilate was God’s Representative of Justice
Why is Pontius Pilate mentioned in the Creed? Could he not just as easily have been left out of it? It is all the more puzzling when you think that the formulation of the Apostles’ Creed was not just a quick attempt to throw a few words together in time to meet a deadline. These twelve articles of our Christian faith, accepted by such a large part of the historic Christian church, have stood the test of time for nearly seventeen centuries. The Creed, although not the work of the apostles, contained their teaching, which in turn, came from Christ Himself.
As far as we know no one in particular put it together, the Creed just grew to its present size over a period of time. Before the end of the fourth century the ancient church had accepted all the articles in its now familiar form. So the early Christian believers had plenty of time to think about whether or not Pontius Pilate’s name should be included. And they decided, obviously, that it should. But Christians like you and I have sometimes wondered why Pilate’s name is in the Creed. For the Creed is about God and salvation – it states what we believe. So why is Pilate, an unbeliever, mixed up with that?
Well, for a start, Pontius Pilate is in the Creed in order to date the time of Jesus’ death on the cross. You see, Christianity is a religion that came out of history. It’s not just a philosophy. It’s not just a system of thought that some religious people put together and gave to the world as their basis for love and peace. No, Christianity is an historical faith. It rests on certain events that took place in time. Jesus was a historical person. He lived in Palestine and He was condemned to death by Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, in about 33 AD.
Today we date an event by a year. When you are asked when you were born, then you’re not going to say that you were born when everyone already had a television set. Or if you’re a bit older, then you’re not going to say that you were born during the Great Depression. Not unless you were asked as to what times were like when you were born. Generally we just give the year, 1977, or 1933, or whatever it may be.
But in the ancient world one could not say it like that. It was not yet the practice of referring to a specific year, either BC, before Christ, or AD, in the year of our Lord. Someone’s time of birth or death was referred to by saying that it took place when some famous person lived, say a king, or some well-known event took place. For example, Matthew’s gospel says Jesus was born during the time of King Herod, and then you still have to figure out from other events which Herod was meant for there were several. Luke’s gospel says that Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census was to take place and this happened whilst Quirinius was governor of Syria, and that then was the time when Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem where Jesus was born.
So Pontius Pilate’s name in the Apostles’ Creed enables us to know when approximately Jesus died because we know from history when Pilate was governor. But there is something else about the Creed referring to Pontius Pilate. It doesn’t say that Jesus lived under this Roman governor but it says that He suffered and died under Pontius Pilate.
The Apostles’ Creed, of course, doesn’t go into any detail with any of its twelve articles. It just states the main facts. But it is rather significant that the early Christian church insisted on saying that the Lord suffered, was crucified and died when Pontius Pilate was the representative of Rome in Jerusalem. The Creed could have said that Jesus died when Tiberius was the Roman emperor, or when Caiaphas was the Jewish high priest. But the early Christian church did not link Jesus’ death with those names. Instead it referred to Pontius Pilate.
The reason for this is that Pilate was the legal representative of the most powerful law code in existence in the world at that time. The gospels go to great length in describing Jesus’ trial under Pilate the Roman governor, who was the judge. The Catechism has picked that up and explains that Jesus, though innocent, was condemned by a civil judge.
The Jewish leaders had, of course, wanted to kill Jesus for a long time and under the law of Moses they had their grounds. They accused Jesus, whom they saw as only a man, of being guilty of blasphemy because Jesus said that He was the Son of God. Many times the Pharisees and scribes argued with Him that not He but only God could forgive sins. They knew Mary His mother and Joseph whom they thought was His father, as well as His brothers and sisters. So how could Jesus say that He existed before Abraham?
Yes, they also knew of Jesus’ many miracles and some were even done by the Lord in their presence. But the Lord’s wonderful teaching and mighty miracles had only a negative effect on them. They said that he did such things by the power of the devil. They refused to believe He was the Christ, the Son of God. All they saw and heard was a mere man making these ridiculous claims about Him and God the Father being one.
So, according to Moses’ law, Jesus was guilty of terrible sins and indeed subject to death by stoning. But the Romans, who were in power, had taken the right to execute someone away from the Jews. Therefore, the Jewish high priest had to go to Pilate the Roman governor and say that Jesus was guilty and subject to death, and could Roman law see to it.
But if there was one judge who wished he were free of this troublesome case, then it was Pilate. The gospels make it very clear that he knew that Jesus was not guilty according to Roman law. Maybe according to Jewish law, as the Pharisees saw it, but not according to Roman justice. Hence Pilate hoped that the Jews would choose Jesus to be released and not Barabbas. And that’s why Pilate also washed his hands of the whole matter and claimed he was innocent of Jesus’ death. But that didn’t change the fact, of course, that Pilate handed Jesus over to be crucified and he passed this death sentence as the representative of Roman law.
And Roman law was not at fault. It was Pilate who perverted Roman justice. You might see in some courthouses still today a statue of stone or metal, or engraved somewhere into the stones of the building, a woman wearing the traditional Roman gown, blindfolded, and holding a set of scales. It is a representation of Lady Justitia. The scales of justice she holds must not tip in favour of anyone being tried under Roman law. She is blindfolded so that she cannot see a bribe. She must not be persuaded by someone trying to influence the course of justice in an unfair manner.
Furthermore, Jesus said to Pilate that the power he had as judge was given to him by God (Jn.19:11). Only God has the power to take away freedom, honour, and even life itself, from a person bearing God’s image. But God has entrusted this power to certain people, like a judge. And in the Bible we often hear God being angry with weak and corrupt judges who take bribes and who tip the scales in someone’s favour unfairly.
God demands from all judges that they be impartial, just, not to tolerate injustice, to defend the cause of the weak and fatherless, to maintain the rights of the poor and the oppressed. The judge is responsible to rescue the weak and the needy, deliver them from the hand of the wicked (Ps.82:1-4). The remarkable thing was that Roman law upheld all that. Pilate knew what he had to do – release Jesus. But the Jews kept shouting, “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar” (Jn.19:12).
So Pilate became afraid. And any judge who acts out of fear or seeks favour, destroys justice. The Jews also destroyed justice by trying to be friends with Caesar in order to achieve their goal of being rid of Jesus. They came to this because they had let go of God a long time ago.
But Pilate was God’s representative not only in being a judge. He was also serving the purposes of God concerning Jesus the Saviour from sin. The Catechism says that Jesus’ condemnation under Pilate as judge frees us from the severe judgment of God that was to fall on us. Pilate remains responsible of perverting justice concerning Christ, but at the same time God was using Pilate to condemn Christ His Son in order to save His people from their sins.
What happened in Pilate’s court was that this Roman judge’s judgment, however crook it was, was also God’s judgment. Pilate condemned Jesus to death for the sake of expedience. But God used that human action to fulfil His own purpose, which was to condemn His own innocent Son to death for the sake of saving guilty sinners. You might say – well I can’t understand that. How can God who is altogether righteous use the crooked justice of a corrupt judge?
But bear this in mind. Pilate saw Jesus only as a man. To Pilate, Jesus was just some misguided Jew deeply despised by other Jews. But God looked on His only Son and regarded Him as the guilty one when He, in the greatest act of love ever, transferred the sins of others to His Son. Christ was condemned to death in our place. The innocent one in place of the guilty. God thus set us free from His justice on our sin. All those who look to Christ as the Saviour may hear and believe the gospel truth that they no longer will have to face God’s eternal judgment. They have been set free!
How will all this make you glad and thankful? Well, know this: Christ suffered this terrible suffering under Pilate willingly. He knew that what was being done to Him was a perversion of human justice. He had done no wrong. But more than anything else, Jesus was also conscious that in His suffering and dying He was saving from God’s justice all those whom God elected to save from condemnation. And to make it even more meaningful, Jesus knew He was God in the flesh. Here was God Himself facing the death penalty on our sin in order to set us free forever. It is incomprehensible and yet wonderful to know and believe. It is God’s love for sinners at its best.
2. Death by Crucifixion Represented God’s Curse on Sin
During His life the Lord Jesus could have died a number of times and in different ways. Herod tried to kill Him when he murdered the infant boys of Bethlehem, but God warned Joseph and Mary to escape to Egypt (Mat.2:13). Many years later, when the Pharisees had complained angrily to Jesus about His disciples picking some grain on the Sabbath to ease their hunger, and when they saw Jesus heal the man with a shrivelled hand on the Sabbath, then they went away from Him, plotting how they might kill Him (Mat.12:14; Mk.3:6).
When Jesus had cleared the temple of people who had turned its courts into a marketplace, then again the chief priests and the teachers of the law began looking for a way to kill Jesus (Mk.11:18). Another King Herod also tried to kill Jesus but some friendly Pharisees warned Him (Lk.13:31). Once when He was teaching in the temple, a whole crowd of people got angry and tried to kill Him (Jn.7:19). Even in His own home town of Nazareth, after He taught in their synagogue but did not do a miracle there, these people He grew up with drove Him out of town and tried to throw Him down a cliff (Lk.4:29).
But God did not allow all this scheming and the attempts on his life to succeed. It was His will that His Son die on the cross. The Romans used crucifixion to execute low class criminals, such as slaves and foreigners. They would not crucify a Roman citizen. The law of Moses, under which the Jews lived, demanded that offenders worthy of capital punishment be stoned to death. And sometimes they would hang the dead body on a tree, for all to see that this person was guilty of terrible sins against God and had now been condemned by God. The body had to be buried on the same day. But anyone hung on a tree was under God’s curse (Deut.21:22,23). And the New Testament follows on from this and says: “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree!” (Gal.3:13)
What is meant by God’s curse? Well, when someone violated God’s commands so badly that it deserved the death penalty, and hanging of the dead body followed, then it meant that God had cut Himself off completely from such a person.
Now think for a moment. We use words like ‘curse’ and ‘bless’ far too carelessly. We buy a car with air-conditioning and we might say, ‘that has been such a blessing’. Or, we arrive at the beach and there’s no surf and we then might say, ‘what a curse’.
God, however, uses these words in a far weightier way. He alone is the One who can really bless or really curse. God blessed Abraham and passed on that blessing to Isaac and Jacob. But not to Esau. When Balaam tried to curse Israel, the covenant people of God, he found he couldn’t do it. Not even with lots of money from king Balak to bribe him.
When and where God blesses there is well-being, wholeness and happiness. God’s blessing can rest on people, on our work, our business undertakings, and on the land. His curse can fall on those who disobey Him, who turn away from Him, who cheat and are dishonest. In Old Testament times, barren land and deserts were signs of God’s curse.
There are different degrees of God’s blessings and curses. Hell would have to be the worst of His curse. And how meaningful is God’s blessing in the benediction at the end of the worship service: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn His face towards you and give you peace” (Num.6:22ff). Whenever you leave the worship of God to go back to your life and work, then God’s blessing goes with you and it consist of God keeping you, being gracious to you, giving you peace.
The scapegoat in the Old Testament was placed under God’s curse. The sins of the people were confessed over it then the goat, symbolically carrying the guilt of the people, was banished into the wilderness. No one was to come near it. It was cut off. And the person releasing the goat had to wash his clothes and take a bath. He had to purify himself before he could come near God at the tabernacle (Lev.16).
And now Jesus took our sin on Him and He became the scapegoat for us and He took God’s curse on our behalf. The public hanging on the cross became a clear indication from God that He had cut Himself off from Christ because on Him was our sin and guilt. Jesus suffered terribly under this burden and He cried out from deep within His heart, “My God, My God why have you forsaken me.” It was not only Pilate who sent Him to the cross, it was God also. It was not just the Jews saying, “Away with him, away with him!” God also said ‘away with Him.’
Can you see in all this the love of God for sinners who really deserve His curse? Christ removed our curse by becoming a curse for us. God, cursing His own Son, in order to bless you and me!
A long time ago, God said that through Abraham He would bless the nations. That began to happen after Pentecost. The gospel was taken to all nations and those who believed in Christ and became His followers were blessed by God. For the sake of His church in the world, God blesses the nations where the members of His church are. His curse was removed from them. But on the day of judgment, God’s curse will fall on all those who have rejected Christ and wanted nothing to do with Him.
But let not God’s curse be the last thing you hear in worship. You have heard of His blessing. Rejoice in that and believe in it.
Let the words of this hymn be our words:
Lord, dismiss us with your blessing;
fill our hearts with joy and peace.
Let us each, Your love possessing,
triumph in redeeming grace.
O direct us and protect us
travelling through this wilderness.
Thanks we give and adoration
for Your gospel’s joyful sound.
May the fruits of Your salvation
in our hearts and lives abound.
Ever faithful, ever faithful
to Your truth may we be found. [BoW 241]
Amen.