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Well, at this time, this morning,
I invite you to turn with me to our scripture reading, which
is in the gospel of Mark, continuing our series through this gospel. And we find ourselves still in
chapter 15. And just a few verses for our consideration,
verses 16 Mark chapter 15 verses 16 through
20. Hear the word of God. Then the
soldiers led him away into the hall called Praetorium, and they
called together the whole garrison, and they clothed him with purple,
Then they twisted a crown of thorns, put it on his head, and
began to salute him, Hail, King of the Jews. Then they struck
him on the head with a reed, and spat on him, and bowing the
knee, they worshiped him. And when they had mocked him,
they took the purple off him, put his own clothes on him, and
let him out to crucify him. So for our reading of God's holy,
inspired, infallible, and blessed word, may he add his blessing
to the preaching thereof. Well, congregation of the Lord
Jesus Christ, isn't it often the case that we are more prone
to think of our own sufferings than the sufferings of Jesus
Christ? That we more easily think about
our own pains and our own difficulties than we do to think about what
Christ had suffered. Now I think one reason for that,
and indeed it is the case so often, and one reason for that
is because we are, just by nature, those that are selfish individuals,
and we're prone therefore to think about ourselves. Another reason is perhaps that
when we feel all those pains in our own bodies, at least physically,
then we do Christ. We're not a part of Christ's
literal physical body in that sense. We have our own bodies,
but maybe it's also because it's difficult to read something like
this that we've read and think about just how horrendous it
is to really be subjected to such ridicule and mocking. And so maybe that's why we don't
think about it. Not as much as we ought, but
I think it's encouraging to remember that every word that is written
in the gospel accounts, including ones that we have read here this
morning, all of it is a part of the good news, the gospel. including these awful things
that we have read. It's a part of the gospel. So
as we read of this horrendous mockery of the King of Kings,
our Lord Jesus Christ, we should know that what's being revealed
for us is the gospel. things for our salvation. Yes, it is ugly. Yes, it is brutal
and grotesque. It's shameful. But as we read
this, we may ask ourselves, well, why does our Lord subject himself
to this and endure this? And the answer is one I hope
we're all familiar with. The scripture makes very clear
He endures this because he's doing it for our sake, to rescue
us. And so we must understand all
of the details that are here in verses 16 through 20 are things
that were required for us, his people, to be saved from eternal
condemnation. And so we must believe that the
insults that we read of here this morning were not added for
no reason at all. The Father, God the Father, doesn't
just heap upon Jesus all kinds of auxiliary or needless sufferings
that were really not so necessary for Him. No, God wouldn't expose
His Son to anything He didn't have to go through for our salvation. But what we also need to see
here is that what's done to Christ here, this bitter mockery and
ridicule, being poked at, made fun of, these things, we must
know, are things that we deserve, not Him. Listen to what John Calvin said
in commenting on this passage. He put it beautifully. He said
this. Our filthiness deserves that
God should hold it in abhorrence and that all the angels should
spit on us. But Christ, in order to present
us pure and unspotted in his presence, resolved to be spat
upon and to be dishonored by every kind of reproach. That's
what we need to believe today. That's what we need to see. That we deserve to be humiliated
and expose our sin. It deserves eternal and everlasting
contempt and shame. But instead, we inherit everlasting
glory. Because Christ sat there and
took it in our place. This is the love of Christ that
surpasses all knowledge and all understanding. And so we have
before us the King of Kings is mocked. And we'll look at that
today under two points, which you might notice have been pretty
much taken right out of our form for the celebration of the Lord's
Supper. The first point, he suffered
countless insults. And secondly, that we might never
be put to shame. And so first, we consider that
he suffered countless insults. And we come in our text to the
Roman guards. And just to note a bit of context,
Jesus had been deeply shamed and insulted even before this. He'd been rejected by the religious
leaders and they mocked him. He had been rejected by his own
people who desired a rebel and a murderer, Barabbas, and they
actually cried out for his crucifixion. He had been shamed and humiliated
by Pontius Pilate, who did not give him his legal rights under
Roman law, but he's throwing him instead to this bloodthirsty
mob. Pilate had him scourged already. whipping he endured was brutal
in and of itself. It was typically a whip that
had bits of bone and metal that were tied to the ends of that
whip in order to rip a person's back to shreds. And Christ here
has endured all that already. Physical beatings and insulting. And as you read through the Gospel
of Mark, and any of the other Gospels too, you just know how
the sufferings of Christ just keep piling on top of each other,
and they seem to increase and increase, and this is another
step forward in the sufferings of Jesus, who's been condemned,
who's been rejected by the religious authorities, by Roman authorities,
and now by Roman soldiers. Jew and Gentile alike. The whole
world. But as we read it, we notice
that Mark especially doesn't focus so much on the physical
sufferings, does he? Rather, the emphasis is very
clear. It's upon the derision and the mockery that Jesus endures. Notice how that was the case
with the Sanhedrin before. The false witnesses came before
him and he endured the slander. And how they particularly mocked
him in his prophetic role. They mocked him as a prophet.
Remember that the religious leaders blindfolded him and they slapped
him and they said, prophesy, tell us who hit you. But here,
among the Roman soldiers, this mockery focuses around Christ
as king. So here we are in the setting
of this place called the Praetorium. This would have been the governor's
headquarters but apparently it's also the garrison or the place
where all of the personal guards of the governor and those who
are specially assigned to this, they would be housed. And they
would live there and dwell there and live life there. And if you've
been in the military, you know how soldiers at times get bored
and they look for some kind of distraction, some kind of diversion
to keep themselves entertained. And so here an opportunity presents
itself and they think that they're going to have some fun. And so
they called together, in verse 16, the whole garrison. Now this
may have been up to about 600 men. Now we don't know the exact
number of how many this garrison was, but the fact that it's a
whole garrison being called, we don't have just the execution
squad of just four or five men that are gathered here. There's
perhaps hundreds of them that have come here just to have a
little fun. It's not for the usual card games
or whatever soldiers did in those days. They're called together
because, well, here's this prisoner who's already been roughed up
by a couple of crowds. He's on death row. He's been
condemned and sentenced to death. He's bloodied and beaten. And
he claims to be a king. The Romans' eyes, they think
this is a ridiculous claim. This guy thinks he's a king. He's as good as dead already.
He's going to go to the cross soon. His life at this point
is totally worthless, it seems to them. This is just something
very clear and obvious to ridicule, and so here's an opportunity,
they think, to gather around, to make fun, play a game with
Jesus. make sport of him. And it proceeds
in a few stages. They have this mock coronation
ceremony, as it were. They're gonna dress him all up. And so they strip him naked of
all of his clothes and put on him a kind of purple robe, which
is the color of royalty. Now Matthew's account of this,
the Gospel of Matthew, suggests that what they used for a robe
may have been something like a military cloak. So it's not
going to be this royal cloak. They didn't go to Herod's closet
and get something. This is something they probably
had lying around for a while, this old smelly Roman coat and
just threw it on Jesus. The dirtier and the smellier,
the better. And so it fits. He's a phony and a pretender
after all, in their eyes. Well, a king needs a crown too,
doesn't he? And so they have someone weave together a crown
of thorns to put it upon his head. And again, taking from
Matthew's account of this, a crown wasn't enough and a robe wasn't
enough. And so what they needed to do
is, well, a king needs a scepter, right? And so they put a reed
in Jesus' hand, a flimsy, weak little stick. All really what's
going on here is some kind of parody. A mockery. And it must have pleased them
so much. This is really what this word
mocking means. It means to poke fun at, to make
jokes, and to laugh at. It would have been funny in their
eyes. And perhaps one of the funniest
things in their eyes must have been what verse 19 speaks of,
is that they struck him on the head with a reed. And they spat
on him. What could be funnier than a
king being hit with his own scepter? And then they get him all dressed
up, he's coronated as king, and then they need to pay him homage.
Verse 18, they salute him, hail the king of the Jews. And now
all these hundreds of men, each one of them can come in and join
in on the fun. They fall down and they go through
this whole charade. Now in their minds, Jesus deserved
this. Anybody that would claim to be
king in this position, it's ridiculous. Anything ridiculous is deserving
of ridicule. He's coming to them beaten, bloody,
broken, bound, and he claims to be a king. So they have fun. And then when they are satisfied,
they get on to business and lead him out to crucify him. Kind of shame, mocking, teasing,
derision. is sickening. It's a terrible
display of really what human nature, depraved human nature,
is capable of doing. Think of that in terms of just
anybody, a regular person like you and me. being subjected to something
like this. It is sickening, but this isn't just anybody. This
really is and truly is the king of kings, the blessed one who
is fairer than all the sons of men. This is the depths of human
depravity that is on display. And what does this mean? What is this about? And maybe
the first thing that comes to your mind when you think upon
this terrible scene Is it anger? Anger that they would do something
like this, especially to our Lord? Is it disgust? Is it sorrow for Jesus? Compassion, the one who suffered
all this. Many feelings may come to our
hearts and to our minds when we think about the sufferings
of Jesus, but the one thing that we need to ask ourselves when
we come to a passage like this, do I see the glory of Christ? Do I see the majesty of Christ? Where is the glory? Where is
the majesty in something like this? Now it is the case many times
our feelings and especially response to this really rise no higher
than just some kind of fleeting emotion or something like that.
And there are others who suggest that the real response of faith
after reading something like this is to feel sorry for Jesus,
have compassion for him, And if you have those poignant feelings,
then well, really that's what Christ is after. But the gospel
accounts never try to tell us that feeling sorry for Jesus
is the goal. If that was the goal, then they
could have focused more upon the physical sufferings of the
Lord, but they don't. Jesus doesn't suffer these things
to gain our sympathy. He does these things to win,
to merit, to earn our salvation. Jesus is not here as some kind
of helpless victim who can't do anything about this and is
one we should feel sorry for and hope and wish that we could
rescue him. Nothing here is happening by chance. Nothing happens here
that wasn't expected, that wasn't God's will, that isn't unnecessary. There's not a single detail of
suffering here that is senseless or without meaning. What happens
to Jesus here is that what happens according to the sovereign will
of God and for the purpose. And the one who suffers here
does it on purpose. He chooses every second to remain
in submission to these sufferings for our salvation. So with that in mind, we'll ask
again, do you see the glory of Christ and the majesty of Christ? The glory of His humility, that
He stooped so low to this, subject Himself to this disgusting treatment,
the creator of heaven and earth, for his people. You see the glory
of his patience. Ridicule after ridicule, slap
after slap, lie after lie, spit after spit. He sticks with it. But the glory of his love. He loves his father. has come
to do His will. And He so loves His church, His
bride, that He bears this for her. The glory of His faith We speak
of faith with Christ, especially his human nature, confidence
or hope of things not yet seen, promises that are given to him,
that despite the fact that all of these soldiers and everyone
else is telling him that he's a worthless man, that his claims
of kingship are utterly absurd, and yet he believes and knows
that this is what God has given to him, and that God, after he
is crucified, will raise him from the dead and sit him upon
the throne at his right hand. The son believes this and knows
this. So He endures. So what we see
that even in the midst of these terrible hours of agony and this
deep humiliation in the midst of all this darkness that Christ
reigns as King. He reigns in this majestic silence. Christ here did not open his
mouth. They dress him up, he's silent.
They mock him, he's silent. They beat him, he's silent. This
is the very Christ who spoke the world into existence, the
very Christ that could summon a host of armies of angels, and
whose very appearance of glory could cause the Romans to scatter,
and yet he says not a word. Why is that? It is not because
he is weak. Because he is strong. He is ruling. These are the things that Jesus
had already foretold back in Mark chapter 10, verse 33 through
34. Just turn back there a couple
pages and look. Mark 10, 33 through 34. There he says, behold, we are
going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed unto
the chief priests and to the scribes, and they will condemn
him to death and deliver him to the Gentiles. And they, the
Gentiles, the Romans, will mock him and scourge him and spit
on him and kill him. And the third day he will rise
again. Christ suffers, yes, but not
as a helpless victim. He suffers, yes, but not in vain. There is nothing that Christ
will not bear for us that is necessary for our good, our well-being,
our salvation. He knew this even before he went
to Jerusalem. In fact, all the way in Isaiah
chapter 50, verse six, it says this, I gave my back to those
who struck me, and my cheeks to those who plucked out the
beard. I did not hide my face from shame and spitting. Christ
knew full well, before he even came to this earth, in our flesh
and in our nature, that this was his calling as Christ, as
the Messiah, to be obedient to his commission and not to hide
his face from spitting and from shame. That's why it is not weakness,
it is strength. Our natural reflex is to turn
from shame and to turn from spitting, but Christ would bear it. He bears it for us. Brings us to our second point.
He does it that we might never be put to shame. This means so
much, yes, for Christ and his obedience to his calling, but
he does it for us and for our salvation. We recognize, I hope
we do anyways, I trust we do anyways, that what he endures
here, is what we deserve. As proud as we can be at times,
don't we all know something of being ashamed of our sin? Is that what you encountered
in this week of self-examination? As we were called to do last
week, Did you examine yourself? Well, we're called, and the Spirit
calls us even through this, to examine ourselves in light of
this. In fact, it is often the case that pride is that which
keeps us from bringing to light and exposing our shame and our
sin. And there are things in our life
that if they were exposed today, and paraded on this stage of
the world as it were, that we would be embarrassed about, wouldn't
we? Ashamed of things that we thought or said
or done that we say to ourselves, I can't believe I did that, I
can't believe I said that, I can't believe I thought that. We deserve disgrace. In the beginning, God had made
us to be rulers over his creation. He called and said, have dominion
over this world. And so in that sense, we are
to be kings and queens, as it were, unto our God. But as we know from the account
of the first three chapters of Genesis, we did not fulfill our
assignment. We failed as kings and queens,
as rulers. We dealt wickedly We are those disgraced rulers. You can think of what a disgraced
ruler looks like in images that are published in news media about,
you know, you think, at least in my day, of the disgraced dictator,
former dictator of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. Images of him previously
living in opulence and riches until afterwards he was found
cowering in a dirt hole. It was dragged out to be executed. Why? Because he ruled wickedly. And justice was served. But you
see, that's what we are by nature. What we see here, Jesus, in terms
of how he appears in the eyes of the Romans, this pathetic,
this weak, this bloody, this worthless, contemptible, failed
king, this failed ruler, the one who is to have dominion.
But what we need to see is that this is our place. That's what
we are. And that we deserve this ridicule
and mockery, and we deserve the ridicule and mockery of hell. The ridicule and the disdain
of heaven. To repeat what Calvin said, that
the angels should spit on us. The God should laugh us out at
the idea that we would ever be able to appear before him and
restore it to honor of our own accord, of our own strength.
It's a joke. We deserve the contempt of heaven
and of earth by nature because of our sin. But instead, Christ
is being robbed with our indignity here. All the contempt and the
shame that we and our sin deserve, Christ bears. There is a certain grace to shame. A shame that is informed by scripture
and that impressed by the word. There is a false shame indeed
that people need to be set free of, but there is a real shame
that is connected with our guilt, and it's not something that we
can just push away. We could try, we could pretend
in our own strength, but that doesn't make it go away, because
at the end of the day, sooner or later, we will be ashamed. But Christ takes the shame of
his people to himself. You find that amazing that he
took that. So as you think on your life
today, what is it that you are ashamed of? What is most shameful
to you? What is it that weighs you down? Maybe the things you've said
in your marriage. Those ugly things and ugly moments. Maybe it's a failed marriage.
Maybe it's failed parenting. Maybe it's sexual immorality. Maybe it's laziness at work,
a temper we can't seem to put away. Maybe it's the way that
we've hurt people, our selfish quest to get our own way. Maybe
we're ashamed of our entertainment and the things that we have looked
at. Maybe it's our greediness. The question is, what is it that
clings to us, that makes us ashamed? You see, as we look at our sin
and every sin, we hear that about the forgiveness that is in Christ. Maybe we wonder, well, what about
my shame? Am I ever set free of this? Do
I bear this forever? Can I ever stand before God and
before his people? Is there a place for a sinner
like me? with spirit is setting before
us the reality that indeed we are complete failures as kings
and as rulers, that we have failed to be the husband we ought to
be, the wife we ought to be, the worker we ought to be, the
parrot we ought to be, the single person we ought to be, the man
of truth and integrity that we ought to be. All of our failure
as kings and as image bearers that deserves the mockery of
heaven and hell has been born by Christ. For his people. Those who believe
in him. That's what's here to remind
us, to strengthen us. His blood was shed. His body
was broken. For our sakes, he took away our
guilt. He took away our shame. And so
one day soon in his timing, we will be clothed in garments of
glory and splendor. Think of how Revelation 19 describes
the wedding feast of the Lamb. It says, hallelujah for the Lord
our God, almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and
give him glory for the wedding of the Lamb has come and his
bride has made herself ready with fine linen and bright and
clean. It was given her to wear. On Judgment Day, Christ isn't
going to bring out those old smelly Roman uniforms that mock
garb and dress you up and mock you in your kingly office. In
His grace to His believers, He's going to bring forth to His bride
this bright, clean, righteous linen. And He's gonna delight
over her. as he bestows upon her all glory
and all honor everlastingly. And our garments of shame will
be exchanged for garments of everlasting royalty. That's because Christ has stood
where we ought to stand. He bore it in our stead. He bore
countless insults that we might never be put to shame. so that
we will be washed in his blood and presented spotless before
the everlasting throne of God. Isn't this something that stirs
your heart with gratitude and with thanksgiving? Does it move you to bow the knee?
Praise Him. Worship the King of Kings. It's ironic that the Romans prophesy
in a sense of what will happen, of what Philippians 2 describes,
in the sense that every knee will bow. The garrisons will
be gathered together. All of humanity will be there
to confess Jesus as Lord, to bend the knee before Him. Will you bow in faith, in love,
in humility? As we are, those by nature, shameful. But this is why we glory in the
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. The world laughs at the cross.
And they say so many cruel things about Jesus still, and about
our faith, and about the cross itself. They mock this whole
idea that he would die on a cross. The Corinthians did. To the Greek,
the cross is foolishness. To the Jew, it is a stumbling
block. But to us who believe, it is the power of God, and the
wisdom of God. But a rebellious heart refuses
to embrace this kind of a king, this kind of a savior. The natural
heart doesn't want a lowly king, a humiliated king. They want
a tall, proud, fit individual. It's like a comparison of Saul,
the King Saul in the Old Testament versus King David. They want
somebody that looks like a king. But if you have a tall, proud
ruler, you don't have to confess your sin. You don't have to say,
I deserve this kind of ridicule. You could say, I have a good
name. I'm a good person. I'm worthy of honor. I fight
for my rights and I fight for my place. But to embrace the
Christ of Scripture and to confess him as Lord, you have to say,
I deserve everything that he got. And those who won't humble
themselves To acknowledge that in their sin they deserve this
kind of disdain. They're left to reject Jesus
and to fight for their own dignity. Is that what you want to do? To climb the ladder of achievement?
Clean yourself off? Gain respect for yourself? Take
away your own shame? At the end of the day, That will
be vain. It will be empty. What a blessing
it is then, isn't it? That we who do believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ can say by the grace that God has given
us, because Christ bore what I deserved, to be able to say
that I am not in need of cleansing my own name, cleansing my own
refutation. I'm not in need of taking away
my own indignity and shame. I couldn't do that. But Christ
has done that for me. He stepped into my place. He
took my spot, bore the shame, bore the wrath, shed his blood
that we may never be put to shame. Amen, let us pray. Our gracious God and our Father
in heaven, we thank you for the great glories of our Lord Jesus
Christ, his endurance, his humility and meekness, and how beautiful
and bright that shines here in our hearts. So we pray that you
will give to us the eyes of faith to see and a humble heart to
go forth in praising your name in gratitude and thanksgiving. So bless us as we remember the
crucified body and shed blood of our Lord. Feed us and nourish
us. Abide through faith. We pray
this in Jesus' name. Amen.
The King of Kings is Mocked
Series Mark
I. He Suffered Countless Insults
II. That We Might Never Be Put to Shame
| Sermon ID | 71825125447622 |
| Duration | 37:27 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - AM |
| Bible Text | Mark 15:16-20 |
| Language | English |
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