We Don’t Want to Hear It
John 18:28-19:16
Rev. Dr. Michael H. Koplitz
John 18:28 Then they led Jesus from Caiaphas into the Praetorium, and it was early; and they themselves did not enter into the Praetorium so that they would not be defiled, but might eat the Passover. 29 Therefore Pilate went out to them and said, “What accusation do you bring against this Man?” 30 They answered and said to him, “If this Man were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him to you.” 31 So Pilate said to them, “Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law.” The Jews said to him, “We are not permitted to put anyone to death,” 32 to fulfill the word of Jesus which He spoke, signifying by what kind of death He was about to die.
John 18:33 Therefore Pilate entered again into the Praetorium, and summoned Jesus and said to Him, “Are You the King of the Jews?” 34 Jesus answered, “Are you saying this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about Me?” 35 Pilate answered, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests delivered You to me; what have You done?” 36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom 1is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting so that I would not be handed over to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not 2of this realm.” 37 Therefore Pilate said to Him, “So You are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” 38 Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?”
And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews and said to them, “bI find no guilt in Him. 39 “But you have a custom that I release someone 1for you at the Passover; do you wish then that I release for you the King of the Jews?” 40 So they cried out again, saying, “Not this Man, but Barabbas.” Now Barabbas was a robber.
John 19:1 Pilate then took Jesus and scourged Him. 2 And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and put a purple robe on Him; 3 and they began to come up to Him and say, “aHail, King of the Jews!” and to give Him slaps in the face. 4 Pilate came out again and said to them, “Behold, I am bringing Him out to you so that you may know that I find no guilt in Him.” 5 Jesus then came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, “Behold, the Man!” 6 So when the chief priests and the aofficers saw Him, they cried out saying, “Crucify, crucify!” Pilate *said to them, “Take Him yourselves and crucify Him, for bI find no guilt in Him.” 7 The Jews answered him, “aWe have a law, and by that law He ought to die because He bmade Himself out to be the Son of God.”
John 19:8 Therefore when Pilate heard this statement, he was even more afraid; 9 and he entered into the 1Praetorium again and said to Jesus, “Where are You from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. 10 So Pilate said to Him, “You do not speak to me? Do You not know that I have authority to release You, and I have authority to crucify You?” 11 Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me, unless it had been given you from above; for this reason he who delivered Me to you has the greater sin.” 12 As a result of this Pilate made efforts to release Him, but the Jews cried out saying, “If you release this Man, you are no friend of Caesar; everyone who makes himself out to be a king opposes Caesar.”
John 19:13 Therefore when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha. 14 Now it was the day of preparation for the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, “Behold, your King!” 15 So they cried out, “Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!” Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.” 16 So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.
The leaders of the Temple in Jerusalem did not want to hear what Yeshua had to say. They had turned the beautiful religion into something of a mockery. They were interested in power and money. The leaders controlled almost all the aspects of daily life in Judea. They saw this “crazy” preacher going around in the Galilee telling the people that they did not have to follow the commands of the Temple. This was a direct threat to everything that they held dear.
The people were thrilled when Jesus made his way to Jerusalem because they saw him as the Messiah who would rid them of the oppression of the Temple. That sounds strange but was truthful. The people were oppressed by the Roman occupiers and their own leaders. The people never wanted the Herod family to become kings and princes over them. This family was not of Jewish origin. Just because Herod the Great married a Hasmonean woman (the royal house of Israel at that time) did not make him Jewish. He was an Indumean, and that never changed.
Jesus came to Jerusalem to tell the leaders of the Temple that they were violating the ways of the LORD. They unfortunately did the normal thing. They did all they could to exclude the interloper. Leaders rarely want to hear what they are doing wrong.
Here is an example. When I was working on my doctorate in ministry, I created a project for my thesis based on how well the local United Methodist Bishop and her cabinet placed pastors in churches. The question was twofold. First, the conference spent over $100,000 in the 1990s to have Bill Easum tell us that pastors can change their leadership style to match what the church needed. My doctorate was in Christian Leadership and in 2003, I wanted to see if this was correct.
Being a scientist by training my hypothesis was that it was not happening. Therefore, the Bishop and cabinet needed to place pastors in churches based on the pastor’s leadership style and church needs. The pastor’s leadership style was determined using the Leadership Grid which was developed by Blake and Mouton. The church needs were a formula that I developed based on Arlin Routhage’s book about church modeling and sizes and a lot of research. As a church grows its needs change and its leadership style needs change.
A small under 90 attendees church requires a pastor with good relationship skills. The church is called a family sized church. In central PA that means everyone in the church are cousins. Therefore, the pastor must be understanding of the relationship between the people and have the skills to become a part of the family. When a church is between 90 and 350 attendees, the pastor becomes the center of the church, a pastor-centered church. This means that the church has evolved from being a one family church to become a multi-family church. The pastor becomes the center of the communications pathway between the different families. This requires a completely different leadership style. When the attendance is over 350 attendees, the church evolves into a group of pastor-centered churches under one umbrella. Here, the pastor has to be a goal setter and visionary.
I had to get the approval of my local bishop for the project. Bishop Jane thought that the project was great because she thought I would prove that every appointment she made was perfect. They successfully matched the right pastor with the right church about 10% of the time after conducting research and analyzing data.
The once loved idea by Bishop Jane because something that she wanted buried. The Board of Ordained Ministry supported a small part of the cost of a doctorate. When the pastor graduated, they had to present their project to this board. I was never asked. When I asked why, I received silence. The Conference was happier not knowing how poorly the appointments were made.
My guess is that every UMC conference had the same success rate. Luckily, I was not stoned, nor sent to Siberia. In my Conference we had one small church in New York State. Being assigned to that church was like being sent to Siberia. Of course, I assume that there is a black mark on my record. I believe Bishop Jane is an ego-centric person and it damaged her feelings to realize not everything she touched turned to gold.
I am happy that I was not crucified by exposing the deficiency in the appointment system in the Susquehanna UMC Conference. However, it did not help my career at all. Today’s church would rather die off than for its leaders to admit they are doing it wrong. Let me fix that statement. Not wrong, but it could have been done better.
Jesus died at the hands of the Romans because he brought the LORD’s message of peace and love to an evil world with evil leadership. Like the prophet before him, he met the same fate. Like the prophets of old, Jesus went to Jerusalem to confront the leaders. The prophets knew that going to Jerusalem meant death. Jesus knew this as well.
Jesus knew that the slate of sin would not be cleansed from us unless he went to Jerusalem. He knew that as the Messiah, he was going to suffer and be killed. This was done for us. Everything that Jesus did in his lifetime was for us. He made the ultimate sacrifice for us.
How do you react when a fellow Christian talks to you about your attitudes and actions? Over the centuries, people did not react well to this question. That is probably why we don’t do it today. Have you ever been approached by another Christian and told that your attitude or actions were not Christ-like? If you were, what was your reaction?
I offered one sermon about tithing in 25 years. I was forced to do this by the administrative board. My reason for not doing this was because it always backlashes. People would come up to me and scold me, saying that I did not have the right to tell them what to do, especially with their money. Right, not God’s money, their money. So, why stroke the fire. You bet that happened when I gave the required sermon ordered by the administrative board.
For Christianity to grow, we have to hold ourselves accountable. If you are not following Jesus’ ways and actions, you should start. Jesus’ death shows to us how important it is to be in line with God’s wishes for us. Perhaps everyone listening or reading this message will change their ways to imitate Christ. Jesus died for us to prove that everything he said was from God. Now, what are you going to do going forward?
