The Sufferings of Christ

Last year we had a book that was put out about this time of the year called The Gospel of Judas, which was a text that was a Gnostic text, as we have those that were supposed to give a different alternative view of Judas and his relationship with Christ and the Gospels. And then, over the last several years, there's been the Da Vinci Code, which some of us have read, some of us saw the movie when it came out last year.

All of these have a cumulative effort to undermine the Bible and belief. And it works as part of a gradual, continuous erosion of societal faith. Ultimately, that type of an approach will kill people. It will kill a society. It will kill a culture. On another stage in the same debate within the academic, theological, and archaeological stage, there's a decades-if-not-centuries-old debate that seeks to interpret the evidence or the lack of evidence of the Bible's history in a manner that denies such things as the existence of Abraham, the patriarchs, the exodus as a historical event. Even King David and Solomon, the first kings of Israel, are denied as even being historical people who ever existed by some who study the text, study the archaeological evidence and Bible history. There is a school of thought there and theological institutions that deny really that even the nation of Israel, as we see in the Old Testament, ever existed. And they interpret the evidence according to one criteria. And just as vehemently on the other side, there are people who interpret the same evidence and believe that it backs up what the Bible says. In some minds, Israel didn't even exist. It's an effort to do away with the historical record and the evidence of Israel. And some scholars are bold enough to even state that, that there is a bias and a concerted effort in certain scholarly circles to do away with Israel, ancient Israel, ever having existed. Then there's another stage, and that's when we see periodically rarer its head. And that's what we could call the stage of anti-Semitism, that is still very much alive in the world stage, probably personified today by the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. That's a big name to get out. As one radio host likes to call him, which I think is a lot better, it's my mood, I'm in a jihad. It's a little bit better description, perhaps, of his attitude. But he portrays the hatred and the attacks on the state of Israel and Jews around the world in general. Then there's another stage, and that is what we could call the anti-American stage. Whatever America is, has stood for, is doing in the modern world, and we could throw in there Great Britain as well, it's bad. Colonialism, imperialism, power, all of this, it's bad. Anything that America stands for and does is bad on the world stage.

Brethren, believe me, there's a great deal of that out there, and it is growing by the day.

That really speaks to the relative decline of the power of America and Great Britain over the last 60 years, and on the world scene, even though we still are a very great power in relative terms, there has been a decline, and that is going to accelerate, we know, from prophecy.

Behind all of this, when you move from, move to discredit the idea that Jesus was the Son of God, all the way to anti-Americanism, it's all part of a package that is really intent, it's engineered by a spiritual mind that is also engineered a great deal of hatred against God. In Romans chapter 1, the Apostle Paul said of many in his period, the first century, that they did not like to retain God in their knowledge. A hatred of God is at the center of all of these things that I described, and I'm saying the true God, true religion, true faith, true church, whatever you want to, however you want to package it, but it is a hatred of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as we see revealed in the Scriptures. That's part of our world today.

But in the midst of that world, there's you and I, and there are many others.

Part of what we, the Bible calls the elect. And the elect of God, right now, this very day, the elect of God are preparing to observe the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread and the Spring Holy Days. And that's where we are. That's what we are gathered here to begin to do.

What I'd like to do today is take us through a study of the Scriptures and read a section of Scriptures that we don't read on the Passover night. When we come together on the Passover, we read a number of the Scriptures that describe what was done that night, especially in the book of John. This sermon was inspired by a sermon that Scott Ashley gave to us up in Fort Wayne last week. And so those of you that were there will be familiar with that. But this is my own particular take on it. But I felt that it was well put by Scott Ashley. And I decided to go through the same Scriptures and put my particular treatment upon the subject to help us get in the frame and the mood for taking the Passover tomorrow night. And what I'd like to do is begin in Matthew chapter 26 with the story that picks up after Christ and his disciples had kept the Passover service. And we can turn over and we'll go primarily through Matthew's account in this story. And let's pick it up in Matthew chapter 26.

You recall the entire story of the Passover service where they kept the meal and Christ changed the symbols to the bread and wine. They washed each other's feet. And then they sang a hymn and they went out. And that's where we will end tomorrow night.

But what I'm going to do today here is walk us through what took place when they went out. And the arrest and the passion and the suffering of Christ during those next few hours. Because that's what we really should be focusing on as we prepare our hearts and our minds to take the Passover service tomorrow night, brethren. And that's where we are. So let's begin with the story here and let's walk through it. And you can add your own thoughts. And perhaps tomorrow, as you even prepare to come to take the Passover tomorrow evening, you will even add more into this story as well. But let's begin in verse 36 of Matthew chapter 26.

Then Jesus came with them, with his disciples, to a place called Gethsemane. And he said to the disciples, Sit here while I go over there. And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and he began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed. So they came out of a room up in the city of Jerusalem, the old city of Jerusalem, and they came down the steep hill into the Kidron Valley. And the Kidron Valley is what separates even to this day Jerusalem proper from the Mount of Olives. It's a very deep ravine. There's a brook that ran through it. There's not much of a brook there today, I suppose, in the wet season. It is. I walked down through that year and a half ago. I wanted to walk the Kidron Valley on that trip to Jerusalem, and we were able to do that. But that time of year in the fall, there's no water flowing through anything at that period. But there is still the Garden of Gethsemane that is there. And today, if you go to Jerusalem, you can go to the Garden of Gethsemane, at least in the region of where this particular garden was that Christ went to. And there's a big large church that's been built there. But there are still olive groves. Really, the name Gethsemane means oil press. And it was at that time, and there still are olive trees there. In fact, they will tell you that some of the very, very old olive trees date all the way from the time of Christ, 2,000 years ago. Olive trees do last hundreds of years. Whether or not the trees you would see there today are the same ones that were there the night that Christ was there with his disciples. It is probably not true, but it would be safe to say because of the way olive trees grow. And that is, they put out shoots, and other trees grow out from them. Those growing there today are most likely descendants of olive trees that were there during the first century. But the word Gethsemane means an olive press. This is my one prop for today.

I have an olive branch from the Garden of Gethsemane. When we were there a year and a half ago, and walking through there, they were just harvesting the olives. This was right after the Feast of Tabernacles when the harvest was coming in there. And I just pulled, I reached up and pulled a piece of a branch off and put it in my book that I had with me and pulled it out here this morning. I hadn't seen it really since we got back. And I said, Debbie, where's that olive branch that I brought from the Garden of Gethsemane? So this is it. This is still green, lopressed a little bit. But if you want to look at it closer up after services, you're welcome to do so. I don't know how long I'll be able to keep this. I'm about to lose one of the leaves right here.

But I suppose if every tourist that walked through there pulled even this little bit off of a tree, those trees very quickly would be denuded. They'd be bare. So I just pulled it off and kind of stuck it in my coat right there so nobody would say anything to me. But you'll still see olive trees there today. And you will still see people harvesting the olives by hand and pressing them. But that's what Gethsemane means. It means oil press. And so this is where they were. And this is the scene of Christ's exit and just before he was finally arrested. He tells him to sit and pray. And he took Peter and James and John with him. And it says in verse 37 that he began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed. He'd understood what was about to take place. He understood that he was going to be beaten within an inch of his life and that he was going to be killed in a very horrible manner. And the hour had come for that to take place. And Christ had known this all of his physical life. He had known it from eternity when he was the word that this would take place. But now he was at that moment. And being human, he was very, very sorrowful.

Now, this term sorrowful and deeply distressed means more than just a passing sorrow. This is to be... this is talking about a very deep grief. You know, you bump into somebody grocery aisle and what do you say? I'm sorry. We're sorry. We are sorry. We've bumped into them and we move on. And we pass. We may get caught in some problem and may have to be apologizing to somebody. And we can say, I'm sorry for what I said. I'm sorry for what I did. And we can have a sorrow at that level. Maybe sorrow that we got caught again. Maybe, you know, for what distress we caused in some way, we can generally be sorry for committing an offense and say that. But there's a deeper sorrow. And those of us that have felt a deeper sorrow know exactly what Christ is getting to. You've ever lost a mate to death? You've ever lost a child to death? You've been very sorrowful.

And I've walked into hospital rooms and into homes where the sorrow you can cut. I mean, it's palpable. It's hanging in the air. And it's inconsolable. You can't say anything to take it away. And when you are confronted with that type of distress, either in yourself or in someone else, you know what sorrow is. It's deep. This is what is conveyed by what is mentioned here about Jesus, that he began to be very sorrowful. And I mean, in a healing type of sorrow, where it just comes out, it's uncontrollable in that way because of what he was about to deal with. It was a very deep distress. And so he said to them, my soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with me. And he went a little farther, and he fell on his face, and he prayed. So he left even the three. He left the other 11 of them went down with Christ. There were 12 counting Christ, 11 disciples. Remember, Judas was already gone by this point. So he left what? Eight and took three with him. And then he leaves the three, and he goes on a little further and fell on his face. And he prayed, saying, oh, my father, if it is possible that this cup pass from me, nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will. And again, that human element in Christ wanted it to pass. And there was a reluctance to go through it. And he understood that from a human perspective. But it did not overcome what he knew had to be the plan and the purpose of his whole life and already planned from eternity. And that was his death. And so he said, not my will, but your will. Then in verse 40 it says, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping and said to Peter. This was the three. What? He was somewhat surprised, but perhaps not so surprised. But he made the point to them, could you not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The Spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. And so here he says to watch.

Now I gave a sermon some weeks back about the watchman of prophecy and the idea of watching you in the Old Testament. This is one sexual Christ said to his disciples at this moment, watch and pray. And it does have an application to us in a spiritual sense. Part of watching from what the Bible tells us about watching is to watch our relationship with God, with Christ, to be mindful of it, to be praying, to be alert. He's really suggesting and he's saying be spiritually alert and to be in a spirit of interceding, intercessory prayer.

This is what he's talking about, so that you'll not fall into temptation.

Christ understood that these men, including primarily Peter, were in danger of defecting. Peter was going to deny him. The others would not be around at the final moments, other than John, the final moments of his life. But what he's saying here is he's serving an urgent call to prayer.

And he tells them that only urgent prayer will save them from falling into the coming temptation, that they're going to face. And the lesson for you and I is that in our relationship with Christ, we have to be very alert to that. We have to watch for that. You see, watching in the Bible is a whole lot more than just watching what's taking place in our world around us.

It's watching our own personal spiritual relationship with God. And at this very moment of Christ's death, this is what he brings out to them. And he brings out that you've got to be urgent in prayer if you're going to avoid the temptation that is going to come. And then in verse 40, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. He said, Peter, could you not watch with me one hour? Watch and pray. Again, in verse 42, a second time he went away and he prayed, saying, Oh, my father, if this cup cannot pass away from me unless I drink it, your will be done.

Again, he knew that that will had to be done and that the cup was not going to pass from him. But there are times when you have to say things, even though you know that it's not going to change the course of actions and certain things, but you have to unburden yourself. And prayer is like that. Now, there is a time to talk very earnestly and directly to God, even though you know in some cases, perhaps, how the answer is going to go, but to unburden yourself of your feelings.

This is what Christ was doing. And in so doing, he was strengthening himself for what he had to go through. He wasn't changing the course of the next few hours. He knew that would not be altered.

But in the very act of him, humanly talking to God about it in a very direct and powerful manner.

Sometimes your prayers will have to be very powerful. There are times Debbie and I will talk about it in our own things that we may be dealing with. And we may be upset or there's something that we feel passionately about. And we will say, what did you pray about it? And she'll say, or I might say, yeah, I yelled at God about it.

There's a time to yell at God and just to be forceful and strong. You don't need to worry about being jolted with a bolt of lightning at that moment, wherever you may be, and that God's going to rain fire down on you. And God, if your heart is right, you know, but you just have to unburden yourself with how you feel. And even at the times when it's really not going to change what's taking place or the course of action, but Christ was unburdening Himself here, but in the process He was being strengthened. But in verse 43, He came and He found them asleep again, for their eyes were heavy. They'd only had a little bit of wine for the Passover. That's a short time earlier, but they were still very tired and they couldn't stay awake. So He left them. In verse 44, He went away again and He prayed the third time, saying the same words. So He had to get it out again. He had to pray for His own self. And He came to those disciples and He said to them, Are you still sleeping and resting? Behold, the hour is at hand and the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us be going, see my betrayer is at hand. And keeping in mind, even where they were, Christ probably was seeing the torch lights snake their way down the hill from the temple area and the official areas of the Sanhedrin and the Romans, knowing that it was a band of troops now coming down the hillside to where they were in the garden to arrest Him. When He said that, you know, my betrayer is at hand. And He knew that Judas was leading these Roman soldiers to Him because He knew where Christ would be.

They had been in this area before and Judas knew that. And while he was still speaking, behold, Judas, one of the twelve with a great multitude with swords and clubs, came from the chief priests and the elders of the people.

Now, his betrayer had given them a sign saying, Whomever I kiss, he is the one, sees him.

Immediately, he went up to Jesus and said, Greetings, Rabbi, and kissed Him.

And Jesus said to him, Friend, why have you come? And they came, they laid hands on Jesus and took Him. And so Christ must have looked right into Judas' eyes, calling him Friend as he was betrayed. You know, you and I don't look in the same way of someone who we feel has betrayed us, not been faithful to our friendship, do we? It's hard for us to call him Friend.

But Christ could do that with Judas because he knew the purpose and his plan, and he still looked at him as a friend, even though he was going to be the catalyst here at this point and setting in motion all of the suffering in the next few hours.

Verse 51, Suddenly one of those who were with Jesus stretched out his hand and drew his sword, instruct the servant to the high priest, and cut off his ear. Now that was Peter, as other accounts tell us, who acted impetuously, as Peter did quite often, and he cut off the man's ear. But Jesus said to him, Put your sword in its place, for all who take the sword will perish by the sword. Or do you think that I cannot now pray to my Father, and He will provide me with more than twelve legions of angels? How then could the Scriptures be fulfilled that it must happen thus?

In that hour Jesus said to the multitudes, Have you come, I was against a robber, with swords and clubs to take me. I sat daily with you, teaching in the temple, and you did not seize me. But all this was done that the Scriptures, the prophets, might be fulfilled. And all the disciples forsook him and fled. Other gospel accounts will show that Christ healed the man's ear. He put it back on. Which is probably why they weren't all arrested. All the other disciples were told in verse 56, fled. Had in normal circumstances this attack by Peter upon a Roman soldier would have been enough for everybody to be arrested. I mean, you know, you see what happens in LA or Detroit or some other major city when we see these things that are videotaped and one person attacks a cop or a group of cops have been pulled over and then they just swarm. And, you know, anybody around there is going to get swept up in that. This would have happened. This was one Roman soldier being attacked. And normally they would have all probably been swept up and arrested. But Christ healed him. And it was the incident was over. And they were no doubt stunned at what was taking place. But they had to follow through and suit with the arrest.

You would think at that point they might have recognized, wait a minute, this is not just any ordinary man. Maybe we need to rethink the orders in this arrest warrant that we have in our hand and call this whole thing off at this point. But once something begins to move of this size, it doesn't stop. And of course, this was the spiritual forces behind this action. And any human logic was completely out the window. Human reason and restraint was completely gone at this point. Christ makes a point about violence and about attacking. And he makes a point here about those who choose to live by the sword, that they are going to run the risk of perishing by the sword. Peter didn't perish this night because he pulled that sword and cut the man's ear off. But Christ was speaking to a very important principle in regard to violence, that all of us need to understand and ultimately remember. Let's pick up again in verse 57.

Verse 57, Those who had laid hold on Jesus led him away to Caiaphas, the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled. So the plot called for that to happen. They were already here again. This was late in the evening, beyond most business hours. This was a special court convened for this particular case. Verse 58, We're told that Peter followed him at a distance to the high priest's courtyard. Now again, Peter is always an interesting study in the Gospels and how he acted around Christ before this night and the various statements and episodes of their relationship. But again, what happened here this night, Peter is mentioned that he seems to be the one to follow at this point. The others fled and just kind of melted away into the darkness of night. Peter kind of wants to see what's taking place, but he followed Jesus. It says, at a distance in verse 58, as one commentator puts it, he followed at a distance between courage and cowardice. Halfway between being a man of strong courage and one of extreme cowardice.

He was not a complete coward, but he was not completely filled with courage either. Why was he following? Was it out of courage or just curiosity? He hadn't fled like the others. He still wanted to kind of linger around the edges of this story and see what was going to take place.

But he got into the courtyard, it says here in verse 58, of the high priest. And he went in and he sat down with servants to see the end. He wanted to see how this all acted out. Again, the character of Peter is fascinating, but he's not yet the courageous man that we say later on in the book of Acts, but he's not a complete coward either.

He's intrigued. He wants to do more than what he's capable of doing. The spirit is rolling, but the flesh is weak, but he moves closer. And so in verse 59, the chief priests, the elders, and all the counsel sought false false testimony against Jesus to put him to death. But they found none. Even though many false witnesses came forward, they found none. But at last, two false witnesses came forward. So it was hard to even stir up a quorum of witnesses to confirm the charges they wanted to lay on Christ to justify his death with the permission of the Romans.

Now, at this point, maybe it's something to say at this point. You know, the historic episode here with the Jews through the Sanhedrin, these priests, have borne the brunt of anti-Semitism down through the centuries as they have been called Christ killers and historically been given that title. They have lived with that. They bear that mark to this day. When I was in Aachen, Germany last fall, and we were at the Cathedral of Aachen, we were looking at all the golden treasures there in the Treasury Building.

And there was one huge mural that filled a wall about the size of this area over here between these two doors. And it was a medieval painting of a village scene somewhere in Germany. And as paintings were in those days, it was kind of like it was a cross between a painting, a news picture, and a political cartoon. Because as they made these paintings in those days four or five hundred years ago, they were making a political or religious statement. And they had an archbishop at that time. They had a constable. They had the king and the Holy Roman Emperor.

But they were telling you, you looked at various parts of the big scene of this big painting, and each section told various stories. And down in one corner, they had a they had a they had an individual with a hooked nose to portray a Jew. And he was actually pushing a spear into the side of somebody on a horse that wasn't supposed to be Christ, but he kind of looked like a suffering messiah. And I remember the tour guide kind of telling us various parts of it. He kind of glossed over this part of the picture.

And I started to bring it up, and he changed the subject real quick, because he didn't want to admit that this was an anti-Semitic statement in this four or five hundred year old painting of a Jew with a hooked nose killing a Christ-like figure in this particular painting. But it was again coming from a period of time when anti-Semitism against Jews was very, very strong, and these things were portrayed in these public paintings like this.

They've lived with this. When you look at the gospel accounts, yes, they were culpable. So were the Romans. The Jews could never have followed through and caused the death of Christ without the Roman permission. So the Romans were responsible, too. Pilate may have washed his hands, as we will see, but they had their responsibility. And ultimately, when we should look at, take the whole Bible into account, we, brethren, should never, ever get caught up in the anti-Semitic spirit that we see historically and even see in our modern culture today.

And calling Jews Christ killers or looking at them in any way for this. As I've said before, given a sermon on it, all of us, ultimately, from the biblical perspective, you and I are responsible for Christ's death, not just one ethnic group. But that anti-Semitism is a virulent form of God-hatred that is rampant in society and will play another large role in history before it's all said and done. They finally found two people to come forward as false witnesses.

And they said, this fellow, verse 61, this fellow said, speaking of Christ, I am able to destroy the temple of God and to build it in three days. And the high priest arose and said to him, Do you answer nothing? What is it these men testify against you? But Jesus kept silent. And the high priest answered and said to him, I put you under oath by the living God.

Tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God. And so the one charge that we find here brought out against him is what Christ had said on an earlier occasion in his ministry. You can go back to John chapter 2. You will find where Christ said to a group, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up, John 2 and verse 19. And John gives the explanation. Then said the Jews, 46 years was this temple and building and will you rear it up in three days? Verse 21 of John 2 it says, But he spoke of the temple of his body. So Christ's statement really was speaking of the fact that he would die but be raised back to life within three days. Destroy this temple, this body, and it will be raised back up. They couldn't see that because many of them didn't even believe in the idea of a resurrection, much less the fact that he was the Son of God. And they said that they thought he was talking about destroying the temple, the Herodian temple that was there that had been 46 years building and was a quite beautiful facility and was at the centerpiece of the community worship. It was holy and all. And yet Christ was not even talking of that temple. But this is the charge that they bring against him. And this is really at the heart and core of so much of our understanding of the Bible, of the New Covenant, of our relationship with God, understanding Christ's body, being this, in this sense, this temple of God that was destroyed but was raised back in three days and three nights. Remember when Christ died, the veil between the holy of holies and the outer portion of the inner temple complex was rent in two.

That symbolically, well actually more than the symbol, it was a symbol of the reality that that temple and the priesthood and everything connected with it was rendered null and void. It was invalidated at the moment Christ died. And when that curtain was was cut in two supernaturally, God was showing that to all who knew and understood. And this is what is recorded here in the Scriptures. It is a fulfillment and Stephen understood this. Hold your place in Matthew 27 and turn over to Acts 7. When Stephen was brought before the Sanhedrin and he gave his fabulous address here, makes up all of chapter 7 of the book of Acts, he comes down to verse 49.

Verse 48, he says, The Most High God does not dwell in temples made with hands.

Verse 49, he said, Heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool.

What house will you build for me, says the Lord? Or what is the place of my rest?

Has my hand not made all these things? And this is what really got them all upset and got them so angry that they stoned Stephen. That God doesn't dwell in a house.

He doesn't dwell in anything made of hands. He was basically, he was quoting out of Isaiah, but it speaks again to what was being said here in Matthew 26 about Christ, that the temple and all of those physical things were no longer necessary in terms of one's relationship with God.

Now, that's just part of the story of the New Covenant, as we should understand.

We've just published this new book, but on the New Covenant, that you will all, member households, will all be receiving in the next few weeks. That is a rather thick book that goes through the whole story and the explanation of the covenants. It's a much needed book, and certainly it's one of those things we'll probably put down and maybe put a coffee cup on a few times or two or whatever, and it'll wind up on our bookshelves. But we should all take the time to study that concept. But this cuts to it right here. The fact that our covenant relationship with God is spiritual, and there is obedience, there are laws to it, but there's no buildings, there's no temple, there's no functioning priesthood in the sense of what had been set up in the Old Testament period, and they couldn't get beyond that. This was so important here.

This is where Christ was speaking to the true temple, the ultimate point of meeting between God and man. And John here is what is being brought out here about what Christ's statement is, is a critical point of understanding. So anyway, the story moves on.

The hype-reast in verse 65 tore his clothes, saying he has spoken blasphemy. They could not deal with that statement. What further need do we have of witnesses? Look, now you've heard his blasphemy. They spat on his face in verse 67. They beat him, and others struck him with the palms of their hands, saying, prophesy to us, Christ, who is the one who struck you?

And so, it was a sense that he was blindfolded, and they were saying, reveal to us what is supposedly secret. This is what is meant by the idea of prophesying, not telling some future event.

Tell us what you can't see. Who is it that's striking you?

Well, verse 69 says, Peter sat outside in the courtyard, and a servant girl came to him, saying, you were with Jesus of Galilee. But he denied it before them all, saying, I do not know what you were saying. And when he had come out to the gateway, another girl saw him and said to those who were there, this fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth. And again, he denied with an oath, I do not know the man. And a little later, those who stood by him came and said to Peter, surely you also are one of them for your speech betrays you.

He began to curse and swear, saying, I do not know the man. Immediately then a rooster crowed. Peter remembered the word of Jesus, who had said to him, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times. So he went out and wept bitterly. And this is the final scene of cowardice that we find from Peter. When we find him again, see him again in the story of the period, he's the courageous Peter of the second chapter of Acts, speaking on the day of Pentecost. But getting from verse 75 here of this chapter to Acts 2 took a few days. And another episode with Christ on the sea of Galilee, where they had a big fish fry. We remember that story from the last chapter of the book of John.

But he eventually came around. Chapter 27, verse 1, when morning came all the chief priests and elders of the people plotted against Jesus to put him to death. When they bound him, they led him away and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor. Pilate was the Roman governor. They could not do anything without his permission. Then we're told about Judas, his betrayer, seeing that he had been condemned, was more remorseful, and brought back the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, I'm sinned by betraying innocent blood. And they said, what's that to us? You see to it. Judas's behavior doesn't square. And with what we know of Judas, we wonder what's going through his mind at this point. And I think it's been explained by other commentators. And I tend to think this probably is the best explanation to understand his actions, that this had gone further than Judas intended. That he didn't really want to see Christ killed, but perhaps to teach him a lesson or to bring him down a notch. And in so doing, again, Judas was only looking at the humanity and did not see the divine mission of Christ, and perhaps didn't fully understand, even in his mind after three and a half years of watching and being with Jesus, that he was truly the Son of God. And that by betraying him, he could kind of teach him a lesson. And in his own mind, Judas would be elevated somehow within the community of the Twelve. But it went beyond what he thought got out of his hands, and he realized that he had sinned. And by this point, he had been a useful idiot for the Jews at this point.

And now they no longer needed Judas. You know, so this is not just in the story of the death of Christ, but it so happens with a lot of other things in history. Back in the early part of the 20th century, when the Bolsheviks were coming to power and it seized control of power in Czarist Russia toward the end of World War I, they had a great deal of sympathy in the early years of the communist system there from Western liberals and many in America who went over and saw this new beginning and the Czar had been overthrown and there was communism and they didn't understand the horrors that were to come. And many came back touting the advances and the enlightenment that had taken over in Russia that was going to bring it into the modern world, the modern age. And those proponents, whether in England or in America who did that, were looked upon by Lenin and the other leaders of the communist revolution as what they called useful idiots. Useful idiots. They courted people like that and they recognized that they could give a great deal of publicity and support back in this part of the world to what was taking place and in a sense shield the atrocities and the real motives of the Bolsheviks. And the idea was, well, go ahead and let those useful idiots go on. That will aid our cause. And once we've consolidated power, we don't need them. We don't need their morality. We don't need them. We'll need them at all. They're just useful for a period of time. Judas was a useful idiot for the Jews at this point and they used him and when they had finally accomplished their goal, they said, what's this to us? You know, go about your own business. We don't need you anymore. So he went out, threw the pieces of silver in the temple and departed and hanged himself. And the priest took the silver and said, it is not lawful to put them to the treasury because they are the price of blood. And they consulted together and they bought with them the potter's field to bury strangers in.

Therefore, that field has been called the field of blood to this day.

And they don't really know where this field was. The best guess is that it was just outside the walls of the city of Jerusalem, probably where the Kidron Valley and the Valley of Hinnom come together. Remember, the Valley of Hinnom was where all the refuse was thrown and the dead bodies. There was the garbage dump. And geographically, the Hinnom Valley comes in and the Kidron Valley comes in at the bottom of the spur of the hill that the old city of Jerusalem was originally built on. And it's probably in that area that this field of blood was where Judas hung himself and probably hung around for a few days and then fell and burst asunder as the other accounts talk about his death. He came to an ignominious end. Verse 11, Jesus stood before the governor, and the governor asked him, Are you the king of the Jews? And Jesus said, It is as you say.

While he was being accused, the chief priests and the elders, he answered nothing. Pilate said, Do you not hear how many things they testify against you? But he answered him not one word so that the governor marveled greatly. And then he goes on to describe the releasing of Barabbas and the choice that the crowd was given according to the custom of releasing one prisoner. And they had the choice of releasing Jesus or Barabbas. And as the story goes on, they shouted for Barabbas and they said, Let Christ be crucified. And Pilate asks in verse 23, What evil has he done? And they said, Let him be crucified. Again, they couldn't really bring a specific charge. And so he took water, verse 24, he washed his hands before them, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person. You see to it. Pilate was not completely innocent. Even by doing so, he was giving tacit approval to their desire. And then the Roman soldiers had to carry it out. Pilate here is not innocent of his part in this atrocity. And they said, His blood be upon us and on our children. And they released Barabbas. And when he had scourged Jesus in verse 26, he delivered him to be crucified. And then in verse 27, the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the praetorium and gathered the whole garrison around him.

And they stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him. Now the scourging that verse 26 mentions was a horrendous affair. It was a leather rope strap, possibly on the end of a rod, with bits of metal leather balled up at the end and bits of metal embedded or bone embedded within that leather ball. And as it went across a body, it dug in and when it was pulled back, it ripped the flesh. And you can only imagine those of you that saw the Mel Gibson movie, The Passion of Christ a few years ago, you saw that. You saw probably the best cinematic description and display of this event that's been put together by Hollywood. And it is gruesome.

And it is not pretty to even watch in that form. But what happened did literally rip the flesh across his body in the scourging that was the Roman form of punishment. They stripped him, they put a scarlet robe on him, they put a twisted crown of thorns on him on his head, and a reed in his right hand to symbolize a scepter of a kingly authority and a crown, probably to mimic that of the crown of the Caesars that you would see today on a bust of any of the Caesars where they would have kind of a laurel crown there. And this crown of thorns was to mimic that. And the whole idea of Christ being the king of the Jews was being ridiculed by the Romans at this particular point. And they mocked him saying, Hail, king of the Jews! They spat on him and they took the reed and they struck him on the head. And when they had mocked him, they took the robe off him, put his own clothes on him, and led him away to be crucified.

And as they came out from the area of the Roman guard there, down into the streets, toward the spot of that execution, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. Him they compelled to bear his cross. So Christ was not even able at that point to do it. It was the show up. They drafted Simon to do this for a period of time. Not that he did it from any altruistic motive on his part. It seems that he just happened to be standing there and he was pulled into it. And he is even mentioned by name. Now verse 33 says, When they had come to a place called Golgoth, that is to say, place of a skull, they gave him sour wine, mingled with gold, but when he tasted it, he would not drink. Now verse 33 gives us a description of Golgoth, and the site of the crucifixion of Christ. If you go to Jerusalem today, you have essentially two options, two locations to go to, to portray where you will be told this is the place of Golgoth. This is where Christ was crucified. The first place, the traditional spot, held since probably the fourth century when Constantine's mother Helena, Queen Helena, made a tour of the Holy Land and designated various sites of record for the Bible. She designated this particular site, and this was in the fourth century AD, and they began to build a church, a huge church over the site where the crucifixion took place according to the tradition. So you go there today and you go to what is called the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which is this large church in Jerusalem, and within the confines of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, there are multiple altars and locations where the scene of the crucifixion is said to have taken place. The resurrection, Christ's body being laid out. When you walk into the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, there's this huge marble slab right in the entryway, and they say that that is the slab upon which his body was placed when it was taken down off the cross.

You will see people falling out of their wheelchairs, crawling on their knees into the front door of the church, and falling onto this slab of marble expecting a miracle, looking for a healing. And it's quite a sight to see. Then you kind of move around and through the church, and you will find within this huge cavernous church many altars and many, many churches within the church, built all around the sites of Christ's burial, his death, and his burial. They will show you the tomb of Christ within there as well. Now, there's a second site that you can go to that is another traditional spot of Golgotha, or the place of the crucifixion.

That's outside the main old city walls today. It's a mount, a small hill, and it's called, by the locals, by one term, it's called Gordon's Calvary. It's called Gordon's Calvary because in the 1870s, a British army officer named Charles Gordon came through Jerusalem. He was kind of a mystic religious man, but he was an officer in the British army. He made his own tour of the Holy Land, and he looked at this spot called this little hill. He said this is the spot that Christ was crucified because it has a feature on the hill that looks like a skull, the holes in the hillside. You look at it from a distance, and it does look like a skull. If you've seen the pictures, you'll see that. There's an Arab bus depot right in front of it, and there's a cemetery on top.

There's a tomb called the Garden Tomb on the back side of it. You can go in there today. It's maintained by some religious society. It's a very peaceful, very beautiful spot, and there's a tomb there that you can go into it, and they will tell you that this could be a tomb like Jesus was buried in. It's a very peaceful setting to be of the two spots, the Church of the Holosophilcure and Gaugatha and the Garden Tomb area. The Garden Tomb is much prettier. It's a much more peaceful, tranquil spot, even though even with hundreds of tourists milling around about it today.

And the tomb is an interesting tomb, but likely neither site is the actual site.

My good friend Scott Ashley, who was with us when we were on that particular part of the tour of Gordon's Calvary in the Garden Tomb, I always would turn to Scott and I'd say, well Scott, what's the real story about anything we were seeing? Because he's far more advanced in archaeology than I am. And he said of the Garden Tomb, he said, no, well, he said most archaeologists feel that it was a horse stable. So it probably wasn't even a tomb, much less the tomb of Jesus. So those of you that have been there and seen that don't want to burst any bubbles, but it's probably the best place you could go today to probably get a little bit of understanding and feel for the reality, but it's probably not the reality. And the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is a den of demons, as far as I'm concerned, in terms of what it is. Whether or not it's over any part of the actual spot where these events took place, I don't know. If you look through all carefully through the Gospel accounts, where Christ was crucified, there's no mention that he was on a hill. Now, if you still like that old song, on a hill far away, look at the Gospels carefully. There's no reference that it was on a hill.

It was probably alongside the road, as it was at that time, where everybody could see it.

And so it was not on a hill far away. Okay, I know. Sentimental song. We kind of like to hear it maybe, and maybe even humming in our darkest moments. But when nobody's listening, he wasn't crucified on a hill. He was along the road, probably. And so those things, again, it's what took place there that's most important. So you go to all these pilgrimage sites, and you can get caught up even today. And I've been as guilty as anybody when I was a student there in 1971. You could go to the Garden Tomb, and nobody was around. We would go down to the Garden Tomb on a Sabbath afternoon after church, take our Bibles, and sit in the Garden Tomb. And nobody would come in and out. We'd have 15, 20, 30 minutes in there before somebody would wander in off the street looking to see it. And you could just sit in there and kind of read your Bible. And I remember taking my Bible in there and reading these accounts about the death of Christ, setting in that tomb. So again, it can give you a little bit of a feel, but it's more than likely it's not the actual spot. But some of these places can... you just need to know how to use the things that you see when you go to Jerusalem and Israel today to enhance your faith, to help your understanding of the Bible. But don't take any of them too seriously and understand them correctly for what they are in terms of the Scriptures. It's more important to understand what took place there.

You don't need to... you can live your whole life. And if you never go to Jerusalem, if you never walk those streets, you'll still be in God's kingdom. God doesn't dwell in a building made with hands or in a city made with hands. So it doesn't matter.

You know, when that... when the death of Christ took place, it has all changed. And there's no one spot that's holy. God is holy, and there's holy time, and we are holy as God's Spirit is within us, and we have that relationship with God, but it's only through God's grace and God's Spirit that there is any holiness there in any of us, wherever we may be as we live our lives. And so they went on. They crucified Him in verse 35.

They divided His garments. They cast lots that it might be fulfilled by the prophet that they divided My garments among them, and for My clothing they cast lots. And they put up over His head an accusation written against Him. Well, verse 36, setting down, they kept watch over Him there. It was not uncommon for crucified men, when they were taken down off of the cross, to be still alive in some cases. So they had Him on the cross, and they stayed, and they kept watch over to make sure that the job was done. Two robbers were crucified with Him, one on the right and another on the left. And those who passed by, blasting Him, wagging their heads and saying, you who destroyed the temple and built it in three days, save yourself. If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross. Likewise, the chief priests also, mocking with the scribes and elders, said, He saved others. Himself He cannot save. If He is the King of Israel, let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe Him. He trusted in God. Let Him deliver Him now, if He will save Him. For He said, I am the Son of God. Even the robbers who were crucified with Him reviled Him with the same thing. And so this was going on in the minutes as Christ was on the cross. Let me read to you from the expositor's Bible commentary a description of what it meant to be crucified. As I read this, brethren, just again, keep in mind this is what Christ had to do to suffer, to die for our sins, and why He was in such sorrow and distress in the garden, knowing what was going to come. This method of execution, crucifixion, was the most horrid ever designed by any government. We don't fully appreciate that today, and we can read over the fact that they crucified Him there in verse 35, and not fully understand the impact of what that is talking about. Let me read my quote here. Crucifixion was unspeakably painful and degrading. Whether tied or nailed to the cross, the victim endured countless paroxysms as he pulled with his arms and pushed with his legs to keep his chest cavity open for breathing, and then collapsed into exhaustion until the demand for oxygen demanded renewed effort. The scourging, the loss of blood, the shock from the pain all produced agony that could go on for days, ending at last by suffocation, cardiac arrest, or loss of blood.

When there was no reason to hasten death, the execution squad would smash the victim's legs. Remember in the story, they came and they did kill the legs of the other criminals because they did want to get this over with. They didn't have the time because the Sabbath was coming on, so they wanted this one to end. And they came to Christ, as John's account shows, but they didn't break his legs. Beyond the pain was the shame. The later rabbis excluded crucifixion as a form of capital punishment for just this reason, though there is some evidence that the Pharisees, their probable predecessors, did not oppose it in principle. In ancient sources, crucifixion was universally viewed with horror. In Roman law, it was reserved only for the worst criminals and lowest classes. No Roman citizen could be crucified without a direct edict from Caesar.

A victim carried the cross beam to the place of execution, where he was affixed to the cross by nails driven through the hands or wrists and through the feet. Generally, a rope was tied around the chest, knotted between the shoulders, and then tied to the wooden stake behind the body to prevent its falling forward as fatigue weakened the muscles. A peg was set in the upright state to act as a supporting seat. The victim was stripped of his clothing and left shamefully naked, exposed to the mocking people, the heat of the sun by day, and the chill and dampness of night, which in the spring at the altitude of Jerusalem could drop to as low as 40 degrees.

And then it goes on to talk about the unearthing of a skeleton in Jerusalem in recent years to show the skeleton of a man who had been crucified. It showed that the feet had been nailed sideways to the cross, whereas the body had been facing forward. Such a position would create a twist of about 90 degrees at the waist. The unnatural position growing thirst and exposure to the weather, some loss of blood, and impaired breathing contributed to bring about a lingering and painful death. The tension on the arms prevented normal breathing, which caused the lungs to fill slowly with moisture. The victim could drown slowly by internal accumulation of fluid.

The action of the heart was seriously affected. Frequently, a crucified man might live as long as 36 hours or even longer in an increasing agony. Crucifixion was probably the most diabolical form of death ever invented. When Paul said in Philippians 2 and verse 8, when he was speaking of Christ, he said, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Paul's statement reveals the feeling toward death by this method.

Death for Jesus was unbelievable. The crucifixion was unthinkable.

Let's turn over brethren to John 19 and just look at what John says at this point in the story.

Verse 31.

John 19 verse 31.

Therefore, because it was the preparation day that the bodies should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath. This is why death was hastened. The Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, that they might be taken away. The soldiers came and broke the legs the first and the other who was crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear and immediately blood and water came out. This, as I pointed out a couple of three years ago in a at this time in the presentation, showed you that it's a proof that Christ was still alive.

Because blood and water, or blood especially, would not come gushing out of a body that was already dead when the heart had stopped beating. The body is pressurized. That's why we call it blood pressure. And a beating heart is going to then, if there's a severing of the vein or the artery, or in this case a piercing of the side, blood's going to spurt out as the heart beats and essentially pours out the blood. So this shows that he was alive. He had not been dead at that point and he died as a result of the spear being put in, not for any other reason.

And John writes in verse 35 that, "...he who had seen this testimony, and his testimony is true, and he knows that he is telling the truth so that you may believe that one of the scriptures would be fulfilled, not one of his bones shall be broken. And again another scripture says, they shall look on him whom they pierced." So all of these prophecies from the Old Testament were brought into being and fulfillment in so many different ways, even to the minutest way at the death of Christ. There are more prophecies about the death of Christ than any other topic in the Bible. And all down to the last detail were fulfilled in his death. John wrote it, as he says here, that this testimony is true. John wrote his gospel in part, and for one of his motives was to bear firsthand witness to the death of Christ that had happened and the way that all the stories that it followed after had shown that Jesus was indeed the word, the Son of God.

We turn over to 1 John chapter 1. John wrote this a few decades later. He was battling ideas that Jesus had not come in the flesh, that Jesus was either some enlightened rabbi or, in some cases, some schools of thought had him as just kind of an apparition.

But he was not in the flesh. He was not the Son of God. There were a number of differing ideas that had developed around explaining who Jesus was. At the beginning of his epistles, John, as he had done in the first chapter of his gospel, gets right to the heart of what he saw and what he heard. And this is important because, as I began today, I talked about all the modern efforts that we have to discredit Jesus Christ, to discredit God, to discredit the Bible, to kill belief.

It's not new. It's been going on for over 2,000 years in regard to the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And John met it head on in his own day and addressed it in his writings. And we are still dealing with a spirit that wants to discredit anything connected with the truth of God. But read here in 1 John 1, beginning in verse 1, what he wrote, That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our own eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled concerning the word of life, the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested to us, that which we have seen and heard, we declare to you that you also may have fellowship with us, and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And those things we write to you that your joy may be full. These things are true. Regardless of how people interpret the evidence or the lack of evidence that is available today, brethren, we read the Scriptures. We prepare ourselves to take the Passover and to keep God's holy days, but especially this most solemn of evenings tomorrow night, we prepare for. And it's in that preparation and in our watching and praying and being very alert and attentive to our relationship with God and with Jesus Christ that we prove the truth of the Scriptures, that we prove the truth of God, that we prove the Bible, and we prove the truth of Jesus Christ, who died for our sins and is resurrected and lives forever at the right hand of the Father. We don't have to have archaeological evidence. We do not have to have some historical document discovered to shoulder our faith and to show it up. We have to have and look to the relationship that we build with God through the Scriptures, through belief, and through action and works in our life to prove the challenge that God puts to us in every chapter of the Bible, to prove me now herewith. That's our proof. That's the basis for it. And if we take that approach, then we can say like John that what we have seen, what we have heard is true. And so tomorrow night when you touch that bread and you touch that wine and you put it to your lips, you're tasting the word of life. Understand and appreciate how it got there and how we get to that night and how it all takes place.