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A teacher of the law asked Jesus an important question. In essence, he asks, “There are a lot of commandments in the Scripture. If I have to give a student the most basic of instruction, which of the commandments is the most vital?”
The response from Jesus is especially important for two reasons:
Which commandments He listed
The relatively few words He spoke
Check out His short reply—
The most important one, is this: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” The second is this: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” There is no commandment greater than these. (Mark 12:29-31)
In this sermon from Jesus, He speaks a total of 57 words. Notice the breakdown of the words He spoke:
Words from Scripture: 40 words
His own words: 17 words
I wonder how many times we get this reversed? How many times do we share a short passage from the Bible and then use a whole bunch of our own words to try to explain the Scripture? Do we think the Holy Spirit needs our help to illuminate the inspired Word?
Solomon warned twice of the dangers of “many words” (Ecclesiastes 5:3, 7), and Jesus said that if we think a lot of words spoken in prayer makes that prayer effective, we are really just babbling (Matthew 6:7).
The teacher of the law is astounded at this sermon Jesus delivered. He speaks almost as many words as Jesus (52 words), but nearly all of his words are simply repeating what Jesus had said. Jesus said this man’s synopsis of His message was “wise” and indicated that he was “not far from the kingdom of God” (Mark 12:32-34).
When we are asked questions about the Bible, let’s let the Bible do most of the talking. Let’s be careful that our attitude is not one of trying to “help” the Holy Spirit, but let’s rely on the Holy Spirit to help us know what Scripture to quote, what limited commentary to share, and when to be silent to allow the Word to do its irresistible work.
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Last week we mentioned that one of the things the Holy Spirit did after the Day of Pentecost was to unite individual Christians into the Church. In a world divided by religious and political factions, the unity of the Christians set them apart. Is our culture any different? Of course not! So the unity that the Holy Spirit brings is just as vital today.
In Psalm 133, David longs for this unity among believers. This psalm is in the collection of “Songs of Ascent.” That means that pilgrims to Jerusalem sang these songs as they literally went up the hill to Jerusalem. Psalm 133 opens with David singing, “How good and pleasant it is when brothers and sisters live together in unity” (v. 1).
Maybe David thought back to the time when people were joining him to give him support as king—David went out to meet them and said to them, “If you have come peaceably to me to help me, my heart shall be knit to you…” (1 Chronicles 12:17 AMP). In the next two verses of Psalm 133, David explains how this unity from being knit together is seen as a blessing.
Last week, we talked about the blessing of peace the priests pronounced on the people. That word for “peace” is shalom which could be defined as “nothing missing.” But couldn’t we also say that shalom is “no one missing”? Yes, because each and every part of the Body of Christ is vital and indispensable!
We see this same unity when the followers of Jesus were baptized in the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost. Acts 2:1 says these Christians were “all together” (or some translations say “one accord”). This is one word in Greek (homothumadon)which describes the beauty of unity. One Greek dictionary defines this word,“The image is almost musical; a number of notes are sounded which, while different, harmonize in pitch and tone. As the instruments of a great concert under the direction of a concert master, so the Holy Spirit blends together the lives of members of Christ’s church.”
This picture of a majestic musical is further amplified in the next verses of Acts 2 where people from all over the world heard these Christians praising God in their own native tongues. Luke goes on to use homothumadon again and again throughout Acts to show what a powerful testimony their unity was to the watching world.
Paul emphasized the need for unity in the Church when he wrote—
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. (Ephesians 4:1-6)
How does the Holy Spirit help us handle our differences and keep this unity? We first need the Spirit’s help to distinguish whether it’s a biblical, unbiblical, or non-biblical issue.
Biblical issues must send us back to the Bible to find the truth (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
Unbiblical issues—where a brother or sister is living in a way contrary to Scripture—call on us to speak the truth in love and correct in love only after allowing the Holy Spirit to examine our own lives (Ephesians 4:15; Matthew 7:1-5; James 5:19-20). Notice that we are to do this with fellow brothers and sisters, not with those outside the Church.
Non-biblical issues are the trickiest. These are issues over which we should immediately stop fighting as we defer to the weakest brother or sister (Romans 12:10, 14:19-21).
The Church needs this unity today. We need to be in “one accord.” In a world divided by religious and political factions, our unity enhances our witness.
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Last week we learned that we have a job to do. If we want to see Jesus come back to take us Home, we need to share the Good News with everyone. Jesus said that we didn’t have to obey Him in this Great Commission by ourselves, but we can go in His authority and with the empowerment of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 24:14; 28:18-20; Acts 1:8).
In Acts 1:8 notice that Jesus said we are “be My witnesses.” This isn’t an action first, but they are actions that spring out of who we are. So we need to ask: How are we to be His witnesses? Answer: By being blessed by God!
God has desired that we know the blessing of His presence since the very beginning. He instructed the priests to bless the people with these words:
The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace. (Numbers 6:24-26)
The Hebrew word for “peace” in this passage is shalom. One of the most basic definitions for shalom is “nothing missing.” In other words, we are blessed people when we realize there is nothing keeping us back from God’s presence.
If you asked someone in the Old Testament where they thought God’s presence was, they would probably point you to the Tent of Meeting or the Tabernacle in Jerusalem. But that was merely a foreshadowing of what God truly desired for His relationship with us. Jesus promised His followers, “On that day you will realize that I am in My Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you” (John 14:20). So if Jesus is in the Father, and we are in Him, that means we are also in the Father. In this position, we can experience the nearness to the Father that Jesus knows (see Ephesians 1:3-8).
This nearness is our source of peace: Now may the Lord of peace Himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you (2 Thessalonians 3:16). In this verse, the Greek word for “peace” is eirene, which means a soul at utter peace with God because it is assured of its eternal Home in God’s presence.
Blessed people are abundance people. Blessed people have all their needs supplied so that they can be a conduit of blessing to others. Our increasing awareness of God’s blessing empowers us to be witnesses for Him.
Let me take you back to the Book of Psalms. In Psalm 67, the psalmist asks for God’s blessing on his life four times in just seven short verses. Why does he desire this blessing? It’s not for himself but for others. Look at just the first two verses of this psalm:
May God be gracious to us and bless us and make His face shine on usTHAT Your ways may be known on earth, Your salvation among all nations.
Recall that Jesus commissioned us to go to all nations and that the Holy Spirit empowers our witness to all peoples. This psalmist is asking for God’s blessing so that he can be a witness to everyone. Nine times he says that he desires that all nations or all peoples will know and worship the Most High God.
God’s blessing on His people is really SO THAT all peoples and nations can see His blessing and turn to Him. One of the roles of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life is to remind us that we are indeed blessed in Jesus, and that we have a mission to fulfill in taking that blessing to others.
The Holy Spirit positions us to be blessed in Christ. This blessing empowers us to be a witness to all peoples so that they can come to God through Jesus.
It is good for us to pray for the Spirit’s blessing on our lives so that we can BE a blessing to all nations and peoples.
If you would like to check out all of the other messages in our series called We Are: Pentecostal, please click here.
If you were one of Christ’s disciples, wouldn’t you think it would be time for Jesus to take a victory lap? Maybe He could show up at the next meeting of the Sanhedrin, or in Pontius Pilate’s courtroom, or King Herod Antipas’ throne room. You can almost hear their longing for this when they asked Jesus, “Lord, are You at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6).
Jesus answered that question by saying, “Your race is just now beginning!” You see, Christ’s resurrection wasn’t the end of the race, but an important—absolutely indispensable—part of our ongoing race. “I will be raised back to life again” was a bold claim, but it wasn’t the final bold claim. There is one more for us to consider.
The resurrection of Jesus is our assurance that what Jesus says He will do, He will do. One of the things He promised is, “I am going to prepare a place for you and I will come back to get you” (John 14:1-3). The place Jesus has prepared for us is the end of our race—the finish line for which every Christian should be longing.
The disciples asked Jesus how they could know when His return was getting closer. He gave them a lot of things to watch for, but He concluded by saying, “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and THEN the end will come” (Matthew 24:14).
In order for us to go Home, the whole world—people in all nations—have to hear the Good News of the Kingdom of God.
In one of the boldest claims of all, Jesus says He has ultimate authority, and that He is commissioning us to use His authority for the express purpose of our missionary work to all nations. Notice the “therefore” which indicates what we are to do with His authority—
All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Therefore go andmake disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. … But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will beMy witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. (Matthew 28:18-20; Acts 1:8)
The apostle Paul appreciated this analogy of running a race. Just before it was time for Paul to go Home, he told his friend Timothy, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).
Earlier in his life, Paul used a running example when he wrote to the Christians at Corinth—
Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize. (1 Corinthians 9:24-27)
Paul gives us three don’ts and three dos in this passage:
Don’t fail to train, don’t run aimlessly, don’t get disqualified by focusing on the temporal
Do go into strict training, do stay focused on the eternal, do run for the prize of hearing Jesus say, “Well done!”
Do you want to go Home? Do you want Jesus to come again to take all of His children Home? Then finish the race of telling everyone in the whole world the Good News about Jesus.
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On Resurrection Sunday, Christians celebrate an event that is the foundational truth for all of the Bible and for the Christian faith which springs from the Scriptures: The resurrection of Jesus.
If Jesus wasn’t resurrected, this is a terrible, cruel lie we are perpetuating. If Jesus was resurrected, we have been given the key to eternal life. No one has ever made the bold claims that Jesus made about His own death and resurrection and then backed them up!
On the Sunday morning after Jesus was crucified, some women arrived at His tomb to finish preparing His body for burial, but Luke records something fascinating: “They did not find the body of the Lord Jesus” (Luke 24:1-8).
Think about this in a modern-day setting. If you were at the bedside of your loved one when they took their last breath, if you heard the doctor pronounce them dead, if you were at the funeral and saw their body in a casket, and if you saw that casket closed, sealed, and lowered into the ground, you would have every reason to find a body if that casket were re-opened.
These women were on Golgotha when Jesus died, they saw the Roman soldiers verify His death, they witnessed Joseph and Nicodemus wrap His body in linen strips, and they saw His body placed in a sealed tomb.
Then when there is no body where the dead body of Jesus is expected, there are only three possibilities:
(1) He never died
Medical experts have concluded that the horrific torture that Jesus endured prior to even being crucified resulted in significant blood loss, and would have put His body in shock. Then the strain on His weakened body during crucifixion would have resulted in His body experiencing either pleural effusion or cardiac effusion, which is attested to by the flow of “blood and water” from Jesus’ dead body when His side was pierced by a Roman spear (John 19:34).
The dead body of Jesus was thoroughly examined by both the Romans who conducted the crucifixion and His friends who prepared His body for burial (Mark 15:43-45; John 19:38-40). And two contemporary historians—Tacitus and Josephus—who were unfriendly to the cause of Christianity both attested to Christ’s death by crucifixion.
(2) His body was stolen
The Sanhedrin was so insistent on Jesus being crucified, they wouldn’t have left the “conspiracy” option open. So they convinced Governor Pontius Pilate to allow them to both seal the tomb and place a group of soldiers outside the tomb to guard it (Matthew 27:62-66). It is highly unlikely that the disciples who fled before the temple guard and who were now locked in a room because they were quaking with fear would somehow gain the courage to undertake a mission to steal Jesus’ body. Nor is it likely that they could have escaped the notice of the highly-trained Roman soldiers guarding the tomb.
(3) He was resurrected
The angels at the empty tomb reminded the women that Jesus had foretold both the manner of His death and the assurance of His resurrection. Jesus described His death in detail multiple times, including such key details as His death would be in Jerusalem, the religious leaders would pronounce a death sentence but the Romans would crucify Him, and that He would be resurrected three days later (Matthew 20:18-19; Luke 18:31-33). In addition, Paul tells us that there were hundreds of eyewitnesses to the resurrected Jesus (1 Corinthians 15:3-8).
Jesus said, “The reason my Father loves Me is that I lay down My life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from My Father” (John 10:17-18).
If Jesus foretold this and fulfilled this, we can also trust His other promises. Assurances such as:
He is preparing an eternal home for us and He will come back to take His followers there
That He alone holds the keys to Death and Hades
And that only those who have been cleansed from their sins will be able to enter Heaven
The bold claim that Jesus would be resurrected back to life is adequately backed up by the events on Resurrection Sunday! So now we can say that believing the bold claim of Christ’s resurrection gives us hope for the future and reason to tell others about Him!
There is a man that we meet in just a couple of verses of Scripture. We know that he is a Roman centurion. I gave him an appropriate Roman name of Vitellius. I created a fictional backstory for this centurion, but all of the events are well documented in both biblical history and contemporary history books of the time. I have listed below all of the scripture references that you may want to consult, along with some quotes from notable historians.
What isn’t fictional is the fact that the Cross didn’t happen to Jesus, but He came to make Calvary happen.
Jesus said this about His crucifixion, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to Myself” (John 12:32). That’s what happened to the thief, and to the centurion Vitellius, and to me, and to all who have acknowledged that Jesus is the Savior.
Vitellius’ bold claim on the day Jesus was crucified still rings true 2000 years later: “Certainly this was a righteous Man!”
Looking at Jesus who was lifted up on that Cross, we can appreciate the beauty of the 700-year-old prophecy about Him:
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces He was despised, and we held Him in low esteem. Surely He took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered Him punished by God, stricken by Him, and afflicted. But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed. (Isaiah 53:2-5)
Which is what we celebrate in Communion still to this day. “And [Jesus] took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is My body given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.’ In the same way, after the supper He took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is poured out for you’” (Luke 22:19-20).
The way Christians live today can still lift Jesus up for all to see. Jesus told His followers, “Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it” (Matthew 16:24-25).
When we live this way, our lives become the aroma of life to even sin-hardened thieves and war-hardened soldiers.
Check out this video of Vitellius’ personal experience—
Here are some further resources for you to check out:
Historian William Barclay wrote this about the centurions, “The centurions were the backbone of the Roman army. In a Roman legion there were 6,000 men; the legion was divided into sixty centuries, each containing 100 men, and in command of each century there was a centurion. These centurions were the long-service, regular soldiers of the Roman army. They were responsible for the discipline of the regiment, and they were the cement which held the army together. … A centurion was the equivalent of a regimental sergeant-major; and the centurions were the backbone of the Roman army.”
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When Luke says first that “Jesus grew in wisdom” before he mentions any of the other ways Jesus grew, that is our indication that a healthy mind is at the foundation for every other aspect of health (Luke 2:52). If you’ve missed the mental health keys we’ve already learned, you can review them by clicking here.
It’s been said that lions are tamed with a chair. Specifically, with the legs of the chair. These powerful animals are trying to focus on too many points at one time which keeps them from initiating an attack. So they are not so much “tamed” as they are paralyzed and overwhelmed by trying to concentrate on too many things.
It’s the same with us: If we try to concentrate on every voice speaking to us, we’ll become overwhelmed and paralyzed. “The Bible says this … my Mom says that … my best friend told me to try … my agnostic coworker said I should….” It’s overwhelming and mentally draining! Just like our bodies can become exhausted, so can our minds. Exhausted bodies are susceptible to germs, and so are exhausted minds susceptible to unhealthy ideas.
Consider all of the voices Jesus had to deal with in His last days heading toward Calvary. From about 4 months out, things really began to intensify. He still had the voices of His critics constantly harping on Him, and I’m sure the devil was still looking for his “opportune time” (Luke 4:13), not to mention all of the other voices around Jesus. There are two important principles to keep in mind here:
God can speak truth to us through harsh, unfriendly voices
The devil can lie to us through kind, friendly voices
So we cannot automatically listen to or ignore messages because of who the messenger is.
The friendly voice of Peter told Jesus, “You are the Messiah!” To which Jesus replied, “The Holy Spirit revealed that to you. Now let me remind you that we are heading to Jerusalem where I am going to be crucified.”
The now not-so-friendly voice of Peter then rebuked Jesus, “Never, Lord! This shall never happen to You!” Jesus turned to Peter to say, “Get behind Me, satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
The Father gave Peter, James, and John a glimpse of the glory Jesus would have when He was resurrected from the dead when they saw Him transfigured. During this time Moses and Elijah affirmed that Jesus was headed to Jerusalem to fulfill all that was prophesied about Him. In the aftermath of His transfiguration, Jesus again repeated, “I am going to be crucified and resurrected.”
As Jesus entered Jerusalem on the day we now celebrate as Palm Sunday, people cheered and the religious leaders jeered. To both groups, Jesus once again affirmed His mission, “I am going to be crucified and resurrected.”
No matter what others said or did, Jesus never changed His tune. How did He keep clear about the mission He was on? He simply compared every voice with God’s voice. Jesus never changed His tune because He was in tune with the Father’s voice.
Years ago, I played the tympani in our church orchestra. I learned very quickly that the best way to tune these big kettle drums was to put my face close to the drumhead while I hummed the proper note. Then as I adjusted the tuning pedal, I knew I had the tympani tuned to the right note when what I was humming resonated back to me from the drumhead.
At the Transfiguration, the Father told the disciples to listen to the voice of Jesus. Jesus claimed that He only said and did what the voice of His Father resonated to Him. And Jesus told us that His sheep know and follow His voice in the same way (Luke 9:35; John 12:49-50; John 10:3-5).
The Book of Psalms opens with these words:
Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on His law day and night. (Psalm 1:1-2)
The word meditate can be translated as “hum.” When we read and study God’s Word, the Holy Spirit will help us know which voices are in-tune with the Father’s heart and which ones are out-of-tune. You can check out a great example of this from the life of the apostle Paul in Acts 20:22-24; 21:10-15.
So our important mental health reminder is this: To make sure we are listening to the right voices, tune your ear to the voice of the Holy Spirit. Then receive any voice that resonates with that tune, and reject any voice that is out of key.
If you would like to download the graphic of this reminder for your phone, simply leave me a comment with the model of the phone, and I’ll get the right-sized graphic right out to you. If you’ve missed any of the messages in our mental health series, you can find all of them by clicking here.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Caiaphas’ bold claim couldn’t be backed up, but every bold claim Jesus made was backed up. In the process of looking at those claims, we’ve actually already read another bold claim—one that was repeated three times. It is a bold claim made by the Roman governor Pontius Pilate.
When Jesus was first brought to Pilate, he attempted to “pass the buck” by sending Jesus to King Herod Antipas. Since Herod sent Jesus right back to Pilate, the governor took that as support for his bold claim. Check out what Pilate said:
I have found no basis for your charges against Jesus
neither has Herod
Jesus has done nothing to deserve death
I have found in Him no grounds for the death penalty (Luke 23:13-22)
Even Pilate’s wife supported him by saying, “Don’t have anything to do with that innocent Man” (Matthew 27:19).
Pilate’s role in this case was as a modern-day judge. A judge weighs the evidence from the prosecution, compares that with the laws on the books, weighs the evidence from the defendant, and then makes his ruling. Pilate rules multiple times: Not guilty. But the accusers keep coming back with their loud voices but no more evidence. Even though “[Pilate] knew it was out of self-interest that they had handed Jesus over to him” (Matthew 27:18), the shouts of the religious leaders finally prevailed (Luke 23:23-25).
Why was Pilate’s claim of the innocence of Jesus so bold? Because the Bible tells us, “ALLhave sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
These religious elites had been trying to find an accusation against Jesus almost since the beginning of His public ministry. Many of these same accusers were present on the day they hauled a woman caught in the act of adultery before Jesus (John 8:2-11). They claimed she deserved to be stoned to death, but Jesus simply said, “Let those without any sin throw the first stone at her.” Jesus once again allowed His eloquent silence to work on their hearts, as they knew that not one of them was without sin, so they all dropped their stones and left.
Jesus freed this woman from her sin when He refused to condemn her. After all, He was the only sinless One who could have been justified in throwing the first stone, but He knew that “God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him” (John 3:17).
Jesus doesn’t condemn us, but He doesn’t want us to stay in our sin either, which is why He then told this woman, “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
Jesus called all of us to live a perfect life: “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). Yet like those men in John 8, we all would have to drop our stones and leave.
And satan loves to remind God’s saints of this. John shares with us that “the accuser of our brothers and sisters…accuses them before our God day and night” (Revelation 12:10). The accuser wants to keep us trapped in the guilt of our sin—wants to see us condemned to an eternity separated from God’s presence.
But when someone has placed their faith in the sacrifice Jesus made for us with His death on the Cross, Jesus takes us into Himself and there is now no condemnation for those IN Jesus because there is nothing in Jesus to be condemned! Because of what Jesus did, it’s not us who is condemned, but sin is condemned! As a result, we no longer have to live according to the sinful nature and suffer the condemnation of sin, but instead when we are in Jesus, “the righteous requirements of the law” are fully met in us (see Romans 8:1-4).
We cannot do this on our own, but only through the power of the blood of Jesus. Look at the rest of this passage from Revelation: “For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down.They triumphed over him by the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 12:10-11).
What amazing news! The writer of Hebrews gives us more details in this passage:
For by one sacrifice [Jesus] has made perfect forever those who are being made holy. The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First He says: “This is the covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I will put My laws in their hearts, and I will write them on their minds.” Then He adds: “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more.” (Hebrews 10:14-17)
When we are in Jesus—when we have accepted by faith His work on the Cross—God can make the same bold claim to the devil that Pilate made to the religious leaders: “I find no basis for a charge!” This is how we can then fulfill the righteous requirement Jesus gives us to “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
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…Peter took [Jesus] aside and began to rebuke Him (Mark 8:32).
Can you imagine someone rebuking Jesus?!
It’s even harder to comprehend when we realize that just three verses earlier Peter made such a bold declaration about Jesus more explicitly than anyone else ever had: “You are the Messiah!”
This is similar to what happened when Jesus preached His first public sermon in Luke 4:16-30. Luke tells us that the people went from speaking well of Jesus to wanting to kill Him in just a matter of a couple of minutes.
Why? How could this happen so quickly?
In his Gospel, Matthew records Peter’s rebuke this way: “Never, Lord! This shall never happen to You!” (Matthew 16:22). This was Peter’s response to Jesus predicting His cruel mistreatment at the hands of the religious leaders, and His impending crucifixion.
In the sermon in Luke 4, the people wanted their Messiah to only focus on the Jews and let the rest of the world burn. When Jesus said He was on-mission to save all people everywhere, they were furious with Him. They were angry because He wasn’t going to do things their way. “After all,” they probably thought, “our way is the most logical way.”
You and I are also in danger of going from praising to rebuking in just a matter of minutes. It can happen so naturally. By naturally I mean that our sinful nature must not be allowed to get its own way.
After Peter rebuked Jesus, He told him, “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns” (Mark 8:33). Our mind of flesh is hostile to the mind controlled by the Holy Spirit.
There are things that may seem unpleasant or illogical to my natural mind, but I must not be controlled by that mind. I must listen to, and obey, what the Holy Spirit reveals to me. That means I must allow my mind to be transformed to “the concerns of God.”
Our daily prayer must be like the prayer Jesus prayed just moments before His arrest: Father, not My will, but Your will be done. If I continue to do things my way, my natural mind will naturally rebuke Jesus, and I can go from praise to rebuke in a matter of moments. I don’t ever want to be guilty of rebuking Jesus, so I desire to “have the same mindset as Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5). I hope you will join me in this prayer.
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As we near the crucifixion of Jesus, we begin to see how politics plays a role in so many decisions. The Sanhedrin is trying to balance their popularity with the Jewish people and their standing with powerful leaders in the Roman government. Pontius Pilate is trying to balance how the Sanhedrin portrays him to the Jewish people and what those in Rome are telling Caesar Tiberius about him. King Herod Antipas also has issues with balancing the pressure from the Sanhedrin with the popularity of Jesus.
Luke gives us a very telling statement about the politics of the day when he writes, “That day Herod and Pilate became friends—before this they had been enemies” (Luke 23:12). How did they become friends over this issue of what to do with Jesus? Remember that the Sanhedrin is a common thorn-in-the-side for both of them, and the political axiom that still holds to this day says, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
I point out all of the political maneuverings during this pivotal time because these political balancing acts are still being played out today and Christians will end up in the crosshairs.
Pilate was trying to appease the Sanhedrin but there was no Roman law that Jesus had broken that was deserving of the death penalty they were demanding. So twice Pilate tells these religious leaders, “I will punish Him and then release Him.” In fact, without waiting for their approval, Pilate subjects Jesus to the tortuous punishment known as flagellation (Luke 23:13-22; John 19:1-11).
I think Pilate believed that if they saw Jesus so humiliated and beaten down they would back off from their desire for His death. But Pilate miscalculated their commitment to seeing Jesus eliminated from the scene.
Pilate finally gives in and says, “You take Him and crucify Him. As for me, I find no basis for a charge against Him.” But the Jewish religious leaders insisted, “We have a law, and according to that law He must die, because He claimed to be the Son of God.”
If you have ever watched a movie about the gladiatorial games in the Roman Colosseum, you’ve probably viewed the scene where one combatant is disarmed and helpless. Before the victor strikes his deathblow he will look to Caesar in the stands. The Roman Caesar will either give a thumbs-up signal to pardon the victim or he will give a thumbs-down signal to send the defeated one to their death.
Pilate asks Jesus, “Don’t You realize I have power either to free You or to crucify You?”
There was another king who called himself “king of kings” but God called him “My servant.” He was King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. Daniel, an exile from Israel who was Nebuchadnezzar’s prime minister, reminded him where his authority originated, “The Most High is sovereign over all kingdoms on earth and gives them to anyone He wishes” (Daniel 4:17).
In the same way, Jesus addressed Pilate, “You would have no power over Me if it were not given to you from above.”
John Piper wrote: “This does not intimidate Jesus because Pilate’s authority over Jesus is subordinate to God’s authority over Pilate. Jesus gets His comfort at this moment not because Pilate’s will is powerless, but because Pilate’s will is guided. Not because Jesus isn’t in the hands of Pilate’s fear, but because Pilate is in the hands of Jesus’s Father.”
Jesus shows us an important principle: Should we respect our leaders (even the ungodly ones)? Yes! Should we fear them? No!
We don’t fear them because their power is limited to just this life and is under the control of the Most High God (Luke 12:4). Peter and John learned this lesson well, as we see in their interaction with the same Sanhedrin that turned Jesus over to Pilate (see Acts 4:1-10). What Jesus and these apostles demonstrate for us is respectful boldness.
In light of this, here are five things Christians should keep in mind. When persecution comes against us, we should respond like this:
Jesus taught us there is a time for eloquent silence, but when the Holy Spirit needs us to speak, He will give us the respectfully bold words to share. Jesus said,
On My account you will be brought before governors and kings as witnesses to them and to the Gentiles. But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. (Matthew 10:18-20)
Respectful? Yes. Fearful? No. Respectful, loving, prayerful boldness is how we will glorify the Most High God in the face of persecution.
A teacher of the law asked Jesus an important question. In essence, he asks, “There are a lot of commandments in the Scripture. If I have to give a student the most basic of instruction, which of the commandments is the most vital?” 
Craig T. Owens 