Bearing Shame and Scoffing Rude

Matthew chapter 27, verses 27-44.

“Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters and they gathered the whole battalion before Him and they stripped Him, put a scarlet robe on Him and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on His head and put a reed in His right hand and kneeling before Him, they mocked Him, saying “Hail, King of the Jews,” and they spit on Him and took the reed and struck Him on the head and when they had mocked Him, they stripped Him of the robe and put His own clothes on Him and led Him away to crucify Him. As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. They compelled this man to carry His cross and when they came to a place called Golgotha, which means place of the skull, they offered Him wine to drink mixed with gall, but when He tasted it, He would not drink it. And when they had crucified Him, they divided His garments among them by casting lots, then 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, one on the left and 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 from the cross.” So also, the chief priests, with the scribes and elders mocked him, saying, “He saved others. He cannot save himself. He is the king of Israel. Let Him come down now 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 were crucified with Him also reviled Him in the same way.”

These words are probably familiar to many of us. I want you to think about the details that we have in this account of the crucifixion and the details we don’t have. Look at verse 35. It says very matter of factly, almost with a passing glance, “and when they had crucified him,” that’s it. That, that’s all the details we get here, of the actual act of the nails being pounded into His hands, the crucifixion itself. We sometimes focus on the physical pain of the crucifixion, and it was horrendous. It was an unbelievably cruel way to kill someone, even many of the Romans thought it as something barbaric. Your feet would be nailed to the lower beam. Your hands would be tied, or in Jesus’ case, nailed to a cross beam, but you wouldn’t be so fortunate as to bleed to death. You wouldn’t die a quick death with a beheading or a relatively quick death with, say, a hanging from the gallows. But often you would hang on the cross for days before your heart finally gave out or until you couldn’t get another breath, and you would finally die of asphyxiation. It was a gruesome ordeal where naked criminals or nearly naked rebels died in excruciatingly terrible pain. It was considered a scandal, hideous, barbaric. But notice the Gospels don’t focus on those details. That is to say they are not like Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ that wants you to get up close and personal with as much of the physical blood and guts and gore and torture as possible. And it’s true, Jesus suffered unbelievable physical torment, but think about it, so did two other men on the hill that day. They, too, were crucified and likely hundreds of criminals over the years were crucified by Rome in this terribly cruel ordeal. In fact, if you know Mark’s account, in Mark 15, you know that what’s surprising about Jesus’ death is how quickly He died. It was a mercy that someone would come and would break the bones in your legs because then you could no longer by instinct, prop yourself up to try to get another breath, and so it was a mercy that you would break your legs and then you would finally asphyxiate and die, and when they came to do that in fulfillment of the prophecy, that not one of His bones would be broken, He was already dead. Pilate was surprised. He died so much more quickly than most people died on the cross.

So, the physical anguish is not what makes Jesus’ death unique. When it comes to the gory details, Matthew simply records, “and when they had crucified Him,” those details are not here. I want you to notice the details that are here. The gospel accounts do not highlight the physical pain of the cross as much as they draw our attention to the shame of the cross. Here’s what you should notice in this text, not just that Jesus is killed, but that He is so thoroughly rejected, despised, mocked, ridiculed, derided. Just think, one by one we can go through the characters in this familiar scene. You first have the soldiers at the palace, calling together the whole battalion, could be as many as 600 men, probably can’t fit that many people here, but however many you could, they gather them together and they crowd into the governor’s headquarters and what brings them all together, they want to have some sport with Jesus. So, we read that they put a cloak, a scarlet robe on Him. Likely, it was one of those soldiers that, a robe that a Roman soldier would wear. You’ve probably seen them in movies or books, and they took one of those off and they put it on Him and why did they give Him a robe? Because they were going to pretend that He was a king.

All throughout this story we see that those who mock Him, they do not know all that they know, for they think they’re mocking Him when they are speaking the truth. They take turns kneeling before Him and you can hear their words dripping with sarcasm. You can almost hear the cackle and the laughter in their voice, “Your highness, hail, King of the Jews,” and put a reed, a stick in His hand, no doubt to be a kind of make-believe scepter. “Look at there, sitting in His royal robe with His scepter, this man who they call King of the Jews,” and they take it out of His hand, and they hit Him over the head with it. They twist together a crown of thorns to add to the effect, and they spit upon Him. Have you ever been spat upon? Not just a joking sort of (spitting sound) but real spit. It’s gross, it’s guttural. If you’ve ever had it, there’s an immediate sense of not only revulsion, and that’s disgusting, somebody has this saliva or worse in the back of their throat and then they project it on you, but it’s also humiliating to spit in public. I hope that’s something you don’t do here, at least when you’re in the church. Be considerate. A rather uncouth thing, let alone to spit on someone else. They strip Him of His robe, they put His clothes back on and they lead Him out to be crucified. What a sight it must have been. And remember, Jesus is not sitting there looking rather dignified, sort of folding His arms and putting up with it and rolling His eyes and saying, “Fine, fine,” sigh. No, He’s half dead. He’s been scourged. He’s been whipped with the Cat of Nine Tails, with pieces of glass and bone digging into his skin. He looks nothing like a king and so they must have felt absolutely hilarious to salute a half-dead, half-naked man torn apart by the lash, bruised and dripping with blood, “Hail, King of the Jews.”

They lead Him out to be crucified and next we meet this man from Cyrene, Simon by name. Mark’s account says he was the father of Rufus and Alexander, probably the same two gentlemen introduced in Roman 16, so it seems likely this man went on to be a leader of the church, a Christian, but here he’s just a guy who happens to be in the right place or maybe the wrong place at the wrong time. It says they compelled him. There’s no sense that Simon is trying to do something magnanimous. He’s simply there and he’s made to carry the crossbeam. Now, why is this bit of detail here? It’s here to give one more example of how utterly destitute and weak Jesus is. He is unusually feeble. The men usually carried their own cross, that is the horizontal beam. But after the scourging, Jesus is too weak even for that. He needs this man who’s in town from Northern Africa, to carry His cross for Him, yet one more element of shame in Christ’s passion.

Then we have the soldiers of the cross. Here in Matthew’s account, verse 32, it just says, “they,” and then again verse 34, “they,” where it told exactly who the they refer to, but it seems to be the group of soldiers, at least some of them, that led Jesus away from the governor’s headquarters, and now they are here at Golgotha, which means place of the skull. Calvary, which is from the Latin, and means head or scalp. And they, too, add in to the mockery. They offer Him a drink, wine mixed with gall, a nasty drink. Imagine just how thirsty Jesus was, how it may have seemed like one small act of mercy from the soldiers that they would lift up something for Him to drink, to parch or quench His parched thirst and yet He tasted, and he cannot swallow it, it’s so revulsive. They strip Him, they crucify Him, they gamble for His clothes, just as Psalm 22 predicted, and He’s nailed there to the cross without any dignity. The Jews would have been a little more modest than the Romans and covered Him with some kind of loin cloth, but barely. He is almost completely naked, hoisted up to die and the soldiers are there busy casting their dice, playing a game for His clothes, as if they were all on their phones like nothing very important was happening and how’s your score on Crossy Road?

And if that weren’t enough humiliation, we are introduced in verse 39, “To those who passed by,” maybe pilgrims in town for the Passover, people just passing through on the outer skirts of Jerusalem. These are nobodies, “and they, too,” verse 39, “derided Him.” The Greek word, blasphemeo from which we get our word blaspheme. They hurled insults. They cursed Him. I want you to understand that this is a strong word, a harsh term. Let’s not think it too mild that they passed by, and they see Him, and they say, “What a dummy, what a loser,” no, this was blasphemeo. They hurled insults at Him. they derided Him. In our language, and I won’t say the words, but you’ll know what I mean. They looked at Him up on the cross and said, “Would you look at that S.O.B. Look at that,” fill in the blank. “Look at that piece of,” you know what. It says they shook their heads at Him, and they scoffed, and they said, “Ha, Ha, you were going to tear down the temple and rebuild it in three days. Remember when He said that, remember how crazy that was, this temple that took generations to build, this temple. He said He’s gonna tear it down and build it back up again in three days. Hey, Jesus, I’d like to see you do that now.”

We have all these crosses here, seven of them intentionally. This big one right in the middle, stained glass, crosses all over this room. There’s a cross right here. It’s a symbol, rightly so, of our Christian faith, and we’ve learned to embrace it as the early church did, as the very heart of the Gospel in the Good News, but of course, it was nothing of the sort, didn’t have any majesty like that, wasn’t something people looked upon and said, “My, what a, what a lovely church they have,” with this gallows, this electric chair, this butcher’s block in front of them and as Jesus hung there, and they wagged their heads and insulted Him and called on Him to come down from the cross and who is giving this insult? Nobodies. They just happen to be in the area, passing by and they cannot help but join in the mockery.

We see then the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders join in. Well, they must have been ecstatic. This is what the religious leaders wanted all along. They wanted to get rid of Jesus and now they must be thinking, “This is even better than we hoped for, it’s really happening, boys. He’s been found guilty and the Romans killed Him for us.” But still, you might have thought that here, the dignified religious elites, the professors, the, the pastors, the seminary presidents, you might thought that they might have been too good to join in with the sport. Perhaps they would have just stood there and been a little more restrained and said, “Oh, what a pity. Sad it had to turn out this way.” But they’re more than happy to join in the mocking. “He healed the sick. Well, I’d like to see Him heal Himself right now. Think of all the people who waited in line to be saved from this so-called Messiah. He can’t even save Himself.” And again, they say more than they know. When they understand that He cannot save Himself, it’s true. He could not both save us and save Himself. And they joined in with the mockery. “Hey Christ,” they say,
“We want to believe in you.” I can just hear them, see them, ribbing each other, chuckling, slapping each other on the back, “Hey, come down from the cross. We’re ready to bow the knee. We’ll worship You. Wait, what’s that? You, you can’t, you can’t make, oh, You’re crucified, right. Can’t make it down from the cross. Well, we believe in You, Mr. Messiah,” and on they go.

And to give just one last bit of humiliation, we’ve had the soldiers, we’ve had Simon of Cyrene to carry His cross, the soldiers again gambling for His clothes, we’ve had men just passing by, we’ve had the religious elite and verse 44 is the absolute humiliating cherry on top. “And the robbers who were crucified with Him also reviled Him.” If it wasn’t enough to be counted among the transgressors, to be crucified between two common criminals which, for this level of punishment, were likely some kind of violent insurrectionists. If that weren’t bad enough, they, too, join in the mockery. These are convicted criminals. They, too, are hanging there in excruciating physical torment and they may be up there for hours, even for days, and they manage to muster up just enough strength and vitality to heap more abuse on Jesus. They also revile Him. “Hey, Mr. Messiah, You’re gonna save people. I’d like to put in my request right now.”

These verses give a scene of such remarkable and comprehensive rejection. The abandonment of Jesus is total, and to complete the sense of forsakenness, He will, in the verses that follow, “cry out with a loud voice Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani.” Even God will have forsaken Him. From Judas’ betrayal to His best friend so-called, who fell asleep, to Peter’s denial, to the council’s sham trial, to the false witnesses, to Pilate’s cowardice, to the crowd’s violence, to the mockery by the soldiers and the chief priests and the scribes, to the insults from those passed by and now even two convicted criminals join in the fun. Was there ever a man so utterly abandoned by His friends, cheated by His enemies, mocked even by complete strangers? There has never been anything like this in the history of the world. A man treated so much less than He deserved.

You know about Jesus’ life. In His whole life He never cheated anyone. He lied to no one. He hated no one. He insulted no one. He healed, He cast out demons. He welcomed little children. He loved the poor. He lifted up women. He welcomed Gentiles. He poured himself into 12 men. He gave the blind their sight. He made the lame to walk. He restored the flesh of lepers. He brought the dead back to life. He deserved accolades. He deserved fame and fortune. He was deserving of any earthly and indeed, in the Heavenly honor that could be bestowed upon Him, but here He is, mocked, beaten, stripped, spit upon, crucified, derided, and all of it was in public. That’s the point of the cross, public and total humiliation. Has there ever been a man treated with such little dignity by those who were so far beneath Him? Parents, you feel this when your children talk back to you or when some low-level employee thinks they know more than you, or some teenager gives you some lip when you fought in a war that they don’t even know about, and you think, “How dare you? You have no idea who I am.” And you think of Jesus here, ridiculed by those who were so much His inferiors, those that the Son of God Himself created, fashioned, upheld by the word of His power. They should have been His subjects, not His masters. They should have been showing Him infinite respect, not ridicule. They should be reverencing Him. Instead, they revile Him.

So, why this emphasis on the shame, the shame of the cross? It’s not to make us feel sorry for Jesus. Luke 23, Jesus says to the weeping women, “No, no, no, no, don’t weep for me. You weep for yourselves and the judgment that’s coming if you don’t repent.” Good Friday and this whole week, it’s not one long exercise in people simply feeling sorry for Jesus.

Is this here to give us an example of not returning evil for evil? Yes, that’s part of it. First Peter 3 makes that connection. Are these details here to demonstrate the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy? Yes, that’s clearly part of it. Is this here to show us how we can despise the shame we may encounter for following Jesus? Yes, that’s also true. Hebrews 12 tells us, “Jesus looked to the joy that was set before Him. He endured the cross and He despised the shame.” But here’s the most important truth for us on Good Friday. That you and I realize that Jesus died for our sin and for our shame.

There are two types of shame. On the one hand, there is misplaced shame, and this is the way the world usually thinks about shame. People say, “Don’t be embarrassed. Don’t let anyone put you down. Stop the negative self-talk. Don’t listen to the critics. Believe the best about yourself. Find the hero within.” And it is true. We can easily experience shame for things that we should not feel ashamed about, some imperfection in your body or some honest mistake or when people criticize you for believing and doing the right things. It is true. There is misplaced shame in the world. But there is also the shame we should feel. When we sin, we are objectively guilty, and when there is real objective guilt, we ought to feel shame for that guilt. In fact, shame can be a powerful force for spiritual good. Paul tells the immature believers in First Corinthians 65, “I say this to your shame,” so God knows how to use shame and there is a shame we ought to feel. And this passage, with all of these details is to help each one of you who know the Lord Jesus Christ and believe in Him in your hearts, to understand that He has not only dealt with your objective sin and guilt, but even with your shame.

Do you ever feel dirty, exposed, humiliated, defeated? Have you felt that before? Maybe you feel that right now. Some of you know what I’m talking about, all too well. You think about adultery you committed, maybe an abortion you had or forced someone else to have. The pornography that you looked at just yesterday, the addiction you can’t seem to shake or the lies that you know you’ve been telling. The double life that no one else knows about but you know about, or the friends you betrayed or the way that you just exploded in rage at your children or the way you once cheated on your spouse, or all of the impure thoughts that get nurtured in your heart and you think to yourself, “I deserve whatever God can dish out.” In fact, maybe you wish He would. Maybe you wish you could somehow have some of this to finally, once for all, be done with the shame. If just you could experience something of the public humiliation, maybe you could then walk with your head held high and say, “Finally, I paid for all of these sins.” But, of course, you can’t.

D.A. Carson says this text shows humanity at its worst, which is true, but if we’re honest, it also shows rather uncomfortably, the humanity that each of us too often represent. Have you ever been mocking? Have you ever been jeering? Have you ever been dismissive of the truth? Have you ever ignored or wished Christ would ignore you? Have you ever cast aside His claims in your life? Have you ever thought to yourself, “If my sins were put on a screen here in front of all of my friends and family and church and neighbors and on a screen and we had a viewing for all of the sins, the things I’ve done in my life, the things that I’ve nurtured in my heart and that I’ve thought, I would be made fun of and ridiculed and mocked and spat upon and laughed at and that’s what I would deserve.” Well, let me tell you what the world will not tell you if you feel that. You’re right. The world will try to lightly heal that and say, “No, no, don’t, don’t talk that way about yourself. You’re not a bad person. You made some mistakes. Nobody’s perfect.” The world will not tell you the truth about yourself, but here’s what the world will also not tell you. They will not tell you the truth about God. Because the other truth that you’ll never get from the world, you’ll never find it on the internet, is that someone suffered so that you don’t have to. You won’t get that from the way the internet tears you down. You won’t get that from your own guilty conscience. You need a voice from outside yourself to give you this hope, to give you this good news, to see on this Good Friday, the Savior on the cross who did not save Himself, in order that He might save you and me, and all that we deserve, all of this humiliation for our sins can pass us by as blow after blow landed upon His head. Shame poured out like a dump truck, just beeping, backing up. Dumping out humiliation and mockery and shame upon His shoulders that we deserve so we can be free and rejoice, and we can, in fact, leave here with our heads held high.

Bearing shame and scoffing rude. In my place, in your place, condemned He stood, sealed my pardon with His blood. Halleluiah, what a Savior. Let’s pray.

Gracious Heavenly Father, we turn to You and look to You for all that we lack, for You have born on Your shoulders, in Your body and soul, all that we deserve. While the world tells us that there is healing only if we pretend we do not deserve it, You give us a better way, an eternal way, a more freeing way, to look hard and honest at ourselves and acknowledge all that we deserve, and then to look upon the cross and see, truly Jesus has paid it all for us, and we rejoice in His name. Amen.