Memorial Bible Reading for Wednesday
John 19:1-42
1 At that time, therefore, Pilate took Jesus and scourged him. 2 And the soldiers braided a crown of thorns and put it on his head and arrayed him with a purple outer garment; 3 and they began coming up to him and saying: “Good day, you King of the Jews!” Also, they would give him slaps in the face. 4 And Pilate went outside again and said to them: “See! I bring him outside to YOU in order for YOU to know I find no fault in him.” 5 Accordingly Jesus came outside, wearing the thorny crown and the purple outer garment. And he said to them: “Look! The man!” 6 However, when the chief priests and the officers saw him, they shouted, saying: “Impale [him]! Impale [him]!” Pilate said to them: “Take him yourselves and impale him, for I do not find any fault in him.” 7 The Jews answered him: “We have a law, and according to the law he ought to die, because he made himself God’s son.”
8 When, therefore, Pilate heard this saying, he became more fearful; 9 and he entered into the governor’s palace again and said to Jesus: “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. 10 Hence Pilate said to him: “Are you not speaking to me? Do you not know I have authority to release you and I have authority to impale you?” 11 Jesus answered him: “You would have no authority at all against me unless it had been granted to you from above. This is why the man that handed me over to you has greater sin.”
12 For this reason Pilate kept on seeking how to release him. But the Jews shouted, saying: “If you release this [man], you are not a friend of Caesar. Every man making himself a king speaks against Caesar.” 13 Therefore Pilate, after hearing these words, brought Jesus outside, and he sat down on a judgment seat in a place called The Stone Pavement, but, in Hebrew, Gab´ba·tha. 14 Now it was preparation of the passover; it was about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews: “See! YOUR king!” 15 However, they shouted: “Take [him] away! Take [him] away! Impale him!” Pilate said to them: “Shall I impale YOUR king?” The chief priests answered: “We have no king but Caesar.” 16 At that time, therefore, he handed him over to them to be impaled.
Then they took charge of Jesus. 17 And, bearing the torture stake for himself, he went out to the so-called Skull Place, which is called Gol´go·tha in Hebrew; 18 and there they impaled him, and two other [men] with him, one on this side and one on that, but Jesus in the middle. 19 Pilate wrote a title also and put it on the torture stake. It was written: “Jesus the Naz·a·rene´ the King of the Jews.” 20 Therefore many of the Jews read this title, because the place where Jesus was impaled was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, in Latin, in Greek. 21 However, the chief priests of the Jews began to say to Pilate: “Do not write ‘The King of the Jews,’ but that he said, ‘I am King of the Jews.’” 22 Pilate answered: “What I have written I have written.”
23 Now when the soldiers had impaled Jesus, they took his outer garments and made four parts, for each soldier a part, and the inner garment. But the inner garment was without a seam, being woven from the top throughout its length. 24 Therefore they said to one another: “Let us not tear it, but let us determine by lots over it whose it will be.” This was that the scripture might be fulfilled: “They apportioned my outer garments among themselves, and upon my apparel they cast lots.” And so the soldiers really did these things.
25 By the torture stake of Jesus, however, there were standing his mother and the sister of his mother; Mary the wife of Clo´pas, and Mary Mag´da·lene. 26 Therefore Jesus, seeing his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing by, said to his mother: “Woman, see! Your son!” 27 Next he said to the disciple: “See! Your mother!” And from that hour on the disciple took her to his own home.
28 After this, when Jesus knew that by now all things had been accomplished, in order that the scripture might be accomplished he said: “I am thirsty.” 29 A vessel was sitting there full of sour wine. Therefore they put a sponge full of the sour wine upon a hyssop [stalk] and brought it to his mouth. 30 When, now, he had received the sour wine, Jesus said: “It has been accomplished!” and, bowing his head, he delivered up [his] spirit.
31 Then the Jews, since it was Preparation, in order that the bodies might not remain upon the torture stakes on the Sabbath, (for the day of that Sabbath was a great one,) requested Pilate to have their legs broken and the [bodies] taken away. 32 The soldiers came, therefore, and broke the legs of the first [man] and those of the other [man] that had been impaled with him. 33 But on coming to Jesus, as they saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. 34 Yet one of the soldiers jabbed his side with a spear, and immediately blood and water came out. 35 And he that has seen [it] has borne witness, and his witness is true, and that man knows he tells true things, in order that YOU also may believe. 36 In fact, these things took place in order for the scripture to be fulfilled: “Not a bone of his will be crushed.” 37 And, again, a different scripture says: “They will look to the One whom they pierced.”
38 Now after these things Joseph from Ar·i·ma·the´a, who was a disciple of Jesus but a secret one out of [his] fear of the Jews, requested Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus; and Pilate gave him permission. Therefore he came and took his body away. 39 Nic·o·de´mus also, the man that came to him in the night the first time, came bringing a roll of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds [of it]. 40 So they took the body of Jesus and bound it up with bandages with the spices, just the way the Jews have the custom of preparing for burial. 41 Incidentally, at the place where he was impaled there was a garden, and in the garden a new memorial tomb, in which no one had ever yet been laid. 42 There, then, on account of the preparation of the Jews, they laid Jesus, because the memorial tomb was nearby.
