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When we come back, John 18:36
John 19.1
April 12th 2015
Milk
So Pilate has come back in from speaking with the Jews.
They claimed Jesus was guilty of all manner of crimes including causing insurrection among the people, denying that the people ought to pay taxes to Caesar, and that He claimed to be a King.
John’s account reports Pilate coming back in and asking Jesus if He was the King of the Jews, to which Jesus asked him a question in return about where he got his information.
This apparently angered Pilate and he demanded, given the fact that his own people have turned Him in, to know what He had done.
Jesus replies at verse 36:
“My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.”
Let’s read to the end of the chapter to finish this scene out.
37 Pilate therefore said unto him, “Art thou a king then?” Jesus answered, “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.”
38 Pilate saith unto him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, “I find in him no fault at all.
39 But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews?”
40 Then cried they all again, saying,” Not this man, but Barabbas.” Now Barabbas was a robber.
There are so many approaches we could take to these passages I get overwhelmed just thinking about it.
The reason is is because while short in length these passages are long in content, representing topics that include everything from the division of these kingdoms – heavenly and earthly – how they operate and what they are based on, who the kings of these kingdoms are, the methods they use to govern, and the characteristics of those who belong to them.
And that is only verse 36.
The charge on which Jesus was arraigned was that of laying claim to the office of a king – a charge that put His life in danger since if He was claiming to be a King he would be putting Himself in competition with Caesar Tiberius – a crime worthy of death in the face of Roman Governance.
But His kingdom is NOT of this world and as a result – LISTEN – as a result He and His kingdom posed NO THREAT to Pilate, Tiberius or the Roman Government.
Did you catch that? – His kingdom, if truly lived by His followers – SHOULD have been a blessing to any King or Kingdom, not a threat.
That is, unless His followers got the message all mixed up and started causing Kings and their Kingdoms trouble.
In the face of this situation I want to present to you two conclusions Christians (as a whole) must take into account
The first conclusion is we must admit to here (if we are to consider ourselves Bible believing Christians) is that because of Adam, this world fell, and remains, in a darkened state of sin.
All of us were born in sin, separated from the mind and will of God, alienated from Him and needing reconciliation.
Rebirth.
(beat)
Now, I think we can approach the solution to sin and the fallen world in two ways – they way of God, which is by and through His Son, or every other way imaginable, including philosophy, non-Chrsitian approaches to religion, positive mental attitudes, humanism, barbarism, military force, science, governments, psychiatry, medicines, art, tyranny, anarchy – you name it, it has probably been tried.
It’s not that some of those approaches can’t work with the shed blood of Christ but that solution to the fallen world is the ONLY one that will last and work – here and into the eternities because it works on the human heart with lasting merits.
To suggest that God’s way, which His Son described as
“a straight gate and way so narrow that few would there be to find it”
Can be replaced or altered or enhanced or updated is utter folly.
I recently watched a documentary on L Ron Hubbard’s Scientology which I could not recommend more to every single person on earth let alone people trapped in religious institutions.
So our first conclusion is this world has fallen into a dark state of sin . . . and everyone on the spinning globe is condemned . . . until they each receive God Almighty’s singular solution to their fallen state . . . His Son.
Additionally, we have to admit that His Son, according to scripture, reigns over a kingdom.
Here Jesus told Pilate “His Kingdom is NOT of this world” – and yet millions of believers seem to think that His Kingdom is visible, material, physical and governed and growing here on earth with the hope that someday IT will take over.
The world is fallen. It’s inhabitants are fallen – men and women in flesh who, without the presence of the King in their hearts by the Spirit – will always resort to that flesh and will therefore ALWAYS fail in the administration of a brick and mortar reign.
So another conclusion is (from the Christian perspective, which ought to be the biblical perspective taken as a whole) is that there is only one solution to this world’s fallen and condemned state.
Him and His Spiritual reign over all things – since His kingdom is NOT of this world.
Stay with me.
The solution is NOT and NEVER HAS been social programs aimed at reducing “world suffering.”
Again, it is not political action committees, the republican, democrat, libertarian, socialist, or communist parties. It’s NOT science.
And hard as it is for some to understand, the solution is NOT found in good people banding together to fight world sin like pornography, homosexuality, divorce, abortion, stem-cell research, or any other crime living in the flesh of humanity.
That is where such crimes live – in the flesh – so it is impossible for the flesh to overcome them.
The solution is Jesus Christ . . .
. . . and it is the preaching, teaching, sharing, and exemplifying of Him that His followers will truly have any lasting merits on this fallen world.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The Blood of Jesus Christ.
The Love of Jesus Christ.
(quietly) Nothing more.
If it was something more, than the Gospel would include something more, and He would have taught His disciples to do something more . . . and Jesus Himself would certainly have done something more – especially in the face of Roman governance!
He would have fought.
He would have taken over with angels demanding compliance.
He would have formed armies, and systems, and empires.
Instead He gave His life, then sent His Spirit to rule over the hearts of those who belong to Him and His Kingdom on High.
So, the bottom-line, brass-tacks solution to every collective and every individual issue this world faces is Him.
And again, we have tried – and continue to try EVERYTHING . . . but Him.
Since 70AD the churches that use His name have continually lost sight of its biblical directives to share and exemplify “Jesus and Jesus alone” – and has instead chosen to focus on two courses of action as a means to somehow save and govern the world AS CHRISTIANS –
First, it has chosen to “fight” – politically and even in the streets – against world evil as a means to collectively overcome it or it has become so much of the world that it is impossible to distinguish between Him and it.
Let me ask you all here in the studio/church and those at home a question I have posed before . . .
“Who are we?”
What does it really mean to be a Christian? I mean, how does the New Testament define the identity of Christians collectively and individually?
(LIONS AND SHEEP)
There is a story told in Islamic circles of a lion pup that was one day separated from its mother and wound up in the midst of a herd of sheep.
There it was raised to adulthood, in time believing that he too, was a sheep.
One day (when the lion cub had fully grown) his mother located him, and quickly realized that the lion suffered from a very extreme identity crisis.
So she led her large cub to a pond and told him to look at his reflection in the still water.
It was here that the lion realized for the first time in its life, that he was not a sheep at all, but a great king of the jungle, a full grown lion.
Using this illustration, Muslims teach a simple principle to their adherents – “You are not sheep, but lions.”
And true Muslims live according to this belief.
But somehow Christians have allowed themselves to believe the same thing!
That we must fight!
That we must resist!
That we have rights!
That we ought to reign!
This is certainly not the biblical message though, is it?
Quite the opposite.
I frequently am asked:
Well what do we do in the face of Isis?
What do we do when our government is turning us to godless socialism?
What do we do when our rights as Christians are taken from us?
I respond:
“What did the early Christians do”
“They suffered – even death,” comes the reply.
“Then we do the same.”
In the Christian narrative, we would say that . . .
A lamb was lost in the jungle and was somehow raised up by a pride of meat eating lions.
In time, the lamb began to believe that he was a ferocious king of the jungle too.
One day, a shepherd found the now full grown sheep and took him out from among the lions.
Seeing that the sheep thought himself a giant meat eater, the Shepherd took the wooly animal to a calm pond.
There, looking at his reflection in the water, the shepherd exposed the sheep to his true identity – and for the first time in his existence he was to see himself for what he truly was . . . not a lion, but a harmless, humble sheep, one whose life was now forever altered by the true Shepherd.
(Beat)
When our “True Shepherd” walked the earth, He went to great lengths to avoid using His person and power for political means – even when men tried to make Him the immediate solution to overcoming ugly social sinful evil.
Instead, Jesus did what He came to do, and taught that the world needs Him spiritually as a King to govern the heart.
Certainly, Our King fed the hungry masses (as we too are commanded to do in His name).
And certainly, He was in great favor of helping and serving anyone in physical need – especially the widows and fatherless.
But He was quick to inform all who ate of His miracle loaves that they ought to rather seek for “the Bread of Life . . .” because when anyone eats of this “true bread” they will never hunger again.
Every time the world misinterpreted Jesus and His mission and therefore sought to make Him an earthly king (as the many in the body have sought to make Him an earthly King) He refused the election.
John 6:15 says:
“When Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take him by force, to make him a king, he departed again into a mountain himself alone.”
Why? Why did He depart from being made a king?
The answer is found in this very dialogue He had with Pilate shortly before His death. Standing before Pilate, Jesus said plainly,
“My kingdom . . . is not of this world . . . .”
Throughout scripture there is a clear delineation made between the “Kingdom of God” and the kingdoms of this fallen, material world.
According to scripture, the two literally have nothing to do with each other in terms of how they are to operate.
Where the world says . . .
litigate,
sue,
make demands,
seek retribution . . .
our King taught quite the opposite.
Matthew 5:40 says
“If any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.”
On the topic of suing each other Paul said to the Saints at Corinth:
1st Corinthians 6:7 “Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you, because ye go to law one with another. (listen) Why do ye not rather take wrong? why do ye not rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded?”
Do you what these verses are saying – they are saying that our kingdom is not of this world.
That our treasures are not the type that can be buried and worried over but are located in another realm and amassed through spiritual means not carnal.
This world says, “if someone hits you, hit them back,”
Jesus said . . .
“ . . . resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.”
And this world, with its armies, its political forces, and its powerbrokers chant, “might makes right,” Jesus tells us to be “meek, and lowly, and of humble hearts,” and to focus our minds on a Kingdom to come.
In fact, John the Beloved said in 1st John
“All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of . . .??? . . . this world.”
(Beat)
Is it possible, normative, even expected, for genuine followers of Christ to be actively involved participants in (or even against) the things of this present world?
Are we commanded to fight against it, legislate against it, picket and protest it?
Is it our duty as recipients of everlasting life to make war with a world already gone bad; to fight against all the social ills, to battle corrupt governments, and to threaten “worldly institutions” and “ideologies of evil” with collective economic sanctions if they will not do as we desire?
Are we, in the name of Christ and His kingdom to single sinners out when the fact of the matter is when He was here He hung out with them?
I would strongly suggest today that if you answer “yes” to any of these questions you’ve made a serious error in understanding what it means to be a follower of Christ.
Ask yourself –
“Are Christians today known more for their undying faith in God and love for all people OR for our being against social evils like homosexuality, abortion, pornography, evolution, divorce, gay marriage and the like?”
Our honest answer provides us with some indication of how far we have strayed from the purpose and point of genuine Christianity through embracing a “culture of supposed Christianity” that has been heaped upon us by a fearful, faithless, cowardly group of politically minded-men and women bearing the cross as their insignia against the world.
What were the words of Christ’s great commission?
“Go forth and be ye politically-active gay-fightin, whore-hatin, boarder protectin zealots who won’t take any type of injustice?”
Remember when the Lord said,
“Yeah, go ye forth into the world and picket abortion clinics in my name? Yea, blow them to smithereens if ye must! Yea, go ye forth and boycott McDonalds for their fat laden foods and other corporate empires that offend our Christian sensitivities?”
Yeah, be ye smug!
Yeah, stand ye piously above others?
Yeah, prove thy faith by showing how much better you are then the rabble!
Didn’t He teach all these things?
Or did He say,
Matthew 28:19-20 “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.”
And when Jesus said, “teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded,” what did He mean?
What did He command?
Did our Lord, or Peter, or James, or John, or Paul ever, anywhere, teach us to rise up and fight people in the streets over ideology?
Did He or His chosen apostles ever tell us that in His name we must try and politically govern this Kingdom, this world?
Did He ever say, “My followers are commanded to morally perfect this earth?”
Never.
In fact, let me challenge all of you right here and now! I challenge anyone here to provide us with a New Testament teaching that tells or commands Christians to do anything (relative to this fallen world) other than to share Jesus in faith and to love one another.
John 15:12
“This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.”
John 15:17
“These things I command you, that ye love one another.”
John 13:34
“A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”
Remember, scripture says,
1st John 4:20 “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?”
“By this shall men KNOW you are my disciples . . . if you love one another.”
(beat)
How on earth did we as believers and followers of the Lord Jesus ever allow the Body of Christ to be tacitly represented by these so-called Christian political action committees and their talking heads?
This should have NEVER come to be!
Again, Jesus said in John 13:35
“By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
“Well, well, well Shawn, Jesus said for us to love EACH other – not sinners.”
(people actually interpret this passage this way)
In response I would cite
1st Thessalonians 3:12, which says:
“And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you.”
I would cite Peter who said:
(1st Peter 2:17) Honor all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the king (even President Obama).
See, as believers we OUGHT (according to Romans 13) to be a light to all governments wherever they find themselves in.
Submitting and serving all factions peaceably so as to glorify God.
See, all governors and earthly kings LOVE and APPRECIATE when people are easy to lead.
They want conformity and law abiding citizens. Christians ought to be the most law abiding citizens whether they are Christians under Regan, Marx, Pol Pot, Obama, or Pilate.
For this reason Jesus was not a threat to Pilate, or the Roman Government because if His ways were truly adopted by the Romans governance would be easy.
Paul makes this point clear in Romans 13, saying to the believers at Rome:
“A good action has nothing to fear from Rulers; a bad action has. Do you want to have no reason to fear the Authorities? Then do what is good, and you will win their praise.”
Every single day, almost without fail, our ministry receives an email from some well-meaning believer “whining about” and/or telling us to “fearfully fight against” the collective loss of our rights in the world.
Our Christian rights! Ha!
These missives complain about “the Ten Commandments being taken down from municipal and federal buildings” or the fact that creationism is being replaced with Darwinism in the libraries and labs of our public schools.
Big Freakin Deal – whose in charge us or God?
Turn to almost any Christian radio station in America today and you are sure to hear some host frothing on about standing up for “our rights” –
our “right” to wear crosses,
our “right” to public prayer,
our “right” to protest at family planning clinics,
our “right” to free speech on public grounds.
Now, don’t get me wrong.
Any and every American ought to have the inalienable right to fight for or against any public policy with which they are appalled – and as they are personally so inclined.
No problem.
But an enormous difficulty arises when personal American choices become collective “Christian” battles.
Why?
Because the world then identifies Christianity with these causes rather than with Christ – whose Kingdom is NOT of this world.
And then church ceases to be church. And in the end, Christians cease to be Christian.
I mean
“Christianity today” is involved in everything from protecting our sacred borders to making sure we get a representative in office who will, darn it, protect our rights.
Our bloody, Christian rights.
But how does the Bible describe the “rights” of a follower of Christ?
Jesus said in Luke 6:22,
“Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake.”
We know the facts . . . we’ve poured over the scripture of the New Covenant, but somehow we have come to believe that believers are mandated to fight, sue, to complain, and/or to lash out and protest against those (of the world) who get their way over ours, who bother us, or who embrace a fallen lifestyle.
Listen!
John 3:16 “For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through Him might be saved.”
And hear 1st John 5:4,
“For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?”
We don’t overcome the world by might, or elections, or money, or power, or our flesh . . . 2nd Corinthians 10:4 says it well:
“The weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds” (2nd Corinthians 10:4)
(beat)
So standing before Pilate, Jesus was asked:
“Are you a King?”
He replied:
“My kingdom is not of this world: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is My kingdom not from hence.”
From this exchange we learn from Jesus Himself that “His kingdom is not of this world,” and the proof of this was that if His kingdom was of this world, “then His servants would fight.”
Pilate then repeats the question, asking the Lord again, “Art thou a king then?”
Jesus answered,
“Thou sayest that I am a king (which means, “Yes, I am”). (Then He says!) To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the Truth. Every one that is of the Truth heareth my voice.”
From these words we realize even more about the Lord and our duty in following Him.
Jesus certainly is a king; “ . . . to this end” He says, “He was born.”
And then He explains what His birth, and His mission and ministry were all about, saying, “for this cause I came into the world that I should bear witness unto the truth.”
Is not this the sole Christian duty as well – to “bear witness of the truth” – which is Christ – the way, the Truth and the Life?
(Softly) It is.
Ephesians 6:12 makes it plain on how we, as followers and knowers of The Truth approach difficulties and problems:
Here Paul says:
“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
Since Christian wrestling is NOT ever Against flesh and blood (or against individual people or people groups) we know that our wrestling is spiritual.
In the case of Jesus trial, if His Kingdom were of THIS material world then His servant would fight.
In the case of our lives if our Kingdom were of this world then we would fight too.
But our kingdom, like our King’s, is NOT of this world.
Remember:
“For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.”
(beat)
We have lost our way – and we’re scrambling to rediscover it through moral reformation, political policy, building empires of sand, and being known more for what we are against that what we are for . . . and who we love – God AND everyone else.
And the things that are horrible, and evil, and dark – we pray for these things, we look to God and never, ever the arm of the flesh.
(beat)
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