EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES
John 19:19-20. This was also one reason for the title written (τίτλος, titulus, the technical name) by Pilate for the cross of Jesus. His alone would need it. For people might be inclined to ask (those who were not mere tools of the Jewish rulers), “Why was this man, who had been declared innocent, and who during His life among the people had gone about doing good, thus treated?” But the title was also indicative of Pilate’s scorn of those Jews, and part of his revenge for their having forced him against his better judgment, his will, and his conscience to condemn Christ. The reason why the title was written in the three languages chiefly in use in Palestine at that period is evident; but it seems also to give an indication of Pilate’s eagerness to let the accusation be widely known. Hebrew.—No doubt the current Aramaic (Semitic) dialect. Greek.—The language of culture. Latin.—The language of imperial Rome.
John 19:23-24. Took His garments, etc.—St. John’s is the more full account of this incident. John 19:23-24, explain why the soldiers cast lots. This is merely mentioned generally by the Synoptists, as if it applied to the garments as a whole.
John 19:25-27. Now there stood by the cross, etc.—Are three or four women mentioned here? The evidence on the whole seems to show that there were four—that the sister of Mary, the mother of Jesus, is not “Mary of Clopas” (Alphæus, Matthew 27:56; Matthew 10:3), but Salome (Mark 15:40), “the mother of Zebedee’s children.” The reason why her name is not mentioned is that John in his Gospel does not mention his own name, or the names of his kindred, except by circumlocution. If this explanation be correct it throws a clear light on the incident of John 19:26-27. It would also explain in a measure why the mother of Zebedee’s children ventured to make so bold a request for her two sons on one occasion (Matthew 20:21).
John 19:28-30. Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished (for accomplished read finished, τετέλεσται), that the Scripture might be (accomplished) τελειωθῇ.—These words are from the same root. By His life and death He had fulfilled the purpose for which divine revelation was given, the purpose to which it all pointed, i.e. the redemption of men. Therefore, knowing this, He called out, “I thirst” (thus fulfilling the prophetic words regarding the suffering Servant of Jehovah, Psalms 69:21); and when His parched lips and tongue were moistened by the drops of sour wine, He was able to lift the cry of victory, It is finished (again τετέλεσται). Bowed His head.—All the narratives show clearly that our Lord’s death was a voluntary death.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— John 19:19-30
John 19:19. The “title on the cross.”—
I. We should have an interest in the details of the crucifixion.—
1. If we believe that the death on this cross was borne for our sakes, we cannot but take an interest in every detail connected with it.
2. A wonderful and well-known picture, at which many have loved to look, presents to us the mother of the Crucified being gently led away from the awesome scene by him who was now her “son,” broken-hearted, crushed by what she had gone through. The face is something to look at—so grief-stricken, so heart-pierced and yet with some strange, quaint ray of faith lighting it up! And the painter has given this “touch.” In the poor, feeble, quivering fingers is clasped—what? The “crown of thorns.” Unconsciously, instinctively, Mary had unfastened the cruel thorns from her holy child’s head. They were no more hurting then; but it was nature in a mother’s hand to tear it off. And now she clasps it, keeps it, dear, precious. It was with Him, part of Him, and it is sacred, not to be parted with now! But it will be said—and truly in a measure—that is merely natural sentiment.
3. Well, again there are those who think that could they but hold in their hand, while kneeling in prayer, or engaged in holy, devotional thought, a piece of the real, true wooden cross of Golgotha, how good, how happy that would make them. And now it will be said—in a measure truly—this is superstition.
4. But is there not solid ground on which Christians who are given neither to sentiment nor superstition may stand? We love Him who died for us (would we loved Him better!). We love to think of the death He endured. All our blessings, all our hopes, spring from it. The Bible has given the story of the cross in full detail. We wish to look at, think about, and understand everything, even the incidental details and circumstances, connected with the cross of Calvary.
II. Here, then, is what is called the title on the cross.—
1. We should neither in mere sentiment nor in superstition, but as common-sense and honest readers of the Bible, look at and think of this incident in the story of the cross.
2. There it hangs (nailed no doubt to the cross) in large, legible, official characters, telling in the three languages there in common use the name of Him who was put to death, where He came from, and His crime.
3. We know the name—a name dear to many a heart—to many who love it better still to-day beyond. And “Nazareth.” Ay! bless God, He lived, for our sakes, the common village life of poor Nazareth! And what about His crime? “King of the Jews.” A bitter taunt which the Roman governor, in writing it, flung at the priests and rulers and the Jewish mob they led. We know how this came about. They forged a story which Pilate no more believed than they—that this man had harboured claims of kingly dignity, dangerous to the Roman rule. So in one of the feeble efforts Pilate made to save the life of Jesus, he said, “This is your king: shall I crucify your king?” So anxious were priests and mob to have this man crucified that they were willing to renounce their very national history, as it were, and lay their necks under the foot of Rome: “We have no king but Cæsar.” And when Pilate still hesitated, the last touch that spurred him to the leap was the threat, “Let this man off, and it will be told at Rome, ‘thou art no true friend to Cæsar.’ ” And so, later in the day, Pilate sat down to write the official “title”; and one can fancy the bitter smile that crossed the Roman’s face as he said, “They shall have no king but Cæsar! And it shall be told at Rome that Pilate was so true to Cæsar and ruled the Jewish people with so stern a hand that he crucified before their very faces the man whom they dared to call their king.” The title was nailed up, in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, that all men of all nations might read: “The King of the Jews.”
4. The priests and rulers read it, and gnashed their teeth when they saw themselves entrapped by the wily Roman. They would have him to soften or explain his phrase. But the haughty ruler said, “What I have written,” etc. Thus this title was just one more of the many words and tones of bitterness and hate and mockery with which men surrounded that day the cross of the Saviour.
5. They were all of a piece, these surroundings of His cross! The mocking of Herod’s men, Pilate’s soldiers, the robe and crown and sceptre, all in ribald scorn; the brutal scourging, and hellish hate of priests and Pharisees, and the yells of the fiendish mob! The mocking title with its bitter gibe between Rome and the Jews was quite in tone with all the rest.
6. Only from Him (the central figure of the throng) throughout the fearful scene came that day what was calm and true in tone, and tender. From Him comes the gentle prayer, “Father, forgive them,” etc., and the brief message, and the last look—the one word to His dearest earthly friend, and the one word to her and the last look to her! Even the weary sigh, as all was over, was of heaven and peace! All around was hate and mockery and hell.
7. It mattered little what they wrote above the drooping head, or what bitter scorn might pass between the Jews and Rome, or that it baffled them to say why He was put to death. Why He died was known in heaven, amidst the angels’ joy and wonder.
III. Application.—
1. We can take the Roman’s words of mockery and read them calmly, truly for ourselves. Little did Pilate dream how true were those words of his! He is King, Sovereign, Ruler in a higher, wider, greater realm than ever Rome or Israel dreamed of!
2. Let it be our prayer that He would make us true and loving subjects in His realm, to be owned in the new heavens and the new earth, as having followed His banner and upheld His kingdom.
2. And scattered Israel shall yet be gathered, and the land of His birth and lineage, whose tongue He spoke, whose homes He blessed, whose prophecies He fulfilled, will yet know Him as its “King.”
3. The mocking title may well remind us of many things concerning Him—the love He bears us still, His kingdom here, His kingdom coming.
4. To think of it may also help us, when we have to bear from others things hard to be borne, to remember the patient, silent Sufferer amidst all the insults that were around His cross, to breathe of His spirit and to be His followers.—Rev. Thomas Hardy.
John 19:23-24. The soldiers divide the garments of Jesus.—It was the custom among the Romans that the executioners at a crucifixion should divide among themselves the raiment of the criminals. The raiment was taken off before the sufferer was nailed to the cross. Jesus endured even this humiliation. There was not one drop of the bitter cup He did not drain. But this indignity too was foreseen. The action was retrospectively a fulfilment of the prophetic word: it told of the Saviour’s present condition; it pointed symbolically forward to one chief end of His redemptive work.
I. It fulfilled prophecy.—
1. It was done that an ancient scripture might be fulfilled (Psalms 22:18). How wonderfully was this ancient psalm fulfilled on Calvary! The very words, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” etc., are those recorded. How graphically do such verses as 6 and 17 of the psalm describe the utter humiliation of the sufferings of the Saviour!
2. And in this incident the rude Romans were God’s agents in fulfilling His prophetic word. They knew nothing of it; the Jews would not urge them to do anything to connect Jesus with prophetic Scripture; and therefore all were used as unconscious instruments in carrying out the divine purpose.
3. As the whole of prophetic Scripture points to the Messiah and in Him finds its fulfilment, we should be careful of wresting its meaning lest we lose the divine instruction it is intended to convey.
II. It testified to the poverty of Jesus and His utter humiliation.—
1. “Though He was rich, for our sakes He became poor,” etc. We read of no money. (Judas kept the “bag.” He had made sure of securing it; and what was it to him now?) No gems or jewels bedecked His person. His garments were of a simple fashion. The headdress, sandals, outer robe, and sash were all probably of the simplest, and the large outer robe could readily be divided. But the tunic, fitting closely to the body, and probably finer than the rest, as it was seamless, etc. (John 19:23), the soldiers (there was a “quaternion” engaged at the actual crucifixion) did not divide.
2. All this shows how poor He was in earth’s possessions, and how great was His humiliation. The rude soldiers were unmoved by the silent majesty with which He suffered. They thought only of the spoils, and left Him naked and exposed to the burning sunshine of the late Syrian spring. He drank the cup of sorrow and shame to the bitter dregs.
III. It may be viewed symbolically.—
1. “For our sakes He became poor.” He was made naked that we might be clothed (Revelation 3:18). The seamless garment—like the high-priestly robe (Revelation 1:13)—He allowed to be taken off, that we might be clothed in garments made white in His precious blood (Revelation 7:14). It was symbolical of His perfect obedience (Romans 5:18, etc.).
2. And on His cross, through His sufferings and death, another garment has been woven for His believing people. His suffering unto death satisfied and vindicated the broken law. Hence—
“Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness
My beauty are, my glorious dress” (Isaiah 61:10).
3. The simple garments which He wore on earth the callous Roman legionaries divided and cast lots for. But the heavenly dress, glorious in everlasting beauty, which Jesus provides, is given to all who, feeling their nakedness, the insufficiency of their own poor moral rags to clothe the soul, come in faith to Him. Then He endues them with that which will protect them from the fiery heat of divine wrath against sin, and insure them a welcome entrance to the heavenly feast (Matthew 22:12).
John 19:26-27. Mary at the cross.—It was eternal Love incarnate that hung on the cross on Calvary. And it is in accordance with the nature of that love unspeakable, which embraced all ages and races, that it should care especially for those most moulded to its likeness. And as at the death-bed of those dearest we treasure up the words spoken, so the loving friends of Jesus would treasure up the words they heard fall from His lips during those hours of suffering on the cross. To the writer of this Gospel especially none of those words would appeal more than those in which Jesus honoured him with the care of Mary. Notice:—
I. The bitter grief of Mary.—
1. Simeon’s words in the temple to Mary now received their utmost fulfilment. A sword truly pierced through her soul that day. Was this to be the end of all those hopes which she had treasured up in regard to her wonderful Son? Did the strange events which accompanied His birth, and which she kept, and pondered in her heart, lead to this and nothing more?
2. None can estimate the suffering of Mary as she stood with her weeping friends and John at the foot of the cross. She and they bad been prepared for struggle, for conflict, in His progress toward His Messianic throne. But what a throne was this blood-stained cross, what a crown was that which lacerated His brow!
3. Not only would the bitter grief of shattered hopes fill her breast; the pangs of maternal love would be more bitter still. What true mother could stand unmoved whilst seeing her son suffer untold agonies? And the maternal affection of the heart of her who was called “blessed among women” would not be less but more keen. How then must that heart have been rent during those awful hours!
II. The loving sympathy of Jesus.—
1. Even in that hour of unutterable agony, when dread portents were showing nature’s sympathy in the sufferings of the Son of God, Jesus showed that He was truly human—Emmanuel, God with us. In the midst of His terrible sufferings, in the conflict He was waging to bring redemption to our race, we could not have wondered if Jesus for the time had forgot all of earth.
2. Yet even in that awful hour He did not forget those nearest to Him as the Son of man. He saw the group of weeping followers, but His glance rested especially on two—on His mother and the beloved disciple. He remembered her widowed condition. He saw the traces of her bitter grief. He knew the desolation caused in her heart through the fading of hope in consequence of imperfect faith. And even in that hour when the awful sense of desolation was stealing in upon His own soul, which issued in the mysterious cry, “Eli, Eli,” etc., His filial heart flowed forth in sympathising love to her who bore Him.
3. Even in that hour of suffering He remembered her deep affection, her tender care and solicitude, the strong yet gentle bonds of a mother’s love. This we may believe was dear to the human heart of Jesus; and as He gazed on Mary, now standing with tear-bedewed countenance near the cross, waiting heart-broken for the inevitable end, His filial sympathy and love welled up and overflowed in thoughts and words of tenderness.
III. The filial care of Jesus for Mary.—
1. Whilst Mary and her friends stood weeping, wondering, the Saviour spoke to His mother, commending her to the care of the disciple whom He loved.
2. Why was this? Had faith in Jesus brought with it the inevitable division even into His mother’s home, so that harmony between her and His unbelieving brethren no longer existed, though it was afterward no doubt restored (Matthew 10:36; Acts 1:14)? But in any case nothing could be more appropriate than that those two, who loved the Saviour with the deepest, purest affection, should thenceforward occupy one home.
3. We are not to think that the term Jesus used in addressing Mary—“Woman,” i.e. “Lady”—implied any diminution of His filial affection. But it certainly does imply (as it did to a less extent in John 2:4) that the relationship cannot thenceforward rest on the same basis. Mary, too, must look to her Son as the Redeemer. And as the Saviour must now depart, His filial duty, so far as earth is concerned, must devolve on another; although we must believe that He had still a special interest in and care for her whom He called mother on earth.
4. The disciple to whose care Mary was confided proved himself worthy of so honourable a trust. “From that hour” Mary was tended with filial care and reverence, until she was called to see in His glory Him beside whose cross she had wept in the hour of His deepest humiliation.
Lessons.—
1. Our Redeemer is our example in the doing of relative duty. This is one of the laws of the Christian life (1 Timothy 5:8). Even the awful position in which He was placed did not make Jesus as the perfect man forget the duty of care and consolation toward His mother, even though that relationship was now to be merged in a higher.
2. The honour and dignity of being trusted by the Saviour with the care of His loved ones—His disciples (Matthew 12:49). John entered most deeply into the Saviour’s thoughts, etc., and was rewarded with a special love, showing itself in this special trust committed to him. It is an honour to be thus trusted by kings and potentates; how infinitely greater is the honour when we are thus trusted by the King of kings, and His “needy brethren” committed for temporal or spiritual things to our care!
John 19:28-30. “I thirst.”—The hot Syrian spring day was waning toward afternoon. True, from the sixth to the ninth hour darkness had fallen over the face of nature. The sun had been eclipsed; but as an earthquake was near most likely the air would be still and heavy, oppressive and hot like the sirocco’s breath, as it frequently is before an earthquake. Jesus had stood on Calvary weak and faint, and hung on the cross through the hot morning hours from between the third and sixth. No refreshing draught had passed His lips since the last cup in the upper chamber. And now His exhausted physical frame, though of most perfect mould, craved for refreshment, and He cried out, “I thirst.”
I. In this word from the cross we have an expression of the true humanity of Jesus.—
1. It was a word uttered in order to gain an assuagement of the awful suffering of thirst. Dwellers in the East know well, either from personal experience, or the experience of those who have felt it, how awful it is under the burning sun to endure the agony of thirst, when there is no water near to slake it, whilst the mocking mirage, with vision of lakes and streams, maddens the tortured traveller.
2. And was it to be wondered at that He, who was “treading the wine-press alone,” etc., “travailing in the greatness of His strength” for humanity, should, in that hour of awful suffering, feel the pangs of thirst? How terrible were those sufferings on the cross, to which heart and soul anguish were added in incalculable degree! How racked with fever was that sacred body, whilst His tongue clave to the roof of His mouth, and all the dreadful pain of thirst added to the strain and torture!
3. Who will relieve Him? Not the Jew. He is ready with his taunts to the end. But now even the rude soldiers are being touched with the patient yet majestic bearing of the kingly Sufferer; for it was evidently from the supply of sour wine provided for them (Luke 23:36) that a sponge was filled and held to Jesus’ lips on the end of a stem of “hyssop”—it may be at the instigation of the centurion in command, on whom the whole scene had made a deep impression (Luke 23:47).
4. It was the last service rendered to Jesus in the period of His humiliation. It strengthened and revived Him for the final declaration, “It is finished,” which is the charter of our redemption. May not the hope be permitted that this last kindly act—if it were kindly meant, as it seems to have been—did not go without its reward?
II. This utterance of Jesus proclaims Him as the divinely predicted Messiah, to whom all prophecy bears witness.—
1. Though this word was the expression of a natural desire, yet in its utterance, and in the answer accorded, prophetic Scripture was fulfilled. This was foretold as part of the suffering of the Messiah (Psalms 69:21).
2. The darkness and trouble that had encompassed His soul, resulting in the cry “Eli, Eli,” etc., had now passed away, as the shadow of eclipse from the face of nature, and Jesus knew that He had now endured to the uttermost all that had to be endured for humanity—even to this mysterious hiding of the Father’s face. But now when that face was again seen by Him radiant with love, He knew that His great work was ended, that He had done for men what men could not have done for themselves, and that the Father was well pleased (Romans 8:3). Then physical nature, which had been forgotten during the dreadful conflict—as men forget their wounds in the press of battle—reasserted itself, and the cry arose, “I thirst.” But in this very cry the last unfulfilled word of prophecy regarding the Saviour in His humiliation received its fulfilment. It had been predicted of the suffering Servant of Jehovah that in His thirst they should “give Him vinegar to drink.” Thus the whole prophetic picture of Messiah in His sufferings—through which He was made perfect (Hebrews 2:10; Hebrews 5:7)—was filled in; and all men might see that He was the fulfilment of law and prophecy—the divinely given, God-appointed Messiah.
III. This thirst of the Redeemer was endured for us.—
1. What He endured might be held to be symbolical of that despairing search after God and peace of humanity, that, longing and thirst after God, which was now to be satisfied. To the Redeemer the travail of His soul was now finished, and He desired to see the end of it and its blessed fruits. And as the wine-filled sponge was held to His lips He was physically refreshed and strengthened to proclaim that His soul-travail was past, His soul satisfied (John 17:4-5).
2. Now, too, that the work was accomplished that had been given Him to do, He longed for the presence of the Father, and for that blessed home where the sin and evil of earth could no more pain and torture His pure spirit (John 11:33; John 12:27).
3. He thirsted, He endured, that an ever-flowing fountain of the water of life might be opened for all who desire to have their soul-thirst quenched (Isaiah 55:1; Revelation 22:17). And He shall be most satisfied, and the courts of heaven shall ring (Luke 15:10) with songs of joy, when men and women who have themselves drunk and been satisfied from those rivers of Life which He thirsted and died to send forth, shall lead others who are thirsting for the higher life—the life of Christ’s redeemed ones—to drink and thirst no more.
John 19:30. “It is finished.”—The life heralded by promises of peace is slowly ebbing in pain. He who was announced as king dies as a malefactor. His kingly crown is one of thorns, His high-priestly altar a cross, His sacrifice Himself. The world looked on coldly or mockingly. If His entrance into life was humble, what of His exit? Yet at His birth angels rejoiced, at His death nature trembled. What a life of holiness and heavenly beneficence was it which was thus closing! But this death was the most momentous event in the world’s history. The completion of a great work is matter of rejoicing. Yet never was a great undertaking ended in apparently less auspicious circumstances. These, however, were the concomitants of His victory. What is the meaning of this word?
I. In this word Jesus proclaimed the close of His state of humiliation.—
1. His earthly life, begun in lowliness, etc., misunderstood, etc., was ended. The suffering His soul endured in contact with sin, unbelief, etc.; His rejection by the Jews, the weakness of the disciples’ faith, the dark deed of Judas, Gethsemane and the cross, were now past.
2. His body for a time must lie in the grave, but it will see no corruption. His humiliation was past, and what we should remember is that it was endured for us.
II. This word shows that God’s preparatory discipline of the race had ended.—
1. Moses and the prophets take the position of witnesses to Christ. The educational régime of the law was no longer necessary; it had served its purpose of bringing home to men’s hearts the consciousness of sin, etc. Sacrifice was shown to be typical of this supreme sacrifice, and prophetic utterances ceased which pointed to a coming deliverance by a heaven-sent Redeemer.
2. The heathen world’s dreaming of a coming age fairer than the golden age of fable here became a reality; and even their false religions served an educational purpose, emphasising ever the need of cleansing. And what a training had theirs been—a wandering ever further from the true source of light! To what depths of iniquity had they sunk—all going in the same dreary track, with no true light to cheer them on the way!
3. But this voice from the cross proclaimed the end of this preparatory training. Every type and symbol of redemption must give place, for the antitype had come. Jew and Gentile were under tutelage till they had learned that no rites or ceremonies could bring reconciliation. “The times of this ignorance God winked at,” etc., but is now calling men to be saved without the deeds of the law, etc.
III. This utterance implies the final triumph of the people of God through Christ’s finished work.—
1. By His will we are sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus, etc. (Romans 8:30); and when thus sanctified believers shall also be glorified (1 Corinthians 1:30). But notice: If we are His we must be justified and sanctified. There should be no mistake here.
2. The final triumph of the kingdom of God is here proclaimed. Christ died, but in this very fact is the potentiality of the world’s redemption. Even at that very moment Christ began to see the travail of His soul, the discomfiture of the enemies of His kingdom, and its final triumph. This cry is one of victory. It was the signal of the triumphant conclusion of His enduring for men.
3. “It is finished.” It is the voice of Emmanuel, the Captain of our salvation, who on the red battle-field lays aside the weapons of His warfare, and raises the shout of victory—a conqueror over sin and death and Satan, though seeming to be vanquished by His foes.
HOMILETIC NOTES
John 19:23-30. Christ’s battle and victory on the cross.—“Let us also go, that we may die with Him,” Thomas had said to his fellow-disciples (John 11:16), when Jesus prepared to go the grave of Lazarus to awake him from the dead. In the case of Thomas this was more a kind of resignation which despaired of escape than faith which follows Jesus to death and yet fills the heart with hope of victory. On Good Friday it is well for us to accompany Jesus on the way of His sufferings and death, to pass through it all with Him in faith, so that going with Him we may be led to the cross, but also from the cross to the throne. It is well also to comprehend how the sufferings and death of Jesus effect our reconciliation with the Father, and how thereby are given to us comfort in life and in death. We consider the theme—
How Christ suffered and died on the cross.—We picture to ourselves in connection with His four last words:
1. His anguish of soul;
2. His physical anguish;
3. His cry of victory;
4. His closing prayer.
John 19:23-30. Christ’s conflict and victory on the cross.—We represent to ourselves:—
I. Christ’s bitter conflict.—
1. The earth was darkened, for even nature suffers through the sinfulness of men.
2. The cup of divine wrath was emptied out on the Son of man, so that He felt as if God had forsaken Him, and burning thirst increased the torture of His physical frame.
3. The unbelieving world requited the unspeakable love of the Crucified to humanity with mockery.
II. Christ’s glorious victory.—l. The crucified One remained in communion with His Father; He committed His spirit into the hands of the Father; consciously and freely He yielded up His life.
2. The ransom for man’s debt of guilt was paid; the Father who was angry with men’s sins is reconciled; God’s righteousness and God’s love are firmly established. The work of redemption is completed!—Translated from J. L. Sommer.
John 19:23-30. The death of Jesus.—It is no ordinary death which we are called to witness. The sun’s light is veiled, the earth quakes, and the veil of the temple is rent. Adam was pointed to Him who dies upon the cross, in that it was said to him that the woman’s seed should bruise the serpent’s head. Noah was occupied with Him when he recognised that the life was in the blood. Abraham saw Him in Isaac bound on the altar, and in the bleeding ram. Moses preached Him when he raised up the brazen serpent. Isaiah pointed Him out as He who was “wounded for our transgressions,” etc. And as men from afar had looked forward to the cross, so we look back from afar to the cross. They are eternal obsequies which are celebrated for Him who dies on Golgotha. It is with us as if to-day we stood beneath His cross, heard His latest voice, saw His blood-besprinkled face. Then we say, “O sorrow and mourning!” Yet also, “In Him we have redemption through His blood,” etc. No ordinary death is this which we are called to behold. We seek to find expression for:—
I. The astonishment which fills us.—The true God, the Creator, the King, the Life, eternal Love, the holy God, the Judge of the world, in deepest suffering and misery.
II. The grief to which this moves us.—
1. Over the unbelieving world, which mocks Him.
2. Over our own hearts, which so often forget Him.
III. The penitence which it preaches to us.—
1. We should remember God’s wrath against our sins.
2. Take care that we dishonour God no more by sinfulness.
IV. The comfort which it confirms to us.—
1. In the struggle with sin.
2. In the pains of death.—Appuhn, idem.
John 19:30. The sixth word of Jesus from the cross.—
I. Its meaning.—
1. The Messianic prophecies and types are fulfilled.
2. The Lord’s sufferings had come to an end.
3. Reconciliation between God and man is established, and peace reinstated.
II. The blessings for which we have to thank it.—
1. It calls us to repentance.
2. It assures us of salvation.
3. It serves to strengthen our faith.
4. It enlivens our hope in relation to enduring unto the end.—Dr. von Biarowsky.
John 19:30. The dominion of sin and death ended on the cross (Romans 5:12-14; Romans 5:19; 1 Corinthians 15:22).—The thought of the apostle in these and other passages circulates around Adam on the one hand and Christ on the other, as centres of spiritual influence. The state of man before Christ, and the state of man after—or of all who belong to Christ and share in His redeeming work—is strongly contrasted. Adam, as sinner, gives its character to the one; Christ, as Saviour and the righteous One, gives its character to the other. In the passage from the Epistle to the Romans sin and death are represented as the ruling powers in the world. Adam is the source through which they have entered into the world. Through his one act of sin Adam not only fell himself, but the line of spiritual integrity was broken in him. The flaw extended to the race. “Sin entered the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all, for that all have sinned.” In other words, sin passed to us from Adam, and death from sin. This is the simple meaning of the words as they stand in our version. They might seem at first to add little to the doctrine of hereditary corruption as generalised from the facts of experience. But on a closer view they will be found to add various features to this doctrine. They emphasise the position of Adam as not merely the first in a line of sinners, but as the type or representative of the whole line—one whose act was fatal not only for himself, but for all who followed him. All mankind fell with him into the death which he had incurred.
1. This typical character of Adam;
2. The descent of spiritual depravity from him; and
3. The fatal character of the results which followed, not only for himself, but for his posterity—in other words, the judicial character of these results in their downward passage—are all ideas more or less involved in the passage.—Dr. John Tulloch.
ILLUSTRATIONS
John 19:26. “Woman, behold thy son.”—It has been considered strange that the Saviour, in speaking to Mary, should have made use of the distant word “Woman,” instead of the tender name of “Mother.” In reply to this, it is certainly true that He did so, partly because He would not still more deeply wound her bleeding heart by the sweet title of mother, as well as that He might not excite within Himself a storm of human emotions; and likewise lest He should expose His mother to the rudeness of the surrounding crowd. But the chief reason why, instead of the maternal title, He used the more general term “Woman,” or lady, lies much deeper, both in this and the well-known scene at the marriage in Cana. He certainly meant His mother to understand that henceforward His earthly connection with her must give way to a superior one. As though He had said, “Thou, my mother, wilt from this time be as one of my daughters, and I thy Lord. Thou believest in Me, and shalt be blessed. Thou layest hold of the hem of My garment, and I appear in thy stead. Thou adorest Me, and I am thy High Priest and King. Mother, brother, and sister, henceforward are all who swear allegiance to My banner. The relationships according to the flesh and the manner of the world have an end; other and more spiritual and heavenly take their place.” It was this that the Lord intended to suggest to Mary’s mind; and hence the word “Woman,” which at first sounds strange, instead of the more tender and affectionate term “Mother.” Nay, it the less became Him to call her mother now, since this term in the Hebrew includes in it the idea of “Mistress,” whilst He was just preparing, as the Lord of lords, to ascend the throne of eternal Majesty. But whilst endeavouring to elevate Mary’s mind above the sphere of merely human conceptions, He does not forget either that He is her son, or that she is His dear and sorely-tried mother; and reflects at the same time that man in his weakness has need of man, and must, besides the heart of God, possess at least one heart upon earth into which he can confidingly pour out his own, and upon whose love and faithfulness he may firmly reckon under all circumstances. For these reasons, the Lord is desirous in His filial forethought, and as far as is practicable, to fill up for Mary, even in a human respect, the void which His decease would leave in her life, and give her, instead of Himself, a son to assist her, even in an earthly manner, in whom she might place entire confidence, and on whose shoulder she could lean in all her distresses, cares, and sorrows, and this new son He bequeaths to her is His favourite disciple, the faithful and feeling John. Is it not as if He intended to say?—“I well know, My mother, how solitary and dreary must be a widow’s path upon earth when the crown is removed from her head. But lo I here is the disciple that lay in My bosom, and is thus peculiarly prepared to become thy support and stay. He is ready to do all I desire of him; and since I have neither silver nor gold, I bequeath thee all My claim on this disciple’s love, gratitude, and faithfulness. Let him be thy son!” It was thus He loved to the end; thus delicately does He provide for all the necessities of those He loves. And as He formerly did, so He does still. He is to this hour the compassionate High Priest. He enters most feelingly into the wants of those who confide in Him, so that every one in his station, whether they be widows, orphans, poor and infirm, or to whatever class of the weary and heavy-laden they belong, may rely most peculiarly on His providential care. After saying to Mary, “Woman, behold,” etc., He says to John, “Behold thy mother.” Oh, what a proof does the Saviour here give His disciple of the affection and confidence which He reposes in him! He imposes a burden upon him, but He knows that John will regard it as the highest honour and felicity which could be bestowed upon him on earth. Nor is the Saviour mistaken in His disciple. John understands His Master’s wish, looks at Mary, and his whole soul says to her, “My mother!”—F. W. Krummacher, “Suffering Saviour.”
John 19:26-27. Self-renunciation at the Cross.—Thus the Redeemer endured. Although terror seized hold of His disciple’s heart and a sword went through His mother’s soul as He bled on the cross, yet no bands of blood, nor human friendship, could turn Him aside from His high emprise. And thus, too, His disciples endured. No Peter would have left all, no Paul would have borne the reproach of Christ, no missionary would have gone among the heathen, no Luther would have journeyed to Worms, had they conferred with flesh and blood merely—if women’s tears and friends’ entreaties had availed more than the call of the Lord. No, where the Lord’s work is in question the most beloved on earth must stand aside; when God commands, then we must be prepared to leave and part with what is dearest. Especially at critical moments it is needful to be armed with this spirit of self-denial. Then no sweetest heart-ties, no soft feeling, should hinder us from setting our face steadfastly to go to Jerusalem. Men must renounce many a peaceful hour, many a lawful joy, many a pleasant custom, in the service of the Lord. Sometimes the husband must drag himself away from wife and child when duty calls him; and then the wife must become a heroine, and able to give up husband and child to the divine service, like that heroic mother of the times of the Maccabees who saw her seven sons die before her eyes, whilst she herself had exhorted them to die the martyr’s death.—Translated from Karl Gerok.
John 19:27. “Behold thy mother.”—He who was dying on the cross, whose name was Love, was the great philanthropist, whose charity embraced the whole human race. His last dying act was an act of individual attachment, tenderness toward a mother, fidelity toward a friend. Now, some well-meaning persons seem to think that the larger charities are incompatible with the indulgence of particular affections; and therefore, all that they do and aim at is on a large scale; they occupy themselves with the desire to emancipate the whole mass of mankind. But it not unfrequently happens that those who act in this manner are but selfish after all, and are quite inattentive to all the fidelities of friendship and the amenities of social life. It was not so, if we may venture to say it, that the spirit of the Redeemer grew, for as He progressed in wisdom and knowledge, He progressed also in love. First, we read of His tenderness and obedience to His parents, then the selection of twelve to be near Him from the rest of His disciples, and then the selection of one more especially as a friend. It was through this that, apparently, His human soul grew in grace and in love. And if it were not so with Him, at all events it must not be so with us. It is in vain for a man in his dying hour, who has loved no man individually, to attempt to love the human race; everything here must be done by degrees. Love is a habit. God has given to us the love of relations and friends, the love of father and mother, brother, sister, friend, to prepare us gradually for the love of God; if there be one stone of the foundation not securely laid, the superstructure will be Imperfect. The domestic affections are the alphabet of love.—F. W. Krummacher, “Suffering Saviour.”
John 19:28. The Redeemer drank the full cup of agony on the cross.—“I thirst”; in answer to this they gave Jesus vinegar to drink. Now upon first reading this we are often tempted to suppose, from the unnatural character of the draught, that an insult was intended, and therefore we rank this among the taunts and fearful sufferings which He endured at His crucifixion. But as we become acquainted with Oriental history, we discover that this vinegar was the common drink of the Roman army, their wine, and therefore was the most likely to be at hand when in the company of soldiers, as He then was. Let it be borne in mind that a draught was twice offered to Him; once it was accepted, once it was refused. That which was refused was the medicated potion, wine mingled with myrrh, the intention of which was to deaden pain, and therefore when it was presented to the Saviour it was rejected. And the reason commonly assigned for that seems to be the true one: the Son of man would not meet death in a state of stupefaction; He chose to meet His God awake. There are two modes in which pain may be struggled with—through the flesh, and through the spirit; the one is the office of the physician, the other that of the Christian. The physician’s care is at once to deaden pain, either by insensibility or specifics; the Christian’s object is to deaden pain by patience. We dispute not the value of the physician’s remedies—in their way they are permissible and valuable; but yet let it be observed that in these there is nothing moral; they may take away the venom of the serpent’s sting, but they do not give the courage to plant the foot upon the serpent’s head, and to bear the pain without flinching. Therefore the Redeemer refused, because it was not through the flesh, but through the Spirit, that He would conquer. To have accepted the anodyne would have been to escape from suffering, but not to conquer it. But the vinegar or sour wine was accepted as a refreshing draught, for it would seem that He did not look upon the value of the suffering as consisting in this, that He should make it as exquisite as possible, but rather that He should not suffer one drop of the cup of agony which His Father had put into His hand to trickle down the side untasted. Neither would He make to Himself one drop more of suffering than His Father had given.—F. W. Robertson.
John 19:28. Christ’s thirst on Calvary.—Indeed He did thirst: “The zeal of Thine house hath consumed Me.” He was parched with longing for the glory of God and the safety of man. “I thirst”: I thirst to see of the travail of My soul; I thirst for the effects of My anguish, the discomfiture of Satan, the vindication of My Father, the opening of the kingdom of heaven to all believers. Shall our last end be, in any measure, like this? Would that it might! Would that, when we come to die, we may thirst with the thirst of the Redeemer’s soul! “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled.” “My soul thirsteth for Thee,” is an exclamation of the psalmist, when declaring the ardency of his longings after God. And our Saviour endured thirst that our thirst might be quenched. His tongue clave to the roof of His mouth—“My heart,” saith He, in the midst of My body, is even like melting wax”—that we, inhabitants naturally of “a dry and barren land,” might have access to the river of life, which, clear as crystal, pours itself through the paradise of God. Who does not thirst for these waters? Ah! there is nothing required but that every one of us should be able, with perfect truth, to declare “I thirst,” and the Scripture shall be fulfilled in that man’s drawing water out of the wells of salvation. For the invitations of the Bible presuppose nothing but a sense of want and a wish for relief. “Ho! every one that thirsteth”—there is the summons, there the description. Oh that we may now thirst with a thirst for pardon, a thirst for reconciliation, a thirst for holiness! Then, when we come to die, we shall thirst for the joys of immortality, for the pleasures which are at God’s right hand; we shall thirst, even as Christ did, that the Scripture may be fulfilled. And the Scripture shall be fulfilled; for, bowing the head and giving up the ghost, we shall be in His presence with whom is “the fountain of life,” and every promise that has cheered us here shall be turned into performance to delight us for ever.—Henry Melvill.
John 19:30. Christ’s dying love embraces the race.—That satisfaction was not the mere payment of an obligation which man had incurred; it was not the rendering of a bare equivalent for human sin to the outraged justice of God. It was more than plenary; it was superabundant, since it was offered in a finite nature, but by an infinite Being. We may shrink, indeed, from saying that such a satisfaction must have exerted a peremptory claim on the justice of God. Needed it not, after all, to be accepted by infinite Mercy? Might it not have been dispensed with? Might not the almighty Father, infinite in His resources, have saved the world without exacting the death of His Son as the price of its salvation? Here revelation does not encourage conjecture. Enough that the satisfaction actually offered has been as really accepted. We may presume, without hardihood, that, if God might have saved us in other ways, He has chosen the way which was in itself the best. And the freedom of the Father’s gift of His blessed Son, the freedom of the Son’s self-oblation, are insisted on in Scripture, as if with the object of condemning by anticipation any mercantile estimate of infinite Love. There is a profusion of self-sacrifice which meets us everywhere in the history of the Passion. Throughout it is the history of a “plenteous redemption.” The bearing of the divine Victim is not that of one who is tendering an equivalent for a debt which had been incurred. He does not seek to undergo only the precise amount of ignominy and pain which was needed for the redemption. He has offered His human will without reserve; and His offering has been accepted. True, one blow from the soldier’s sword or hand, one lash from the scourge, one pang of Christ’s sacred soul, one drop of His precious blood, might have redeemed our world, or a thousand such worlds as ours. For each act of submission, each throb of pain, had infinite value in thesight of Heaven—not only as representing the perfect offering of our Lord’s will, but as being penetrated by the informing presence and boundless merits of His divinity. Yet Jesus, who might have saved us thus, was in truth enamoured of profuse self-sacrifice. “In His love and in His pity He redeemed us” (Isaiah 63:9), and His pity and His love knew no bounds. He had surrendered His throne on high, His angel-ministers, His earthly home; He had left His mother and His friends; and when His doctrine and His miracles had brought Him fair fame and popular ascendency, He chose to become “a worm, and no man; the very scorn of men, and the outcast of the people” (Psalms 22:6). And so He gave His face to the smiters, and His cheeks to them that pulled off the hair. He gave His body to physical torture; He gave His soul to an unspeakable spiritual agony. He offered the long history of His suffering life, and of His death of shame and pain, to atone for the sins of us guilty men. He gave all to that will, in which we are sanctified, by the offering of His body (Hebrews 10:10). Less might have merited the Father’s grace; less might have satisfied His justice. But Jesus would display the range, the power, the prodigal generosity, of divine charity. The cross was to be not merely the instrument of His punishment, but the symbol of the throne of His conquering love. “I, when I am lifted up,” etc. (John 12:32). “He loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Each sinner, each saint, around His cross might have used the words of the apostle. For His blessed mother and St. John, for the Roman judge and for the Roman soldiers, for the chief priest and for the Pharisee, for the vilest and hardest of His executioners, and for the thieves who hung dying beside Him, our Lord gave Himself to death. For all who have been first and greatest, for all who have been least and last in human history, for all whom we have loved or seen, for our separate souls, He gave Himself. True, His creatures indeed are still free to accept and appropriate or to refuse His gift. But no lost soul shall murmur hereafter that the tender lovingkindness of God has not willed to save it. No saint in glory shall pretend that aught in him has been accepted and crowned, save the infinite merit, the priceless gifts, of his Redeemer. The dying love of Jesus embraces the race; and yet it concentrates itself with direct, as it seems to us, with exclusive intensity, upon each separate soul. He dies for all, and yet He dies for each, as if each soul were the solitary object of His incarnation and of His death.—H. P. Liddon.