The Substitute - Wild Heart: Mark’s Portraits of a Radical Messiah

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We’re continuing our series Wild Heart: Mark’s Portrait of a Radical Messiah this morning.

Last week we looked at Peter’s denial of Jesus and how it began when Peter decided to follow Jesus at a distance. That’s a cautionary tale for us to take seriously. When we decide to ‘follow Jesus at a safe distance’ we have made our first decision to deny Him. So we’re reminded once again that staying close to Jesus is important as a community or believers.

Today the story of Jesus’ final night before His crucifixion takes us through His judgment before Pilate.

What comes to mind when you hear the word ‘substitute?’ (teachers, ingredients, team sports, foods, etc.) There’s a reason they’re substitutes they typically aren’t as good as the real thing.

Substitutes are usually worse, or inferior to the real thing. We use them when the real thing isn’t available to us or we substitute things of lower quality because what we want seems to be too expensive. People decide on substitutions for lots of things but one substitution is by far the most costly and we’ll see that substitution played out through the eyes of Mark….

Let’s read Mark 15:6-15

One nagging question about this passage comes to mind whenever I read this passage; why did these people choose Barabbas? The Bible makes it clear that they knew he was a convicted criminal.

He was a rebel who had led a revolt against the Romans that included murder. That leads me to believe that those He killed weren’t Roman soldiers killed in a battle. My guess is that they probably killed some tax collectors to get money to fund their rebellion.

This was a bad dude and placed opposite Jesus it should have been a clear choice but for some reason this crowd chose Barabbas. Since Pilate was trying to find a way to release Jesus it seems pretty clear that he thought it was an obvious choice.

What blinded these people so that they would reject Jesus for a robber? Why would they substitute a robber for the real thing?

I guess we could ask the same question today. Why do people reject Jesus for the robber who comes to steal kill and destroy lives? Why do they make this terrible substitution?

I can see three reasons why people choose a substitute for Jesus I in this passage:

Personal bias: choosing to deny the truth vs. 10-11 reveal that the religious leaders had it in for Jesus. They had a personal agenda that was biased against Jesus and they would have been happy with any substitute. In reality they had become so comfortable with cheapo substitutes that it was really easy for them to do it. They had substituted a man made system of rules and regulations for God’s law and they carefully crafted the rules in their own favor.

That’s why they hated Jesus so much. He showed up on the scene and the flimsy curtain they were hiding behind was being shredded by the truth. It really was an inconvenient truth that they didn’t want to admit.

Jesus still poses that same threat. If we really consider the real Jesus, the Jesus of His word, the Jesus of the gospels, He presents us with one BIG inconvenient truth that just won’t go away.

Jesus came as the light of the world, the revealed truth of God and John’s gospel tells us that this Light exposes us for what we really are. Its so inconvenient people will take the substitute rather than life. No one wants to admit that they’re not ‘good.’ In fact there are preachers and teachers that will tell us that deep down we really are good and people flock to them. That’s because they are scratching the itch of our personal bias.

Funny thing is that Jesus came and said we’re all evil and hopelessly lost and separated from God. Never once did He say we’re o.k. just the way they we are. The religious leaders didn’t want to hear that and frankly neither do we.

I think that if Jesus were to come to our churches and tell us the truth we’d find Him to be very inconvenient and we might even cry out for His crucifixion. But as a side note He loves us so much He’d tell us the truth even it if cost Him His life all over again.

Popular will: choosing to follow the crowd vs. 11-14 the people were influenced to substitute Barabbas for Jesus because it was the popular thing to do. The religious leaders started it off by using their influence and pretty soon the crowd was crying for Barabbas to be released and Jesus to be crucified.

People for the most part just naturally follow the crowd, even those who claim to be ‘doing their own thing’ probably aren’t, they’re just following a different crowd.

Popular will has a viral quality to it. It’s starts out small, maybe with one or two people, then they tell some friends and then those friends tells some friends and the next thing you know its spread around the world and it becomes so big that everyone jumps on board.

There’s a strong momentum with popular will that makes it hard to resist. It’s much easier to follow the crowd than to risk being an outcast. Popular will can be fairly innocent but it can also take on a dark, sinister vibe.

One such vibe is what we know as a ‘mob mentality’ that can take hold of us and we’ll actually do something with a group that we’d never do alone.

Jesus warned us that the road to destruction would be really popular and full of people all heading in the wrong direction and that’s what happened to the crowd that day and they chose to substitute popular will for Jesus.

Compromise: avoiding the cost of choosing Jesus vs. 15 tells that Pilate chose to release Barabbas because he wanted to ‘gratify’ the crowd. He could have released Jesus but chose the substitute because it would cost him too much. Pilate knew that if the people rebelled that he would be forced to put them down with violence and it would likely cost him his job or worse. The substitute wasn’t great but in his mind it looked like a less expensive alternative.

Jesus said that following Him would be costly, taking up His cross and being hated by the very people we love. He cautioned us to count the cost because it would be hard.

Like Pilate, when people really consider the claims of Jesus they find it to be too costly and they often settle for a cheap substitute.

Conclusion: It’s pretty easy for us to look at the world around us and point out people who have substituted the things of this world for their relationship to God with Jesus. But, I think it’s important for those of us who claim that we’re followers of Jesus to take a step back and see if there are things we’re substituting in place of Jesus and His desire for our life.

Like Barabbas we stand guilty and condemned. We deserve to die for our sins the things we’ve done to hurt others, ourselves, and ultimately God Himself.

(This is the video we used)

Jesus stands ready and willing to substitute His life for ours so that we can go free

We’re rebellious robbers who are chained together under the authority of a hostile invader who wants us dead.

Like Barabbas we don’t understand it all but when all is said and done if we’ll look back at what has happened we’ll realize that Jesus gave His life for ours and the punishment we deserved He took upon Himself.

Look at Him today and see the joy in His eyes as another one of God’s children is set free.