Daily Blast - The Book of Matthew: Chapter 27
Scripture
“Then he set Barabbas free. But Jesus was beaten with whips and handed over to the soldiers to be crucified.”
Reflection
I wonder how many times you’ve read the crucifixion story? If you’re anything like me and have grown up through Church and Sunday School, you’re probably pretty familiar with the main events in the story. Sometimes though, when you become familiar with a story you tend to skip over the minor but hugely significant details.
In this chapter (v15-26) a guy named Barabbas gets a mention. His appearance in the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection isn’t just limited to the book of Matthew either. He’s also mentioned by Mark, Luke, and John in their accounts of the crucifixion. Just to give this a little context, if you look through the Gospels you’ll notice that in some of them, Jesus’ 12 best buddies (his disciples), weren’t all referred to by name… and Jesus hung around and did life with these twelve guys for the best part of three years.
With mention of his name in each of the Gospels, I really believe there’s something significant about the crucifixion story that God demonstrates through Barabbas and that He wants to communicate to us.
If we look at the book of Mathew (v16), Barabbas is described as being “known to be very bad”. Going and looking in the other Gospels we can find out more information; Barabbas was a robber, a rebel, a prisoner, a murderer, and a rioter (John 18:40, Mark 15:7, Luke 23:19). In short, he was a thug with a whole load of criminal convictions. He was a rightful prisoner. He deserved to be crucified. But instead, he was released and allowed to walk free (Matthew 27:26).
In comparison, what had Jesus done wrong? Nothing. Jesus was completely innocent. He’d spent His time on earth healing people who were sick, restoring broken lives, delivering demon-possessed people from evil spirits. He had no criminal convictions. Jesus deserved to be the one who was allowed to walk free. Instead, Jesus was crucified (v32 –44).
You see, Barabbas is mentioned in the story to represent us. We’ve all messed up and have all done wrong things – we’re all sinners. We deserve to be punished. But God sent Jesus for Barabbas. He sent Jesus for me. He sent Jesus for you. He sent Jesus for us. Jesus paid the price for us all. He took our punishment, so that we, the guilty, could walk free. Romans Chapter 5 verse 8 summarises this beautifully…
“But God shows his great love for us in this way: Christ died for us while we were still sinners” Romans 5:8 (NCV)
Challenge
Listen to the song ‘ How Deep The Father’s Love For Us’. Spend some time dwelling in His presence and thanking Him for His love.