Sherwin, Simon: The Divide Of The Cross

Could you turn with me this evening, please, to Luke's Gospel, chapter twenty three. Luke's Gospel, chapter twenty three. Now, the cross of Christ divides. It divides the world into two camps, into those who are perishing and to those who are saved. It divides people into two allegiances, whether they will side with God and with his Christ, or whether they will side with the devil and with the world that rejected him. I want to read this evening, please, the the story essentially of two people, uh, in Luke's Gospel chapter 23, and it's two people who stood on either side of the divide. I'd like to read, uh, from verse one, please. And a whole multitude of them arose and led him, that is the Lord Jesus, unto Pilate. And they began to accuse him, saying, we found this fellow perverting the nation and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that he himself is Christ, a king. And Pilate asked him, saying, Art thou the king of the Jews? And he answered him and said, Thou sayest it. Then said Pilate to the chief priests and to the people, I find no fault in this man. And they were the more fierce, saying, He stirreth up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, beginning from Galilee to this place. When Pilate heard of Galilee, he asked whether the man were a Galilean, and as soon as he knew that he belonged under Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him to Herod, who himself also was at Jerusalem at that time. Verse eleven: And Herod, with his men of war, set him at naught and mocked him, and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe and sent him again to Pilate. On the same day, Pilate and Herod were made friends together, for before they were at enmity between themselves. And Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people, said unto them, You brought this man unto me as one that perverteth the people. And behold, I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye accuse him. No, nor yet Herod. For I sent you to him, and lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. I will therefore chastise him and release him. For of necessity he must release one unto them at the feast. And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this man and release unto us Barabbas, who for a certain sedition made in the city and for murder was cast into prison. Pilate, therefore, willing to release Jesus, spoke again to them, but they cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. And he said unto them the third time, Why? What evil has he done? I have found no cause of death in him. I will therefore chastise him and let him go. And they were instant with loud voices requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. And Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they required. And he released unto them him that for sedition and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired, but he delivered Jesus to their will. Verse thirty two. uh And there were also two others, benefactors led with him to be put to death. And when they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him, and the benefactors, one on the right hand and the other on the left. Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And they parted his garment, his raiment, and cast lots. Verse thirty nine, And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other, answering, rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds. But this man has done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into my kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Now look to the Lord to add his blessing to the reading of his words. In the account in Matthew's gospel, Pilate asks a question, and it's this question, what shall I do then, or what shall I then do with Jesus who is called the Christ? What shall I do with Jesus who is called the Christ? And a decision had to be made that day. A decision was made by Pilate. I want to suggest that a decision was made by the, uh, the thief that hung beside the Lord Jesus. They both made a decision. They both reached a decision about the person of Christ. They both stood on different sides of the divide, and they both would, uh, give us very interesting lessons that we can learn this evening. Because I want to suggest that if you take your stand with Pilate, then you'll be making some of the same mistakes a- and coming to the same, uh, conclusions that Pilate did that day. And if you decide, uh, to trust Christ, to stand with Christ, to take your, to give him your allegiance and to take him as your Lord, then you'll be doing something that the dying thief did that day. The figure of Pontius Pilate is a very tragic one on the pages of scripture. Not much is said about him, uh, in the Bible. We learn one or two other things about him from history. He's a, uh, a definite historical figure who is attested outside the Bible. He doesn't come just here. You can read about him elsewhere. Not much is said about him, but what goes down on record is that he perpetrated the greatest travesty of justice that this world has ever seen. And what goes down on record is that here is a man who is prepared to listen to the crowd rather than to justice and to what was right. You see, not not only that, but Pilate did a number of things and made a number of mistakes, if you like, before he ever came to that point. And the first mistake that he made was he tried to say, well, it's not my decision. It's not my decision, it's not up to me. I don't have to make a choice here, um, I- I can palm it off on somebody else. And we get that in verses six and seven. when he found out that he- he- he was a Galilean, that he came under Herod's jurisdiction, he said, it's not my problem, send him off somewhere else. I want to tell you tonight that if, uh, if you are not saved, if you've never yet put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation, you cannot, uh, uh, you just cannot do that. You can't say it's not my problem. You can't say I don't have to make a decision. You can't say that the person of Jesus Christ is nothing to me, I can, and I can just palm him off and not make a decision about him. Because, you see, the person of Christ is absolutely essential to the message of salvation. The person of Christ is absolutely essential to the history of the world. And the person of Christ is absolutely essential to your future and to mine. You see, the person of Christ stands at the center of everything, of absolutely everything. He sends, he stands at the center of the purposes of God, and it is by him we stand, and it is by him that we fall. The person of Christ is crucial. We have to, we have to make a decision. The question that Pilate asked, what shall I do then with Jesus, which is called the Christ, is one that every single person has to answer, and which every single person has to face up to. And they can't palm it off and say it's not my decision. See, things that we palm off and things that we, um, we try and say nothing to do with me have a nasty habit of coming back on us, don't they? And you see, Pilate sent him away, but Herod sent him back again. Pilate couldn't get away from the, uh, couldn't get away from this issue. Couldn't stand aside and say it wasn't his responsibility. Couldn't say, couldn't stand aside and say, let somebody else deal with this. It's a personal issue that we must all face up to. The person of Christ is someone that we must all consider. I want to say that the second thing that he did, uh, and we find that in verse twelve, is that he made friends with God's enemies. He made friends with God's enemies. He took his side with those who opposed God. You say, where do I, where do I get that from? It says, verse twelve, the same day Pilate and Herod were made friends together. Who was Herod? Well, Herod was a, was a wicked king. And if you look back in the pages of Luke's gospel and in the pages of some of the other gospels, you'll find out the kind of man that, that Herod was. And Herod has been responsible for, uh, for beheading the greatest prophet that Israel had ever seen. The greatest prophet that God had sent into the world before he sent his own dear son, the Lord Jesus Christ, John the Baptist, Herod was responsible for beheading. Herod was somebody as well who, who flaunted the law of God, who said basically that the law of God doesn't matter, I will do it my way, and I will stand, uh, by myself, and I will do what I want to do. You see, Herod in essence stands for the world around us, because the world around us is anti-God. The world in which we live, you have it in the media, you have it i- i- in all segments of society. The world around us is contrary to and opposed to the God of heaven. And they are, uh, they are opposed to the laws of God. They are opposed to the ways of God. And to stand against Christ is to take your stand with the world and to take your stand with the enemies of God. I want to tell you that that is a very, very dangerous position to take. In fact, if you will, if you want to stand with the enemies of God, it will mean certain doom and certain destruction. Says the psalmist, the wicked shall be turned into hell and all the nations that forget God. It's a very, very solemn thing to do, to take your stand against the person of Christ, to be friends, to be on the side of a world that opposes God. A world that says black is white and white is black, to say a world that says right is wrong and wrong is right, and overturns the laws of God. It's a world that is asking for trouble, and trouble is certainly coming upon this, uh, upon this world. God will act, and God will judge. But to take a stand against Christ, to reject Christ, is to stand with a world that is condemned and that has the judgment of God hanging over it. The first thing that Pilate did was that he ignored what was right. He ignored what was right. Three times over, I think it is, we find in these verses that he tells that, uh, that he says that there's no fault in this man. Verse four, I find no fault in this man. Verse eleven, I having exa- oh, verse fourteen, sorry, even, I having examined him have found no fault in him. Verse fifteen, no, nor yet Herod. Verse, uh, twenty two, I have found no cause of death in him. He knew what was right. He knew that the man that was standing before him was innocent of all charges. And yet he condemned him. And he handed him over to be crucified in, oh, to be crucified. He ignored justice. Let's ask you, would you like to stand before a judge like that? Would you like to stand before a judge who so- who pays absolutely no regard to what is right and to what is true? It's hard to credit, isn't it? It's hard to credit that a man can be brought face to face with someone who is absolutely pure and absolutely holy and absolutely just, and that was what the Lord Jesus was. You see, he wasn't just innocent of the charges that were brought against him, but the Lord Jesus was absolutely perfect and without sin. The Bible teaches that very, very clearly. The Lord Jesus was absolutely pure and holy. Says Pilate in a, i- i- i- in another gospel, I find no fault in him at all, at all. Nothing wrong with him. And yet he overturns justice, and he delivers him over to be crucified. I should tell you tonight that if you reject Christ, you're doing exactly the same thing. If you reject Christ, the one who was crucified, then you're saying he deserved to die. You're saying that you would take your place with Pilate, who condemned him, though he knew that he was innocent of all charges. Again, it's a very dangerous position To to take. break. I want to tell you that one day the one who is, who was being judged by Pilate is himself going to be the judge. And he's the one before whom every single man and woman and boy and girl is going to have to stand. And I want to tell you that he's not like Pilate. And he won't overturn justice. And he won't say that, uh, that that what is right is wrong, and what's wrong is right. He will have absolutely perfect justice and judgment. But I want to tell you tonight that if you stand before him as your judge, then you can only be condemned. See, the Bible paints a very black picture o- o- of men and women and boys and girls in the world in which we live. The Bible says this, the Bible says that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That means that every single one of us has failed to meet the standard that God expects of us. That means that every single one of us have offended the righteous and holy and pure laws of God. We are all lawbreakers. That is what a sinner is. Sin is transgression of the law. Sin is lawlessness, and we are all lawbreakers in God's sight, and as such, we'll be condemned if we stand before the Lord Jesus as our judge. What's the fourth thing that that Pilate did? The fourth thing is he listened to the crowd. You listen to the crowd. See him... To a certain extent, you can feel sorry for Pilate, can't you? I- I say to a certain extent, because I don't feel very sorry for him, because he's, uh, he's... He should have done better. He- he was placed in the position that he was in, uh, in a position of trust by the Roman judiciary and the Roman authorities. You see, Pilate's got a, a tricky situation on his hand, and the crowd's against him, and he can feel it. Uh, and he can hear them, and he can hear them being insistent in trying to crucify him. You see, he was willing to release him. He wanted to release the Lord Jesus, but the crowd said no. What's he going to do? Is he going to listen to the crowd, or is he going to stand against the crowd? You see, the crowd outside is anti-God. The crowd outside says, oh, you don't want to be a Christian, do you? The crowd outside says, you're considering that? You're considering that message. Uh, and and you can think of all the, of all the arguments that they come up, why you shouldn't trust Christ, why you shouldn't become a Christian, why you shouldn't, uh, why you shouldn't take your stand against the one who was crucified two thousand years, uh, with, sorry, with the one who was crucified two thousand years ago. And the crowd can be very insistent. And the crowd at school can be very i- insistent, and they can be very hurtful, a- a- and they can be, and they can be very nasty and cruel. A- a- and Pilate found it very difficult that day when the crowd was against him. But Pilate listened to the crowd. I want to tell you tonight that if you listen to the crowd, then you'll be lost. If you listen to the crowd, you'll be lost. And so Pilate, he released the guilty, and he condemned the innocent. And the greatest travesty of justice is that this world has ever seen. He released him that for rebellion and murder was cast into prison, whom they had desired, but he delivered, he delivered Jesus to their will. Against all justice, against his better judgment, against, dare I say it, his eternal well-being. He listened to the crowd. But then we have the, the, the thief who was hanging beside the Lord Jesus. And if Pilate made a number of mistakes, well, I want to say that this man got everything right. Uh, and this man at the end received that wonderful, uh, uh, wonderful word of assurance from the lips of the Lord Jesus, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Tonight this man's in heaven, and this man is saved. Don't know about Pilate. I've got a sneaking suspicion that he's lost. The Bible doesn't tell us anything, uh, anything other than that. But Pilate one day made his decision to stand against Christ, and if he never changed that decision, then he's lost the light. But this man, if Pilate tried to put off making a decision, well, this man, he hadn't got any time, had he? He couldn't put off making the decision. He couldn't say it wasn't his, that wasn't his decision to make. This man, he realized that time was short, and he had to get right with God. I want to tell you tonight that time is short. We can't promise tomorrow. We can't say how long we'll be given, how many opportunities we'll be given to trust Christ as our savior, or to be like this man here and to grasp the opportunity when he had it. Had he left it another three hours, it would have been too late. Had he left it a little bit longer, it may even have been too late. We don't know he, but what we do know is that he grasped the opportunity when he had it, and this man's in heaven tonight. But then we see if Pilate sided with those who, uh, were, uh, opposed to God and those that were rejecting Christ, can you see this man? He definitely took his side with the Lord Jesus. You've got the other man who is hanging not so very far away from him on the other side of the Lord Jesus, a- a- and he was railing on Christ, saying, if thou be Christ, save thyself and us. He wasn't really interested in that at all. He was just shouting out the, uh, the the the taunt to the rest of them. He didn't believe for one minute that the Lord Jesus could do anything of the sort. But here we have the other answering, rebuked him. He took his stand against those that were opposing the Lord Jesus. I want to tell you tonight that to take your stand with the Lord Jesus will bring you into opposition with the world, and it will set you at odds with the rest of the men and women and boys and girls around us, those whose allegiance is not with Christ, who have never taken him as their Lord and Savior. But I want to tell you, it didn't matter to this man. He was going to take his stand anyway. And I want to tell you that the pathway to blessing and the pathway to salvation is the pathway of allegiance to Christ, and it's the only way, the only route of salvation. What did Pilate do? Well, he ignored what was right. Well, this man doesn't ignore what was right, does he? He faces up to what's right, and he admits his own guilt. So I think that's one of the hardest things to do. Certainly one of the hardest things that my children find to do. It's always anybody else's fault but mine. Harry's got a, a, a latest thing that he says. I don't know where he learnt it. I guess it's his sinful nature that's within him. Wasn't me, it was Christina. Even if Christina's at school. I didn't do it, it wasn't me, it was Christina. He said, but Christina's not here. Where's Martha? Or Annie? Or anybody else, just not me. It's natural, isn't it? It's something that we all do. And it's something that doesn't get any easier and any better as you get older. But this man was prepared to face up to the, to reality. And this man was prepared to face up to his guilt. He says, look, dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation, and we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds and is prepared to acknowledge his guilt in the presence of God. So it was a fear of God, a reverence for God, a realization that very, very shortly he was going to have to stand before God. And that realization kind of brings great clarity of thinking to a lot of people. The realization that time is short, and very, very shortly I'm going to have to stand before God makes us do an awful lot of thinking, and a lot of weighing up, and a- and a lot of assessment, a lot of, uh, self-examination. And this man looked at himself, and he saw that what he was getting was what he deserved, and he admitted that. I want to tell you tonight that if you're going to be saved, you're going to have to face up to your guilt in the sight of God. To face up to the fact that you don't deserve God's salvation because you're just a guilty, hell-deserving sinner, and to admit that in the presence of God. The second, the, the third thing, or the fourth thing, I forget where we've got to so far. The the next thing he does is he acknowledges or appreciates the sinlessness of Christ. Look at this that he says. He says, this man has done nothing amiss. He recognizes the sinless perfection of the man who is hanging beside him. I want to tell you tonight that that is our hope. That is our hope. Because the Lord Jesus Christ was sinless and was perfect, it meant that he could go to the cross and he could become the sin bearer. In the verses that we didn't read, verse 44 and forty five, it speaks about from the sixth hour and there being a darkness over all the earth until the ninth hour. And in those three hours of darkness, the Lord Jesus, the sinless one, the one who'd done not one thing out of place, became the sin bearer and became the one who took upon himself the judgment of God for our sins. He was the only one who could have done it. He's the only one who has. He's the only one who has gone so far and so deep to bring us back to God. That's why we're preaching tonight. That's why we tell you about the Lord Jesus, because without him there is no hope, and without the Lord Jesus there is no salvation. He stood out from the crowd. He didn't listen to the crowd. The crowd are, are all around him, and they're mocking the Lord Jesus, and they're, uh, they're pouring ridicule upon him, but he didn't listen to them. And how do I know that? He turns to the Lord Jesus, or he says to the Lord Jesus, he says, Lord, Lord. And that's it. That is the crux of the whole issue. You see, the, the world around us doesn't want him as their Lord. But if you want to be in heaven, that's just what you have to recognize him as, and just what you have to take him as. If you want to be in God's heaven, it has to be through the Lord Jesus, and it has to be acknowledging his lordship over you, acknowledging his claims upon your life, because I tell you, he has got claims upon you. He's got claims as your creator because he made you, but more of, more than that, he has claims as our redeemer because he has paid the price whereby we can be set free. Lord, he says, remember me when thou comest in my kingdom. This is an absolutely remarkable statement. Remarkable insight, this. For all intents and purposes, the man beside him was done for, was dying. Do you see, this man here looked beyond that. And he looked not at a man who was dying, but looked at a man who was going to be risen again, who was going to be raised again from the dead, and who was going to come in majesty, and was going to come to set up his kingdom. That is remarkable that this man saw it when so many others didn't. Even the disciples didn't believe this at this stage. Th- th- they hadn't appreciated it. But says the thief who's, uh, hanging next to the Lord Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom. And he's looking to the future. And he says, with Christ there is a future. With Christ there is a standing, and with Christ there is salvation. Lord, remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom. He's looking for the future. But the Lord Jesus looks for today. And the Lord Jesus looks to the present. He says, early, I say to thee, today, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. You see, that's what salvation is all about. So John's Gospel chapter three and verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Salvation is all about something that we have now. Something that is to be enjoyed today. Today. For that thief, it was to be transported at the point of his death from, uh, from earth to paradise. It was an immediate transformation, an immediate transportation. For him, it was a conscious realization of the presence of Christ. I want to say, I want to say to you that salvation is no less immediate for those who trust Christ now. It's a present salvation. It's the possession of eternal life. And it's for now. Yes, the future is secured, and there is a full assurance of a coming day with Christ in his presence forever. But it's not just that. This is the day, today. Don't now be with me in paradise. If Pilate condemned the guilty, uh, condemned the innocent and let the guilty go free, here's the guilty going free, and the innocent not condemned but dying in his place. Here's the, the innocent, if you like, the Lord Jesus was far more than innocent. He was perfect and he was holy. Here was the, the, the, the perfect one giving himself, as Peter would say, the just suffered for the unjust, that he might bring us to God. And so the guilty can go free. And the guilty can go free justly and rightly, because justice has been satisfied in the person of Christ. And if we take him as our savior and as our Lord, then we can know that present possession of eternal life now, and the assurance of everlasting life with Christ in the day to come. So we pray. Our Father, we thank thee this evening for thy word. We thank thee for the Lord Jesus. We thank thee, our Father, for what he has accomplished at Calvary. We thank thee, Father, for the fact that he was the perfect one, and that he gave himself for us. And he died for our sins. Our Father, we thank thee more than that, that the one who died is the one who has been raised again from the dead and who lives in the power of an endless life. We thank thee, Father, for the one who is worth trusting. Our Father, we just pray that thou will bless thy word to each of our hearts this evening, that we might be all found trusting in the Savior, not worrying and not caring what the world may think, but realizing the, the, the glories of thy salvation in the person of thy Son. So we give you thanks for this time we spent together, and we ask thy blessing to be upon us now, in the name of the Lord Jesus.