Listen to the sermon with the player below, or, download the audio.
+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
How many times have we heard or seen dramatized the account of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Praetorium, before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor? For some of us, perhaps we have heard or seen dramatized this account at least as many years as we have been alive, with its often being read in Church services at least once each year: during Lent, on Palm Sunday, and on Good Friday. (Our individually following the Daily Bible Reading plan might expose the account to us another four times each year.) Despite so much exposure to the account, how well do we understand it? One of the things I enjoy about preaching in general are the opportunities for me to study Holy Scripture more closely, and so the opportunities for the Holy Spirit both to give me greater understanding and faith and to use me to give you all greater understanding and faith. Such opportunities are all the more meaningful for me this Lent, as we again both hear Readings from the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ as drawn from the four Gospel accounts and reflect on key statements or events from the Readings. In some cases our focus is on statements or events that I myself have had questions about or difficulty understanding, such is the case tonight, when Jesus refers to someone’s having “the greater sin”. Thus the theme for our reflection tonight is “The greater sin”.
From the palace of the high priest, the site of the Sanhedrin’s convicting Jesus on religious charges of blasphemy that deserved death, the leaders of the Jews led Jesus to the Praetorium and gave (or delivered) Jesus over to Pontius Pilate (Matthew 27:2) to sentence Jesus to death on political charges of insurrection. As the Divinely‑inspired St. John for the most part uniquely reports, Pilate repeatedly interrogated Jesus, both before and after Jesus went before Herod and before and after Jesus was flogged. For His part, Jesus largely was silent, except when He absolutely had to answer, as when Pilate’s excited question to Jesus claimed that he had authority to crucify or release Jesus. Then Jesus answered Pilate, saying, “You would have no authority over Me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered Me over to you has the greater sin.” (John 19:11)
To be sure, the authority Pilate had over Jesus ultimately was given Pilate from above, from God the Father. And, the next statement to me seems linked in such a way that Jesus almost seems to be saying that God the Father had the greater sin since one could argue that He ultimately delivered Jesus over to Pilate (see Acts 2:23). Of course, Jesus cannot be suggesting that His own holy Father in some way sinned. (That understanding is apparently so ridiculous the commentaries I checked did not even mention it as a possibility.) But, if not Jesus’s holy Father, then who is the one who has the greater sin? Who delivered Jesus over to Pilate? Judas delivered Jesus over to the leaders of the Jews, and the leaders of the Jews delivered Jesus over to Caiaphas, and, while Caiaphas was certainly involved, the leaders of the Jews were also the ones who delivered Jesus over to Pilate (John 18:30). As to whom Jesus is referring, there is really no consensus among the Bible commentators I consulted. For his part, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther notes that the singular can be used for more than one person and says that Jesus is referring to the entire group: Judas, Annas, Caiaphas, and everyone else in the hateful mob (AE 69:238).
Of course, identifying he who has (or even those who have) the greater sin does not excuse from the lesser sin Pilate or anyone else, including us. We too easily blame Pilate or the Jews for Jesus’s death, forgetting that, if, as is the case, Jesus died for our sins, then we also are in some sense responsible for His death. Clearly Holy Scripture, such as that we heard tonight, and so also the Lutheran Confessions know of some distinction between sins, but even lesser sin is still sin. When we think of others as greater sinners than ourselves, we too easily can wrongly think of ourselves as not sinners at all. We may like to make more of the sins we do not obviously commit and to downplay those we do. Yet, any and every sin on its own merits death now in time and torment for eternity in hell, where we even grant that there are degrees of torment (for example, Matthew 11:16-24; Luke 10:1-16). As Jesus warned Pilate that he was under Divine judgment, so Jesus warns us. As Jesus called Pilate, so Jesus calls us to repent of our sin. And, already tonight in the Psalm (143), we have pleaded to the Lord for mercy and asked Him not to judge but instead to deliver us and preserve our lives for His Name’s sake. Truly the Lord hears our plea of repentance and faith and forgives us our sin for Jesus’s sake.
For his part, Jesus’s statement prompted Pilate to go on trying to release Jesus, but in the end Pilate gave in to the Jews’ demand and gave Jesus over to their will to be crucified (John 19:6). Pilate may have had the lesser sin and others the greater, but God’s grace for Jesus’s sake through faith is greater than all sin. From the judgment seat Pilate pointed to Jesus standing before them and said to the Jews, “Behold your king!”, and from this pulpit I point to Jesus on the cross and say to you, “Behold your King!”—your King, Who took a servant’s form, was betrayed by a friend with a kiss of intimacy, crowned with thorns, mocked and scorned, and bore the cross and all its pains for your sins and for mine. “Behold your King!—your King, Who rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, where He even now is reigning over all things for the benefit of His Church.
In His Church even now your King as Prophet and Priest, through those He has called for the purpose, preaches His Word and administers His Sacraments. As Pilate’s authority was given him from above, so in Holy Baptism, with water and the Word, God with the hands of our pastors gives birth to us from above (John 3:3, 7). As the Father sent Jesus with the authority not to release or crucify but the authority to forgive or retain sins, so Jesus sent the apostles and they, in turn, have sent their successors, effecting individual Holy Absolution for those who privately confess the sins they know and feel in their heart (John 20:21-23; confer Matthew 28:18-20). And, in Holy Communion, the very Body and Blood of Jesus once delivered over to Pilate for sentencing and in turn to the Jews for crucifying are now given to you and to me, under the forms of bread and wine, for us to eat and to drink, and so for us to receive the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.
We who by faith so receive God’s forgiveness, life, and salvation also find their impact in how we live our lives. We want to do better than to keep on sinning. We recognize that, for believers, some sins are venial, readily forgiven as we live in our baptismal grace, but we also recognize that other sins are mortal or deadly, that by their very nature they drive the Holy Spirit from us and require us to be converted anew. And, we are aware that ultimately any sin becomes deadly if we persevere in it against the admonition of God’s Word, sometimes reflected in us by our own properly‑formed conscience. So, we live every day repenting of all our sin, lesser and greater, and believing in God’s even greater grace for Christ’s sake, that grants us the forgiveness of all our sin, now and for eternity.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +