Recognize Yourself

The more carefully I read the events surrounding the crucifixion of Jesus, the more appalling they become. Men lied, manipulated legal proceedings, ignored evidence, pressured a governor, stirred a crowd, and railroaded an innocent man toward the cross. You can read it and think, These people were evil.

They were. The proper recognition of evil in the Passion narrative, however, begins by recognizing ourselves among those who wanted Christ crucified. The men who crucified Jesus were not different from us.

There is great value in reading dark periods of history this way. When we study Nazi Germany, we flatter ourselves if we automatically imagine that we would have been hiding Anne Frank in the attic or fighting with the resistance. The resistance was small. The more useful exercise is to reckon seriously with the possibility that we would have been among the ordinary people who went along, kept quiet, accepted what authorities told them, or lent tacit support by refusing to resist.

The same discipline belongs at the cross. When I read about the men who crucified Jesus, I should begin by asking which one looks like me.

Caiaphas gets there by calculation. Jesus has become a problem, Rome is a threat, the nation must be protected, and Caiaphas decides that one man is expendable.

And one of them, named Caiaphas, being the high priest that same year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all, Nor consider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not. (John 11:49-50)

Caiaphas does not sound insane. He sounds practical. He takes an innocent man, places Him on one side of a calculation, places political stability on the other side, and decides that killing Jesus is expedient.

The chief priests get there through settled opposition. They have watched Jesus teach, watched Him work, argued with Him, challenged Him, and finally determined that He has to die. They have been moving toward this end for a long time.

Pilate gets there by cowardice and political pressure. He repeatedly acknowledges that he finds no fault in Jesus, yet the threat of being accused of disloyalty to Caesar presses harder than his obligation to do justice. He knows enough to release Jesus and lacks the courage to act upon what he knows.

Each man takes a different road. They arrive at the same place.

Human beings are socially responsive creatures. We watch the people around us, take cues from them, respond to their fear, absorb their judgments, and often begin moving before we have independently examined what caused the group to move.

Picture a hundred horses standing in a field. A mountain lion appears along the south side, and the horses nearest the danger react first. The hundredth horse does not stand at the north end demanding his own personal inspection of the mountain lion before moving. He sees the herd move, receives information through the movement of the herd, and runs with it.

That capacity serves a herd very well when a mountain lion is actually present. Human moral judgment requires something more, because the crowd can run toward evil as readily as away from danger. God warned Israel about that danger very early.

Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment: (Exodus 23:2)

That warning continues throughout Scripture. God warns against walking in the counsel of the ungodly, consenting when sinners entice, learning the ways of bad companions, fearing the people and obeying their voice, being conformed to the world, and running with others into sin (Psalm 1:1; Proverbs 1:10, 15; Proverbs 22:24-25; 1 Samuel 15:24; Romans 12:2; 1 Peter 4:4).

John has already shown the same pressure working around Jesus. Men know things about Him and suppress what they know because confession carries a social cost.

Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue: For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. (John 12:42-43)

They recognize something true about Christ. The people around them possess enough influence to keep that recognition from becoming confession.

Then we arrive at the crowd before Pilate.

Luke says the multitude cried out together in Luke 23:18. A few verses later, he records their demand.

But they cried, saying, Crucify him, crucify him. (Luke 23:21)

Luke describes continued shouting. The demand is short and repeated, and the crowd presses it until Pilate yields.

And they were instant with loud voices, requiring that he might be crucified. And the voices of them and of the chief priests prevailed. (Luke 23:23)

Put those pieces together. They act together, keep shouting, repeat the same short demand, and press it loudly and persistently until their voices prevail. That is awfully close to what we ordinarily call a chant.

Now hear yourself in it.

I may not be Caiaphas, one of the chief priests, or Pilate. If I can honestly clear myself of all three, I still have to decide where I would have been standing when the crowd found its voice.

The hundredth man in Jerusalem did not necessarily arrive at the judgment hall after conducting his own sober examination of Jesus of Nazareth. He could have arrived as a disengaged spectator. He could have entered that crowd without the settled hatred of a chief priest and without the political calculations of Caiaphas.

Then the crowd moves.

A disengaged spectator can move with the same speed toward condemnation as the man who has opposed Christ from the beginning. One man arrives after months of hostility, another arrives with very little thought at all, and both eventually lend their voices to the same demand.

Crucify Him.

That is the danger of reading the Passion while assigning ourselves the flattering roles. We imagine ourselves standing with John, defending Christ, resisting the Sanhedrin, or courageously refusing the crowd. The harder and more useful exercise is to remember what kind of creatures we are and ask where we would actually have stood.

Once I recognize what kind of men they were, I have to recognize that I am that kind of man.

I understand calculation. I understand cowardice. I understand protecting what is familiar. I understand fearing consequences. I understand allowing the judgment of people around me to press upon my own judgment. I understand how quickly a crowd can make its certainty feel like my certainty.

The men who crucified Jesus were men.

So are we.

John’s Gospel keeps placing Christ before men until they must decide what His words require of them. Recognition that never governs conduct eventually exposes itself as empty recognition.

The Christian needs an authority outside himself and above the crowd. God has supplied that authority through His Word.

Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. (John 17:17)

God’s Word determines what is true when everyone around us says otherwise. His Word determines what is right when the multitude demands evil. His Word governs our judgment when friends, institutions, leaders, communities, and entire societies begin moving together.

The difference between Christians and the crowd before Pilate is that God has worked upon us through His Word, and we have submitted ourselves to it. Native moral superiority does not separate us from those men. God has taught us, corrected us, restrained us, and changed us through the truth He gave.

That is why the warnings about the crowd matter. We remain socially responsive creatures. We still hear the voices around us, feel their pressure, and recognize the cost of standing apart. The Word of God must possess greater authority over us than the voice of the people.

Saul once explained his disobedience by admitting that he feared the people and obeyed their voice (1 Samuel 15:24). That is the choice in plain language. The people have a voice, and God has spoken.

Whose voice governs us?

The Passion narrative gives us every reason to condemn what happened to Jesus. Caiaphas calculated, the chief priests opposed, Pilate surrendered justice, and the crowd cried for crucifixion. Their guilt is real.

The proper recognition of that evil begins when we recognize ourselves among them. I may enter the scene through calculation, cowardice, settled opposition, fear of men, or the simple willingness to move when everybody else begins moving. Different roads can still arrive at the same rejection of Christ.

The men who crucified Jesus were not different from us. The difference is that God has worked upon us through the power of His Holy Word, and we have submitted ourselves to it.

So when the crowd finds its voice, the Christian must already know whose voice governs him.