Event Calendar
Lent Midweek 2009– God’s Truth vs. Satan’s Lies
“God is always Righteous vs. The Crowd is always Right.”
Grace to you and peace from God, our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen. The text for our sermon meditation is taken from the Gospel of St. Luke, the 23rd Chapter:
“Pilate called together the chief priests, the rulers and the people, and said to them, "You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people to 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."
With one voice they cried out, "Away with this man! Release Barabbas to us!"
(Barabbas had been thrown into prison for an insurrection in the city, and for murder.)
Wanting to release Jesus, Pilate appealed to them again. But they kept shouting, "Crucify him! Crucify him!"
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. So Pilate decided to grant their demand.
So far the reading.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:
Hear this fable about the five fingers. At one time all five fingers stood side by side on the hand. They did everything together as friends. They worked together, played together, washed together, did chores together and even wrote together.
One day the hand was resting on a table and the fingers noticed a beautiful shining gold ring.
The first finger said, ‘What a beautiful shining ring.”
The second finger said, “It would look beautiful on me.”
The third finger said, “Let’s take it.”
The fourth finger said, “Do it quick while no one is looking.”
The thumb said, “Wait! We should not do this. The ring does not belong to us!”
The other fingers began to mock the thumb. They went off in a group by themselves thinking that the thumb would follow and beg to be taken back. However, the thumb knew they were wrong and stood fast. That is why the thumb stands apart from the fingers today.
A quite fanciful fable, but it illustrates one of the points we consider during our Lenten journey tonight and in the weeks ahead. The theme for this year’s journey is “God’s Truth vs. Satan’s Lies.” The theme for this evening is “God is always Righteous vs. The Crowd is Always Right.” The person we consider is Pilate, who struggles with the crowd, knowing their motivation and desires, but failing to be righteous.
What does Pilate see and hear as he desperately seeks the release of an innocent man? Luke paints this clear word picture for our minds eye.
“But with loud shouts they insistently demanded that he (Jesus) be crucified…”
Can you hear the crowd? I can hear the crowd. I can hear the loud shouts and the insistent demands directed at Pilate and against Jesus. I can also picture them milling about the Praetorium murmuring and mumbling in between the loud shouts and insistent demands. There is an unrelenting energy that is building to a crescendo. It is an almost unstoppable momentum that has set the crowd in motion. The inertia of the event is about to overwhelm Pilate who struggles to uphold righteousness in the face of what appears to be right.
Let us consider this inertia and momentum. Luke opens the eyes of the reader and hearer to the beginning of this unholy force or power. He writes;
The chief priests and rulers of the people have gathered before Pilate shouting these charges against Jesus.
“We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes the payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Christ, a king.”
A brief look at Jesus’ trial before the Sanhedrin reveals that these charges were not the reason for Jesus standing before Pilate. Jesus confessed to being the one who will be “sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of heaven.” In effect, Jesus was claiming to be God. To this statement, the high priest tore his clothes and declared Jesus guilty of blasphemy and worthy of death. Herein do we realize the motivation of the crowd incited by the chief priests and rulers of the people.
Pilate recognized this false accusation as well, for Matthew writes:
“(Pilate) knew it was out of envy that they had handed Jesus over to him. While Pilate was sitting on the judge's seat, his wife sent him this message: "Don't have anything to do with that righteous man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him."”
How often, the loud voice of untruth will be heard and the still quiet voice of truth will go unnoticed.
Crowds are not always dependable. Tension in a crowd always has an underlying reason as we have already discussed. There is often unrighteous justification which moves people to gather together and mindlessly act as one in an unrighteous manner. How many people are hurt because the crowd follows the inertia of the moment? Reason and sanity disappear while mindlessness and self justification take over.
Now a crowd could be as many as a thousand and as few as two or three. Size does not matter, only temperament. Soon the inertia and moment build, and the crowd becomes uncontrollable. In these
What we see each day and what we hear each day affects our sense of right vs. righteousness. Society shows a distinct lack of moral underpinnings. In the paper today, there was an article about a whole class of students at a prominent university that were caught cheating on an engineering exam. When these people graduate, what will they be designing for our use? How safe will it be and how long will it last?
Or consider the term “friends with benefits” which describes the attitude toward casual sexual relationships among a group of friends and acquaintances. Furthermore, consider the state of marriage and the attitudes toward marriage today. Comments like, “I don’t need a piece of paper to legitimize my relationship”, or “If you can’t get along, then get apart”, or “We need to live together to see if we are compatible”, or “We love each other so it makes whatever we do together right” are lies placed before us by the crowd deceived by the Father of Lies.
Just like the thumb in the fable, we are called to stand against such lies which the crowd of our present society would force us to accept as truth. At times, it will be difficult as it was for Pilate who knew the righteous thing to do was free Jesus from the lies of the crowd. Three times Pilate stood before the crowd and sought the righteous end he knew he should pursue. Three times the crowd shouted back with their false testimony and overwhelming inertia.
Pilate is in quite a dilemma is he not? He is pleading for the life of an innocent man against the inundating flood of public opinion. It appears that he just might prevail against this lying crowd. Pilate prevails until the crowd makes it personal for him. For John records a sudden shift in the inertia of the crowd. They shift from focus on Jesus to focus on Pilate. John writes:
[T]he Jews kept shouting, "If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar."
Apparently, this had great significance for Pilate. To be “Friend of Caesar” meant you were part of a special group associated with Caesar. You enjoyed special honor and privileges. You were forced from this group by death if you brought dishonor to Caesar for any reason. Now Pilate was faced with a choice to make. The life of Jesus is forfeit or Pilate’s life is forfeit. Whose life will it be?
The inertia of the crowd overwhelms Pilate. As Luke simply records, “… their shouts prevailed.” Apparently, Satan has won. The Son of God would die and God would fail.
Satan seems to have swayed the crowd and struck fear into the heart of Pilate. However, we must consider the Word of God spoken through the prophet Isaiah:
“By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And who can speak of his descendants? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was stricken.
He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.
Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.
After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.” Isaiah 53:8-11
All this happened in accord with the will of God. The oppression and judgment, which engulfed Jesus as he stood silent before Pilate and the crowd, is the fulfillment of God’s powerful and saving truth. This truth is that our salvation comes through the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. What God foresaw long ago became a reality in the loud shouts and insistent demands of Praetorium and on the cross which eagerly grasped this Son of God in a death grip and drinking as it were the righteous blood shed for unrighteous crowd, of which you and I are a part.
Tonight we will receive the benefits of that oppression and death of the Son of God. For, we will receive in the holy meal the Lamb slain for the sins of the world. Satan’s lies will be revealed and God’s eternal truth in Christ will abound to us.
In the Name of Jesus Christ our Righteousness.