Whose Power Wins? Luke 22-23

1. Luke 22  ⁶³ Now the men who were holding Jesus began to mock him and beat him; ⁶⁴ they also blindfolded him and kept asking him, “Prophesy! Who is it who struck you?” ⁶⁵ They kept heaping many other insults on him.
2. ⁶⁶ When day came, the assembly of the elders of the people, both chief priests and scribes, gathered together, and they brought him to their council. ⁶⁷ They said, “If you are the Messiah, tell us.” He replied, “If I tell you, you will not believe, ⁶⁸ and if I question you, you will not answer. ⁶⁹ But from now on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God.” ⁷⁰ All of them asked, “Are you, then, the Son of God?” He said to them, “You say that I am.” ⁷¹ Then they said, “What further testimony do we need? We have heard it ourselves from his own lips!”
3. Luke 23 ¹Then the assembly rose as a body and brought Jesus before Pilate. ² They began to accuse him, saying, “We found this man inciting our nation, forbidding us to pay taxes to Caesar and saying that he himself is the Messiah, a king.” ³ Then Pilate asked him, “Are you the king of the Jews?” He answered, “You say so.” ⁴ Then Pilate said to the chief priests and the crowds, “I find no basis for an accusation against this man.” ⁵ But they were insistent and said, “He stirs up the people by teaching throughout all Judea, from Galilee where he began even to this place.” ⁶ When Pilate heard this, he asked whether the man was a Galilean. ⁷ And when he learned that he was under Herod’s jurisdiction, he sent him off to Herod, who was himself in Jerusalem at that time. 
4. ⁸ When Herod saw Jesus, he was very glad, for he had been wanting to see him for a long time because he had heard about him and was hoping to see him perform some sign. ⁹ He questioned him at some length, but Jesus gave him no answer. ¹⁰ The chief priests and the scribes stood by vehemently accusing him. ¹¹ Even Herod with his soldiers treated him with contempt and mocked him; then he put an elegant robe on him and sent him back to Pilate. ¹² That same day Herod and Pilate became friends with each other; before this they had been enemies.
5. ¹³ Pilate then called together the chief priests, the leaders, and the people ¹⁴ and said to them, “You brought me this man as one who was inciting the people, and here I have examined him in your presence and have not found this man guilty of any of your charges against him. ¹⁵ Neither has Herod, for he sent him back to us. Indeed, he has done nothing to deserve death. ¹⁶ I will therefore have him flogged and release him.”
6. ¹⁸ Then they all shouted out together, “Away with this fellow! Release Barabbas for us!” ¹⁹ (This was a man who had been put in prison for an insurrection that had taken place in the city and for murder.) ²⁰ Pilate, wanting to release Jesus, addressed them again, ²¹ but they kept shouting, “Crucify, crucify him!” ²² A third time he said to them, “Why, what evil has he done? I have found in him no ground for the sentence of death; I will therefore have him flogged and then release him.” ²³ But they kept urgently demanding with loud shouts that he should be crucified, and their voices prevailed. ²⁴ So Pilate gave his verdict that their demand should be granted. ²⁵ He released the man they asked for, the one who had been put in prison for insurrection and murder, and he handed Jesus over as they wished.

A reflection:

Many years ago I learned that If I wanted to understand power in a system, I should pay attention to energy. The Passion Story for this Sunday finds St. Luke masterfully describing power/energy and how it moves.

1. Look at the guards at the start. They have physical power over Jesus, and they use it to blindfold him and ask him, “Who’s hitting you?” They use up their energy on immature bully games.       

2. Look at the religious leaders, who ask Jesus questions to get him to spend his energy saying something that they can use like a live trap to cage him. Jesus knows how they work and refuses to use his energy that way.

3. Look at the exchange between the Jewish leaders and the Roman governor, Pilate. The leaders stack up charges like kindling that quickly lights a fire, and Pilate, hating them, dismisses all their energetic stacking; he blows out the fire like a candle. When the leaders mention that Jesus started in Galilee, Pilate again blows out the flame, sending Jesus to the Tetrarch over Galilee, Herod. No fire here.

4. Then look at Herod, who really just wants to witness a miracle. He and his people spend a lot of energy questioning and provoking Jesus, but Jesus adds no energy. Herod, too, waves him off and sends this disappointment back to Pilate.

5. See Pilate hatch a plan that will solve everything immediately. His easy fix? Since Jesus is innocent, he will release him without punishment to the crowd, as was his Passover custom. It won’t cost Pilate any more time or energy. But the crowd is already expending fierce energy and won’t let it go.

6. They cry for Barabbas the murderer instead. Pilate spends some energy trying to convince them, but it is wasted on the revved-up crowd, so Pilate cuts his losses and gives in.

Whose power prevails in this story as told by St. Luke? We could say the religious leaders, since they get what they want, but in fact they are thwarted by Pilate. We could say the crowd, as their energetic desires made Pilate fold in the end. But no, St. Luke wants us to see that it is God the Father’s and Jesus’s vision for how to save humankind which prevailed. The night of trials resulted in Jesus’s walk to the cross, just as he had told his disciples it would. Jesus’s willingness to see God’s work through to the end, his acceptance of his role in bringing the Kingdom to us by giving up his human life, his emptying of himself of his power, gave God’s power of resurrection the chance to happen. As Jesus empties himself to save us, he becomes the glory of God and the Savior of us all.

A prayer:

Lord God, Thank you for loving us. Thank you for Jesus’s giving up everything, even all his heavenly power, to die to save us human beings. Help us to remember that your son used his energy to give us everlasting life. Amen.