The Great Exchange
Tom Shrader walks through Mark 15:1-15, explaining the false charges brought against Jesus, Pilate's inability to find Him guilty, and the crowd's demand to release Barabbas in His place. The Barabbas exchange serves as a vivid picture of substitutionary atonement — an innocent Jesus taking the place of a guilty man — set against the backdrop of Passover and its imagery of the Lamb of God. Shrader anchors the passage in the question Pilate asks in verse 12, pressing listeners to consider their own answer to what they will do with Jesus.
“Christ dies unjustly, but just like He took Barabbas' place, the symbolism is so rich — the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, right at the time that they're celebrating the Passover, in the middle of this, Jesus comes and there's the fulfillment of it.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Standalone Teachings
Recorded: 2015 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 39 min
Themes: substitution, sacrifice, forgiveness, guilt, innocence, passover, the cross, who is jesus, searching for faith, new believer, questioning christianity, feeling unworthy, carrying guilt, skeptic, seeker, young adult
Scripture: Mark 15:1-15, Mark 10:45, Acts 12, John 18:31
Theological Themes: substitutionary atonement, atonement, lamb of god, imputation, propitiation, gospel of mark, passion narrative, justification
Full Transcript
Introduction to the Gospel of Mark
Open your Bibles, if you would, to Mark chapter 15. We are going to look at the first 15 verses. As you turn there, let me remind you of some things we covered in the introduction to this book. It is the second book of the New Testament and the shortest of the Gospels at just 16 chapters. Each of the Gospels has a different target audience: Matthew presents Jesus as king, Luke emphasizes His humanity, and John presents His deity. Mark presents Jesus as servant.
Matthew wrote primarily for a Jewish audience. Luke wrote to the Greek mind, the philosophical mind. John wrote to believers, though there is a broad affinity for that book. Mark wrote primarily to a Roman mind. It is an action gospel — the word "immediately" appears over 40 times — short and fast by design.
The primary Roman audience would largely have been illiterate, so this book would have been read aloud to them. It is designed to be a page-turner. Sandy and I are watching the series 24 for the first time right now, and I thought if you were going to do a television adaptation of Mark, the Jack Bauer feel is exactly what you would get — four screens at once, always something happening. That is by design, as the Holy Spirit moved on Mark as he wrote.
I read this week that of all the books of the Bible, the Gospel of Mark is the one most translated into the most languages around the world. We meet Mark in Acts chapter 12, where Peter is arrested and about to be executed. There is a supernatural earthquake, the chains fall from his hands, an angel leads him through the city, and he arrives at a house and knocks on the door. We are told in Acts 12 that it was the house of a woman named Mary, whose son was Mark — this same man.
Mark also makes a passing reference to himself in the Gospel: as Jesus is on the way to the crucifixion, there is a young man wrapped in linen, naked underneath. That is Mark's quiet reference to himself. If we were to summarize the entire Gospel in one verse, it would be Mark chapter 10, verse 45: "The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve." We are coming now to the very centerpiece of that service — the crucifixion.
J.C. Ryle on the Slaying of the Lamb
Leading into this section, J.C. Ryle writes: "These verses which begin this chapter — Mark describes the slaying of the Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world. It is a part of the Gospel history which should always be read with particular reverence. We should call to mind that Christ was cut off, not for Himself, but for our sake. We should remember that His death is the life of our soul, and that unless His blood had been shed, we would have perished miserably in our sin."
That is the backdrop as we come to this passage. Look with me at Mark chapter 15, beginning in verse 1.
The Text: Mark 15:1–15
"Early in the morning, the chief priests and the elders and the scribes and the whole council immediately held a consultation. In binding Jesus, they led Him away and delivered Him to Pilate. Pilate questioned Him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?' And He answered him, 'It is as you say.' The chief priests began to accuse Him harshly. Then Pilate questioned Him again, saying, 'Do you not answer? See how many charges they bring against you.' But Jesus made no further answer, so Pilate was amazed."
"Now at the feast, he was used to release for them any one prisoner whom they requested. The man named Barabbas had been in prison with the insurrectionists who had committed murder in the insurrection. The crowd went up and began asking him to do as he was accustomed to do for them. And Pilate answered them, saying, 'Do you want me to release for you the king of the Jews?' For he was aware that the chief priests had handed Him over because of envy. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to ask him to release Barabbas for them instead."
"Answering again, Pilate said to them, 'Then what shall I do with him whom you call the king of the Jews?' They shouted back, 'Crucify Him.' Pilate said to them, 'Why? What evil has He done?' And they shouted all the more, 'Crucify Him.' Wishing to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas for them, and after having Jesus scourged, he handed Him over to be crucified."
The Pivot Question
Yesterday morning I was sitting, waiting for the Iowa game to come on, assuming just another victory. Somebody sent me a text projecting Iowa to play Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl. How great would that be? I'm doing the closing prayer at the Fiesta Bowl breakfast this year — that would be a chance to pray, "God, I know you have a favorite team in this game, and it's not those guys."
So I'm sitting there, and Sandy's over in her chair. She said, "Are you ready for tomorrow?" I said, "Yeah, not really." I could see her mind going — well, you don't have that oomph very often, so I don't know why tomorrow would be different. She said, "What's the passage?" I said, "Mark 15, 1 to 15 — Jesus, Pilate." She said, "Well, wow," and she unpacked it without even having a Bible. "You've got the conspiracy against Jesus and the false trial, they bring him in there, false accusations, Pilate can't stand up, he caves under the pressure of the people — you can apply that — and Jesus suffers in Barabbas's place, that's substitutionary atoning death." I said, "What are you doing tomorrow morning at 8, 9:30, and 11?"
Then I watched half the game, went to Ben's wedding, and came home. The girls didn't know if I knew the score, and I did. Sarah said, "There's lots of diving in the end zone — dangerous." I said, "Listen, I have to study. Sarah, I'll see you in the morning. Haley — Jesus, love, cross, sin, forgive, hope, peace, future, sacrifice. Am I helping?" Apparently anyone on the planet can do this lesson but me. I said, "Did you read the passage?" She said, "No, it's that every week." Well, that is the message. That is the gospel message.
So here's what I've chosen, and I think it's right. It's the pivot verse — verse 12. Pilate said, "What shall I do with Jesus?" I want to come back to this throughout the message and explain some of the nuances and history of what's going on.
Who Is in the Room This Morning
For some of you — if you're like Sarah, Haley, and Sandy — you can unpack this passage, you've been around this material, and my hope is that you'll come back again and identify with the different people in the story. For others of you, and I learn this every week, there are those who are not just brand new to the church but brand new to this whole thing. You know Jesus because he's around at Christmas. You've heard of Pilate. You're not sure how it fits together, but you're here and you're curious.
Here's what I realized yesterday — there are 52 baptisms today. Whenever we have baptisms, we always have people who are here as family, friends, classmates, co-workers, or neighbors who are not particularly spiritually curious at all. It could be an Eagle Scout award or a volleyball game — it happens to be baptism. It's important to your friend, not that important to you, but you want to be here to support them. My hope is that God would use this morning to really speak to you, that you would come face to face with what to do with Jesus and the question of who He is.
One of the things I learn over and over again is that as you talk about Jesus' trial and what took place, people are stunned when they get into it and see not only that it was a miscarriage of justice, but that everyone found Him innocent — meaning Pilate and the Roman authorities all saw that He had done nothing wrong. You sense that in this passage, so we'll try to get at that.
The Jewish Trial
In chapter 15, verse 1, it says, "Early in the morning." We're thinking about 5 or 6 o'clock. What has taken place is that the Jewish leaders — the Supreme Court, scribes, Pharisees, chief priests, about 71 men — have wanted to kill Jesus for a long time. They were afraid to do it, especially after the triumphal entry into the city, where hundreds or thousands were crying, "Hosanna, Hosanna." So they decided this was something they wanted to do at night.
They didn't know how to make that happen, and Judas made it possible. Judas came — and this isn't speculation, this is the story — and said, "I can deliver Him. I can get Him at night because we have this habit. We go to this place called Gethsemane and we pray up there. He'll be easy to take." The Jews brought as many as 1,000 men with them to make the arrest, scared that the people might rise up against them.
They arrested Him, and then around 1 o'clock they took Him to Annas' house, and then to his son-in-law Caiaphas' house. We're not sure exactly what took place — perhaps from three to five in the morning. There were two trials during that time. Both were inappropriate. Both violated Jewish law. There were accusations, there were witnesses, and the witnesses were false. The corroboration didn't line up.
Then there was a final consultation, which you see in verse 1. They had to have this last trial to close the Jewish phase of the proceedings. They decided He was guilty. So now they are ready for Pilate.
Why They Needed Pilate
Their motive, John tells us in John 18:31, was that they were not permitted to put anyone to death. Now, those of you who are veterans of this material might say — well, isn't that not quite true? Didn't they stone Stephen in Acts chapter 7? Yes. But that wasn't the Jewish leaders acting under the law. That was the mob.
The Charges Against Jesus
They wanted to put Jesus to death — not just death, but death on a cross, the death that had been prophesied. Only the Romans could carry this out. The Jewish leaders needed Pilate not as a judge but as the executioner, so they came and brought Jesus to him with charges. They were trumped-up charges: that He had told the Jews not to pay tax, that He was perverting the nation, and that He was challenging Caesar. That last charge was the one that got Pilate's attention.
The Jews hated Jesus for three reasons. First, He threatened their power. People were beginning to follow Him, and power tends to be addicting. It was Acton who said power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Now, is that strictly true? No, because the only absolute power in the world is God, and He is not corrupt — but we get the thrust of it. If you have power, it is hard to not run for reelection.
Jesus as He Really Is
The second reason the Jews hated Jesus is that He did not fit their expectations. Even the people began to turn on Him. One of the things we say today when we say "consider Jesus" is this: consider Jesus as He really is, not as you want Him to be. Not the Messiah you think He needs to be. Not the Messiah who delivers health and wealth and a smooth, easy life.
The third reason — and this is a big deal — is that Jesus exposes sin. For those of you for whom this is new, whether because it is the first time you have heard it or because you have been around church but never really heard it this way: you are a sinner and you cannot fix it. Jesus comes along, and all of a sudden He is the standard.
I love the idea of grading on a curve — even the idea of saying, "I'm bad, but I'm not as bad as him or her." When I was in eighth grade, around 1964, I was in Davenport, Iowa, in the Quad Cities area. We heard that at a Catholic school over in Rock Island, they had a dance one Sunday night a month. I did not know how to dance, and I am not sure my friends did either, but it seemed like something we ought to do, so we went.
Every fourth dance, they had a tradition where a couple would be dancing and four girls could come up and hold hands around the couple, and the boy had to pick one of the girls to dance with — or conversely, four boys would come around and the girl would pick one of them. I learned very quickly that the key to this was to find three guys uglier than you. It is totally superficial, and I went a whole night getting shut out, but I managed. Some people go through life that way: just find three people more sinful than me, and I will be okay. Jesus comes along and exposes all of that.
Jesus Before Pilate
Look at verse 2. The question is: "Are you the king of the Jews?" Jesus answers and says, "It is as you say." In other Gospels, at other times, when challenged by the Jewish leaders, He affirms it — "Yes I am," or "I am, but my kingdom is not of this world" — but not here with Pilate. He neither affirms it nor denies it, and Pilate is troubled by this. At this point his sympathies appear to be with Jesus, not with the priests.
The priests sense this. In verse 3, they begin to accuse Jesus more harshly, adding more and more charges, just keep coming at Him. Pilate said to Him, "Do you not answer? See how many charges they bring against you." And Jesus made no further answer, so that Pilate was amazed.
I suspect Pilate did a great deal of judging in the course of a week, and he was not accustomed to someone being accused choosing to stay silent. Our tendencies tend to run the other direction. Years ago, I got a DUI — I actually got two of them — and after the second one they sent me to school. It was a Saturday morning, and the man leading the session sat us in a half circle, about twenty of us. Starting to his left, he asked each person why they were there, and everybody had an excuse. I remember one man who was about my age now. He said he had a bad cold, took some NyQuil, went to bed, his daughter called needing a ride, he got up and gave her one — and that is why he blew a 4.0. I thought, that is a lot of NyQuil. We went through nineteen people, it got to me, and I said, "I guess I'm the only guilty one here — I drank all day long." The instructor caught me at the break and said nobody ever admits to that. So I think of that when I picture Pilate looking at Jesus and saying, "You are not going to say anything to defend yourself? I am not used to this."
Judas and Pilate
Now, simultaneously with what is happening before Pilate, on the other side of town Judas is arriving at his own moment of reckoning. He declares that he has made a terrible mistake and returns the thirty pieces of silver. Judas then goes and hangs himself from a tree; the tree breaks, he falls, and his insides spill out. Back with Pilate, the question remains: what is he going to do?
Pilate Sends Jesus to Herod
Harmonizing the Gospels at this point, Pilate sends Jesus to Herod Antipas. There was first a man named Herod the Great — and you know how he got that name? He said, "Call me Herod the Great." It is a bit like Michael Jackson saying, "Call me the King of Pop." That is how he got the name. Herod the Great died in 4 BC and had four sons, one of whom was Herod Antipas.
Herod Antipas reigned for about forty years and was a bad, bad man. He was a builder, like his father, and constructed cities. He had married a woman out of military convenience, simply to prevent wars and bring factions together. Then one day, at what we might call a Thanksgiving dinner — not literally, but you can sort the truth out — his brother was present with his new wife, and Herod decided he wanted her instead. He had his brother killed and married his sister-in-law. It was John the Baptist who confronted him over this, and it was Herod's stepdaughter whose dance ultimately led to John's execution.
Herod had heard about Jesus and had a chance that very night to meet Him. He could not deal with Him. So Jesus is sent back to Pilate, and that is where you pick up in verse 6.
Pilate's Desperate Plan
Pilate is in serious trouble at this point. He has exhausted all of his options and does not know what to do. You can at least give him some credit for struggling with it — he knows Jesus is innocent, and he senses that killing Him would be wrong. As Sandy reminded me, one of the other Gospels records that Pilate's wife had a dream and warned him, "Don't mess with this man. That would be a mistake." Pilate has all of these warnings pressing in on him, and then he comes up with what he thinks is a perfect plan to get out of it.
Verse 6 tells us that at the feast, at this time of year, it was his custom to release a prisoner. He knows there is a man in custody named Barabbas — a murderer, a revolutionary, unquestionably guilty. Pilate's thinking is straightforward: he will offer the crowd a choice between Jesus and Barabbas. Just five or six days earlier the people had been shouting, "Hosanna, Hosanna." Surely they will choose Jesus over Barabbas.
The crowd gathers and begins to ask him to do as he had always done. Pilate answers in verse 9: "Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?" He is fully aware, as verse 10 makes clear, that the chief priests had handed Jesus over because of envy. This is not his first difficult situation. He understands exactly what is happening — the leaders are against Jesus, but he believes the people are with Him, and he plans to use that to his advantage.
The Crowd Chooses Barabbas
Verse 11 tells us what went wrong with Pilate's plan: the chief priests stirred the crowd up to ask for Barabbas instead. Some time passes, and John tells us that Pilate is afraid — afraid of Jesus, afraid of the crowd, afraid of the consequences. The Jewish leaders intervene, and when Pilate asks in verse 12, "What then shall I do with Him whom you call the King of the Jews?" they shout back, "Crucify Him, crucify Him."
Now, here is a detail worth pausing on. In his book *Loving God*, Chuck Colson writes a section imagining Barabbas in his prison cell. He lays out all of the evil Barabbas had done, all his crimes, and makes clear he is guilty and awaiting execution. Barabbas hears a crowd gathering outside but cannot make out every word — he can only hear the moments when the crowd cries out together. What he hears is this: Pilate's question about who should be released, and then the crowd screaming, "Barabbas!" Then another question from Pilate, and the crowd screaming back, "Crucify Him!" So all Barabbas hears, from his cell, is his own name shouted — and then "Crucify Him." That is not encouraging news if you are Barabbas.
Pilate turns back to the crowd and asks, "What evil has He done?" Their answer, in verse 14, is simply, "Crucify Him." They are not interested in the question of evil or innocence. Then comes verse 15.
The Scourging
Motivated not by justice but by a desire to satisfy the crowd, Pilate has Jesus scourged. A scourging was not simply a man with a whip. There would be two soldiers, one on each side of the prisoner. Each held a wooden handle about eighteen inches long, with perhaps a dozen strips of leather two to three feet in length. Embedded in those leather strips were pieces of glass, bone, and rock. The motion was a slash inward — burying the metal, glass, and rock into the back — followed by a sharp jerk downward to rip the flesh open. The two soldiers would alternate blows.
This was designed not only as an excruciating punishment but to begin the bleeding process in order to shorten the duration of crucifixion. We sometimes forget that crucifixion was not designed to last three hours. It could go on for days — which is precisely why the soldiers eventually broke the legs of the thieves, causing them to collapse and suffocate. Pilate's hope is that after the scourging, with the crown of thorns and the robe, Jesus will look so devastated that the crowd will be satisfied. That is what he is counting on.
The Fickleness of the Crowd
Sandy was working through these verses and pointed out what is perhaps the most obvious lesson here: people are fickle. I follow politics closely, and it seems like every segment discussing poll numbers begins with the disclaimer that "the polls are very fluid." That is just another way of saying people are fickle. A favorable rating of sixty percent one day can look entirely different the next.
God Is in Control
Pilate thinks he is the one in control. He is the authority. People are coming to him. But the practical application for us is this: it may not always look like it, but God is in control — in your life individually, and in our life corporately. I spend so much time with people who spend all day listening to talk radio, watching Fox News, buying gold, and then going to bed and worrying. Be prudent, but understand this: God is in control.
When I was a wee lad, we used to watch the Ed Sullivan Show every Sunday night at seven o'clock. There was a woman on there that Ed Sullivan had on all the time — her name was Mahalia Jackson. You can go to YouTube and find her there. She sang all sorts of spirituals, but she sang one in particular: "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands." He's got you and me, brother, in His hands. You and me, sister. The little bitty baby in His hands.
This is not a picture of God's plan gone awry. It looks like it, but God is in control. We are told all along that Jesus says, "I voluntarily lay down my life." This is a picture of God using this moment to show us our own sinfulness.
J.C. Ryle writes this: "Let us learn a practical lesson from Jesus' example. Let us learn to suffer patiently — not to complain. Whatever God may think fit to lay on you, don't complain. Let us take heed to His ways, which are higher than ours." The irony, and one of the great truths of this passage, is that Pilate thinks he is in control. But he is not.
We also know where Pilate ends up. From this point forward, all we know is that Pilate kills himself. We do not know how, or where, or the details surrounding it. And that brings us back to that original question: what are you going to do with Jesus?
The Crowd Turns
People turn so quickly. I was back in Iowa last summer, and everybody wanted Coach Ferentz fired. "Get him out of here. He's been here fifteen years. He makes four million dollars a year." I was the only one saying the guy is terrific and we should hang in there. Now they want to run him for governor. That is just the way people are. And that crowd in this passage has turned — and that is exactly what Pilate is counting on.
If you look at the headings in this section of Mark 15, beginning at verse 16, you see: Jesus is mocked, then the crucifixion, then the burial. That is the rest of the story.
The Lamb of God
In a few minutes, you are going to see men and women and students who at some point in their lives became aware of Christ's holiness. They were not doing a comparison exercise. They were seeing His perfection. They know the rest of the story — that Christ dies unjustly. But just as He took Barabbas' place, the symbolism is so rich. The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world appears right at the moment they are celebrating the Passover. Jesus comes and fulfills it. He is the Lamb of God.
Our Only Hope
J.I. Packer writes that we humans are hopers by nature. We hope that this or that or whatever else is going to satisfy us or remedy our spiritual problem. We tell ourselves we will get really serious, go to church, start giving, get involved in children's ministry — whatever it is. But the only hope is Christ.
The people being baptized today are acknowledging that they have come spiritually to the end of the rope and said, "I give up trying to please God on my own. I am going to accept what Christ did for me on the cross." This is the culmination of what we talk about every week. Communion and baptism are the culmination of it all.
Whether you are here because you know all of this well, or whether you are here today simply out of courtesy or friendship to someone being baptized, I hope God does something in you. I hope He causes you to turn to that person being baptized and say, "What happened there? I want that."
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Father, thank you for that awesome and amazing truth. God, it is so good to see Your kindness and Your graciousness and Your love and Your care — that You are in control even when it does not look like it. Father, thank You for Jesus, who died in our place. We deserved what He got. It is called grace. God, thank You for that. We praise You in Christ's name. Amen.