Participants: Glenn Russell & Ranko Stefanovic (Host)
Series Code: MTBOTB
Program Code: MTBOTB00025A
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00:20 Welcome to the 'Books of the Book.'
00:23 A special series on 3ABN 00:25 featuring each of the books of the Bible. 00:27 It's a wonderful series to be part of. 00:29 I'm Glenn Russell, professor of Religion 00:32 at Andrews University. 00:33 I'm here with a good friend 00:35 and New Testament scholar, Dr. Ranko Stefanovic. 00:38 Ranko, as you teach there in the seminary, 00:40 it's great to partner with 3ABN ministry 00:44 and to come and share the insights of scripture. 00:47 So you're sharing as teacher, 00:48 but you're also a student of the word 00:50 of all the way through the process. 00:51 You know Glenn, we are there in the classroom 00:54 and our purpose is always, whatever we teach our students 00:58 what we present to them, 00:59 we want them to use that material one day for preaching. 01:03 So I try to balance my teaching with traveling around, 01:06 because I've like to share the word of God with others. 01:10 And this is what our mission is. 01:13 I'm really grateful to God that He gave me privilege 01:16 that I've more time than pastors in the churches 01:19 to study the word of God. 01:21 So we need to help each others. 01:23 I learned many things from others 01:25 and I try to make my own contribution. 01:28 We need each other in order to understand the Bible. 01:30 We certainly do and we need 01:31 the Holy Spirit to guide us. Yes. 01:33 Let's pray as we continue. 01:35 Lord as we open Your word, 01:38 we ask that once again You'll open our hearts. 01:41 Father, we are not able to know You by ourselves. 01:44 We could never understand You 01:46 and we thank You for Your revelation. 01:49 We realize that we will still only know enough 01:54 to give us a taste of Your wondrous awesome glory. 01:57 And we look forward to eternity 01:59 when we can sit at Your feet 02:01 and you'll teach us face to face. 02:03 But until then thank You for Your spirit. 02:05 May You be our teacher now, 02:06 in Jesus name, amen. Amen. 02:10 We've been with Jesus following Him on his journey 02:13 as He goes through His baptism, 02:16 through His temptations of the worldliness 02:18 through His three and half years, 02:20 and now He is coming to the cross. 02:22 He's gone through Gethsemane, that great agony of heart. 02:26 He's faced the mob in the garden. 02:29 He has been taken into arrest 02:31 and now we find Him heading to the cross. Yes. 02:34 So Jesus is standing before Pilate. 02:39 Pilate was Roman Governor who was in charge 02:43 of the entire political situation in Palestine. 02:46 He was also in charge of collecting taxes. Yes. 02:50 And his main mission was to keep 02:53 peace in Palestine for any price. 02:58 If keeping peace meant torturing people 03:02 and kill many innocent people doesn't matter 03:04 as long as the peace is there 03:08 and then he can collect taxes, that was all. 03:12 So he gives the people a choice 03:13 for Barabas or Jesus 03:15 and the devil and the priest stir up 03:17 the people to say, "We'll take the Barabas. 03:20 Crucify Christ." 03:21 So see the Jewish leaders first presented 03:24 charges that were religious one. 03:27 Pilate did not buy it. Didn't work. 03:29 But then he know that they went to another thing. 03:32 They changed their acquisitions to the political ones. 03:35 It was at that point 03:37 that Pilate actually became concerned. 03:41 We don't have a king but Caesar. 03:46 Yes. What a tragic pathetic confession? Yes. 03:50 We will take Caesar instead of Christ. 03:52 And this cruel procurator 03:56 who did not care about innocent people. 04:00 Actually did not have the peace. 04:05 He wanted to release Jesus to make Him free. 04:08 He's got a message from his wife. 04:10 He sees Jesus eyes, he senses this man. 04:13 There's something different about Jesus. 04:15 But he thinks one more thing to do. 04:17 You see, he's moved with compassion. Yeah. 04:21 But what about Jewish leaders? 04:23 The cost is too high. 04:25 He even presents Barabbas to them to make their choice. 04:30 They'd rather chose Barabbas than Jesus 04:35 and then he moves to the last action 04:39 hoping, hoping to save Jesus and what was that? 04:42 May I pick it up in 04:44 Matthew Chapter 27 verse 24? Please. 04:46 "So when Pilate saw that he was gaining nothing, 04:49 but rather that a riot was beginning," 04:51 You can see how fearful he be of that. 04:54 Verse 24, "He took water and washed his hands 04:56 before the crowd and said 04:57 I am innocent of this man's blood, 04:59 see to it yourselves." 05:00 Of course he wasn't innocent. 05:02 Verse 25, "And all the people answered, 05:04 ''His blood be on us and on our children!'' 05:06 Then he released for them Barabbas, 05:08 and having scourged Jesus, 05:11 he delivered him to be crucified." 05:13 Yes. And then we have the description. 05:16 Can you just read description of scourging? 05:18 Ah, this is so tragic. 05:21 "Then the soldiers of the governor 05:23 took Jesus into the praetorium, 05:25 and they gathered the whole battalion before him. 05:27 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe upon him. 05:30 And plaiting a crown of thorns they put it on his head, 05:33 and put a reed in his right hand. 05:35 And kneeling before him, they mocked him, 05:37 saying, ''Hail, King of the Jews!'' 05:40 And they spat up on him and took the reed 05:42 and struck him on the head. 05:44 And when they had mocked him, 05:45 they stripped him of the robe 05:47 and put his own clothes on him 05:50 and led him away to crucify him." 05:53 So many times I hear when people are taking 05:55 about scourging of Jesus, 05:57 how Jesus was whipped or beaten etcetera. 06:02 We have to keep in mind that 06:04 people then go to another extreme 06:06 and we have that-- There is a famous movie-- 06:10 Famous movie where people went 06:12 to completely another extreme that-- 06:16 Jesus was so beaten in that movie 06:18 that He could die three four times there etcetera. 06:21 The question is how to keep the balance. 06:22 We have to understand what scourging was all about. 06:26 Actually, there were-- let their thongs, 06:30 at the end there were pellets 06:34 out of which sharp lead or bones were coming out. 06:39 So they're five, six of them. 06:41 They would bind the person for a pillar there. 06:46 They would stripped, you know, person of the clothes, 06:49 so nothing was just a skin. 06:51 And one of the strongest soldier would take that scourge 06:56 and beat the person so many times. 06:59 After the scourging, the person was beaten, 07:03 there was no skin left there on the back and on shoulder. 07:11 Actually if the soldier was not careful in beating, Yes. 07:17 The person could easily die 07:20 and they must say something is, 07:22 we don't know, which of the two was worse, 07:27 scourging or the crucifixion? Yes. 07:31 It's a terrible beating as they whipped Him. 07:33 And they had limit, 07:34 you can only beat Him so many times otherwise-- 07:36 Among the Jews, 39 times. Yes. 07:38 Yes. Now-- 07:40 Actually scourging was a dreadful punishment. 07:43 Yes. Almost equal to the cross. 07:47 And Ranko, I'd like to pause for a moment. 07:49 Someone might get the impression 07:51 that we're saying the Jews, 07:52 because the text--the Gospel sometimes say the Jews. 07:55 We should pause and reflect, 07:56 this is not an ethnic term as it's used here. No. 07:59 It's dealing with the leadership at the time. 08:01 So there is n o justification for any anti-Semitic behavior 08:05 or anything thing like that. 08:07 This is not against the people. 08:08 They probably behaved as human beings would behave. 08:11 Sure, of course, many of ordinary people 08:14 were prompted by Jewish leaders 08:18 to shout at and stood up, 08:21 you know, against Jesus etcetera. 08:23 But when the Holy Spirit served them up 08:26 on the day of Pentecost, 08:28 they responded in repentance. Yes. 08:30 So to talk about any consequences 08:33 or anything you know, 08:34 it will be against Biblical teaching. 08:37 We are talking about Jewish leaders of course, 08:39 they had the consequences. 08:42 And so many times Christians they are so ready 08:46 to judge those people, 08:48 but we don't have any judgment 08:52 that was coming from Jesus. 08:54 Actually the only reaction of Jesus was a prayer, 08:57 "Father, forgive them because they don't know 09:00 what they are doing." 09:01 They really did not know what they were doing, 09:03 because few weeks later they repented 09:07 and actually they were among the first one 09:10 who joined the Christian church. 09:11 By the thousands. Yes. 09:13 "And when they went out of that place, 09:16 they came upon a man of Simon of Cyrene 09:20 and they compelled Him to carry His cross." 09:22 So we see now we're moving 09:24 on that Via Dolorosa, the Way of the Cross. 09:26 Let's keep in mind what happened here 09:28 in Garden of Gethsemane there, 09:31 drained Jesus, I mean you remember, 09:33 sweat was mixed with blood. 09:35 Then the whole night evidently Jesus did not sleep. 09:38 I mean He was beaten there 09:39 and mistreated. Mocked, abused. 09:42 There mocked, abused in the house of Kayafa's. 09:47 Now He was scourged. 09:48 We know what it means 09:50 and finally He had to carry His cross 09:54 to the place of the crucifixion. 09:57 Let's talk a little about crucifixion and cross 10:00 and what that was in Roman times? 10:03 Actually crucifixion has been considered 10:08 to be one of the cruelest method of execution. 10:14 It wasn't simply to kill someone? No. 10:16 That could have been done very quickly. 10:18 You know what they're supposed to do to-- 10:20 to kill a person but to make torture 10:23 and suffering as long as possible. 10:26 Crucifixion was not done by anybody. 10:30 In the court of the Roman soldiers, 10:33 there was a specialist for nailing person on the cross. 10:38 It means to put the nails into the places 10:42 where the pain was the most severe. 10:46 So to make the person to suffer as long as possible 10:52 and to make, you know, that pain as great as possible, 10:59 does that make sense-- 11:00 And the reason would be not just for the prisoner, 11:03 it's to show everybody else. 11:05 So they would crucify people usually on the crossroads, 11:08 on the prominent places, usually the gate of the city. 11:12 So when people were coming in or going out, 11:16 there was a message, 11:18 you'll see this is what will happen to you 11:21 if you do not surrender yourself to the Roman authority. 11:24 Spectacle of the cross. Spectacle of the cross. 11:26 By the way, Roman citizens could not be crucified 11:30 because it was too humiliating 11:33 for any dignified status of Romans 11:37 who claim to have Roman citizens. 11:39 And the pathway from trial to the cross 11:42 was not the most direct route. Yeah. 11:44 He would take them through the places. 11:46 You've walked through those 11:47 narrow streets of Jerusalem. Yes. 11:49 You've been on that tragic journey 11:51 for as many people as possible to see, 11:53 this is what happens to someone who rebels against Romans. 11:56 So let's provide few more details. 11:58 You know the traditional picture of crucifixion of Jesus 12:01 is how Jesus carries the whole cross. 12:05 However it does not fit the historical reality. 12:09 You see on the shoulder of that scourged--shoulder, 12:16 okay, a cross beam which was called in Latin, 12:21 patibulum, so that cross beam. 12:23 So the upright is there? 12:25 It's there, it's fixed already in the ground. 12:27 So that cross beam would be put on this, 12:30 it was very heavy. Oh, yeah. 12:32 It was very heavy. 12:33 So the person had to carry it, okay, 12:37 to the place of the crucifixion. 12:41 Okay, so they would come to the place, 12:43 they would put that cross beam, 12:45 they would put the-- Prisoner? 12:48 The prisoner, they'll put that on cross beam, 12:50 they will tie the hands and after that 12:53 they would put the nails there. 12:55 Because people are fighting, I mean it was-- 12:59 That's a gory and 12:59] graphic. 13:00 But according to the gospels 13:03 there was no need for Jesus to be bound. 13:06 Jesus put His hands there and then He was crucified. 13:11 By the way, the problem is that 13:17 we don't know too much about crucifixion. 13:19 We have information, we have ancient inscriptions 13:22 telling us about, but the problem is 13:25 we don't have any tomb of any crucified person, why? 13:28 Because a crucified person, 13:30 see crucifixion was so humiliating 13:33 that crucified person could not be buried, 13:37 the person would be thrown on the garbage place there. 13:41 Cor Gehenna. That's why we understand 13:45 why Nicodemus and Joseph, they had to go to ask Pilate, 13:49 did to God, please would you give us. 13:51 Actually they brought a lot of money, 13:53 they bribed Pilate in order to get the body of Jesus 13:56 to prepare Him for the funeral. 14:00 And we're saying that it was not simply nails 14:02 that held Jesus to the cross, 14:04 it was His love for you, His love for me. 14:07 We're going to explore that love 14:08 a little bit further right after our break. 14:10 We'll be right back. |
Revised 2014-12-17