I was thinking of all the adjustments that we make for the sake of ministry and for one another, but nothing like what Jesus Christ has suffered in our place. I was thinking this, you know, giving with iPad. I'm not a techie. I'm like the whole computer thing is even like a second language to me. And I don't have to tell a number of you. I'm not quite as bad as one of my pastor friends who They joke that they knew whenever he was working on the computer because of the white out on the screen. He really just decided he's going to write out everything and if something needed to be on the computer someone else to do it for him. I don't know if that's changed over the years or not but a lot of us it is like a second second language and I was just thinking as I sat there with my tablet you know somebody that's kind of in the crossover generation like me might just put my tablet in the offering plate and let them figure it out. But but we live in a we live in an awesome time of opportunity and we look at ways to use the tools that God has given to us and in ways that will honor him and live in an awesome time in terms of I mean like the song we just sang. Do you realize that that good hymns being produced are solidly scriptural and that are in the idiom of the times musical idiom of the times that that that is not a constant sort of thing that that actually the church has gone centuries between a real influx of great hands and we and we happen to be living in a time. When new hymns are being written that are full of substance and full of the word of God and and touch our hearts. And I know it takes a little bit of adjustment like using an iPad or or some other tablet form takes a little bit of an adjustment to learn something new. But I think the blessing will be ours as we do so in order to honor the Lord Jesus and minister to one another. I'd like to turn your Bible to Matthew 27. Last time we were together here in Matthew 27. We looked at the subject of death to the innocent. We saw a series of contrasts between Jesus and everyone else in the account innocence on one hand. and guilt on the other. The Jewish leaders guilty of envy and lies and murder. Barabbas guilty of notorious crime yet released while Jesus remained in custody. The crowd guilty of demanding a groundless execution no reasons given just demands to crucify him. Pilate guilty of irresponsibility appeasement cruelty murder all in an effort to protect himself He tried to wash his hands of responsibility, but could not. Jesus is innocent. All the more clear from the guilt of those that condemned him, willingly bearing the blame and dying for it. Because we realize as we look at the scriptures from beginning to end, if the innocent does not die, the guilty cannot be rescued from their sin. If the lamb is not slain, sin will not be atoned for. Death to the innocent was necessary to fulfilling God's saving plan. So the religious leaders, the criminals, the surging crowd, the civil authorities, all guilty. All complicit in the death of the innocent one just as we all are as those who sin made it necessary for Christ to die. We're all in need of forgiveness. All in need of cleansing from sin. And it was his violent death on the cross that would bring that to us. We pick up the account in verse 27 of Matthew 27. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor's headquarters. They gathered the whole battalion before him. And they stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him and twisted together a crown of thorns. They put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand and kneeling before him mocked him saying Hail King of the Jews. And they spit on him. They took the reed and they struck him on the head when they had mocked him. They stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him and let him away to crucify him. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. Cyrene's in northern Africa. And they compelled this man to carry his cross. And when they came to the place called Golgotha, which means place of a skull, it's a mount that kind of looks like a giant skull, they offered him wine to drink mixed with gall. That was to anesthetize the pain. When he had tasted it, he would not drink it because he was going to endure the suffering completely. And when they crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots. And they sat down and kept watch over him there. And over his head they put the charge against him, which read, This is Jesus, the King of the Jews. And two robbers were crucified with him, one on the right and one on the left. Those who passed by derided him. wagging their heads and saying you who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days save yourself. If you are the son of God come down to the cross. So also the chief priests the scribes and elders mocked him saying he saved others. He cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel. Let him come down from the cross and we will believe in him. He trusts in God. Let God deliver him now if he desires him for he said I am the son of God and the robbers who are crucified with him also. reviled him in the same way. Really, three groups of people, each responding to Jesus and each responding to this central claim, the central identity of Jesus being the king. I've entitled the message King, question mark, exclamation point, because that's the issue that's the focus here as they as they reveal their own rejection of him. In verses 27 to 31, Jesus is mocked as king. The soldiers did not believe Jesus was really a king. He was too weak and pathetic to be revered, mocked as king, 27 to 31. In verses 32 to 38, he is crucified as king. That was the inscription of the accusation. The reason for his being crucified was that he was Jesus, king of the Jews. Pilate didn't believe Jesus was a king, not in the normal sense. In fact, Jesus' kingship was too otherworldly to be practical to a political man like Pilate. And then verses 39 to 44, we find the crowd, we find the civil and religious leaders blaspheming Jesus as king. You have the soldiers mocking him as king. You have Pilate crucifying him as king. You have the crowd, the civil and religious leaders blaspheming him as king. That's the word that's used. It's translated derided. He was too great a threat to the position and power because he was a divine king. He was the king that God had set up. He was the Messiah, the son of God. That's what they condemned him for. And they made it very clear to Pilate that day that they preferred Caesar as much as they hated Caesar. They preferred Caesar to Jesus. So Jesus King mocked as king crucified as king blasphemed as king. That is why they all conspired to execute him as a criminal. He was not the kind of king they feared or wanted. As we track through this passage, here's the question that's going to come to us. Is Jesus. Your king. Or will you join those who, for their own reasons, reject his kingship. And conspire to rid him to rid their lives of him. Let's ask God to help us as we look at this passage of Scripture, Father, thank you for your word and Now, Lord, as we track through it, I pray that You would teach us, that You would convict our hearts of anything that we have put in front of Jesus, that we might treat Him as the King that He is, when we consider that He went to the death and rose again to save us. For it's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. First, consider with me the response of the soldiers as they mocked Jesus kingship. Why did they mock his kingship? These soldiers, military power, the battalion, it says the whole battalion would be about 600 men. It doesn't mean that every single one of them maybe was involved. I'm sure they had other duties. But we're talking about a large group of powerful men. likely not from Italy but from regions all over the world now part of the Roman Empire. Jesus has already been scourged. That alone could kill a man. He's been up all night. He's been beaten. He's been spat upon. He's already been brutalized. He's scourged now. So his back's in ribbons. The scourging could tear a man open. They spit on him. They beat him. They take thorns and they crown him with thorns. They strip him and then dress him in a scarlet robe. They put a little reed in his hand, mocking his pathetic kingship. They bow to him. They hail him as king of the Jews. Then they strip him again of the scarlet, put his own clothes on him. Later, they will strip him again, humiliate him again to crucify him and gamble for his clothing. mainly a seamless outer garment woven in one piece of some value. Now, few if any of these soldiers would have been aware of Jesus' teaching and ministry. To them, he was just a condemned man whose battered condition made his kingship laughable. They were men of blood. They were used to inflicting injury and death. They were men of physical and military might part of the strike force of the empire that at that time dominated most of the civilized world. And if you want to get any kind of picture remember the last time we were in New York City in the Metropolitan Museum I shared it with you before. But when you walk through the ancient civilizations section and you see the statues and chariots of the Greek Empire and the Roman Empire. And then you cross over into medieval Christianity and the artifacts from there. You get a great sense of the overwhelming power and worldly majesty of these kingdoms and how pathetic Christ and his kingdom would have to seem to them. I mean Rome. was about utility and power. Rome was about roads and buildings and law. Rome was about taking many nations and combining them under one empire and working well, ruling over them. And here you have a king who appears to be on the short end of the stick. The humiliation and suffering of the Savior This king didn't fit their paradigm with which they were familiar. So the claim that he was king of the Jews or anything else was ridiculous to them. Why would a king, by definition, a powerful individual, submit to this kind of torture and humiliation and death? It didn't make sense. That's why Paul says that the cross is foolishness to the Greek mind. That was the culture that dominated the philosophy and thought of the day. It was foolishness. And even today, as you look at the glitz and power of worldly kingdoms, you look at the various industries, the entertainment industry, you look at the movers and the shakers, you look at the rich and the powerful. It seems almost pathetic to put a Bible beside all of that. And to talk about losing your life for Jesus' sake. It seems to turn everything on its head. In time, however, some of these very soldiers would change their minds about Jesus. And this is what I love about the Gospel. The truth of the gospel is such that when you understand it, when you understand what God is doing, when you understand the purpose of the cross, then you start to see things all together differently. In fact, in this very chapter, before it ends, if you look down at verses 51 to 54, notice the response of one of the most respected soldiers of the group, a centurion. And Rome's army was dependent on the leadership of the men who led the bands of hundred men, the centurions. Verse 51, And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. Gigantic curtain, very thick, clearly an act of divine intervention. The earth shook, the rocks were split, the tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. And coming out of the tombs after his resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many. How's that for some power for soldiers to see? They're thinking that Christ is weak. And God demonstrates, no. No, what he's doing is making a way for you to access God. And what he's doing is going to conquer death itself. When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, They were filled with awe and said, truly, this was the Son of God. Not just any king, the God King. The risen Lord would send out his followers with the gospel to make disciples of all nations. The very nations from which this Roman fighting force was drawn. And long after people were swearing allegiance to the Roman Empire, There would be millions from every quarter of the globe, willing subjects of the Savior King Jesus, who will rule together with him in his everlasting kingdom. Instead of mocking, one day every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of the Father. Philippians 2.11. To many people, Impressed with worldly power and success, the cross of Jesus is a turn-off. And if you're not careful, you'll be among them. Are you afraid to lose your life for His sake? If the Scriptures are correct in what they reveal Him to be, can you possibly lose by owning Him as your king. They mocked his kingship, but in time some of them believed and one day all will confess that he is indeed king to the glory of the father. Second, in verses 32 to 38, we see that Jesus was crucified as king. This was his crime, that he is a king. This is the response of Pilate for the sake of political survival, not justice. The official accusation above Jesus' head, this is Jesus, the king of the Jews. And we know from the account that Pilate knew the Jews had delivered Jesus up out of jealousy and that that they had actually brought him on religious grounds and he refused to deal with him that way. So they they shifted to claiming that Jesus was in effect encouraging insurrection against Caesar. And by so doing they put pilot in a dangerous position. The leaders hated pilot for his brutal missteps as governor towards the Jews. It wasn't that they cared about pilots that they hated Jesus. They would have been more than willing to throw him under the bus to get rid of Jesus Christ. And Pilate knew it. So Pilate authorized executing Jesus as a criminal in order to preserve his own political safety. He knew Jesus was no threat to the Roman Empire, not in the usual sense. He tried to wash his hands of the matter. He caved into their demands to crucify a man he knew to be innocent. But the death of one innocent man was preferable to him, to the political suicide that not condemning him would bring. But if you can't get rid of the God-man Savior, you can't get rid of the God-man Savior by crucifying him. He will rise from the death more powerful than ever. According to Daniel 2, his kingdom A stone cut out without hands will smash to powder all the empires of the age and will grow to universal sway forever. The politics that Pilate was exercising was way too small. Because ultimately, Jesus rules it all. To turn against such a king for personal survival reasons is actually backwards. And that's why Jesus would teach his disciples, those that lose their lives for Christ in his gospel, actually find it. Those who try to save their lives will lose their lives. This is ever the paradox of Christianity. You try to save yourself. And you end up giving up Jesus. If you will lose yourself for the sake of Jesus, you will finally find your life. We have this little. This little account of Simon of Cyrene, forced by Roman soldiers to carry the cross of Jesus to the crucifixion mount. Simon may have, in fact, come to trust in Jesus, a savior, along with his family, and the reason that many Bible scholars think so is that Mark and his gospel tells his readers And he wrote his gospel seems to be targeted toward the Roman mind. He tells his readers that that Simon of Cyrene is the father of Alexander and Rufus, two names that they knew there in the church. Paul refers to a Rufus. We don't know if it's the same one and his mother and his greetings at the end of Romans. The point is that Mark, when he's writing his readers, he he he refers to two people they know. And so it's assumed they were part of the church. And they say Simon of Cyrene is the father of these brothers in Christ. Simon is the only one in this account besides Jesus who bears the cross. Those who reject Jesus do so because he threatens their worldview of self-advancement and human power. That's why Pilate rejected him. That's why Pilate crucified him. But Jesus taught his followers that to follow him, they would have to take up their cross. And then in losing their life for his sake in the gospel, they would find it. I think there is a connection, a contrast between pilots desire for self survival and Simon having to bear the cross of Jesus. And and The likelihood that Simon actually at some point and possibly this was the turning point became a believer himself. So the question that we draw from this as we look at pilot and why why he would execute Jesus as a criminal for being king. Is that his own worldly success was too important. So that's the question we come with. Is any sort of worldly success more important to you. than bowing the knee to Jesus as your king. What are you living life for? What does Jesus want you to do as you read your Bibles? What does Jesus want you to do that you're afraid to do because of what it might cost you? Do you realize that kind of thinking was the kind of thinking that entrapped pilot and that it's not until you let go of that desire for personal survival and success and you pick up a cross that you actually find a life that God intends you to live. How can you possibly how can you possibly get ahead. if you give up Jesus. Do we really think that Pilate got a better life by condemning Jesus Christ? He did it for political survival, but was it actually the right move? God used him to accomplish His will because Jesus did have to die. But for Pilate's sake, Pilate made the wrong choice. And millions of human beings have made the wrong choice since they have traded in the eternal kingdom for worldly kingdoms that are passing away. The third group, the villains of the story, blaspheming Jesus as King, verses 39 to 44. This is the response of the civil and religious leaders. They respond this way because they're jealous and they're threatened. Here they are religious men, and yet they are reviling him. They're blaspheming him. They're wagging their heads with scorn and derision. They're they're ridiculing him, mocking him, making fun of him, just as they did on the night of his trial. Why? Why did they respond this way? Well, they respond this way, like the others, because they reject his claims. They reject his claim as savior, and yet they admit he saved others. They've they've seen his miracles. In fact, just a few weeks earlier, they saw him raise Lazarus from the dead. So when they say he saved others. It's a self indictment. This man is supernaturally powerful, he saved others, he cannot say himself. They call him the king of Israel, and they say, come down to the cross and we will believe they say, if you're really the son of God, come down from the cross, rebuild the temple. You're trusting in God. Will he deliver you or desire you? It reminds us of Isaiah 53. We esteemed him smitten of God and afflicted. The fact is, Jesus was going to fulfill all those words. He was going to do more than come down from the cross. He was going to come out from the grave after three days. And they were part of destroying the temple, his body. And he would, in three days, raise it up again. Their words revealed that they had seen enough of Jesus' miracles and they had heard enough of his teaching to believe. Their unbelief was not the unbelief of ignorance. Their unbelief was the unbelief of will. He saw through their religious charade. He threatened their religious business. He had just once again driven people out of the temple and called the place of den of thieves. He was not impressed with their prestige. And so he had to be destroyed. Whenever, whenever surface religion, whenever religion meets up with genuine godliness. Genuine godliness has to be destroyed. If the religion will not repent, the genuine godliness will be persecuted and will will be they'll attempt to destroy it. They dared him to come down from the cross. Then they would believe they said he to save others. Yet he could save him. He saved others. He couldn't save himself. And actually, they're telling the truth. He he is saving others by his death on the cross. And because of that, he would not come down. He was willingly laying down his life to save others. He could not come down from the cross because he had to finish his mission of dying for our sins. But then he did something more amazing. Having endured the cross, he rose from the dead and still they refused to believe he was more of a threat than ever to their kind of religion. Interestingly enough, it was the robbers that is the bandits, the revolutionaries. We would we would probably turn them terrorists today that he insults on him in the same way. Their insults were like the insults of these religious fathers. What a picture. The most respected, powerful theologians and religious leaders of the nation lead the way with blasphemous cruelty and swaggering pride behavior suitable for murderous terrorists. You dress a man up, you elevate him to the highest station, and he will still be full of fleshy rebellion against God. He might be a bandit. He might be a chief priest, but he's made of the same stuff. They loved religion, but they hated God. They wanted no divine king. They preferred a human one, Caesar. As powerful as Caesar was, he did not threaten their way of life as much as the God man, Savior King does. Religion that strayed from vital relationship with God always tracks this way. Secular atheism is filled history with atrocities and blood, but religious atheism, that is a religion without the true God. A religion that's in form but no power has slain millions of saints too. The devil hates God. He hates God's son, Jesus, and he hates God's people. He will lie about them and seek to destroy them. And if he can, he loves to use religious people to do it. But even from among this class, Jesus will draw his true followers. Converts on the day of Pentecost. Some of them were men who had actually taken part in crucifying Jesus. And Peter confronts them and they repent. Saul of Tarsus was such a zealot against Jesus. And Christ confronts him and makes him into perhaps the greatest missionary ever. Today, we still feel the impact of his conversion. Thirteen books of the New Testament. Christianity established in Europe. From which the settlers of the United States of America came. King Jesus will always threaten religion as usual. If you and I are part of a church, part of practicing religion for the public respectability of it, we've missed the boat. Public respectability is no substitute for being right with God, reconciled through Jesus, who went to the cross precisely to save us. The soldiers, Roman governor, The religious civil leaders all had no use for the kingship of Jesus. He was either a joke or a threat. But they were desperately wrong. They could strip him of his clothing, beat him, spit on him, nail him to a cross, hurl insults at him, kill him. But the king, the king he was and the king he remains. Those of them that never did turn in faith to trust the risen Lord now await the final judgment before the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Jesus Christ, the same one they condemned, who will pronounce everlasting condemnation against them. So what about you? Is Jesus your king? Are you willing to take up the cross to follow him? Or is he a threat? to your definition of power and success and happiness, your personal survival, your respectable religion. May God bring us to the point of confessing Jesus to be Lord and King, our Savior, to the glory of the Father before it's eternally too late. King, you better believe it. Let's pray.