One of the things that the cross reveals is just how much the world hated Jesus. They didn't just dislike Jesus. They didn't just reject Him. They hated Him. They hated Him so much they were willing to go against everything they stood for to get rid of Jesus.

If you want to see how far they were willing to go, you can look at John 19:15. In that verse, the roman governor Pilate is trying to get Jesus to go free, knowing that He is innocent. But the High Priests and jewish leaders are insistent that Jesus must be crucified. Listen to this chilling exchange:

John 19:15 - KJV
15. But they cried out, Away with
him, away with
him,
crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.

If you know anything about Israel in this period, you know how absolutely shocking that bit of conversation is. The jewish leaders were in a constant standoff with the Romans over recognizing Caesar.

Not long before this, the Pilate had threatened to murder all of the leaders over their opposition to images of Caesar in Jerusalem, and these jewish leaders had taken a knee as if to say "Go ahead and kill me, but I won't bow to Caesar."

But here, when it looked like Pilate would let Jesus go, the chief priests said publicly "we have no king but Caesar." You have to understand, that this is like Martin Luther King Jr. endorsing racism, this is like Donald Trump praising the mainstream media, this is like Greta Thornburg doing commercials for the gas industry. "We have no king but Caesar" is one of the most shocking things ever said.

And why did they say it? Because they hated Jesus Christ. They hated Him. He wasn't just a threat, he wasn't just a nuisance, they hated Him so much they wanted Him killed.

Jesus predicted this a few chapters earlier. In John 15:24 Christ said:

John 15:24 - KJV
24. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father.

The reason they hated Jesus is because He exposed them. Because He was a light that shone on them and showed the darkness of their hearts. Jesus was so pure and so holy that he ripped off the thin veil of self-righteousness they had and showed them how wicked they were and they hated it. So they put Him on the cross.

And listen, were Christ to come again, they would crucify Him again. The heart of mankind hasn’t changed. Throughout the last two thousand years of history many have come with the heart of Christ and lived as true Christians, and the same hatred has worked against them.

This world hates Jesus - and Jesus died for them. He died for his enemies. In fact, one of the biggest enemies of Christ, certainly a man who would have been party to Jesus going on the cross and a persecutor of the early church became Paul the apostle who wrote about half of the New Testament.

I know people who hate God and hate Christ and are very vocal about it, and I have to remind myself sometimes that God doesn’t hate them, Christ died for them.

We rejected Him, yet He died for us.