Holy Week Devotion - Day 4 (Matthew's Gospel)

Matthew 27:11-31 - The fourth day of a 5-Day devotion for Holy Week (ROMAN TRIAL ) 

Join Pastor Mark as he leads us through the Passion of Christ in Saint Matthew. (That is Matthew’s account of the suffering and death of Christ).  
    Each day will include five sections:
    1 – Reading the Bible passage
    2 - Reflection and teaching about background, context, and helpful insights
    3 - Responses and points to ponder (with three questions for you to consider)
    4 – A Prayer
    5 - Hearing the text again, this time with more depth 

Devotions from Pastor Mark, Advent Lutheran Church in Harleysville PA.   

Special thanks to Mr. Vince Ryan for the piano music.

For more information or to contact Pastor Mark, go to https://www.adventharleysville.org/contact

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

This is the Passion of Christ according to Saint Matthew, day four. Welcome to this five-day devotions for Holy Week using Matthew chapters 26 and 27. The Passion of Christ, the account of the Last Supper, Arrest, Trial, Crucifixion, Death, and Burial of Jesus. I'm Pastor Mark from Advent Lutheran Church in Harleysville, PA, and I invite you into this Holy Week time together. I want to also thank Vince Ryan for the musical interludes and background music in these recordings. Day four, reading from Matthew chapter twenty seven, verses eleven through thirty one, as we hear about the Roman trial. Now Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, Are you the king of the Jews? Jesus said, You say so. But when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you? But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly amazed. Now at the festival the governor was accustomed to release a prisoner for the crowd any one whom they wanted. At that time they had a notorious prisoner called Jesus Barabbas. So after they had gathered, Pilate said to them, Whom do you want me to release for you Jesus Barabbas or Jesus who is called the Messiah? For he realized that it was out of jealousy that they had handed him over. While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him have nothing to do with that innocent man, for today I have suffered a great deal because of a dream about him. Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. The governor again said to them, Which of the two do you want me to release for you? And they said Barabbas. Pilate said to them, Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah? All of them said Let him be crucified. Then he asked Why? What evil has he done? But they shouted all the more Let him be crucified. So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying I am innocent of this man's blood, see to it yourselves. Then the people as a whole answered, His blood be on us and on our children. So he released Barabbas for them, and after flogging Jesus he handed him over to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into a crown they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. They spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. After mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him. It was likely at that time that Jesus was riding in from the east side of Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, hailed as Messiah and anointed to rule, but humble, on a donkey, with children singing. Pilate was riding in from the west on a war horse with all sorts of soldiers and a military show of force. Pilate was brutal and evil. He had massacred people. In this reading he is manipulative and avoids responsibility. He gets the religious rulers to do his dirty work, and the crowd to be blamed. Some interesting features of this trial. There is a reference to a Passover tradition where Pilate would release a prisoner for the crowd. We see that nowhere in any Jewish writing or Roman history, but all four Gospels tell us about this. Matthew lets us know that when they are talking of releasing someone, the choice is Jesus or another Jesus Barabbas. In Hebrew Bar means son of. Simon Bar Jonah is Simon son of Jonah, sort of like our English Samson or Donaldson, originally son of Donald or son of Sam. The word Abba means father or dad. So literally Barabbas means Bar Abba, son of the Father. So the choice that Matthew presents is between Jesus Barabbas, Jesus Son of the Father, or Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, the one who calls God Father. Matthew presents this, but doesn't make a big deal of it. What he does share is that the guilty man is acclaimed, and the innocent one is condemned. Matthew opens with the story of the Magi, the wise men, back in chapter two. At Jesus' birth Herod the king and the chief priests and scribe seek the death of this child Jesus. Here in chapter twenty seven Pilate the procurator and the chief priests and scribes seek the death of adult Jesus. Back in chapter two, the Gentile magi were guided by a star to come to Jesus, and warned in a dream not to return to Herod. Here in chapter twenty seven a Gentile woman, Pilate's wife, is guided by a dream that Jesus is innocent. At Jesus' birth, narrated in Matthew chapter two, the magi seek the child who is born king of the Jews. The chief priests and scribes search for information about the Messiah. Now in Matthew chapter twenty seven we see that term King of the Jews three more times. Pilate asks if Jesus is the King of the Jews. The soldiers mock Jesus, saying, Hail, King of the Jews, and on the cross they post the charge against him. This is Jesus, the King of the Jews. Back to Pilate. He ignores his wife's word of Jesus' innocence. At the end he uses the hand washing, an action that is actually out of Jewish tradition for an unsolved murder, and he uses it sort of a mockery as he says he is not responsible. The words that Matthew says the crowd spoke, his blood be on us and on our children, are maybe the most damaging and destructive words in the Bible used throughout centuries to justify torture and death of Jews as Christ killers. As I shared in the last episode, there's a context back then that's different from today, and this was not all of Israel but a crowd in Jerusalem, and even if someone believed it was spoken for all Jews, literally as described, it can't be the last word for us. Jesus said love your enemies. From the cross, Jesus said in Luke, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. In communion Jesus says in Matthew, that the cup is his blood for the forgiveness of sins. May that blood, that forgiveness be on all of us and our children. What part of today's reading impacted you the most and why? Pause and take a little time to reflect on that. What might God be saying to you? Have there been times when you've followed a crowd or been influenced by others to make choices or actions that you realized were not true to your values or faithful to God? How might you be more aware of that and resist? How do you respond when you realize you've messed up? Those words are shouted by the crowd. When we read this in worship, the whole congregation joins in those words. We shout crucify him. The truth is that we all are guilty. It was our humanity, our ways, our sinfulness. Can you acknowledge how easily we do that? You can challenge others, Jesus, but don't challenge my own lifestyle or my comforts or my views of others. Consider our guilt. Then consider the irony of the next words by the crowd. His blood be on us. The blood of the new covenant for the forgiveness of sins. What irony. We're pretty fortunate that God switched that one around. Pause to ponder our guilt and God's grace. Loving Jesus, you were abandoned by your followers, mocked and falsely judged by religious leaders, mocked and manipulated by the authorities, and condemned to death. We are guilty. Our voices might not have shouted for your death, but we're not good at being challenged or taking unpopular stands, or putting our reputations on the line for others. We have a hard time loving when loving gets difficult. When there's real risk we get pretty quiet. Forgive us. Keep working on us and keep our sights on you. Amen. Now Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, Are you the king of the Jews? Jesus said you say so. But when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you? But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly amazed. Now at the festival the governor was accustomed to release a prisoner for the crowd any one whom they wanted. At that time they had a notorious prisoner called Jesus Barabbas. So after they had gathered, Pilate said to them, Whom do you want me to release for you Jesus Barabbas or Jesus who is called the Messiah? For he realized that it was out of jealousy that they had handed him over. While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him have nothing to do with that innocent man, for today I have suffered a great deal because of a dream about him. Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed. The governor again said to them, Which of the two do you want me to release for you? And they said Barabbas. Pilate said to them, Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah? All of them said Let him be crucified. Then he asked Why? What evil has he done? But they shouted all the more Let him be crucified. So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying I am innocent of this man's blood, see to it yourselves. Then the people as a whole answered, His blood be on us and on our children. So he released Barabbas for them, and after flogging Jesus he handed him over to be crucified. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and after twisting some thorns into a crown they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. They spat on him and took the reed and struck him on the head. After mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him. Thank you once again for being part of this Holy Week journey together. We have one more episode, and again I invite you, if this was helpful, please share that with a friend, and also I invite you to share that with me and what might make it more helpful next year. God be with you and bless you through this time together.