November 7, 2023
Your King or Mine?
(Some information may be too graphic for small children)
“So they cried out, ‘Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!’ Pilate said to them, ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered, ‘We have no king but Caesar.’”
John 19:15 (NASB)
As our world continues to secularize, notice how the scriptures tell us that in the last days (2 Timothy 3:1-5) people will turn away from God. They will appear to have some form of godliness but will deny its power. This is exactly who the Jews were. They had a form of godliness (in appearance) but denied the One who was the true Power over all. These verses warn against what Jerusalem became, a place of traitors. For a nation that trusted God for countless generations, they would trade their Messiah in for an earthly king. It sounds a lot like their past found in 1 Samuel 8.
“So they cried out, ‘Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!” Oh, how the Jews were fulfilling the prophecy of Matthew 23:37, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her!” Now the Jews were about to kill another. The Jews showed disdain for the Romans who would often kill their Jewish people. A nation of theocracy had traded God for a monarchy. They disregarded Jesus and embraced the authority of those who oppressed them and occupied their land. But this is how hatred works. It is blind. It is self-serving and never looks after anything other than its interests. “The chief priests answered, ‘We have no king but Caesar.” Lenski says, “Driven to the limit, this fatal word escapes the high priests. John writes, ‘the high priests,’ whereas before he writes, ‘the Jews.’ This cannot mean that the few persons who bore this title made this declaration while the rest of the Sanhedrists refused to do so, and while the populace dissented. They were all of one mind, no dissent arose at any time. Where the leaders went all the rest followed. Some followed because of fear, but whatever their low motives, they followed. John names ‘the high priests’ in order to inform us that this declaration came, not from irresponsible persons in the crowd, but from the very heads of the Jewish nation, from the most responsible of all, the most highly representative, whose very position entitled them to speak for all.”[1] I wonder if the Jews (average Jew or the leader) remembered this action some forty years (66-70 A. D.) later when Caesar’s troops would crush their city and bring their nation to a standstill. It would bring starvation to those seized inside the city. “The Romans would allow pilgrims to enter the city, but refused to let them leave- thus depleting food and water supplies in Jerusalem.”[2] The war would continue over four years against Jewish insurgency. Then the debris field of the city would stand for years.
As the world continues to trade in God for something else, it stems from the human heart. The prophet Jeremiah warned us, “The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; Who can understand it?” (Jer. 17:9). The Jews had a deceitful and sick heart. It didn’t matter what they put on to hide it. Their heart was revealed when they said, “We have no king but Caesar.” Who is your King today? It might be whatever you elevate above God. The Jews had a god, but it was their prestige and power. Could this be said about you and me today?
[1] Lenski, R. C. H. (1961). (p. 1275). Augsburg Publishing House.