“Pilate had a notice prepared and fastened to the cross. It read: JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS…The chief priests of the Jews protested to Pilate, ‘Do not write The King of the Jews, but that this man claimed to be the King of the Jews.’ Pilate answered, ‘What I have written, I have written.’ When the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took His clothes, dividing them into four shares, one for each of them, with the undergarment remaining. This garment was seamless, woven in one piece from top to bottom. ‘Let’s not tear it,’ they said to one another. ‘Let’s decide by lot who will get it.’ This happened that the Scripture might be fulfilled which said, ‘They divided my garments among them and cast lots for my clothing.’ So this is what the soldiers did.” (John 19:23, 24)
Once Jesus had reached the hill where He was to be crucified, the soldiers took the crossbeam from Simon and put it on the ground. Then they stripped Jesus of His clothes and wrapped a loin cloth around Him. This was something Rome did as a consolation to the Jews because they considered it an insult to crucify a Jew naked. Then they laid Jesus down on the beam and drove the iron spikes into His wrists just below His palms. Crucifixion had become an art to the Romans. They hammered the nails with precision in order to minimize the bleeding and prolong the suffering of the prisoner. They then raised the beam and put it in it’s place on the vertical part of the cross. Finally, another spike was driven into His feet and this part of the soldier’s work was done. Now they would wait for the prisoner to die and make sure no one tried to interfere with the execution.
The soldiers now divided up the clothing between themselves which was one of the perks of working the execution detail. When getting ready to tear the undergarment into pieces they realized that this piece was seamless (a rare thing) and that they should “cast lots” for it. Isn’t it odd that these men were more concerned about tearing a piece of cloth than the cruel torture of the man who was hanging above them? The Messiah…the Son of God…who at that very moment was giving His life…shedding His blood for the those very men at His feet.
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
For us the cross is a gut wrenching scene that brings a flood of emotion and shame. But, I wonder if we are sometimes more like these distracted soldiers than we think. As Christians we are called to live at the foot of the cross remembering the sacrifice of Jesus for our redemption. Many of us, like the soldiers, can be distracted by the “things” that are associated with Jesus and miss the most important thing…Jesus. The chief priests were more concerned about the wording on the sign than about what was happening right before their eyes. We stand before the cross and argue about the color of the carpet.
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.”
John tells us in the Scripture above that the soldiers were fulfilling a prophesy from Psalm 22, written 800 years earlier, which graphically describes the crucifixion of the Messiah. Their apathy or that of the priests was not a surprise…it’s just a sad reality…if we are not careful we can be easily distracted by the “cloth” of this world and miss the work that God is doing right in front of us.
Today… “Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full into His wonderful face.”