Luke 23:25

Luk_23:25

He delivered Jesus to their will--

The illegal trial and condemnation of our Lord

I.

THE TRIAL OF CHRIST FOR HIS LIFE WAS MANAGED MOST MALICIOUSLY AND ILLEGALLY AGAINST HIM, BY HIS UNRIGHTEOUS JUDGES.

1. Was Christ thus used when He stood before the great Council, the Scribes and Elders of Israel? Then surely great men are not always wise, neither do the aged understand judgment. (Job_32:9.)

2. Hence also we learn, that though we are not obliged to answer every captious, idle, or ensnaring question, yet we are bound faithfully to own and confess the truth, when we are solemnly called thereunto.

3. Once more, hence it follows, that to bear the revilings, contradictions, and abuses of men, with a meek, composed, and even spirit, is excellent and Christ-like.

II. ALTHOUGH NOTHING COULD BE PROVED AGAINST OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST WORTHY OF DEATH OR OF BONDS; YET WAS HE CONDEMNED TO BE NAILED TO THE CROSS, AND THERE TO HANG TILL HE DIED.

1. A most unjust and unrighteous sentence: the greatest perversion of judgment and equity that was ever known to the civilized world, since seats of judicature were first set up. Pilate should rather have come down from his seat of judgment, and adored Him, than sat there to judge Him. Oh! it was the highest piece of injustice that ever our ears heard of.

2. As it was an unrighteous, so it was a cruel sentence, delivering up Christ to their wills. This was that misery which David so earnestly deprecated--O deliver me not over to the will of mine enemies (Psa_27:12). But Pilate delivers Christ over to the will of His enemies; men full of enmity, rage, and malice.

3. It was also a rash and hasty sentence. Trial of many a mean man hath taken up ten times more debates and time than was spent about Christ. They that look but slightly into the cause, easily pronounce and give sentence.

4. As it was a rash and hasty, so it was an extorted, forced sentence. They squeeze it out of Pilate by mere clamour, importunity, and suggestions of danger. In courts of judicature, such arguments should signify but little; not importunity, but proof, should carry it. But timorous Pilate bends like a willow at this breath of the people; he had neither such a sense of justice, nor spirit of courage, as to withstand it.

5. As it was an extorted, so it was a hypocritical sentence, masking horrid murder under a pretence and formality of law.

6. As it was a hypocritical, so it was an unrevoked sentence. It admitted not of a reprieve, no, not for a day; nor doth Christ appeal to any other judicature, or once desire the least delay; but away He is hurried in haste to the execution. Blush, O ye heavens! and tremble, O earth! at such a sentence as this. In what manner did Christ receive this cruel and unrighteous sentence? He received it like Himself, with admirable meekness and patience.

He doth as it were wrap Himself up in His own innocency, and obedience to His Fathers will, and stands at the bar with invincible patience and meek submission.

1. Do you see what was here done against Christ, under pretence of law? What cause have we to pray for good laws, and righteous executioners of them?

2. Was Christ condemned in a court of judicature? How evident then is it, that there is a judgment to come after this life? When you see Jesus condemned, and Barabbas released, conclude that a time will come when innocency shall be vindicated, and wickedness shamed.

3. Here you see how conscience may be overborne and run down by a fleshly interest.

4. Did Christ stand arraigned and condemned at Pilates bar? Then the believer shall never be arraigned and condemned at Gods bar. Christ stood at this time before a higher Judge than Pilate; He stood at Gods bar as well as his. Pilate did but that which Gods own hand and counsel had before determined to be done. (J. Flavel.)

The act of a moment and its results

I. IT WAS ONLY THE ACT OF A MOMENT THIS DELIVERING OF JESUS TO THE JEWS, BUT IT SEALED THE DOOM OF PILATE. Of many important acts it may be said that they are done both suddenly and slowly. In one way or another the decision must be made in a moment: and yet these momentary acts are not so isolated from all the life as they seem. Our life is truly one; all parts and all events of it are closely joined together. Each event is at once a cause and an effect--a link which grows out of a former link, and out of which in turn a new link is formed. Thus it happens that we could account for any strange-seeming word a man speaks, or act he does, if we could only go back far enough into his history, and see deeply enough into his character. His life has been slowly moving round towards the point it now has reached. Into the house which bad been slowly preparing to receive him, the guest has suddenly stepped. There has been a removal of obstacles which would have hindered, or a heaping up of obstacles which make it impossible to proceed. In a word, character and habit decide a mans action at any moment of test and trial; and character and habit are not things of a moment. It is not always unfair, therefore, to judge a man by the act of a moment, or by his attitude under sore and sudden temptation. These things reveal the secrets of his character and life, perhaps to himself, certainly to other men; well if only he is willing to learn at the first lesson where his weakness is, and so make up the breach before the next assault. Peter was walking carelessly for hours, or days, before that terrible stumbling and fall in which his very heart was broken, and all his fancied righteousness and courage fell in a moment into ruins about him. In one of the western towns of the United States, a young man stood one day in the midst of a group of gay companions. A public house was open on the one side of the street, and the building of the Y.M.C.A. on the other. He was being pressed to go into the tavern, but suddenly he turned from all his companions, and amid their jests and laughter, entered the Y.M.C.A. rooms. From that moment his path in life was plain; he had committed himself on the right side. But was there no preparation for the sudden act? I am sure there was. If we knew all the story, we would find there was a godly home behind him. Many a warning conscience had given him. In a moment Pilate yielded to the request of the chief priest, and did this fatal act; but a whole life of selfishness and self-indulgence and cruelty had prepared him for that moment, and made it certain that when the time of trial came, he would do the wrong thing. Young men may be sure of it that there will come a time when they will be suddenly put to the test.

II. PILATE TRIED TO RID HIMSELF OF THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THIS ACT, BUT HE COULD NOT DO IT. There are some things of which we can easily divest ourselves. We can tear them off and throw them away in a few moments. I can change my dress and make myself, in outward appearance, another man. There are some things that cleave to us always and everywhere. I cannot destroy my personality; through all changes! remain myself, conscious of my own personal identity. One of the commonest excuses men make in such circumstances is, I did it under pressure. Some men are sensitive to the pressure of duty, of honour, of obligation, of truth, of love, of pity. This pressure is irresistible. When these influences are behind them, they must go on, no matter what lies in front. It was in this way that Christ was pressed to the cross, and many of Christs servants to the scaffold and the fire. I cannot do otherwise, God help me, were Luthers words when this pressure was strong upon him. There are many, however, who scarcely feel such pressure at all, but who are keenly alive to every touch of popular applause, of the blame of men, of the sharp edge of ridicule, of the fear of loss and pain. By the force of popular opinion, they could be pressed anywhere, into anything. It is putting the same thing in other words to say, that men try to get rid of their responsibility for wrong-doing by throwing the blame upon others, and upon God. It is the way I was brought up.

You see I was led into it. A man in my position must do such things. Every one does it, and you may as well be out of the world as out of the fashion. It is a weakness incidental to my constitution. Circumstances shut me in, so that I could do nothing else; as if a man should not rather die than do the wrong! Pilate washed his hands. He tried, in the most public and solemn way, to cast off his responsibility; but though he had a better excuse than thousands have who sin against conscience and a sense of duty, we see, as we look back upon his case, that it was impossible for him to put the blame on any one else. When he delivered Jesus to the Jews, it was his own deliberate act, done against his conscience, not to speak of any supernatural warning; and he must take the consequences. And Pilates future history was very sad and hopeless. Responsibility is a thing I cannot get rid of. The gospel of Christ does not remove it. Every man shall bear his own burden. Every one of us shall give account of himself unto God. If I have done wrong, let me bravely confess it, and seek the grace of God to avoid the temptation again. Thus out of weakness I shall rise to strength, and my very errors and mistakes may be stairs leading me up to God.

III. PILATES GUILT WAS GREAT, BUT NOT SO GREAT AS THAT OF THE JEWS, WHO CHOSE BARABBAS AND REJECTED JESUS. That there are degrees of guilt is clearly taught by our Lord Jesus. Some shall be beaten with many stripes, and some with few. Christ does not exculpate Pilate, but He tells him, He that delivered Me unto thee hath the greater sin. Such choices--not sudden decisions like Pilates on partial knowledge and under pressure, but calm, quiet, almost unconscious acts of choice--we are making day by day. (W. Park, M. A.)

Jesus delivered to their will

I. WHAT WAS THIS WILL? What was the moving spring of their fierce resolution that Jesus of Nazareth should die?

1. It was their will that this stern censor of their manners and morals should die.

2. They willed that the witness to the truth should die. The Lord belonged to another world, which they did not care to enter; a world which troubled their selfish, sensual lives. It distracted them with visions, it oppressed them with dread.

3. They willed that this teacher of the people, this friend of publicans and sinners, should die. They were a ruling class, almost a caste. And such rulers hate none so bitterly as those who speak loving, quickening, emancipating words to the poor. As society was then constituted in Judaea, that meant that He or the rulers must fall.

4. There was something deeper and more malignant than this. It was their will that their Saviour should die. One cannot shake off the impression, reading the gospel narrative, that the rulers knew Him. This was the will of the Jews. But--

II. WHAT, MEANWHILE, WAS THE WILL OF GOD? St. Peter explains it Act_2:23). To understand this, we must consider--

1. That it was not possible that the God-man should be holden of death. The flesh, the outer man, they killed. But what is the outer man, and what is death? They willed that He should die, but what He was, what they hated, could not die. God delivered it into their hands that they might see that they were powerless, that what they hated and had arrayed themselves against was eternal. His death made His life immortal, His witness to the truth eternal.

2. Through death the power of Christ, His witness to the truth, His witness against sin, His redemptive work for mankind, became living, nay, all-pervading and almighty realities in the world. Hidden for a moment by His death, the power reappeared, and reappeared to reign. Jesus delivered to their will was slain; but the world was soon filled with men who were charged with the spirit of Jesus, and who made His death the gospel of salvation to mankind. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luk 23:25. Θελήματι, to their will) that they might do to Him whatever they had wished or might wish. [If the same power Mere at the discretion of some of those who wish to be called Christians, what, think you, would be the result?—V. g.]

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Luk 23:25 . τὸν διὰ σ .: the repetition of this description, instead of giving the name, is very expressive. τῷ θελήματι α ., to their will. Weak man and wicked people!

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(25) Whom they had desired.—Better, whom they were asking for. The tense is imperfect, not pluperfect, and implies that the cries were still continuing.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And as they led him away,.... From Pilate's hall, and out of the city of Jerusalem, towards Calvary; which was done by the Jews and Roman soldiers, after they had stripped him of his own clothes, and put on him a scarlet coat, and had platted a crown of thorn, and put it on his head, and a reed in his hand, and bowed the knee, and mocked him, saluting him as King of the Jews; after they had finished their sport and pastime with him, and had put on him his own clothes again:

they laid hold upon one Simon, a Cyrenian; father of Alexander and Rufus, Mar 15:21; see Gill on Mat 27:32.

coming out of the country; either out of the country part of Judea, to the city of Jerusalem; or out of the field where he had been about rural business, and was now returning home, and perhaps knew nothing of the matter, what had been doing at Jerusalem:

and on him they laid the cross; on which Jesus was to be crucified, and which he was bearing himself; but finding that he was weak, and languid, and unable to carry it himself, and fearing, should he die by the way, they should be disappointed of glutting their malice, and seeing him in shame and agony on the cross, and of triumphing over him there; and being in haste for the execution of their malicious designs, they put the cross, at least one end of it, upon this man's shoulders:

that he might bear it after Jesus: either the whole of it, following Jesus; or only one end of it, Jesus going before with the other end on his shoulder; which seems to be the order in which it was carried between them.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

25 And he released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired; but he delivered Jesus to their will.

Ver. 25. Him that for sedition] The Jews, before they were banished out of this kingdom, threw bags of poison into the wells and fountains that the people were to drink of; and so endeavoured to poison them all. So deal those that sow sedition; these are the pests, the botches of human society.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

§ 138.—DELIVERS JESUS TO BE CRUCIFIED, Luk_23:23-25.

See notes on Mat_27:24-31; Mar_15:15-20; Joh_19:1-16.

25. Released—Barabbas to their mercy, and delivered Jesus to their will. This is stated by Luke as a sad contrast. It marks the transition from the trial to the execution.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

25. ὃν ᾐτοῦντο. ‘Whom they were demanding.’ Comp. Act 13:18.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

25. τὸν δ. σ. κ.τ.λ.] The description is inserted for the sake of contrast;—see Act 3:14. Luke omits the scourging and mocking of Jesus. It is just possible that he might have omitted the mocking, because he had related a similar incident before Herod; but how shall we say this of the scourging, if he had seen any narratives which contained it? The break between vv. 25 and 26 is harsh in the extreme, and if Luke had any materials wherewith to fill it up, I have no doubt he would have done so.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

25. ἀπέλυσεν … παρέδωκεν. This tragic contrast is in all three; and all four use παρέδωκεν of the final surrender. Comp. Act 3:14, and note the contrast between these aorists and the imperfect ᾐτοῦντο, “kept demanding.” Both the repetition of τὸν διὰ ατάσιν, κ.τ.λ. and the addition of τῷ θελήματι αὐτῶν are peculiar to Lk. The writer thus emphasizes the enormity of the transaction. In the Gospel of Peter Herod is present at this point and gives the sentence. He does not wash his hands, and the blame is transferred to him and the Jews. So also in the Acta Pilati (B. x.) it is the Jews who hastily execute the sentence, as soon as Pilate has pronounced it. Comp. Justin (Try. 108.) ὃν σταυρωσάντων ἡμῶν. See Hastings, D.B. 1. p. 245.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.