I. THE STOOPING OF MEN WHEN THEY HAVE AN END TO GAIN. "We have no king but Caesar." Assuredly the high priests would never have said anything like this except in the way they actually said it. They had no love to Rome and Rome's ruler, and Pilate knew it, and must have despised them as they professed to be influenced by loyalty to Caesar in all their enmity to Jesus. They were ready to say anything and do anything, however inconsistent, however mendacious, if only it helped them to their end. Thus we have clear evidence from their own conduct of what bad men they were. We cannot give them the credit of being mistaken patriots. Real lovers of their country, however exasperated, however driven into a corner, would never have made a lying confession of allegiance to the hated foreigner.

II. EVEN IF THE STATEMENT HAD BEEN TRUE, THE ACTION BELIED THE WORD. Suppose there had been a real fidelity to Caesar, rejection of Jesus was the very way to injure Caesar's government. The more subjects of Jesus there are in any kingdom, the better for that kingdom. Christians can struggle bravely against all that is tyrannous and overbearing without forgetting that human authority of some sort is an ordinance of Heaven, and must be maintained and honored. All opposition to Christianity tends toward anarchy, and none the less so because the tendency may be denied. - Y.

As the "Crucify Him!" falls upon our ears, it is simply the cry of an excited mob, instigated by the chief priests and elders. It falls painfully upon our Christian, and even upon our civilized, ears. We do not like to see human nature wrought up to such a pitch of frenzy. And if He whose cruel execution is thus demanded is the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world, then this cry pierces our very souls. But let us, while we gather around the cross, close our outward ear and hear with the ear of faith. Then other voices will reach us, and, though they utter the very same sentence, it will sound very differently and produce a far different impression. We hear a voice —

I. FROM THE DIVINE SIDE.

1. From the throne of God. "Let Him be crucified" is the decree of the Almighty, the "determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God." This shedding of the precious blood of Christ, as of "a lamb without blemish and without spot," was "fore-ordained before the foundation of the world." We cannot discern the point at which God's sovereignty and man's free agency meet: we know that they were without excuse who nailed the Redeemer to the tree; but underlying all, overruling all, accomplishing all, is the Divine purpose. Through that guilty act of man there was wrought a mysterious bat most real purpose of Divine love. "God so loved the world," &c. We shall never know at what a cost nor understand the terrible strain upon the heart of the infinite Father. But though there entered into His ear that deepest wail of sorrow, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" He only answered by His silence — "Let Him be crucified." It was a terrible price to pay, but only thus can sin be taken away and man be saved from everlasting death.

2. From the cross itself. Christ had prayed a little before that if it were possible for human salvation to be secured in any other way He might be spared. But not otherwise. It was for this purpose He had taken human nature upon Him. "Lo, I come," &c. And now, He asks not for deliverance; nay, though He is able to come down from the cross, yet will He not do it. "Let Me be crucified" is the utterance of the willing sufferer. "I have power to lay down My life, and I will lay it down for My sheep." "For the joy that is set before Me I will endure the Cross and despise the shame." "Father, forgive them," &c.

3. The Holy Spirit joins His voice. In all that He had caused to be written He had foreshadowed the death of the Son of God. The sacrifice in Eden; the sacrifice of Abel; the paschal lamb and the scapegoat; the sacrifices offered every day upon the Jewish altar; all pointed to this Lamb of God now laid upon the altar of the cross. How then, saith the Spirit, shall "all be fulfilled" unless He be crucified?

II. FROM THE HUMAN SIDE. Is there no petition for this atoning death from the lips of the sinners themselves whom God has so loved? I will suppose that we are gathered about the cross of Christ, and that the consciousness of our sin and misery has dawned upon our minds and is burdening our souls. Shall we enter our protest? Shall we say, "Let Him not be crucified." Oh, then, if He should heed our cry, what would become of us? We cannot by any means save ourselves. "The soul that sinneth, it shall die"; and we cannot make ourselves alive. We are sold unto Satan; we are powerless to deliver ourselves; only One can do that, and He in one way only, viz., by being crucified. If He dies the death, at that instant the doors of our prison-house will fly open and Satan will be powerless to hold us. But not otherwise. And so we cry, "O Son of God, die for us." Are we selfish? Would we have Him perish that we may live? Ah, if the condition of our salvation were His everlasting destruction, God forbid that we should demand the awful sacrifice! For what would heaven be with such a memory as that? But when we know that, "having died for our sins, He will rise again for our justification"; that He would far rather die for us thus than to have us lost; and that our salvation will be a source of joy to Him for ever, we can say, while we mourn that our sins have pierced Him and made it necessary for Him to die, "Let Him be crucified." Conclusion:

1. Let nothing draw you who are Christians away from Christ crucified even for one careless moment.

2. What shall be said to those who seem so indifferent about this great event? Shall heaven and hell be moved by this scene, and any of us men, for whose salvation it occurred, pass by it?

(G. D. Baker, D. D.)

The chief priests answered, We have no king

but Caesar. —

No king but Caesar: —

1. There is nothing which shows more completely what sin is, than the scenes which centre about the death of our Lord. We see wicked men now, but they act generally under restraint; but here sin seemed to be without restraint; and it carried the Jews on to a wickedness unparalleled in history. For Christ did nothing in the whole course of His life to anger men. What aroused evil passions was simply the righteousness that was in Him. Therefore, if we desire to understand what sin itself is, we must look at it in those wicked men, who would have nothing but the blood of the sinless Saviour.

2. In the text we see the degradation of sin. These Jews renounced every thing of national honour and greatness, every hope concerning the Messiah; every principle of patriotism; and they confessed themselves the abject slaves of their Roman conquerors. Heretofore, their highest glory was that God was their King; and in the strength of this position they had endured, with a certain air of grandeur, their oppression. But the language, "We have no king but Caesar," was a complete abandonment of all their claims. What was it all for? Simply that hatred might satiate itself in the blood of One who had conferred upon them the highest benefits. It was sin in the heart, acting without restraint, showing its true self. In order to carry out purposes of wrong, it is not unusual to find men falsifying their whole past record, and placing an indelible stain upon their characters. See what avariciousness and covetousness will make a man stoop to, the many mean, tricky, and dishonest actions. See what ambition will bring men to. See how the in. ordinate appetite for strong drink will bring men from respectability to the gutter. See how impurity, unchastity, and all the vices of fleshly sensuality, destroy manhood. He abandons every thing, to serve the Caesar of his own sinful lusts and passions.

3. In the end these Jews got more than they wanted from Caesar. When they were made to feel the iron heel of the despot in the destruction of their city, how their minds must have reverted to the day when they cried out to Pilate, "We have no king but Caesar"! So is it with sin when it has finished its work. Its imperious will must be submitted to. When at last the man has reached that awful end in eternity, when there is no thought, desire, affection, will, but to do iniquity; when he is entirely under the control of sin, and is enduring the suffering consequent upon sin — then will be realized the bitter degradation and curse to which sin legitimately tends.

(C. S. Abbott.)

Latimer, while preaching one day before Henry VIII., stood up in the pulpit, and seeing the king, addressed himself in a kind of soliloquy, thus: "Latimer, Latimer, Latimer, take care of what you say, for the great King Henry VIII. is here." Then he paused, and proceeded: "Latimer, Latimer, Latimer, take care what you say, for the great King of kings is here."

(W. Baxendale.)

When Alexander the Great set forward upon his great exploits before leaving Macedonia, he divided amongst his captains and nobles all his property. On being rebuked by a friend for having, as he thought, acted so foolishly in parting with all his possessions, reserving nothing for himself, Alexander replied, "I have reserved for myself much more than I have given away: I have reserved for myself the hope of universal monarchy; and when, by the valour and help of these my captains and nobles, I shall be monarch of the world, the gifts I have parted with will come back to me with an increase of a thousand-fold."

(W. Baxendale.)

Cleopas, Cleophas, Jesus, Joseph, Mary, Nicodemus, PilateArimathea, Gabbatha, Golgotha, Jerusalem, Nazareth, The Place of the Skull, The Stone PavementCaesar, Caused, Cesar, Chief, Cried, Cross, Crucify, Cry, Death, Except, Loud, Outcries, Pilate, Priests, Says, Storm1. Jesus is scourged, crowned with thorns, and beaten.
4. Pilate is desirous to release him,
15. but being overcome with the outrage of the crowd, he delivers him to be crucified.
23. They cast lots for his garments.
25. He commends his mother to John.
28. He dies.
31. His side is pierced.
38. He is buried by Joseph and Nicodemus.

John 19:15

     5281   crucifixion
     5824   cruelty, examples
     6231   rejection of God
     7330   chief priests

John 19:4-16

     5714   men

John 19:12-15

     2312   Christ, as king

John 19:15-16

     2545   Christ, opposition to
     2585   Christ, trial

John 19:15-18

     2525   Christ, cross of

February 20 Morning
He shall see of the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied.--ISA. 53:11. Jesus . . . said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.--He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. This people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my praise.--To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

August 4 Morning
It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.--JOHN 19:30. Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.--I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.--We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest standeth daily ministering an offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins: but this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

October 18 Morning
One of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.--JOHN 19:34. Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you.--The life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls.--It is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. Jesus said unto them, This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many.--By his own blood he entered in once into …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

February 17 Morning
The whole bullock shall he carry forth without the camp unto a clean place, where the ashes are poured out, and burn him on the wood with fire.--LEV. 4:12. They took Jesus, and led him away. And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha: where they crucified him.--The bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

The Title on the Cross
'Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross.' --JOHN xix. 19. This title is recorded by all four Evangelists, in words varying in form but alike in substance. It strikes them all as significant that, meaning only to fling a jeer at his unruly subjects, Pilate should have written it, and proclaimed this Nazarene visionary to be He for whom Israel had longed through weary ages. John's account is the fullest, as indeed his narrative of all Pilate's shufflings is the most complete. He alone records …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

The Irrevocable Past
'What I have written I have written.'--JOHN xix. 22. This was a mere piece of obstinacy. Pilate knew that he had prostituted his office in condemning Jesus, and he revenged himself for weak compliance by ill-timed mulishness. A cool-headed governor would have humoured his difficult subjects in such a trifle, as a just one would have been inflexible in a matter of life and death. But this man's facile yielding and his stiff-necked obstinacy were both misplaced. 'So I will, so I command. Let my will …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

Christ's Finished and Unfinished Work
'Jesus ... said, It is finished.'--JOHN xix. 30. 'He said unto me, It is done.'--REV. xxi. 6. One of these sayings was spoken from the Cross, the other from the Throne. The Speaker of both is the same. In the one, His voice 'then shook the earth,' as the rending rocks testified; in the other, His voice 'will shake not the earth only but also heaven'; for 'new heavens and a new earth' accompanied the proclamation. In the one, like some traveller ready to depart, who casts a final glance over his preparations, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

Christ Our Passover
'These things were done, that the Scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of Him shall not be broken.'--JOHN xix. 36. The Evangelist, in the words of this text, points to the great Feast of the Passover and to the Paschal Lamb, as finding their highest fulfilment, as he calls it, in Jesus Christ. For this purpose of bringing out the correspondence between the shadow and the substance he avails himself of a singular coincidence concerning a perfectly unimportant matter--viz., the abnormally rapid sinking …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

The Grave in a Garden
'In the garden a new tomb.'--JOHN xix. 41 (R.V.). This is possibly no more than a topographical note introduced merely for the sake of accuracy. But it is quite in John's manner to attach importance to these apparent trifles and to give no express statement that he is doing so. There are several other instances in the Gospel where similar details are given which appear to have had in his eyes a symbolical meaning--e.g. 'And it was night.' There may have been such a thought in his mind, for all men …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

Jesus Sentenced
'Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him. And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, and they put on Him a purple robe. And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote Him with their hands. Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in Him. Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the Man! When the chief priests …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

An Eye-Witness's Account of the Crucifixion
'And He bearing His cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha: Where they crucified Him, and two other with Him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS. This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin. Then said the chief priests …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

Joseph and Nicodemus
'And after this Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; ... And there came also Nicodemus which at the first came to Jesus by night.'--JOHN xix. 38, 39. While Christ lived, these two men had been unfaithful to their convictions; but His death, which terrified and paralysed and scattered His avowed disciples, seems to have shamed and stung them into courage. They came now, when they must have known …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

The Fifth Word
"I thirst."--JOHN XIX. 28. This is the only utterance of our Blessed Lord in which He gave expression to His physical sufferings. Not least of these was that intolerable thirst which is the invariable result of all serious wounds, as those know well who have ever visited patients in a hospital after they have undergone a surgical operation. In this case it must have been aggravated beyond endurance by exposure to the burning heat of an Eastern sun. This word, then, spoken under such circumstances, …
J. H. Beibitz—Gloria Crucis

The Sixth Word
"It is accomplished."--ST. JOHN XIX. 30. 1. What had been accomplished? In the first place, that work which Christ had come into the world to do. All that work may be resumed in a single word, "sacrifice." The Son of God had come for this one purpose, to offer a sacrifice. Here is room for serious misunderstanding. The blood, the pain, the death, were not the sacrifice. Nothing visible was the sacrifice, least of all the physical surroundings of its culminating act. There is only one thing …
J. H. Beibitz—Gloria Crucis

The Third Word
"Lady, behold thy son." "Behold thy mother." ST. JOHN XIX. 26, 27. In this Word we see the Son of God revealed as human son, and human friend, all the more truly and genuinely human in both relations, because in each and every relation of life, Divine. 1. The first lesson in the Divine Life for us to learn here is the simple, almost vulgarly commonplace one, yet so greatly needing to be learnt, that "charity," which is but a synonym of the Divine Life, "begins at home." Home life is the real test …
J. H. Beibitz—Gloria Crucis

The Last Look at Life,
(Passion Sermon.) TEXT: JOHN xix. 30. "When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, It is finished." THESE greatest and most glorious of the last words -*- of our Saviour on the cross come immediately after those which are apparently of the least significance and importance. The Lord said, "I thirst;" then the moistened sponge was handed to Him; and when He had received the soothing, though not pleasant draught, He cried, "It is finished." And we must not break the connection of these …
Friedrich Schleiermacher—Selected Sermons of Schleiermacher

The Shortest of the Seven Cries
As these seven sayings were so faithfully recorded, we do not wonder that they have frequently been the subject of devout meditation. Fathers and confessors, preachers and divines have delighted to dwell upon every syllable of these matchless cries. These solemn sentences have shone like the seven golden candlesticks or the seven stars of the Apocalypse, and have lighted multitudes of men to him who spake them. Thoughtful men have drawn a wealth of meaning from them, and in so doing have arranged …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 24: 1878

The Procession of Sorrow
I. After our Lord Jesus Christ had been formally condemned by Pilate, our text tells us he was led away. I invite your attention to CHRIST AS LED FORTH. Pilate, as we reminded you, scourged our Savior according to the common custom of Roman courts. The lictors executed their cruel office upon his shoulders with their rods and scourges, until the stripes had reached the full number. Jesus is formally condemned to crucifixion, but before he is led away he is given over to the Praetorian guards that …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 9: 1863

Death of Jesus.
Although the real motive for the death of Jesus was entirely religious, his enemies had succeeded, in the judgment-hall, in representing him as guilty of treason against the state; they could not have obtained from the sceptical Pilate a condemnation simply on the ground of heterodoxy. Consistently with this idea, the priests demanded, through the people, the crucifixion of Jesus. This punishment was not Jewish in its origin; if the condemnation of Jesus had been purely Mosaic, he would have been …
Ernest Renan—The Life of Jesus

The Third Word from the Cross
In the life of our Lord from first to last there is a strange blending of the majestic and the lowly. When a beam of His divine dignity is allowed to shine out and dazzle us, it is never long before there ensues some incident which reminds us that He is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh; and, contrariwise, when He does anything which impressively brings home to us His humanity, there always follows something to remind us that He was greater than the sons of men. Thus at His birth He was laid …
James Stalker—The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ

Objections to Genuineness.
THE most plausible objection to the genuineness of these writings is thus expressed by Dupin: "Eusebius and Jerome wrote an accurate catalogue of each author known to them--with a few obscure exceptions,--and yet never mention the writings of the Areopagite." Great is the rejoicing in the House of the Anti-Areopagites over this PROOF;--but what are the facts? Eusebius acknowledges that innumerable works have not come to him--Jerome disclaims either to know or to give an accurate catalogue either …
Dionysius—LETTERS OF DIONYSIUS THE AREOPAGITE

And at his Crucifixion, when He Asked a Drink...
And at His crucifixion, when He asked a drink, they gave Him to drink vinegar mingled with gall. (Cf. Joh. xix. 29) And this was declared through David. They gave gall to my meat, and in any thirst they gave me vinegar to drink. [262] …
Irenæus—The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching

Inward Confirmation of the Veracity of the Scriptures
We are living in a day when confidence is lacking; when skepticism and agnosticism are becoming more and more prevalent; and when doubt and uncertainty are made the badges of culture and wisdom. Everywhere men are demanding proof. Hypotheses and speculations fail to satisfy: the heart cannot rest content until it is able to say, "I know." The demand of the human mind is for definite knowledge and positive assurance. And God has condescended to meet this need. One thing which distinguishes Christianity …
Arthur W. Pink—The Divine Inspiration of the Bible

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