13th Day of Lent
Beloved. In last week’s account of Jesus’ agony in the garden we read that after Jesus prayed, Father, if it is Your will, remove this cup from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done, a very interesting and wonderful thing happened: Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven, strengthening Him. Here the angel, certainly visible only to Jesus Himself comes to help and serve Jesus. Jesus is the almighty God Himself, the very One Who created that angel and all things visible and invisible. In His humiliation, the true God accepted help from one of His creation. Jesus is the almighty God but He is also true man. And as true man Jesus needed to be strengthened both bodily and in soul. Of course, that angel strengthened Jesus inwardly by reminding Him of the divine plan to rescue the world—you and me—from sin, death and devil; but certainly that angel must have strengthened Jesus physically to endure all the physical torments that He was about to go through—so much so that with that last word Jesus spoke on the cross, Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit, the holy evangelist [Lk. 23.46] reports that Jesus…cried out with a loud voice. Here we see that Jesus’ life wasn’t slowly ebbing away from Him but, as He promised, He would lay down His life, it wouldn’t be taken from Him [John 10.18]: I have power to lay [My life] down, and I have power to take it again. In the garden the angel came and strengthened Jesus according to His human nature.
In tonight’s text, we see the blessed fruit of this strengthening. Then Pilate said to [the crowd], “Why, what evil has He done?” And they cried out more exceedingly, “Crucify Him!” So Pilate, wanting to gratify the crowd, released Barabbas to them; and he delivered Jesus, after he had scourged Him, to be crucified. Although it evidently was common Roman practice to add the scourging/ whipping as a “prelude” to the crucifixion in order to add to the physical agony of the crucifixion—the raw bloodied back on the roughhewn wood of the cross—it seems Pilate had this done to Jesus for a different reason. Reading our text also with the other Gospel accounts of the Passion, it seems that this was part of Pilate’s plan to try to gain Jesus’ release. On numerous occasions throughout, Pilate had declared Jesus “innocent” but he was dealing with a crowd that, egged on by its religious leaders, was screaming for Jesus’ blood. St. Luke [23.14-16] reports Pilate’s words: “…having examined Him in your presence, I have found no fault in this Man…no, neither did Herod, for I sent you back to him; and indeed nothing worthy of death has been done by Him. I will therefore chastise Him and release Him. Notice Pilate’s plan was to whip Jesus and release Him; he didn’t want to crucify Him. After having Jesus whipped, Jesus was given the crown of thorns, the purple robe—all in mocking His kingship—and was beaten. Pilate then had Jesus come out before the people in this pitiable and ridiculed condition, and said [John 19.4-5]: Behold, I am bringing Him out to you, that you may know that I find no fault in Him. Then Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe. And Pilate said to them, “Behold the Man!” Here was Pilate’s rouse to try to get sympathy for Jesus. It failed. And they cried out more exceedingly, “Crucify Him!” So Pilate, wanting to gratify the crowd, released Barabbas to them; and he delivered Jesus… to be crucified.
So what was involved in this prelude or lead in to the crucifixion? The Jews also knew of whipping or scourging. But the Jews limited it to 40 hits with a rod—and in case there was a miscount, there were only 39 strikes. But the Romans had no limitations—they were left at the mercy of the torturers! The Roman whip was short handled with several leather lashes. On the tips of these leather lashes were pieces of bone or metal that would be driven into the skin to rip it. And to make things even, two whips were used—one on each side. The effect was that skin and flesh were gashed to the very bone in every direction, with deep bloody holes.
That’s what happened to Jesus. With the scourging was the first part in the agony of the crucifixion. What had probably happened was that Jesus was whipped in front of the Praetorium, the governor’s official residence, in the presence of the Jews—again, remember, Pilate was probably trying to arouse sympathy and pity for Jesus since he had found Jesus innocent. Either Jesus was fastened in a position where He was bent over a post giving those who were whipping Him the opportunity to reach His entire back; or for the same reason, He was standing upright with His arms fastened around a pillar. Either way, it was the same result.
How odd the scene! He who was the very pillar of fire and cloud that led the Israelites out of slavery, through the desert into the Promised Land, was now tied to a pillar to be whipped. He who created the very pillars of the earth—a poetic and picturesque way to describe the firmness of the earth, the laws of nature working to keep the earth in its proper position in the universe, etc.—He who created and established all this was Himself now tied to a pillar and whipped.
That is His great love for us sinners. He wanted to rescue us from sin, death, devil and hell and did/ endured whatever He had to in order to do it. Jesus endured the lashes of the whips; our Deliverer was in chains—for us, to save us.
What Jesus must have suffered as each strip of leather with its sharp bone or metal tipped end ripped into His skin, ripping and shredding it is unimaginable to us. To be sure others—many countless others—endured it as well. But they were guilty—if not of that specific wrong they were being punished for, then certainly some other wrong. But remember Jesus is sinless. He had no sin of His own. Being God He was unable to sin. But here He was enduring this most horrific punishment as a prelude of something even more horrendous yet to come. How? Why? Although He had no sin of His own, Jesus came into this world of sin in order that He might take up the sins of the world; in order that He might be made the world’s sinner; in order that the sins of all people of all time might be charged to Him, the holy/ perfect One. This is His great love for us sinners. Out of pure love for us sinners, Jesus came into this world to save us sinners from the just result of our sin. Even though Jesus was suffering greatly and mightily—all emphasized by the fact that He Himself is sinless; even though He was already now with the whipping nothing but one giant bloody wound, His heart was not touched. That is, with each lash He endured, He did not question why He was there and what He was doing there. He did not waver in His love for us sinners for whom He was enduring this. He did not become embittered against us for us and our sin putting Him through all that agony—an agony that was a prelude of more to come. To put it differently, all the lashes could only shred and bloody the outside; they could not touch His heart—His heart full of love, overflowing with love for the sinner. If anything, if there was any change to His heart, it was only that each lash filled Him with a greater love for us sinners.
What a wonderful comfort this is for us! As we see our holy, innocent, sinless Jesus being scourged in such a cruel way, there we see His love for us. There can be no way that we can doubt His love for us. We see that His although His holy flesh/ skin is ripped apart, His holy heart—His love for us stands. If He loved us while in the midst of His suffering for our sin, certainly He loves us now as He is risen from the dead and ascended into heaven in glory! What a firm, solid foundation for us to build/ rely upon! What a glorious comfort to us in all our trials and sorrows. No matter what—our Jesus loves us.
The thing to remember as Jesus is being scourged is that He is standing there. As true God, He could have stopped it at any time. But He didn’t. He desired to offer Himself wholly and completely as the one perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world. When Jesus came, He said to His Father in the words of the psalm [Hb. 10.5-7]: Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure. Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come…to do Your will, O God. And as we see Jesus standing there, He is not standing there in resignation as if it is something He is being forced to do. Never! His very purpose in coming to this earth was to joyfully and willingly doing the will of His Father. And why? Together with the Holy Spirit, the Father and the Son are one God with one holy, divine will. Jesus has the burning desire to accomplish to the full all that was necessary for Him to save humanity. Here it was to stand there and take the suffering and punishment for our sin. Jesus gladly accepted the suffering and death that our forgiveness, reconciliation with God and eternal life would require. That’s what we see here at Jesus’ scourging. He didn’t back away; He stayed. It is the assurance to us that Jesus would and did continue on the path that would save us from sin, death, devil and hell. Jesus stands there at the pillar and is most brutally scourged. He does so in love for us and in patience, meekness and willingly. The prophet St. Isaiah [Is 53.7] says of Jesus here: He was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth.
Jesus’ patient suffering during His entire Passion, and even here as He was scourged, has a blessed result. Jesus’ suffering wasn’t just “window dressing”; it all had meaning/ significance. Here, Jesus was whipped/ scourged unjustly so that He might deliver us from the punishment that we rightly deserve. We are sinners who earn/ deserve the greatest imaginable divine punishment for our sin, even if we think we’re not all that bad a sinner. But Jesus, the holy and sinless God, was unjustly scourged—but remember: He took our sins upon Himself. So the punishment He received was for our sin. Already here, Jesus was shedding His blood for our sin. And He would not stop until the very last drop was shed for us and for our forgiveness and reconciliation with God.
There Jesus is covered with wounds and deep blood holes in His holy and precious skin. Think of each wound from the whip from which blood flowed as a sin—but look, blood is flowing from it—it is the blood of God Himself which cleanses us from every sin. Think of each bleeding wound as God’s grace and forgiveness being poured out for you. As we see Jesus being scourged and ending up looking like one giant wound, let each of us think that each of those wounds as each of my sin, and there we also see God’s grace and forgiveness pouring forth to us and on us. The glorious thing for us, dear Christian, is that Jesus suffered to make us glad in spirit; He was forsaken of the Father that we might be taken back into the Father’s grace. With each of these wounds Jesus endured from the whip as He patiently and meekly and in love stood there for us, we see His love and determination to continue on and on the cross to bear the full brunt of God wrath and anger and so reconcile us to Him.
Jesus’ scourging cannot leave us unmoved as we ponder this during this Lenten season. Pilate had hoped that by this scourging pity and sympathy would be aroused from the crowd which then wouldn’t want to kill Jesus. But let us go beyond that to the realization that Jesus gave Himself for us so that we might give ourselves wholly to Him and with all our strength and might love Him in return. We give ourselves wholly to Jesus as we look to Him and His holy and bloody sacrifice of Himself for our sins, that by it He brought us forgiveness of sin and peace with God, and now we strive in His grace and by the power of the Holy Spirit to fight against sin and our own selfish will and to live according to His will. And he delivered Jesus, after he had scourged Him, to be crucified. INJ