Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1086
“Pilate therefore said unto Him, Are You a king, then? Jesus answered, You say that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Everyone that is of the truth hears My voice.” John 18:37.
THE season is almost arrived when by the custom of our fellow citizens we are led to remember the birth of the holy child Jesus who was born “king of the Jews.” I shall not, however, conduct you to Bethlehem, but to the foot of Calvary. There we shall learn, from the Lord’s own lips, something concerning the kingdom over which He rules and thus we shall be led to prize more highly the joyous event of His nativity. We are told by the Apostle Paul that our Lord Jesus Christ before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession. It was a good confession as to the manner of it, for our Lord was truthful, gentle, prudent, patient, meek and yet uncompromising and courageous.
His spirit was not cowed by Pilate’s power nor exasperated by his sneers. In His patience He possessed His soul and remained the model witness for the Truth of God—both in His silence and in His speech. He witnessed a good confession, also, as to the matter of it, for though He said but little, that little was all that was necessary. He claimed His crown rights and, at the same time declared that His kingdom was not of this world, nor to be sustained by force. He vindicated both the spirituality and the essential truthfulness of His Sovereignty.
If ever we should be placed in like circumstances may we be able to witness a good confession, too! We may never, like Paul, be made to plead before Nero but, if we should, may the Lord stand by us and help us to play the man before the lion! In our families or among our business acquaintances we may have to meet some little Nero and answer to some petty Pilate—may we be true witnesses! O that we may have Grace to be prudently silent or meekly outspoken as the matter may require, but in either case be faithful to our conscience and our God!
May the sorrowful visage of Jesus, the faithful and true Witness, the Prince of the kings of the earth, be often before our eyes to check the first sign of flinching and to inspire us with dauntless courage! We have before us, in the words of the text, a part of our Savior’s good confession touching His kingdom.
I. Note, first of all, that OUR LORD CLAIMED TO BE A KING. Pilate said, “Are You a king, then?” asking the question with a sneering surprise that so poor a being should put forth a claim to royalty. Do you wonder that he should have marveled greatly to find kingly claims associated with such a sorrowful condition? The Savior answered, in effect, “It is even as you say, I am a king.” The question was but half earnest—the answer was altogether solemn—“I am a king.” Nothing was ever uttered by our Lord with greater certainty and earnestness.
Now, notice that our Lord’s claim to be a king was made without the slightest ostentation or desire to be advantaged thereby. There were other times when, if He had said, “I am a king,” He might have been carried upon the shoulders of the people and crowned amid general acclamations. His fanatical fellow countrymen would gladly have made Him their leader. At one time we read that they would have “taken Him by force and made Him a king.” At such times He said but little about His kingdom and what He did say was uttered in parables and explained only to His disciples when they were alone.
Little enough did He say in His preaching concerning His birthright as the Son of David and a scion of the royal house of Judah, for He shrank from worldly honors and disdained the vain glories of a temporal diadem. He who came in love to redeem men had no ambition for the gewgaws of human sovereignty. But now, when He is betrayed by His disciple, accused by His countrymen and in the hands of an unjust ruler—when no good can come of it to Himself—
when it will bring Him derision rather than honor, He speaks out plainly and replies to His interrogator, “You say that I am a king.”
Note well the clearness of our Lord’s avowal! There was no mistaking His words—“I am a king.” When the time has come for the truth to be spoken, our Lord is not backward in declaring it. Truth has her times most meet for speech and her seasons for silence. We are not to cast our pearls before swine, but when the hour has come for speech we must not hesitate but speak as with the voice of a trumpet, giving forth a certain sound that no man may mistake us. So, though a prisoner given up to die, the Lord boldly declares His royalty though Pilate would pour derision upon Him in consequence thereof. O, for the Master’s prudence to speak the Truth at the right time and for the Master’s courage to speak it when the right time has come!
Soldiers of the Cross, learn of your Captain! Our Lord’s claim to royalty must have sounded very singular in Pilate’s ear. Jesus was, doubtless, very much careworn, sad and emaciated in appearance. He had spent the first part of the night in the garden in an agony. In the midnight hours he had been dragged from Annas to Caiaphas and from Caiaphas to Herod. Neither at daybreak had He been permitted to rest, so that from sheer weariness He must have looked very unlike a king. If you had taken some poor ragged creature in the street and said to him, “Are you a king, then?” the question could scarcely have been more sarcastic.