To Encourage You

John 19:23-24 “When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his garments and divided them into four parts, one part for each soldier; also his tunic.  But the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom, so they said to one another, ‘Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see whose it shall be.’ This was to fulfill the Scripture which says, ‘They divided my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.’ So the soldiers did these things.”

Here in John 19 we have the account of the soldiers whose job it was to crucify Jesus.  The law gave them the authority to carry this out and apparently, they had full freedom to do as they wished, no matter how wicked.  In John as well as in the other gospel accounts we find that it was the soldiers that put the crown of thorns on Jesus’ head and then they proceeded to beat down on this crown with a reed. They struck Him and spit on Him. They are the ones who put the purple robe on Him and mocked Him incessantly, bowing before Him and saying “Hail, king of the Jews.” It was the soldiers that drove nails through Jesus’ hands and feet.  Then they divided his clothes among themselves and cast lots for His tunic – all with the full authority of the Roman civil government.  They took full advantage of the “privilege” they were given to torture and murder the King of kings.  

Perhaps nowhere else in Scripture do we see the opposite of love being practiced to such a degree.  These soldiers “rejoiced in their iniquity” per the words of 1 Corinthians 13.  Here we have an example of how men, though given the authority to govern by God (Romans 13:1: “Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.”) shows the wickedness in their own hearts by using that authority to commit great sins against the very God to whom they are accountable.  

We see this very same thing in so many of our laws today.  Although most laws are developed to constrain the evil actions of people, increasingly today, we find that laws are being developed to encourage and even reward sin, and punish those who would speak out against it.  Like the soldiers at the crucifixion, people seem to rejoice in the authority they are increasingly being given to rebel and sin against God.   

In the end, what defense will there be when people stand before a holy God to give an account for their lives?  Surely it won’t be that they “obeyed the law” when those very laws are an affront to God.  The true test will be whether we have “obeyed God rather than men” (Acts 5:29).  And that applies to religious rules as well, as so many churches today follow the bad example of the civil authorities in the things they promote rather than stand true to the Word of the God Whom they claim to be following.