Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ,
It is likely that as we think about the crucifixion of our Lord that we don’t spend much time thinking about the soldiers who crucified Him. I mean, how does anyone crucify people for a job? What do you say to your children when you get home at the end of the day and they ask you, “How was work today, daddy?”
The Gospels give us a picture of the usual nastiness that accompanies any group involved in torture of this kind as are told that they stripped Jesus and put the crown of thorns on His head and beat Him and spat at Him and later divided up His clothes.
But thankfully we are spared the gory details of the actual crucifixion. For instance, Matthew’s account simply says that they crucified Him and then, “sitting down, they kept watch over Him there.”
Now, on the one had, it is easy to picture them passing around a cup of wine and making crass jokes about aspects of what they had just done. But in Matthew’s Gospel, after we are told that they sat down to keep watch, we are then told about the sign above Jesus’ head, the crowds mocking Jesus, the three hours of darkness, Jesus crying out and dying, and then the massive earthquake that opened the tombs and the dead rising from those tombs. And all of this would have been quite different from your ‘average’ crucifixion, if there is such a thing!
And then we read these words, “When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely He was the Son of God!”” The crucifixion of Jesus and all that surrounded it had such a profound affect on the soldiers that they were drawn to acknowledge that He was no ordinary human being.
So congregation, today we join those soldiers. We sit with them and contemplate Jesus on the cross of Calvary. And we do so to see why this was necessary, so that we also, with heads bowed, may confess Him as the Son of God.
And we do this as we consider the words of our text, “Here they crucified Him.” And those four words are the four points of this sermon – HERE – THEY – CRUCIFIED – HIM.
So we begin with Here.
1. And the word ‘here’ has to do with LOCATION. If I was talking with you boys and girls and I said, “Here is where the pulpit stands,” you would know that am telling you about the location of the pulpit. So we are being told something about the location of the crucifixion – where Jesus was crucified. And we are told the location in v17: It was “the place of the skull (which in Aramaic is Golgotha).”
a. Now, there are various theories as to why this place was known as ‘the place of the skull.’ Some think that the skulls of executed criminals were left there, others that the hill was shaped like a skull, and there is even a tradition which says that this very spot is believed to be the place where Adam was buried. And I read that you can visit, today, the place where many believe Golgotha was and that there is an excavated chamber below this site, which contains the very tomb and skull of Adam.
b. But that is not the significance of this location that chiefly concerns us today. If you look at v20, you will see that this location was “NEAR THE CITY”; it was near Jerusalem but it was outside the city itself. And the fact that it was outside the city if very important.
i. Please turn with me in your Bibles to HEBREWS 13:11. There we read these words: “The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood.”
A. THE CAMP referred to there is the camp of the people of Israel as they journeyed from Egypt to the Promised Land, for they lived in tents during that journey. And in the law God gave to Israel, He told them that there was to be nothing unclean in the camp.
B. Well, the people of Israel were sinners who broke God’s commandments. That made them unclean. So they deserved to die for their sins. But God made it possible for an animal to die for them as a substitute. So the High Priest would take its blood and enter the Most Holy Place and sprinkle it on the Mercy seat. But because the animal was killed in place of the people, it’s body had to be taken outside the camp and burned there because it was considered unclean.
C. And so, as Jesus hung on the cross there, “outside the city gate,” we see three things:
1) We see the body that bears our sins.
a) Isaiah 53:6, “The LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”
b) 2 Corinthians 5:21, “God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us.”
c) God took all your lies and all your lusts and all your greed and all your anger and all your gossip and all your disrespect and rebellion and put it all on Jesus. His body became the body of sin.
2) But secondly just as the High Priest took the blood of the goat into the Most Holy Place to sprinkle it on the mercy seat, so we see Jesus, the great High Priest, entering the temple that is not made with hands – heaven’s throne room – and offering His precious blood to the Father, who receives it as an acceptable sacrifice.
a) You can read this in Hebrews 9:28, “Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people.”
3) And thirdly, because He took our sins upon Himself, He is the unclean one who must go and die ‘outside the city gate.’
And this, brothers and sisters, is the gospel in the location of the crucifixion – HERE, they crucified Him; “Jesus … suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood.”
But note secondly, Here THEY crucified Him.
1. Towards the end of last year, LUCY KNIGHT witnessed a young thug trying to steal the purse from another woman. So she stepped in to help but was hit over the head and she fell. She suffered a fractured skull and a brain bleed. Thankfully, she survived the attack but her recovery was slow and even now, she still suffers the effects of the injury. And when we hear a story like that, we wonder what kind of a person can commit a crime like that?
2. Well, we might ask the same in relation to the crucifixion of Jesus. Lucy Knight was described as a ‘Good Samaritan.’ But even Lucy Knight was not perfect. But Jesus was! He never hurt anyone. On the contrary, He healed many even raising some from the dead. He obeyed God’s law and the law of the land, perfectly, as the Gospels are at pains to tell us. So what kind of people could do this to Jesus?
a. Well, there were the SOLDIERS we spoke of earlier – trained upholders of law and order.
b. Behind them was PONTIUS PILATE AND ROME – the world empire of the time that was famous for its law and order and its civilized culture.
c. And then there were the REPRESENTATIVES OF RELIGION. And not just any old pagan religion, mind you, but Judaism – the people of the Book – the Scribes and Pharisees and the High Priest of the time, whose task it was to teach the people the will of God. They too are those who want Jesus crucified.
d. And there is also THE CROWD, people from the high and low of society, as crowds inevitably are, screaming for Him to be crucified.
e. But who else was there? JUDAS ISCARIOT – one of Jesus’ inner circle; one who had heard and seen all that Jesus did these last three years; one of His friends; one who had had His feet washed by Jesus just a few hours ago.
f. Congregation, the they of the crucifixion is SINFUL HUMANITY; everyone is crucifying Jesus; high and low, friend and foe, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, politician and lawyer and cleric – they are all united in crucifying Jesus.
g. This crowd represents the world. You see, Romans 1:18-30 tells us that apart from the regenerating work of God’s Spirit, what you find in all mankind, regardless of their position in society, is hatred of God. And so, as one commentator puts it, “If the Lord [lived] among us today, and walked the streets of our civilized world, we, mere men, no matter what our station may be in life, no matter how beautiful may be the polish and glamour of our culture, would no more give Him a place, and tolerate Him, than did the men of His day. We would certainly crucify Him.”
h. The cross of Golgotha is the cross of mankind. It is our natural response to Jesus. It is what we would always to do to Jesus if the Spirit of God did not take away our spiritual blindness.
i. Who are THEY that crucified Jesus? Look around. Later in the service we shall sing these words:
Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon Thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.
‘Twas I, Lord Jesus, I it was denied Thee: I crucified Thee.
But as we come now to our third point, which is that they CRUCIFIED Him, we see that even in the cross, God was at work to save all those He chose to salvation in Christ.
1. Congregation, nothing reveals the hatred of the crowd that day more starkly than the cross. You have to wonder, why didn’t they just ignore Jesus? If they didn’t like what He did and taught, why not just ignore Him? But no, they cry out, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” Why? Why crucifixion?
a. Well, turn with me please to ACTS 2:23. There Peter is speaking to the Jews and He says this of Jesus, “This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross.”
i. So he lays the responsibility for this crime on their shoulders, but He also explains that this was done according to God’s set purpose and foreknowledge.
b. And flip over to Acts 4:27, “Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen.”
i. So as much the cross was the design of the people, so also it was the design of God.
2. But again, why? Why did God so ordain that His beloved Son would die on the cross?
a. Well, we read earlier in the service from DEUT. 21. And there we saw that the body of anyone guilty of a capital crime was to be hung on a tree. So criminals were not put to death by hanging, but after they were dead, usually from being stoned to death, their bodies were hung on a tree.
i. And this was to deter others from committing the same crimes.
ii. But this was done also to demonstrate that these people were cursed-covenant breakers; they were those who had seriously violated God’s covenant law.
b. But what our other reading from GALATIANS 3 makes plain is that it is not just those who commit a capital crime who are cursed covenant breakers, it is everyone who breaks even one of God’s commands. One lie, one idol worshipped, one swear word, one blasphemy, one lustful thought, one item, stolen, and you are a cursed-covenant breaker.
c. But, as we read in GALATIANS 3:13, “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.””
d. Jesus had to be crucified so that He could take the curse that you and I deserve to Himself!
e. So it was Herod and Pilate and the Jewish people and their leaders who hung Jesus on the cross, and it was your sins and mine that nailed Him to the cross, but Jesus went there, purposefully and willingly, that our sins might be forgiven!
And these words lead us lastly and briefly into our final point, which is that they crucified HIM.
1. We have seen in our Gospel of Mark studies that at least three times, Jesus told the disciples what must happen to Him in Jerusalem. He said, for example, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and … be killed and after three days rise again.”
a. As God, Philippians 2 tells us that He voluntarily left heaven to come to earth to humble Himself and become “obedient to death – even death on a cross.” The Second person of the Trinity came to die at Golgotha that He might redeem His people.
b. But as a human, He read the Scriptures and learned from them what must happen to Messiah and obediently submitted to the will of His Father in heaven and journeyed to the cross.
i. Early on His earthly ministry, Satan came to Him and offered Him the kingdoms of the world without the need for the cross, but He refused that temptation.
ii. His disciples and the crowds would have placed Him on the throne of David as King of the Jews in a heartbeat, but He refused that ‘easy way’ and chose the cross.
iii. In the Garden of Gethsemane, when He was arrested and Peter tried to defend Him with a sword, He said, “Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and He will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?” He could have escaped the cross, easily. But instead He chose the cross.
iv. He endured the nakedness, the beatings, and being spat on. He allowed them to nail His hands and feet to the cross.
v. And even on the cross, the crowds cried out, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if He is the Christ of God, the Chosen One.” And He could have come off and saved Himself. But by His own will He remained there to bear the wrath of God against sin.
Congregation, the centurion and those with Him were right, “Surely He was the Son of God!” The cross is a symbol of our sin and guilt and hatred of God; it is the blackest stain on humanity’s record. But God sent His Son to the cross and Jesus went to the cross and the Spirit sanctified Him so that His sacrifice for our sins was acceptable.
Here they crucified Him, but from the cross shines the bright light of God’s wondrous love for sinners. Shall we pray.