Well, good morning. Welcome to
our continuing Bible study in the book of Luke. We're in chapter
23 today. And we've been kind of looking
at the events leading up to the crucifixion. And last time that
we met, the message was entitled, it was Barabbas, son of the father,
release Barabbas. the son of the father being released
and the son of the father being condemned. So no accident there. And we've been trying to bring
a kind of a personal application to the things that we find that
the Lord went through on behalf of his people so that we look
at them as those things he suffered as in our place. And today is
no exception. And so we're going to read in this section from Luke 23,
18 down through 25, And they cried out all at once,
saying, Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas, who
for a certain sedition made in the city, and for murder was
cast into prison. Pilate therefore willing to release
Jesus spake again to them, but they cried out, saying, Crucify
him, crucify him. And he said unto them the third
time, Why, what evil hath he done? I found no cause of death
in him. I will therefore chastise him
and let him go.' And they were instant with loud voices requiring
that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and the
chief priest prevailed. And Pilate gave sentence that
it should be as they required. And he released unto them him
that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they
had desired. But he delivered Jesus to their
will. And so as we look at this, we're
going to kind of explore some things that Luke didn't quite,
for his purposes, didn't include in this particular portion. I remember when we were in Luke
23 chapter 11, and Jesus was turned over to Herod because
Pilate found out that Herod was in town for the Passover. And he says, oh, he's a Galilean,
so we'll just send him over that way and let Herod deal with him.
And Herod and his folks mocked Jesus abused him, and then he didn't
do anything magical for Herod to view, so they sent him back
to Pilate. In Luke 23, 11, Herod, with his
men of war, set him at knot and mocked him and arrayed him in
a gorgeous robe and sent him again to Pilate, and so these
events are covered in Luke 23, John 19, Matthew 27, and Mark
15. And what we have is, among them
is written for us the final insults and mocking and afflictions that
were poured out on our Lord prior to being led away to the place
of crucifixion. And I just want to read those
because parts of them are covered in Luke and parts are not. In
Matthew 27, verse 26, then released Hebarabbas unto them, and when
He had scourged Jesus, He delivered Him to be crucified. Then the
soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall, and
gathered unto him the whole band of soldiers. And they stripped
him, and put on him a scarlet robe. And when they had plaited
a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in
his right hand. And they bowed the knee before
him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. And they
spit upon him, and took the reed, and smote him on the head. And
after that they had mocked him, they took the robe off him and
put on his own raiment on him and led him away to crucify him.
In Mark's account in chapter 15, So Pilate, willing to content
the people, released Barabbas unto them and delivered Jesus
when he had scourged Him to be crucified. And the soldiers led
Him away into the hall called Praetorium, or the place of judgment. And they called together the
whole band, and they clothed Him with purple and plaited a
crown of thorns and put it upon His head. about his head, and
began to salute him, Hail King of the Jews. And they smote him
on the head with a reed, and did spit upon him, and bowing
their knees, worshipped him. And when they had mocked him,
they took off the purple from him, and put his own clothes
on him, and led him out to crucify him. You know, He said all this
was going to happen. He told His disciples. If you
remember back to our lesson from chapter 18 of Luke, He told His
disciples in chapter 18, verse 32, For He shall be delivered
unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated,
and spitted on. And they shall scourge Him, and
put Him to death. In the third day He shall rise
again. So this was not by surprise, this was not something that he didn't know
about, and it's something that he wrote about thousands of years
before. You know, all of this, and one
of the things that we want to emphasize here is all these things
he endured in the place of his people, in the place of his elect,
all this he had power to end, But he was committed to the will
of the Father to accomplish the atonement for those whom God
had given him to redeem from every kindred, every nation and
tongue, and from every time, past, present, and future. And he caused every suffering
and humility that he endured to be written beforehand. And
he was silent through the whole ordeal. We go back to the Old Testament
and we look at even from the Book of the Laws of Moses where
he had to be lifted up like the serpent in the wilderness. In
Isaiah chapter 50, some particularly detailed account given to us
in verse 5 through 7, the Lord God hath opened mine ear, and
I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. He's describing
this coming to Jerusalem, this final time for the faith that
awaited him that, as we were talking about this morning, the
lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. In verse 6, he
says, I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked
off the hair. I hid not my face from shame
and spitting. And just maybe underline the
gave part here. He willingly let that occur. The Lord God Almighty had power
to stop that if that would have been his intention or his aim.
And it declares that the only way that this was permitted was
by divine allowance and purpose. He wrote about it. because it
was in order to satisfy the righteousness and justice of God. And He took
those things in our place. He suffered these abuses for
us in our place. He said, for the Lord God will
help me, therefore shall I not be confounded. Therefore, because
of these things, I've set my face like a flint. I know that
I shall not be ashamed. He's not going to embarrass himself.
He's not going to cower under the beatings, and the spitting,
and the hair plucking, and the smacking on the head, and the
blindfolding, and smacking him and saying prophecy to us. And
under all that abuse, he's not going to say, give up. He is
going to continue on. and accomplish the redemption
of the people that the Lord gave him, that the Father gave him.
He declared absolutely that this was going to happen to him as
it was written. Every single thing that he caused
to be written was carried out exactly as he purposed it to,
to satisfy the God Almighty. He declared it. Every stroke
of the scourging whip, and you've all probably heard this a million
times, this lash that was made out of several lashes with a
handle, and the Romans were pretty ingenious on making it
inflict the maximum amount of pain. They would put little bits
of, weave little bits of bone into, or metal into the lashes
so that they would inflict the maximum damage. And the Jews
had a custom, or their law was, from Deuteronomy was that you
couldn't give anybody more than 40 lashes. That was the maximum
punishment that was allowed under Jewish law. And Paul said, five
times, I got 40 lashes, save one. Five times that had happened
to him. Can you imagine what a terrible
condition that left him? Every one of those times, those
things cut into you right to the bone, you know, and inflict
damage. It's just unbelievable. So these
lashes that they inflicted on Jesus, would leave a terrible
wound and his body would have been covered with bloody lacerations
from top to bottom. It's written that many didn't
survive the scourging. Sometimes that was enough to
cause death, but not for Jesus. They stripped him. They scourged him. It's interesting, we go back
to Isaiah again. I don't know how many times we
always go back to Isaiah 53. This is going to become important
here as we go through later part of this lesson here. In Isaiah
53, the opening words of that chapter are, Who has believed our report?
To whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? Well, that tells
you who the letter is. That part is written to. It's
written to the church. It's written to the people that
believe the report. It's written to the people that
it's been revealed to. To whom has the arm of the Lord
been revealed? That's who it's written to. And
so as we get into verse 5 of that chapter, it says, he was
wounded for our transgressions. And this is talking about the
part before he was crucified. Certainly, he was wounded on
the cross, but he was wounded severely long before he was attached
to that cross. He was wounded for our transgressions,
and he was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace
was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed." And his stripes
are talking about every mark that one of those lashes made
on him, and not to mention the marks that might have been left
by whacking him in the head with a reed. I mean, that was probably
a pretty good—a reed was a pretty substantial whip. and then the
crown of thorns that they jammed down on his head that would have
left marks. So they did that to him, and
that was recorded in Isaiah, as we just read, and they stripped
him and mockingly put on him a scarlet robe. And boy, you
know, I just brought to my mind Adam being stripped in the garden
and then being clothed with the righteousness that God supplied. clothed by God through the sacrifice
of an innocent. You know, and the soldiers, they
meant that for mockery. They thought, oh, this will be
funny. How little did they realize the truth of their actions? Another
case where the Lord uses even unbelievers to accomplish His
purposes, and sometimes they do and say things that demonstrate
His gospel, and they don't even know that they're doing it. And
they have no idea of really the context of what they're saying. You know, this crown of thorns
takes us back to the garden again in Genesis 3. We have that declared to us,
where the curse of sin is pronounced, and the victory over it is declared.
In Genesis 3.15, it says, I will put enmity between thee and the
woman, and between thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy
head, and thou shalt bruise his heel. And unto the woman he said,
I'll greatly multiply thy sorrow in thy conception. In sorrow
thou shalt bring forth children, and thy desire shall be to thy
husband, and he shall rule over thee. And unto Adam he said,
because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast
eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying thou shalt not eat
of it, cursed is the ground for thy sake. In sorrow shalt thou
eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles
shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of
the field. Matthew, John, and Mark all include
the placing of the crown of thorns on his head. When they had platted a crown
of thorns, they put it upon his head in a reed in his right hand,
and they bowed the knee before him and mocked him. Sometimes
we're at a place where Norm and I used to go have breakfast,
and there was this guy that was an acquaintance of Norm's, and
he always mocked him. He would come in and kneel down
and call him, your worship, and all this stuff. he should have
been smacked for. But Norm put up with it. But it was mockery. And that's
what these soldiers did to Jesus. They bowed the knee to him because
he was king of the Jews. And they clothed him in purple,
which was the only reserve for royalty. And they plaited a crown
of thorns and put it about his head. And then Pilate, therefore,
took Jesus and scourged him. And the soldiers platted a crown
of thorns in John, this is John 19, 1 and 2, and put it on his
head and they put on him a purple robe. So a crown of thorns that
was meant for mockery. to him who was king of the Jews,
but in truth was a symbol of the curse being put on his head,
bearing the curse and the weight of that. In Isaiah 53 again,
in verse 4, it says, Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried
our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken. smitten of God
and afflicted. Every stroke of the lash, every
smiting with a reed was all in reality being smitten of God to pay for the atonement of And
that wouldn't be enough. It would ultimately require his
death to satisfy totally the iniquity of all the people. All
we, like sheep, have gone astray. We've turned every one to his
own way. And the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all, those who have believed the report,
those to whom the arm of the Lord has been revealed. Every
single one whom the Father gave the Son to redeem. That's why it says, as Mike brought
out in one of his messages, in Romans 8, chapter 8, verse 1,
there's, therefore, no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,
who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. No condemnation
to those that are in Christ. And we go to Hebrews chapter
2, and it gives us some descriptions. We see Jesus in chapter 2 of
Hebrews verse 9, who was made a little lower than the angels
for the suffering of death. He had to be reduced to the level
that we are as humans to be able to accomplish this. Crowned with
glory and honor. that he, by the grace of God,
should taste death for every man." And we wanted to remember,
as we were looking at Isaiah, who is this written to? Here,
every man does not mean the totality of the human race. As we think
about Jesus suffering all these lashes, the crown of thorns,
the smiting on the head, the spitting, and the hair, beard
pulling out, all these were done for the atonement of all those
that the Father gave him, and not for the entire planet, not
for everyone that was ever born. If you read the context here
in Hebrews chapter, Two, on down through verse 13, we find the
context does not support a interpretation of this being every man being
the totality of the human race. And there's a good article on
the back of your bulletin here on particular redemption. Very
good and quinky dink, I guess. written in what, 1646? When I was reading that or writing
stuff for this lesson here, just imagine that, just imagine Jesus
every time someone dies and ends up in hell saying, dang, that
didn't work. I took that beating for that
person for nothing. Isn't that ridiculous? Hebrews 2.10, For it became him
for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing
many sons unto glory, and to make the captain of their salvation
perfect through sufferings, for both he that sanctifieth and
they who are sanctified are all of one, for which cause he is
not ashamed to call them brethren. saying, I will declare thy name
unto my brethren in the midst of the church will I sing praise
unto thee. And again, I will put my trust in him. And again,
behold, I and the children which God has given me. That's pretty
explicit. That pretty much does away with
the every man concept. It just means every man from
every kindred, every tongue, every nation, every race, that
make up the ones that the Father gave the Son to redeem, the ones
that are described in Revelation. And Hebrews 2.13 says, Behold,
I and the children which God hath given me. He caused that
to be written in Isaiah chapter 8, verse 18. That's where that
quote comes from. Behold, I and the children whom
the Lord hath given me are for signs and wonders in Israel from
the Lord of hosts which dwelleth in Mount Zion. And Jesus makes
reference to that himself in his prayer in John 17, particularly
verse 9, where he says, I pray for them, I pray not for the
world, but for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine. Behold I and the children whom
thou hast given me. And so usually in Scripture,
the context absolutely has to be looked at in order to understand
the scope of the statement. So just as we were in Hebrews
there in Chapter 2, we can't just take that one verse and
saying that he should taste death for every
man, and apply that to universal salvation. And then it puts all
the impetus on the man to accept or reject that through their
own their own ability, which being
dead in trespasses and sins they don't possess, as this article
brings out here on the back page. So you have to look at the context
of the Scripture. I have a couple of examples here. In Luke 2, verse 1, it came to pass in those
days, and this is regarding the time of the Jesus in Bethlehem. It came to pass in those days
that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all
the world should be taxed. Well, I'm pretty sure he didn't
tax the Chinese. or anybody from South America,
or North America, or anybody north of Spain, or parts of France
and England. It only applied to the land mass
that the Romans had control over through military conquest. just
kind of a marginal area. They didn't even control anything
east of the Jordan River. Those folks over there gave them
fits. And every time they went over
there and tried to conquer that area, they got beat back soundly. So I'm pretty sure they didn't
exact a tax from anybody in the Persian Empire. So, it's plain
that all the world only refers to the part of the world that
was controlled by Rome. So, their context is important. In Romans 3.19, We know that what things soever
the law saith, that saith to them who are under the law, that
every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty
before God. Well, here all the world means
all the world. Everyone is, all have sinned,
all come short of the glory of God. So there's a, the context
of that is clear. All the world means all the world.
In John chapter 12, and the scene here is Passover is about to
take place. It's at the beginning of this
chapter. It's like six days before the Passover feast. And Jesus
is coming to Jerusalem. He just got through raising Lazarus
from the dead, and all the people were anxious to see Him and to
see Lazarus as well. And He comes into Jerusalem,
and they have what they call the triumphal entry, where they're
all singing hosannas to the King and laying down the palm branches
and stuff for His entry. And the Pharisees, and the elders,
and the chief priests, they all looked at that. And it's worth
mentioning again that the Passover was one of the feasts that Jews,
male Jews, were required to attend. It was the law. And so they all
would come to Jerusalem for these three feasts, and this Passover
being kind of the main one. There would be Jews there from
all over the world. And as we reported from several
sources, and particularly Josephus, remarked that in 70 A.D., when
the Romans besieged Jerusalem, there was like three million
Jews in Jerusalem for the Passover. So there was a lot of people
from all over the world that would come to Jerusalem for these
things. There was that Ethiopian eunuch
that came there for religious purposes. There were Greeks.
There were people from the north. There were proselytes and Jews
from all over the Asian Mediterranean area that came to Jerusalem for
that feast. And they are all pouring out
to see Jesus. The Pharisees there in John 12,
19 said, The Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive
you how ye prevail nothing? Behold, the world is gone after
him. Because they saw there were Greeks,
there were people from the South, the world has gone after him. The world, in this case, in the
context of it, means that it had to do with the region of
Jerusalem being filled with Jews and proselytes from all over
the East just a few days before the Passover. But that was their word, and
that was their usage of it, but it didn't mean planet Earth. The world has gone after him.
So, the point being that redemption can't be reconciled to the whole
world when it's recorded that he bear the sins of many, not all. If he bared the sins of all,
then what are they being punished for? Why would they end up in
hell? If he paid the ransom for them, then why would they ultimately
end up in that location paying for their own? Hebrews 9, verse 28 says, So
Christ once offered to bear the sins of many. And unto them that
look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto
salvation. And that's what it says in Isaiah
chapter 53 again verse 11. He shall see the travail of his
souls and be satisfied by his knowledge shall my righteous
servant Jesus justify many. for he shall bear their iniquities."
And many means a lot. Many is not an insignificant
number because in Revelation it tells us that there is a multitude
that no man can number. So, it doesn't mean all. but it means many. The Old Testament
says hell becomes enlarged to accommodate the transgressors
there. He shall justify many. And in
Acts 13, 48, it says, and when the Gentiles heard
this, they heard the Gospel, these Greeks and those from all
over, It's like thousands of them,
when they heard the gospel, they were glad and glorified the word
of the Lord. And as many as were ordained
to eternal life believed. So that implies that there were some that heard, but
they didn't believe. But many that were ordained to
eternal life did believe. They were caused to believe.
As it says in Ephesians 119, we believe according to the working
of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ when He raised
Him from the dead. You don't come up with that on
your own. It takes divine, almighty power
to cause one to be born again and to believe. So as many as
were ordained to eternal life believed, John 6, 37, all that
the Father giveth me shall come to me. That's a specific group
of folks. The ones that the Father gave
the Son in eternity in the covenant of grace, all of those are going
to come to him. And he said, no man comes to me except the
Father which sent me. Draw him, but they're going to
come. And all that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. So the many, the all that the
Father giveth me are the ones for whom He bore their iniquities,
the ones for whom He bore the stripes of scourging, and the
ones for whom He would lay down His life a ransom for many. It's
what it tells us, Matthew 20, 28. He would lay down His life
a ransom for many, not universal all. So that would be the end of our
lesson today. Next time we'll be looking at
the accusation and going to the cross. In the meantime, be free
because He paid the price and set you free.