24 // Jesus is your Savior, but is He your King? // Guest Speaker Pastor Cody

And privilege to preach this morning.

We have been going through a series.

Does anyone remember what the series is called?

Twenty-four.

Alright, a couple of us in the room.

We're going through this series called Twenty-Four.

As we look at the last twenty-four hours before Jesus' crucifixion.

Before the crucifixion of Jesus, we examine the last 24 hours of what he went through, and we've seen his trial with Pilate.

As Pilate says, Man, I I found nothing wrong with this man.

He is not guilty, but because he lacked conviction, he did what the crowd told him to do.

Last week we got to hear from Pastor Edgar.

Didn't he do an awesome job?

Can we give it up for him?

Yeah.

Talking about Peter's denial of Jesus, but then watching how Jesus redeems his story and used Peter in an amazing way, showing that no one is ever too far gone.

And today I have the special honor and special privilege of the culmination of all of this when Jesus is crucified on the cross.

When he lays his life down for your sins, for my sins, for the salvation of this world.

I have the honor to talk about the crucifixion.

And we love to talk about Jesus as our Savior.

We love to sing songs about our salvation and the salvation that we have in him and his grace and his mercy, and we should, because all of those things are true, and all of us are people in need of a savior.

We're going to be in John chapter 19 today, and John paints Jesus a little differently.

John 19 · chapter mention

When we look at the way John talks about Jesus, it shows a different aspect of who he is.

It's in John 19 where we see a crown of thorns placed on Jesus' head.

John 19 is where we see a purple robe put on Jesus' back to represent his royalty.

It's where we see Pilate's in this trial with Jesus, and Pilate says, Don't you know I have the power to condemn you?

Jesus says, You have no power except the power that heaven has given you.

He's the one who's in true, complete control.

You see, John 19 doesn't just paint Jesus as their Savior, it paints him as our King.

In John 19, as Jesus stands before Pilate, he brings them out in front of this angry crowd.

This angry crowd of uh the Israelites of the Jewish people, and he says this when he brings them out, Pilate brings them out in front of everyone, and he says, Here is your king.

He meant it as a mockery.

To mock the nation of Israel, to mock Jesus.

He brings them out with a at this point Jesus had been whipped, at this point Jesus had been beaten, he's got the crown of thorns on his head and this purple robe on him, and he presents them and he says, Here is your king.

See, John 19 doesn't just paint Jesus as our savior, he paints him as our king, and that's what we're gonna unpack today is this question.

Is Jesus just your savior or is he your king?

Is he just the person that you receive salvation from, or is he truly the king of your life?

Sometimes we as Christ followers can treat him as just our way to get to heaven.

And we can all agree that there's a huge difference between the Savior and the King.

I remember when I was saved as a child, and and I don't mean saved spiritually, I mean saved physically.

How many of you guys have ever had a near-death experience before in your life?

Yeah.

This one I'm gonna, it's a little dramatic, okay?

I might have died, maybe not, but I'm gonna tell it.

There's a time when I was a kid when I almost died, and somebody saved my life.

Like I said earlier, I grew up in Hawaii and I'm from Hawaii.

And when you tell someone that that is where you're from, they always ask you the same question.

When they find out you're from Hawaii, they ask you this question.

See if you can guess what it is, fill in the brink.

They say, Do you know how to surf?

That was good.

That was good.

That was better than the 8, 15, whatever time that service is.

They say, Do you know how to surf?

Can I tell you a secret?

Not everyone who's from Hawaii knows how to surf, okay?

I just want to lay that out there.

I also want to say this, just while I'm up here, pineapple pizza is not Hawaiian pizza.

This is a pet peeve of mine.

How many of you love pineapple pizza?

You guys are wrong, okay?

I'm preaching to you this morning.

You look, you can put pineapples on your pizza if you want to and be weird, that's fine.

It's not Hawaiian pizza.

Pineapples aren't even from Hawaii, okay?

That has nothing to do with anything.

I just wanted to say that since I was up here.

But they always ask, does someone say preach?

They ask you, do you know how to surf?

And the answer is yes, but I'm not very good at it.

Like I grew up, I learned how to do it.

I could stand up, but I'm not like riding any huge waves.

I can do the basics of it.

But I did grow up, what my dad would always take me is something called boogie boarding.

How many of you know what boogie boarding is?

Alright.

Boogie boarding is kind of like surfing except not as cool, and the board is like half the size of your body, so your legs hang off the end and you don't stand up, you just ride the waves like this, and you kind of steer.

And that's what I grew up doing.

And when you first start out, you know, my dad was teaching me how to boogie board you lay on the board with him, and he kind of steers for you, so you can get used to the feel of it, and that's what I did like probably since I was less than one year old.

Like my dad would take me out on the board and we would go boogie boarding together.

But when I was about six or seven years old, my dad decided it was time for me to go out on my own.

Which, by the way, that's probably not old enough to go out into the open ocean by yourself and ride waves.

Okay, but he decided, he's like, hey, you're a big boy now, you can do it.

So he gets me a brand new boogie board.

And I was so excited.

I like wax this board up, I'm ready to go, we get out there, we go to the beach, and then I look out at the waves, and I'm like, man, waves look a little bigger when dad's not there with you.

And this particular day the surf was a little bigger than normal, which is awesome if you know what you're doing, but not so great if you're just starting to learn how to do it.

So my dad like gives me some final tips.

He's like, You ready?

Yeah, I'm ready.

And we go out there and we start paddling out through the waves, and you gotta get through the breakers.

And after like five seconds, my dad is gone.

Like he just left me.

He's like, Alright, bro, I'm gonna go have some fun.

You got this.

I look around, I can't see my dad.

He's gone, he's having a good time, and I'm there just trying not to die.

Like I'm getting rolled under the waves, I'm trying to hold my breath.

And if you guys don't know this about boogie boarding, there's this velcro leash that they attach to you.

Because if you fall off, you don't want to lose your board.

But the problem is when you fall off, you're tied to the board, and that thing's just gonna pull you wherever the waves go.

So I'm getting like tumbled, what seems like hours, it was probably like 30 seconds, and then finally I see this rock sticking out of the water.

And it was like on the side where the breakers weren't breaking as much, so I like paddle out there as hard as I can, and I just grab this rock.

And I'm holding on to this rock for dear life, and I'm there crying and snivelling, and then finally, this older guy on a surfboard sees me over there and he paddles over.

He's like, Hey man, you're you okay?

Obviously, I was not okay.

I was crying hard, snob porn out.

I don't know where my dad is.

So he grabs me, he puts me on his board, and he grabs my board and he paddles me back to shore.

This dude saves my life, and I'm here this morning because of this guy who put me on his board and saved my life.

And then I'm standing there at the beach and I'm just waiting, and like, like an hour, dude.

An hour later, my dad paddles in.

He's like, wasn't that awesome?

The waves are so good today.

And of course, I'm not gonna tell my dad I almost died.

I was like, Yeah, man, I caught I caught so many waves, it was great.

Little did he know I was fighting for my life.

Parents, you gotta be careful.

Your kid might grow up to be a pastor and they're gonna tell all these kind of stories, okay?

So I get there, but here's the deal, here's the deal.

This guy saved my life, and I'm incredibly grateful to him.

If I saw him today, I would say, hey man, thank you so much.

You saved me, thank you for doing that.

But he's not my king.

I didn't dedicate my life to him, I don't serve him.

If he told me to do something, I don't have to obey it.

And sometimes this is how a lot of Christians treat Jesus.

We're super grateful, we're super thankful for the salvation that he offers us, but we don't want to submit our lives to him as our king.

See, a savior rescues you, but a king rules you.

A savior will forgive your past, but a king directs your future.

A king tells you where to go, what to do, how to do it.

And many of us love Jesus enough, truly love him, to receive his salvation, but not enough to surrender our control.

We want to hold on to that part.

We want a Savior who will cleanse us, but not a king who commands our steps.

And we're gonna walk through this in John 19 this morning to see what scripture says about how can Jesus become our King.

If you guys are ready, would you say amen today?

Amen.

Let's go.

All right.

John 19, starting in verse 14 through 22, we'll read through this passage, then we'll dissect it together.

It says, It was the preparation day for the Passover, and it was about noon.

Then he told the Jews, this is Pilate, here is your king.

They shouted, Take him away, take him away, crucify him.

Pilate says, Should I crucify your king?

Then they say this, We have no king but Caesar, the chief priest answered.

Then he handed him over to be crucified, then they took Jesus away, carrying the cross by himself.

Which in Aramaic is called Golgotha.

There they crucified him, and two others with him, one on either side, with Jesus in the middle.

And Pilate also had a sign made.

And he put it on the cross, and it said, Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.

And many of the Jews read this sign because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and it was written, this is important in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.

So the chief priest of the Jews said to Pilate, Don't write the King of the Jews, but that he said, I am the King of the Jews.

And I love Pilate's response here.

He says, What I have written, I have written.

In other words, he says, I said what I said.

So what do we see from this passage?

How can we take it apart?

The first thing we see is this, number one, the world rejected its king.

We see that the world was rejected its king.

Pilate brought Jesus out in front of them and said, Here is your king.

But in verse 14, it says it was the preparation day for the Passover about noon.

Then he told the Jews, Here is your king, they shouted, take him away, crucify him.

Pilate said, Should I crucify your king?

We have no king but Caesar, the chief priest answered.

Then handed him over to be crucified.

See, Pilate brings him out, and at this point Jesus had been beaten, he had been whipped, they put a crown of thorns and hammered it into his skull, they put a purple robe on him, and he brings him out, and he says, Here's your king.

And they don't just reject Jesus.

He says, We have no king but Caesar.

Not only do they reject Jesus as their king, they pledge allegiance to Caesar instead of pledging allegiance to God.

They said the person we serve is Caesar.

Let that sink in.

These were God's chosen people.

This was the nation of Israel who have prayed for years and years and years for the Messiah to come, for a Savior to come, and when their king is presented in front of them, they reject him completely.

Why?

Because Jesus didn't look like the king they wanted.

Jesus didn't fit the picture that they had made in their minds of what their king should look like.

They expected this conquering king, this ruler who was gonna overthrow the Roman government from them to free them, to lead their armies.

But Jesus didn't send them a physical king.

God didn't send them a physical king, God sent them a spiritual king.

They wanted a political king, but God sent them a spiritual king.

But here's what's so interesting: when you go back, the same crowds yelling, Crucify Him, saying, Put him on the cross.

Just a couple days before were the same crowds putting palm branches on the ground, shouting Hosanna in the highest.

They were the same crowds who gladly followed Jesus around to see the miracles to get healed.

Like Jesus was famous at this point.

Crowds came to him for healing.

Crowds came to him to hear him preach.

Just a few days before they gladly ate of the boys' lunch from the loaves and the fish, and they saw this miracle performed and they ate of the food.

And just a couple days later, something switched.

They went from following him to rejecting him.

Here's why they loved Jesus the miracle worker.

But they didn't love Jesus the King.

We can say it this way they wanted the benefits of the kingdom without the obedience to the King.

They loved all the stuff that Jesus could provide for them.

They loved the healing, the miracles, the provision.

But they did not love the fact that they had to obey him.

They loved what he had to offer, but they didn't want to submit to him as their ruler.

And as long as Jesus gave them what they wanted, they followed him gladly.

But the moment he told them to take up your cross and follow me, oof.

I don't know about that one.

The moment he told them to deny themselves, he confronted their pride that they had to submit to him, they turned their backs on him because they loved what Jesus did for them, but they didn't want to do what Jesus asked of them.

So they denied their king and sent him to be crucified.

That's the first thing we see is the world rejected Jesus as king.

The second thing we see is this that the cross was his throne.

The cross, the place they meant to be his defeat, was actually where they lifted him up as king on the throne.

The cross was his throne.

It says this, carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called place of the skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha.

There they crucified him and two others with him, one on either side, with Jesus in the middle.

Pilate also had a sign made, put it on the cross, and said, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.

Many of the Jews read this because it was written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.

This is an important part for us to zoom in on.

When Pilate put this up there, he wrote King of the Jews.

He wrote it in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.

And this is incredibly significant.

Here's why.

These three languages are this.

Aramaic, I think we have a slide for this.

Aramaic was the language of religion.

Aramaic was the language that the Jewish people would have spoken to each other.

This was their language, their religious language.

Latin was the language of government, the power of Rome.

Government documents would have been written in Latin.

Government rulers and officials would have spoken in Latin.

And then Greek was a language of culture.

It was the voice of philosophy, art, the nations.

It was the common language that everyone kind of knew and could talk to each other in.

And whether Pilate knew it or not, that sign declared a message to the world.

That this king rules over every religion.

This king rules over the government.

This king rules over all of culture, all of these different languages.

They could read that Jesus is king.

It reinforces Jesus' kingship.

And here's something interesting as we think about this.

He writes, King of the Jews puts it on the cross.

Why was that put there?

See, what they would do is when someone was crucified, they would write their legal reason for the crucifixion.

It was meant to be a deterrent for people.

So they would read that and they say, Okay, I'm not going to do that, because if I do that, that means that is going to happen to me.

The legal reason Jesus was crucified was the king of the Jews.

In other words, he was crucified for insurrection.

There should have only been one king, Caesar.

Jesus they claimed that Jesus said that he was king and so they crucified him.

But see, the cross was meant to be a place of defeat, but for Jesus it became the throne of victory.

That inscription, King of the Jews, was supposed to show a people what they were guilty of.

But for Jesus it was a declaration of truth.

It was who he was.

And it was on that cross where he defeated sin.

It's where Jesus fulfilled his mission, where he says these famous words, it is finished.

In other words, the debt is paid.

I have come to do, or I've done what I have come to do, and it fulfills this prophecy in Isaiah 53, 5.

It says, But he was pierced because of our rebellion, crushed because of our iniquities.

Punishment for our peace was on him, and we are healed by his wounds.

See, the cross was not just a tragedy.

It was a transaction.

The cross wasn't just this tragic historical event.

It was actually this legal transaction, this spiritual transaction, because all of us had a debt.

Romans 6 23 says, For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is the eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord.

The whole reason that Jesus had to come to this earth to die was to pay the sin penalty for your sin and for my sin.

That there was a debt owed, and Jesus as King came down and said, Hey, I'm going to pay that debt for you.

He laid his life on the cross and he conquered death.

He conquered sin by taking the place for us.

This is why he had to die on the cross.

And today we're talking about Jesus is your Savior, but is he your king?

Maybe for some of you, he is not yet your king because he's not yet your savior.

We'll have people after the services at the prayer next step spanners.

They can walk with you, show you what it means to be saved, show you what it means to accept Christ as your Savior, to have eternal life, and to begin this relationship with Jesus as your king.

We saw the world rejected Jesus as king, the cross was his throne, and number three the king demands allegiance.

The king demands our allegiance.

Verse 16, then they handed him over to be crucified.

They took Jesus away, carrying the cross by himself.

He went out to what is called place of the skull.

See, the text points out that Jesus carried the cross by himself.

Referring back to when he was calling his disciples to him, he says, You have to carry your own cross and follow me.

It demonstrates that true allegiance to God involves taking up the responsibility that was given to him by God the Father.

They didn't force him to the cross.

In other words, he knows the pain he's about to go through.

He knows the shame that he's about to experience, the weight of the world sin is going to fall on his shoulders.

He says, God, please, if there's any way for me to avoid this, would you take this from me?

He did not want to do it.

But then he ends with this.

He says, Nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done.

He surrenders his wants, his desires, in full submission to God the Father.

This text teaches us that true allegiance to Jesus is inseparable from obedience.

He sets the example that the king submits himself fully to the Father's will, and he calls us to do the same.

To be in full submission to Jesus as our King, not just as our Savior.

Well, we see here from the text and passage, all of John paints Jesus as King.

That's what it points to.

That's the point of this whole passage of John is showing Jesus as our King.

And here's what I believe many Christ followers, we think Jesus is our King.

We sing to Him, we worship Him, we do a lot of stuff for Him.

But I think for a lot of us there are areas in our lives that we're kind of keeping for ourselves.

Things that we've just gone, God, I just can't, I can't give this to you.

And we claim He's our King because we do all this other stuff, but there's a couple areas we're like, man, God, I just can't give this up.

Here's why this is so important.

If Jesus is not King of all, He's not your King at all.

If Jesus does not reign over your entire life, if your full life is not surrendered, submitted to Him, He's not your King.

We can't pick and choose what parts of the rules of the kingdom we want to obey.

If Jesus is not king at all, or king of all, he is not our king at all.

There are areas of your life that you know you've been holding on to, keeping for yourself.

You know God has been asking you to surrender, but you've just been holding on to them.

Jesus is either your king or he isn't.

It goes back to what Pilate said earlier in this chapter when they asked him, hey, change the inscription.

See that he said he was the king of the Jews.

Pilate says this, he says, What I have written, I have written.

In other words, he made a legal decree.

He said, I have decreed this to be true, I'm not going to go back on it.

In the same way, there are commands in Scripture that we have been ordered to obey.

With Jesus as our king, he has written things in Scripture that we're supposed to follow, we're supposed to listen to.

But here's the reality of a lot of us can treat Scripture, the Bible, as a menu.

We look at it and we're like, ooh, I love the grace, I love the forgiveness.

Yeah, I'm gonna take that one, I'm gonna receive that one.

Love my enemies?

I don't think that one's for me.

Love my neighbor as myself, like you have not met my neighbor, you don't understand how annoying this dude is.

Like I can't do that one.

But the Bible's not a menu for us to order from.

We don't get to pick and choose and decide what part of the kingdom we want to follow.

We can't enjoy the blessings of the kingdom without being in true obedience to the king.

As I was thinking through and praying through this, I just looked up like what are some of the common areas that we as Christians have a hard time surrendering to God.

I'm gonna read a few of them.

Maybe they're not yours, that's okay, maybe it's something different for you.

But here are some common areas that we struggle surrendering with.

Number one is this time.

We don't prioritize God in our daily schedule.

I get it, we're busy.

We wake up, you gotta take the kids to school, then you gotta go to work, and then you gotta try to get back to pick them up, and you gotta get home and go to the grocery store and make dinner.

And maybe if you have time at night, you'll pray and maybe try to pull up the verse of the day.

Instead of saying, hey God, no matter what happens, this time block is yours.

I am prioritizing this time for you.

Some of us need to surrender our time to Him.

Maybe for some of us it's finances.

We struggle to tithe or give generously, and what happens is we kind of go through the month and we get to the end of the month, and we're like, okay, I got some leftovers, I can give this month.

The king doesn't ask for your leftovers, the king asks for our first fruits.

He wants the first of everything we have.

He wants us to say, hey God, no matter what, I'm giving you this percentage of my finances because I'm gonna trust that you're in control and I'm gonna trust that you're gonna provide and take care of me.

Maybe for some of you it's finances, maybe for others it's relationships.

Engaging in sexual relationships outside of marriage, that the Bible would deem that marriage should be a sexual relationship should happen between a man and a woman inside of marriage, and some of it would say, like, man, I just can't give that up.

We like what the relationship provides for us more than we desire to follow God's design for us.

Or maybe it's just a sinful habit or an addiction.

Maybe you struggle with anger, lust, pride, envy, all these recurring sins, and there was a time in your life where those things used to convict you.

Well, you've kind of settled in, you're like, oh, this is just who I am.

Like I've tried over and over again to have God change this, and you've used to repent for it, you used to be convicted, but now you just kind of keep it in your pocket as your little pet sin.

These are just some of the common ones.

Maybe it's something different for you, but we're gonna quickly hear how do we apply this?

How do we truly allow Jesus to rule over our lives?

How do we move from Him just being Savior to now Him being King?

Is number one, identify.

Identify, write down the area of your life you've been holding back from God.

Something pops into your heart, into your mind that the Holy Spirit put into you.

Take that thought and make it physical by writing it down.

There's something powerful by writing down what God is speaking to you.

It turns a vague thought into a tangible act of honesty before God.

Number one, identify number two, confess.

Confession is simply this: tell God, God, you're right and I'm wrong.

Sometimes we think confession has to be this long prayer and we have to word it all correctly.

Confession is simply saying, God, my way is wrong, your way is right.

And repenting to him and giving it to him.

Number three, is we submitted, you surrender that area to him.

You release control.

And this is what a lot of us try to do with sin.

Is we try to say, God, I'm never gonna do this thing again.

God, I promise you this will never happen again.

I'm gonna do everything I can.

If I tell you this, you cannot conquer sin.

You can't conquer sin when you're gonna do it.

If you could, you wouldn't need Jesus.

It's not about trying harder.

It's not just about putting all these strategies in place.

It's you saying, God, I'm giving you this area of my life, and I'm surrendering it to you.

I'm asking you to change me.

I'm asking you to help me not desire this anymore.

Submission is not you saying God, I'll do everything I can to never do this again.

It's saying, God, and I'm giving you this area of my life because I can't do the money.

And number four, this is the tough one.

A lot of us want this one time, ridiculous thing, and those can happen.

What we do is we're in this process called sanctification.

As we spend so much of our information is what he begins to change, we are sanctified.

Obedience is a comfortable.

Allowing Jesus to be king does not mean living in full perfection.

It means living in full surrender.

Just because he's king doesn't mean I don't mess up.

It doesn't mean I don't fall.

It's not about being perfect.

You don't have to wait till your life is all together and you've conquered all these things.

It's saying, God, I'm giving it all to you.

Every area of my life that I've been holding back from you, I'm surrendering it to you.

I'm laying it on the foot of the cross.

And I'm asking you to change me.

It's giving God complete control.

So this morning, will you submit to your life to Him?

Will you identify that area that you know you've been holding back?

And will you give Him control to allow Him to change and transform you?

Let me pray for us today.

Dear Lord.