John 19 - CSB Tony Evans Study Bible

19:1 Flogging involved the use of a whip of leather strips with bits of bone or metal tied to the ends. It would rip the skin from the victim’s back.

19:2-3 Though the soldiers no doubt thought they were merely exercising the might of Rome over a simple Jew, they were actually fulfilling biblical prophecy about the Messiah in detail (see Isa 50:6; 53:5).

19:5-6 Given the fact that he judged Jesus innocent, Pilate surely thought the Jewish crowd would be satisfied with the brutality and humiliation that Jesus had experienced (19:5). But only one thing would satisfy them. They wanted Jesus crucified (19:6).

19:7 Jesus had made claims that only God could make. The Jews therefore accused him of blasphemy, saying, “You—being a man—make yourself God” (10:33).

19:8 What would make Pilate fearful? Jesus had told Pilate that he ruled a kingdom that was “not of this world” (see 18:36). Now the Jews were telling him that Jesus claimed to be the Son of God. In Matthew 27:19 we learn that Pilate’s wife told him she had dreamed about this “righteous man” and that he should have nothing to do with him. Pilate was likely a superstitious pagan who feared the gods. He was perhaps thinking, “Who is this guy?”

19:9 Given Pilate’s rising fear, he was essentially saying, “Where are you from, really?”

19:10 When someone insists on shouting, “Don’t you know that I’m in charge here?,” it usually means he’s uncertain himself.

19:11 If a person exercises any authority on earth, ultimately that authority has been granted by God (from above). Whether or not an individual chooses to wield that authority for kingdom purposes has serious consequences because we all will one day be called to give an account for our use of authority—whether in government, at work, in the community, or even at home. Remember, God is the ultimate authority. While the human in charge may be a boss, he or she isn’t the boss.

19:12 The Jewish leaders won the battle of whether or not Jesus should be released because they pitted Pilate against the emperor. What would Caesar think if he heard one of his governors was setting free some would-be revolutionary who claimed to be a rival king in the Roman Empire? Caesar didn’t mind religion—as long as it didn’t compete with his absolute authority.

19:13 Mention of the judge’s seat here is a subtle reminder that one day every Christian will stand before the judgment seat of Christ so that he may render a verdict, not regarding salvation, but regarding service and faithfulness to him.

19:14 That these events coincided with Passover was no accident. When the Israelites were slaves in Egypt, God had commanded them to slaughter a lamb and place its blood on the doorposts of their homes. Then, when he struck down the firstborn of Egypt, he “passed over” the homes with a blood covering. By means of this, God rescued his people from slavery (see Exod 12:1-28). Jesus, “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29) was about to shed his blood so that all those who believe in him would be saved from slavery to sin.

19:15 Notice that the chief priests didn’t say, “We have no king but God.” Their hatred of Jesus was so great that they were willing to disregard their divine ruler and align themselves with a pagan king. Placing human government above God never ends well.

19:17 The Latin translation of Golgotha is Calvaria, from which we get the English rendering Calvary.

19:19-22 Pilate had made the sign read as a title, a fact. The Jewish leaders wanted it to clearly indicate that this was merely Jesus’s claim (19:21). But Pilate rebuffed them, saying, What I have written, I have written (19:22). He meant for the sign to sting the Jews. But, in his sovereignty, God meant it to declare to the world the truth about his Son.

19:26-27 Even while dying, Jesus fulfilled his obligation to care for his widowed mother, entrusting her to the care of John, his disciple and the author of this Gospel. Jesus entrusted the well-being of his mother to John rather than to one of her biological sons because they had not yet believed in him (see 7:5). Spiritual relationships are to take precedence over biological and physical relationships (see Matt 12:46-50).

19:29 Hyssop was the plant used to brush lamb’s blood on the doorposts during the Passover (see Exod 12:21-23). As the apostle Paul says, “Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed” (1 Cor 5:7).

19:30 Jesus’s declaration, It is finished, meant the debt for sin had been paid in full.

19:31 Victims hanging on a cross had to put weight on their legs in order to lift themselves to breathe.

19:33-34 That blood and water flowed out (19:34) indicated that Jesus’s heart was no longer beating. In the early years of the church, a heresy arose claiming that Jesus was totally divine and only pretended to be human (see 1 John 4:1-2). But John wants his readers to know that such talk is a complete lie. As sure as Jesus was fully God, he was fully human: he bled and died.

19:36-37 Down to the slightest detail, our sovereign God was fulfilling his Word.

19:38-40 The other Gospels inform us that Joseph of Arimathea was wealthy and a prominent member of the Jewish Sanhedrin (19:38; see Matt 27:57; Mark 15:43). Joining Joseph was Nicodemus, another secret disciple who had previously spoken with Jesus at night (John 19:39; see 3:1-13).

19:41 That no one had yet been placed in the tomb is a significant detail because later, when Jesus’s body was gone, no one was able to point to any bones there as being Jesus’s remains.