Luke 23:1-25 - Jesus Before Pilate

So we want to backtrack just a little bit into chapter 22 and pick up the last couple of verses because it's going to set the table for where we're going to be studying the last three trials that Jesus is going to go through on his way to the cross. Chapter 22 gave us the first three of those, and so verse 70 reads: "So they all said, 'Are you the Son of God, then?' And He said to them, 'You say that I am.' Then they said, 'With what further testimony do we need? We have heard it ourselves from His own lips.'" And so, that's where we left off, so we need to understand the setting of the culture at this time. It is Passover in Jerusalem; a lot of people are in Jerusalem for Passover, and for the Roman government, what is most important for them is maintaining the peace.

One of the things that we're going to take away from this is that, typically in the Jewish culture, when somebody was worthy of death for blasphemy or some other offense, they would pick up stones and stone them to death. But that's not what happened here. Instead, they go to the Roman officials, and there's a reason behind that because of what was happening in Rome. Rome needed to be the ones to carry out the execution, and some 20 years earlier, a rule had been passed by the Roman government that the Jewish leaders were not allowed to put people to death—only Rome could put people to death. Now, we know that that's not the way it always happened because we saw with the woman caught in adultery, immediately everybody's grabbing stones. We see it with Stephen in the book of Acts; they grabbed stones and they put him to death. But in this case, they go to the Roman government. Now that's their reasoning, but the reality is the prophecy of Scripture—the Messiah had to be crucified. Had He been stoned to death, Jesus wouldn't be the guy. So these things are all according to God's plan, and I want us to see them.

Starting in verse 1 of chapter 23, the whole company of them, all these Jewish leaders, arise and they bring Jesus before Pilate. And so let's stop there because we need a little introduction to who is Pontius Pilate. Kerry says Pontius Pilate is his favorite word in the Apostles' Creed, but it's deeper than that. Who is Pontius Pilate? He is the Roman governor who has been instituted into this normally his seat of rule is Caesarea, but he's in Jerusalem because of the Passover. Now the thing we don't know about Pilate from the Scripture, but we do know from historians of that time, is Pilate was on the bubble with Rome. When Pilate first came to town, he came marching into Jerusalem with the Roman gods and was going to establish them in Jerusalem. And the leaders of Jerusalem said, "Oh no, you're not." And Pilate said, "Oh yes, I am. If you don't get out of my way, my soldiers are going to kill you." So the leaders of the city kneeled down before him and bared their necks and dared him, the great, "Kill us." And Pilate backed down—strike number one. The Romans don't back down from anybody.

So then we get to strike number two. Pilate decides he wants to build a water system into Jerusalem, and his way of paying for it is to steal from the Temple Treasury. And because there's opposition to that idea, he sends spies into the midst and they begin to assassinate key leaders. Rome wasn't thrilled with that one either, and so Pilate is fighting for his survival. What we find out about Pilate is he ruled for 10 years, he was eventually recalled to Rome, and he committed suicide once he returned to Rome. But as we find him today, he's made a few uh-ohs, Caesar is watching him, and now here comes the mob bringing Jesus.

And so in verse 2, they began to accuse him, saying, "We found this man misleading our nation and forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar, and saying that he himself is Christ, a King." So remember, their whole deal is, well, he's blaspheming; he's saying he's God. Well, Rome is not going to put anybody to death because they say they are God, and they violated Jewish law, so they have to change the charges to offenses against Rome. The first one being that he's misleading our nation, he's creating an insurrection, he's trying to raise up an opposition. The second one is that he's forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar, he's telling us not to pay our taxes. And then saying that he himself is a king. So we need to dissect those for a minute. First of all, as we've studied Luke, there were many times where the crowd wanted to get Jesus and elevate him and make a king out of him, right on the spot. And Jesus said no and would withdraw. So that charge doesn't hold. He says we shouldn't pay taxes. Well, two chapters earlier, these same leaders came to Jesus and said, "Jesus, is it right for us to pay taxes to Rome?" And Jesus said, "Let me see a coin. Whose picture is on that?" "Caesar's." "So render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." So that charge is false. Finally, he's uh, saying he himself is Christ, a king, king of the Jews. Okay, well, that one's an issue because there's no ruler other than Caesar.