Today is the day we celebrate and recognize the death of Jesus as He went to the cross to pay for the penalty for sin. The crown of thorns is a part of the story that most people think was just part of the crucifixion process and how Roman soldiers mocked the claim that Jesus would be a king. However, there is much more to this crown than we realize, and it goes straight back to Genesis. When I gave the closing keynote to the El Paso Creation Conference’s first conference in 2021, this was one of my key points and the audience said it was the point that resonated with them the most. Of the many times when God has shown me something in Scripture, this one brought me to a place of worship more than most others. Jesus wore a crown of thorns.
To see the significance of the crown of thorns requires returning to Genesis. God created a perfect world – a world without disease, decay, death, or corruption. While things like erosion and digestion would take place, there was no curse upon the creation. No groaning, earthquakes, tornadoes, predation, or anything of the sort. That is, until Adam sinned. When Adam sinned, the curse that was directly attributed to him was a cursed creation. The ground would produce thorns and thistles, and Adam would have to spend more energy getting his food than the energy the food would give back to him. As a result, Adam’s body would age and after 930 years he would die. But I want to emphasize the thorns.
Thorns did not exist prior to sin. Roses, Palo Verde trees, and cacti would not have had thorns on them, nor would actual thorn bushes and such. So God either cursed plants and changed their DNA to produce thorns, or He created plants that would be such things. This would be an exception to the “creation was complete” statement in Genesis 1:31-2:3. How it happened is irrelevant for this discussion. Before sin, no thorns; after sin, thorns. Thorns and thistles were a physical and perpetual reminder of the curse of sin.
Thorns show up several places in Scripture. One notable case is when Abraham was going to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham brought no sacrifice because it was going to be Isaac. Abraham bound up his son, the son of promise, believing God would raise him from the dead, and at the moment his hand came down, God stopped him. There to the side a goat was caught in a thorn bush, and that goat became the sacrifice. The substitute for Isaac was caught in the physical symbol of sin.
Thorns are an annoyance and are used in many places to describe people and nations to Israel who would continually harass them. Because Israel did not drive out all the nations from the land that was to be theirs, those nations would be perpetual thorns, leading them into sin and causing countless trouble for them. Paul continued this analogy to describe his “thorn in the flesh.” We don’t know what Paul was battling, but it was a perpetual annoyance that kept him humble.
Thorns keep coming back. They are weeds that never go away. When you think you have pulled them, they keep coming back. They require a high level of maintenance and give you no benefit whatsoever. This is why Adam would die by the sweat of his brow. In order to get his food, he would have to waste energy dealing with these thorns, and if he didn’t deal with them, the thorns would overtake his crops and choke them out. Jesus used this image in the Parable of the Sower. Soil that has weeds in it will not produce good food, because much of the nutrients will go to the weeds instead of the good food. And why would there be thorns and weeds in the field? Because the manager of that field isn’t taking care of it, letting the world have its way on that ground and person.
Then we get to Jesus. The Romans put a crown of thorns on Jesus’ head to mock Him for His proclamation to be a king. While we think this may be just a trifling extra detail that goes into the crucifixion, understand that every single part of what Jesus went through that day had a point and a purpose beyond merely fulfilling prophecy. Jesus wore a crown made from thorns, the physical image of the curse of sin. Jesus literally wore sin to that cross and died as the “king of sin,” if you could call it that. He became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God.
But Jesus’ crown also shows something else: man’s rejection of Jesus’ kingship. The Jews and the Romans rejected Jesus as the King. They knew He was the King, but they rejected Him, so they gave Him a crown of thorns to mock His claim to be the King and the Savior. Sinful man will not bow his knee to Christ, even if it is the most logical thing to do. Sin is the utter hatred, defiance, and treason against God, and sinful man will not accept God to rule over them. The Jews and the Gentiles both rejected Christ. They rejected His kingdom, and they rejected His commands. Yet He still rules today, calling for all to repent of their treason and their rebellion against God before He comes back to crush all those who remain in rebellion. His terms of peace are His terms of peace, and there is no alternative. We have no say, and we cannot negotiate. We can only accept or reject – all or none.
While we are still in our sin, we are thorny people. We’ll try to marginalize it and say we have some rough spots around the edges, but our sins still poke and skewer us, and it’s not fun. People don’t want to touch roses because of the thorns. Jumping cactus is extremely annoying because if you get near it, it shoots it thorns at you. We can all be like jumping cacti if someone hits that button of ours. That’s why we need to submit to Christ, who wore the crown of thorns. When He died, the thorns on us died as well. We need to die daily to self so those thorns don’t grow and so we can be handled gently and not ‘poke back.’
If we are in Christ, when He died, we died with Him; but when He was raised, so we too shall be raised. When Jesus was raised from the dead, He no longer wore the crown of thorns but was instead given the crown above all crowns. Jesus is not just King of the Jews, but the King of all Kings. And if we are in Christ, we too will no longer bear thorns but the righteousness of God. As we celebrate the death and resurrection of Christ this weekend, let us honor and remember what Jesus did that day and submit to His rule and His Kingship.
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