Luke 23:1-25

What is God's will? And what is the will of the people? What is your will?

Read along as Matthew guides us through the Gospel of Luke. In these verses, Jesus has been arrested and interrogated by the religious leaders. Now he is dragged before Pilot who speaks for the empire of Rome. Pilate struggles to find fault in Jesus, but ultimately the crowds persuade him. Pilate must submit to the will of those around him in order to maintain his power. Who killed Jesus? Who is at fault? These verses show a twisted path of competing wills that lead to death. 

Matthew Schmidt is the Pastor of St. Paul's United Church of Christ located in the beautiful small town of Grand Haven, MI. Discover more about St. Paul's today. www.stpaulsgrandhaven.org

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

So we're starting to read Luke chapter 23, and so far in the last two chapters, uh everything is coming to a head, right? In in Luke 21, Jesus is talking about the signs of the times and the end of the world, as if everything is going to collapse soon. And then in Luke chapter 22, Jesus gathers his disciples around what we would call the Last Supper. It's the Passover celebration, and he breaks bread and he gives them the cup and he says, something new is being inaugurated in this ritual feast. Something new is going to happen. And then, of course, uh from there he heads out to the Mount of Olives where he prays. And while he's praying, Judas arrives and betrays him with a band of guards and soldiers. And they take Jesus in the middle of the night, and they take him to the high the chief priests or the high priest's house, and he's in jail, and he's being put on trial by the most powerful people in that area. Um, and uh and his trial continues today. Uh so he's going to be dragged before Pilate and Herod, not just the religious leaders. So let's pray, and then um we'll start reading. Oh God, we thank you for a chance to read Luke chapter 23 today. Uh as these verses wash over our hearts, our minds, our souls, may they move us, challenge us, shape us. We prayerfully enter Luke 23 with an open heart, longing to know you more, dear Jesus, hoping to see you and get a glimpse of what it is that you're doing for us and for all of humanity and for all of creation in this great climactic scene. May your word be our guide, may your spirit be our teacher, and may the glory of Jesus be our greatest concern. Amen. Luke twenty-three. Then the whole assembly rose and led him off to Pilate. So Jesus has been on a bit of a trial scene in a in a bit of a trial. Uh at daybreak, the council of the elders of the people, the chief priests, the teachers of the law, they met together, and Jesus is brought before them. They're concerned to see if he's the Messiah, which would be a title for a king, right? They are not kings. They are priests, and they are Pharisees, and they are elders, and they are teachers, they are not kings. They're curious if he is king Messiah, right? Um, and and they ask if he's the son of God, and he says, You say I am. So so they're concerned about Jewish titles. Messiah, son of God. This is Jewish business. Why in the world would they drag him before a totally different court system? Pilate. Who is Pilate? Is Pilate Jewish? No, Pilate is Roman. This is like let's say you have an issue with uh let's say you have an issue with our church, and you have an opportunity to have uh a fair trial before the council of of St. Paul's United Church of Christ, and then all of a sudden the council of St. Paul's United Church of Christ says, you know what, we're gonna take you over to the county. It's like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. My issue is with the church. Why are we going to the county or to the state or to the feds? Like, what are we doing here? Why the shift? Why bring him before Pilate?

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Because he's holding the number over all of them. You know, like with a fed world or something. They want to get rid of him and they don't have the authority to do it.

SPEAKER_02 4:23

They want to get rid of him and they're looking for somebody to do their dirty work. That's a big part of this. They're also, and this is just how humanity works, and this is so sad. The Jewish Messiah is a king from the descendancy of David, based on the eternal covenant that God makes with King David. Why does that have to fit into the politics of the day? Right? Messiah is king. Now they're defining king in the terms of the government that's controlling and operating within their worldview. Right? And they see a connection there. Part of why Rome should care about a messianic movement is Rome is king, thank you very much. Unless Rome sets in place client kings, which are basically the kings they pick. That's what they have governing this area. They have a governor, Pilate, they've got a client king like Herod Antipas, right? Why does it have to fit into that worldview in order for it to be, you know, a thing? When we think of the Messiah as a king of the whole universe, I think we limit ourselves if we define it in worldly political terms. And that's part of the conversation Jesus has with Pilate in the Gospel of John. He says to Pilate, literally, My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, boy, we'd have a war and you'd get smeared. But my kingdom's not of this world. It's as if Jesus is just the kind of king that doesn't even fit the definition that we have used for governor or king or emperor. It just doesn't fit that category. That category is far too small, far too human, far too worldly for this otherworldly anti-king, king of the whole universe, Jesus. So it's important that he goes before Pilate. They're doing the wrong thing. God is doing the right thing, redefining for God's people what real kingship is by allowing this kind of trial to unfold. Okay, we'll go to the political sphere, not the religious sphere. In the ancient world, it wasn't necessarily a division between politics and religion. It was messier. There weren't those clear lines. But uh in this case, it's got to go into that sphere of politics, of empire. Okay, so the whole assembly led him off to Pilate. And they began to accuse him, saying, We have found this man subverting our nation. Again, here's this phrase nation, not the people of God, which is a diaspora people who live all over the planet, subverting this nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Messiah, a king. Interesting. What do you think Pilate would care about? The rules of the empire. He's gonna care about a king, he's gonna care about taxes, he's gonna care about the nation over which they rule. Huh. No language of son of God. You know, where did that theological title go? Right? So Pilate asked Jesus, Are you the king of the Jews? You have said so, Jesus replied. Then Pilate announced to the chief priests and the crowd, I find no basis for a charge against this man. Notice the insertion of the crowd now. What crowd is this? This has moved before Pilate. It is in broad daylight. There is now a crowd gathering. Who is this crowd? And that's an interesting question to ask. Earlier, Judas shows up with a crowd in the middle of the night and they arrest Jesus. This crowd is bigger. This crowd is more general than that. This is the same types of crowds that gathered for the temple festivities. It's the crowds that are in town for the Passover. It's some of the some of the people in this crowd are from the crowd that are chanting, you know, Alleluia and Hosanna. Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord when Jesus triumphally entered Jerusalem. This is the everyday ordinary person, the crowd, is picking up the story here. And Pilate is asking the chief priests and the crowd. He's going to talk to both. And it's just interesting to see what people think. The leadership of the Jewish religion, but then also the crowds of people. What do they think about this Jesus, about this form of Messiah, about this God?

SPEAKER_00 9:47

There were some people there that supported the light of blood.

SPEAKER_01 9:54

Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Could be. Yeah. Yeah.

unknown 10:15

And you know we took it, they took all their guards, but they're too.

SPEAKER_01 10:18

Oh yeah. Right. So then you gather people see what's going on. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:24

Also, remember, there's no like news media to tell you whose side are you on and to say which crowd is here. What is what's gathering the crowd? The gossip network. And I would imagine every player here is trying to gossip their story to get the crowd out there. So there's probably Jesus followers, Jesus sympathizers, people interested in Jesus in this crowd. Uh there's also probably people who are loyalists to Rome in this crowd, non-Jewish people who are here just because how cool, let's go visit the city. And, you know, there's also probably people who are just loyal to the temple. Devout Jewish folks who they like the way it is. At least the emperor gives us permission to worship in our temple. And they, you know, they're there sympathetic to the temple. You know, there's probably a lot of people here, and it's a diverse group. So Pilate announced to the chief priests and the crowd, I find no basis for a charge against this man. I don't know what homework he's done, but he doesn't like the charges they're bringing. But they insisted. He stirs up the people all over Judea by his teaching. He started in Galilee and has come all the way here. Uh why would the detail Galilee be interesting to Pilate? Where is Pilate's territory? Does anybody know? So Pilate's territory is Judea. He is uh the the governor of the basically the capital. Is Galilee in the capital region? No, it's further north. And so he hears that a neighboring area governed by somebody else could could have some stakes in this uh conversation. So on hearing this, Pilate asked if the man was a Galilean, and when he learned that Jesus was under Herod's jurisdiction, he sent Jesus to Herod, who was also in Jerusalem at that time. Which Herod is this? Which Herod is this? Is this Herod the Great? This is Herod Antipas. It's one of Herod the Great's sons. Is Herod Antipas great? No, he's an idiot. He he was a bad king. Herod the Great wasn't so great. He was actually Herod the Horrible. And he, when his sons become rulers, none of them are politically savvy enough to handle what Rome had tasked Herod the Great with. So they break the kingdom up into four regions and they end up needing to put in their own Roman governor to handle the most sensitive spot, Judah Judea. Herod Antipas is up north. Herod Antipas is the guy who had John the Baptizer arrested and beheaded. Herod Antipas has heard about this Jesus and is sort of interested in him. He is curious. We don't know why. Maybe he's curious because he's just heard the story. He's far enough north. He's a petty enough king to be interested in a guy who's got some superpowers. When Herod saw Jesus, he was greatly pleased because for a long time he had wanted to see him. From what he had heard about him, he hoped to see him perform a sign of some sort. He wants a magic show. He's heard that this guy's fed thousands of hungry people, that he can take bread and multiply it, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all across the crowd. That he could take somebody who can't walk and say, get up, and all of a sudden the the person can walk around and that he's taken dead people and raised them. Maybe he's a necromancer. So he wants to see a sign. He plied him with many questions, but Jesus gave him no answer. Why does Jesus continue to not answer? Does he not want to incriminate himself? He's just refusing to play the game. You know there's a game he's not playing the game. What's that?

SPEAKER_00 15:22

He knows what his game is and his open is going to be played. And so he's not giving him an energy way.

SPEAKER_02 15:41

It does seem like he's he's opening himself up to a plan larger than himself. That he's he's not taking every effort to manipulate his circumstances and get himself out or convince anybody of who he is. He has let his actions speak for themselves. He has let his teachings speak for themselves. His word will not be amplified in this moment. His word is everything he's taught and everything he's spoken in public. And his identity is who he is and who he has always been from that time he was born as a baby in Bethlehem until now. And he's not gonna let the court records define who he is. He's gonna let his activity and his action, and he has given himself a fair shot at showing the world that he is the true Messiah, that he is the hope for salvation. And now he's almost leaving it in humanity's hands and also leaving it in God, his father's hands, to let you said, his fate unfold, or let God's purposes unfold, or or let humanity make the wrong choice so that God's purposes can unfold. Yeah, something like that's going on. Jesus gave him no answer. Verse 30, the chief priests and the teachers of the law were standing there vehemently accusing him. When Herod and his soldiers, then Herod and his soldiers ridiculed and mocked him, dressing him in an elegant robe, they sent him back to Pilate. That day Herod and Pilate became friends. Before this they had been enemies. Why are Herod and Pilate friends now? They have a common enemy. Why were they enemies before? Yeah, one's got a little piece of a kingdom, one's got a little piece of a kingdom, they're neighboring rulers, and uh, you know, Herod, Antipas, probably hates Pilate because he wishes he was more like Daddy and got to rule Daddy's whole territory. Pilate, meanwhile, knows the truth about the whole Herod family. It's like these idiots were just put in as client kings. I just want to go back to Milan and be in charge of a different, you know, group of soldiers, and they hated each other. But now they're friends, they have a common enemy. You know, the later Luke will describe that the the gift of the Holy Spirit is to unite people in Christ, that that diverse groups of people are united to the cause of love in Christ. And I think this is the inverse of that. This is a warped and twisted spirit. This is an evil kind of spirit that's taking two people who are political adversaries and uniting them for a common cause that benefits them and eradicates their enemy. And it's unfortunately, it happens a lot today. Why do nations become united? Right? And at our best, we are united for things like, you know, the Olympics or like the World Cup has unfolded this summer. And I I've heard people say up to four billion people were watching the World Cup. And in the spirit of sporthood, uh, you know, Argentina and Spain, they hate each other, but they also respect each other. And they love the game that's being played. England and France love the game. Harry Kane and Mbappe, they love the game that's being played. Watching these wonderfully gifted athletes perform. In the Olympics, you see the same kind of thing. You're rooting for your own cause or your own team or your own athlete. And yet there's a commonality and there's a unity there that is it's competitive, but it's respectful. And it and there's a dignity and a goodness there. And then in geopolitics, outside of sports, it's just kind of the opposite, isn't it? Nations are allied with nations that benefit themselves. You don't see a lot of nations. Sometimes you get small examples of this, but you don't see a lot of nations just taking another nation under their wing saying, we're gonna be buds, we're gonna, we're gonna work together, we're gonna be allies so that I can help you. Well, what do you get out of it? Nothing. You know, you just don't see that. And that's what's happening here. Herod and Pilate get something out of this, a common enemy. And it's sad that the world operates this way, but it does. Verse 13, Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers, and the people. And he said to them, You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to rebellion. Is that what they said? That he was inciting people to rebellion? That's what he heard. Messiah, Messianic movement, an anti-Roman king who's drawing people from Galilee into this region to bring about a rebellion. I have examined him in your presence, and have found no basis for your charges against him. Neither has Herod, for he sent him back to us. As you can see, he has done nothing to deserve death. Therefore, I will punish him and then release him. Herod and Pilate have a common enemy, they also have a common concern, and that is that the crowds will not like the death of this particular prophet. Jesus did a lot of good things in Galilee. There's a lot of those villages that love him. There's some villages that didn't turn to him, but he worked the town after town after town after town, and a grassroots movement in Galilee has taken place. And Herod's got to go rule that territory. And he doesn't want 62% of his people that he rules pissed off that Jesus has been killed. So they've got a common enemy, Jesus, but they also have a common cause, which is keep the peace. So they want to punish Jesus and release him.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

You look at the legal band dress and up and overcome. Here was some anthems walking around and um and that Tyler and Harry both were don't get the dress, except how they're this man with a commoner.

unknown 23:00

Yeah. And he said, no, he can't be because he doesn't dress that way. And he doesn't look that way, he just doesn't care. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

Yeah, I uh so there I think there's two or three layers of meaning here. So the the the question is about the elegant garments or the elegant clothing. First of all, who dresses him up that way? It is Herod's soldiers. So this is Rome defining who he is and saying, okay, if he's gonna call himself a messiah, we'll make him look like a king. Purple robe. Purple is the the you know color of royalty because it's so darn hard in the ancient world to dye things purple. It's really expensive. They get their purple dye from the snails in certain parts of the shores of Greece, and and they don't, it's not readily available to everyone. So uh dress him up in some elegant clothing and and that signifies that he's somebody important. Jesus hasn't done this for himself. Humanity is putting that expectation on him. And the irony is like this is actually what humanity wants. Humanity wants a ruler who looks like a ruler. They don't want a ruler in rags. Humanity wants a king who kicks butt and looks great, you know, on the front page of the news the next day. They don't want a king who is muddied and brutalized and beaten and hanging on a cross. How many, you know, kids are gonna go and buy Mbappe jerseys this week?

SPEAKER_01 24:36

After France lost to England 6-4.

SPEAKER_02 24:42

I checked out the Nike website. All of the jerseys are on sale right now. Why are all the jerseys on sale? Nobody wants a loser. He won the golden boot or whatever it's called, but still, you know, nobody wants a loser. And so part of this is just a mirror being held up to humanity saying, Gosh, why is it that you love kings who wear purple? Why is it that you want a ruler who looks like a ruler? In our country, it would be, why do you want a president that looks like a president? You know? It's it's weird, isn't it? It's kind of so the clothing, uh he is he is the true king, and there's an irony that they're putting that upon him. It's interesting to note that the soldiers are the ones putting that on him. You know, Jesus' followers aren't choosing that, and Jesus himself isn't choosing it. Jesus is accepting the identity that they would want to put on him, which is ironic. And what are and and why are the soldiers actually doing it? For the worst reasons, because they're, excuse my French, they're assholes. They're mocking him. They're just being mean. They dress him up like a king so that when they beat the crap out of him, they get to beat the crap out of a king. How fun is that? It's not so fun to beat the crap out of a homeless guy who's wearing rags. That's just ugly. But you dress him up like a king, that's a lot more fun to hit. And that's just gross, isn't it? I mean, that so there's just the level of why are human beings, not all of us, some of us, so darn violent and mean. We're bullies. There's a lot of us who are bullies. Why? They get something out of it. We're grasping at any power we can get. It's a power move. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Boy, this beats a day in the office. We get to dress up a puppet and hit him, you know? They're just jerks. Yeah. Some people like to look back on these scenes and they want to point a finger. Who do we blame for the death of Jesus? Some people, and this trends towards anti-Semitism, they want to blame the Jewish people for the death of Jesus. And I just get skeptical of that because I'm reading this and there's you can point a lot of fingers. It's not just the crowds. By the way, those crowds were more than just Jewish people, right? It's also the soldiers who are being jerks, it's also the leaders who are corrupt. It's also, you know, the empire. If you want to blame someone for killing Jesus, you blame humanity. And if you want to get really, really challenging, you blame God. God is overseeing this. Why is God allowing humanity to be so brutal to God's own son? What is God trying to prove? He's trying to save humanity. He's waving the white flag, offering his own self to us, and watch what we're choosing to do. So Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers of the people, and said to them, You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to rebellion, but I have examined him in your presence and have found no basis for your charges against him, neither is Herod, for he has sent him back to us. As you can see, he has done nothing to deserve death, therefore I will punish him and release him. Verse 18. But the whole crowd shouted, Away with this man, release Barabbas to us. Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city and for murder. Why is Barabbas in jail? He's not a crook. Okay, he killed somebody, but who did he kill? Barabbas is going full Moses, right? He walks into Jerusalem, sees his people being oppressed by the not Egypt this time, but Rome, and he kills maybe a soldier who's harassing one of his beloved Jewish brothers, and he's in jail for insurrection. This is a messianic movement. Barabbas was a part of a messianic movement trying to drive out the evil overlords. And the crowd has a choice between two messiahs, between Jesus, Messiah from a whole nother world, that's going to save the whole world with light and goodness and love and non-violence and peace. Or a messiah who knows how to come into a city and kick some butt and actually will kill in order to get what he wants. Who will the crowd choose? That's what they wanted. Dude, if this guy can raise the dead, wait till he pulls out his mega robot with you know swords and nuclear weapons. Like, my goodness, people have been waiting for Jesus to become Ninja Jesus. And and he's not? He's not even defending himself on trial. Uh, maybe this is not the guy we thought. When is he gonna become like David? At least give this guy a slingshot, right?

SPEAKER_01 30:38

And he just doesn't. He's just he's weak. He's so weak. When you get down to it, do you vote for who is weak?

SPEAKER_02 30:55

When you get down to it, do you vote for the guy who is going to lose? The guy who doesn't defend himself, the guy who he won't even take matters into his own hands. They vote for Barabbas. Somebody who's actually gonna get them what they want. Freedom from these darn oppressors. There's no possible way that Jesus, the path he's walking down, gets them anything. He hasn't killed anybody. He's gonna die. Right? Or he's gonna get beat up and let go, but what difference does that make? We're here to watch the fireworks, people. We're here for freedom and rebellion and insurrection. I wouldn't either. I'd be skeptical of that. So Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city. This is the same charge that Herod is saying Jesus is here inciting the people to rebellion. Inciting the people to rebellion, insurrection in the city, same exact charge. Right. And Jesus is a Messiah unlike every other Messiah. He's just not gonna fit those categories. If he's causing insurrection, it's a pretty peaceful insurrection. The most violent at God is he threw over some tables of some greedy people, you know. Well, wanting to release Jesus, Pilate appealed to them again. You get this sense, especially in John's version, that Pilate, as he talks to Jesus, and because of Pilate's wife, partly, she has this dream about who this Jesus is, but you get the sense in John's gospel at least, that Pilate is scared and spooked about this super weird guy that doesn't seem to check the boxes. And it's just a little bit like, uh, I want to get rid of you, I want to wash my hands of you. This seems like it could slip off the hillside quickly. Uh, too many people are invested in this, and he just he's a coward and he's afraid. And this one, it's a little different. We're not sure exactly why, but he definitely wants to release Jesus. Wanting to release Jesus, Pilate appealed to them again, but they kept shouting, crucify him, crucify him. Now, who is shouting, crucify him? It's the crowd, it's everyone. There is everyone's humanity's witness against Jesus when given a choice is kill that man.

SPEAKER_01 33:39

He's not going to give us what we want. Kill him.

SPEAKER_02 33:43

This is God's play. This is God's big dramatic moment. God refuses to coerce or manipulate humanity by salvation. Instead, God offers himself humbly to humanity in love. And anybody, a thousand years from now, when this is unfolding, two thousand years from when this was unfolding, like us today, any of us reading this story, my goodness, how powerful does your heart just want to take the side of the one who is weak, of the one who is wrongfully imprisoned, of the one who is, it's not his. Come on, you're making the wrong choice. But if any of us were there that day, we probably would have been chanting crucify him.

unknown 34:31

Or at least keep quiet.

SPEAKER_02 34:32

Or at least keep quiet. At least keep quiet. For fear. Yep. The opposite of faith is not doubt. Faith and doubt are dance partners. They go hand in hand. Go ahead and doubt, ask big questions. That's good. The opposite of faith is fear. And I would have been trembling that day. I would have quietly voted, release Jesus, not Barabbas. But I would have been afraid to stand up and convince the crowd, especially when the horde starts chanting crucify him. When a crowd turns bad, when a crowd turns nasty, and you see this, like, you know, after a football game gets out, if you're, you know, I was talking to a friend of mine, if you're an England fan, or you're a France fan, and you go to that England-France game, that soccer match, you know, you take off your jersey and you walk out shirtless after that game because you don't want to be the guy with the Mbappe jersey on who just lost. Because some drunk English fans are gonna kick in your teeth. Or worse, you win. You take off your jersey. I mean, like either way, crowds are crazy. I went to Lansing when Michigan State lost in the Final Four when I was 19 years old. People were throwing burning couches out of windows because they were pissed off that Michigan State lost in the basketball final four March Madness. I mean, the madness of a crowd is a real thing. You know, look at what happened in the United States at January 6th, right? Madness is infectious. It just gets wild fast. It's like, why'd we do that? I don't know, somebody else was kicking in a window, so I did it too. You know, why'd you start the couch on fire? I don't know. It was just you go crazy when you're in a crowd. And here the crowd is going crazy.

unknown 36:24

But they do it with the room, like when we're gonna do it.

SPEAKER_02 36:27

Right. That's the the foolishness of the crowd. And the foolishness of the crowd is on display here when they're chanting, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him. You whip that crowd into a frenzy. I'd be scared if I was there. Going back to I would be scared.

unknown 36:47

Who was gonna say, oh, everyone's healing crucified? No, we're releasing it.

SPEAKER_02 36:52

Yeah. Pilate also is, I'm sure Pilate is scared. It's Pilate's one job to keep the peace, Pax Romana. Like, as a Roman official, he knows the one thing he cannot have is a riot. You know what happens if there's a riot in Jerusalem? Pilate loses his job, right? And and Rome hears about it a week or two later, and they send the troops and they snuff out the riot and they put it in place a new governor. So so Pilate is like up here sweating, I think. What do I okay? The the crowd, this is what the crowd wants. I have to give the crowd what they want, right? Here's here's what he says. For the third time he spoke to them. Why? What crime has this man committed? I have found in him no grounds for the death penalty, therefore I will have him punished and then release him. But with loud shouts, they insistently demanded that he be crucified, and their shouts prevailed. I mean, there it is. The crowd gets what the crowd wants.

unknown 37:57

So how is the fluid spectrum to Bible?

SPEAKER_02 38:01

Well, in that's in the Gospel of John, Pilate's wife has this dream, and she says, have nothing to do with this innocent man. And so he's kind of shaking, like, okay, uh, my wife is saying, she said to me before I went to work this morning, have nothing to do with an innocent man. And then he's talking to this guy, and Jesus, look, I didn't, I wasn't alive 2,000 years ago. But I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that Jesus' personality, that his personhood was infectious, that when he walked in a room, you just felt the love. You saw the kindness. I never you saw the kindness and the joy in his eyes. And I think, if I'm just guessing, this is way extra biblical. My own creative, I think when Pilate looks at Jesus, he can't help but think, holy smokes, there's something special there. And his wife is saying there's something special there. And when the parents like who wants to go with God of Matthew, yeah, yeah, that was for different reasons. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah, yeah. Oh, there's always in in these types of stories, there's always a home life behind the scenes that that plays into it too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:21

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 39:24

Okay, so their shouts prevailed. Verse 24, so Pilate decided to grant their demand. He released the man who had been thrown into prison for insurrection and murder, the one they asked for. And he surrendered Jesus to their will. This is the will of humanity. From the very beginning, we have given, been given free will by God. And if you go back to the first, this is the story the Bible is saying. You go back to the first human beings, Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, and they have a choice to become more than what they are, to eat from the fruit, to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the temptation is to become more than human. They take it, they eat it. They want those nutrients, those supplements, that extra juz, that artificial intelligence. They want it. They want to be more than what they are. It's human desire, it's human ingenuity, it's human adaptability, it's it's we want to be great. We want to be great, we want to be God. And from there on, I mean they have children. And you see violence. When greatness is at stake, human beings turn to violence. Cain and Abel cannot live in a world where one of them is more blessed than the other. They can't live in that world, and a brother kills a brother, and the blood cries out from the soil. Look at what humanity will become, following their own will, not God's will. So Pilate surrendered Jesus to their will. Let's pause there this week, reflect on your will, God's will, what might it look like to uh have a God who surrenders to humanity's will. What does that mean? Why why is that so powerful and meaningful? God would, with open hands, walk in to the midst of humanity and say, in the fullness of time, do with me what you want. I mean, it's it's exactly what humanity is supposed to be saying to God. You know, we approach God and we say, God, do with me what you would what you would do. Again, Jesus is just, God is just modeling for humanity exactly what we're supposed to be as a fully human being, you know. And uh, and so think about that this week. And when we come back next week, we'll read about the crucifixion of Jesus. Grace and peace, everybody.