mockery

I can't stand watching someone get mocked. It angers me...the person getting mocked being humiliated by a person(s) who thinks that for some reason they are better than the other. I believe you can mock someone with words and/or actions. Mock: jeer at, sneer at, deride, scorn, make fun of, laugh at, scoff at, tease, taunt.

Matthew 27 is one of the accounts of Jesus' trial and crucifixion. After a pathetic trial full of lies and false testimony, the drunken crowd screams for Jesus to be killed. Between that moment in Matt. 27:23 and His death on the cross in vs. 50, He...Jesus...King of Kings and Lord of Lords...ruler of all nations...the Alpha and Omega...He is mocked.

²⁷Then the governor's soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. ²⁸They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, ²⁹and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand and knelt in front of him and mocked him. "Hail, king of the Jews!" they said. ³⁰They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again. ³¹After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him.

Jesus is mocked...

³²As they were going out, they met a man from Cyrene, named Simon, and they forced him to carry the cross. ³³They came to a place called Golgotha (which means The Place of the Skull). ³⁴There they offered Jesus wine to drink, mixed with gall; but after tasting it, he refused to drink it. ³⁵When they had crucified him, they divided up his clothes by casting lots

God is dying for their sins and they play a gambling game for His clothes as He suffers. Jesus is mocked...

³⁷Above his head they placed the written charge against him: THIS IS JESUS, THE KING OF THE JEWS.

While the sign reads true, my gut tells me that the people who put the truth on it didn't mean what they wrote. Jesus is mocked...

³⁸Two robbers were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left. ³⁹Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads ⁴⁰and saying, "You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!"

Jesus is mocked...

⁴¹In the same way the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the elders mocked him.⁴²"He saved others," they said, "but he can't save himself! He's the King of Israel! Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.

Here are the representatives of God...the preachers of that day. Instead of worshipping the God they were supposed to welcome and represent to everyone...Jesus is mocked...

⁴⁴In the same way the robbers who were crucified with him also heaped insults on him.

It's sad that the religious leaders acted no better than robbers worthy of the death

sentence. Jesus is mocked...

We come to church. We sing praises to Jesus. We hear the truth of Christ. We have more access to the Word of God today than ever before. And yet, when you look at our lives and the lives of so many who fill church buildings today...instead of seeing Jesus...Jesus is mocked.

Romans 6:1-4

¹What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? ²By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?³Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? ⁴We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

Stay strong...

Tim