Telling the Truth

I want to read a passage of scripture from Matthew chapter 26, I want to begin reading at verse 47, if you would like to find that in your Bibles. This passage begins following one of the difficult things that Jesus faced. Jesus had heard his disciples say to him, we will stand by you no matter what. And even though some will leave you, I want to promise you I will stand by you even if I have to die. Nothing is more affirming than having your friends pledge to you their permanent love for you and care for you. But just before this passage, Jesus' disciples all left him. The closest friends that he had in the world left him. In his greatest hour of trial, they left him. In this story, Jesus is facing what he faces on his own, in human terms. In chapter 26, those who had arrested Jesus took him to Caiaphas, the high priest where the teachers of the law and the elders had assembled. But Peter followed him at a distance, right up to the courtyard of the high priest. He entered and sat down with the guards to see the outcome. The chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin were looking for false evidence against Jesus so that they could put him to death. But they did not find any, though many false witnesses came forward. Finally two came forward and declared, this fellow said, I am able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days. Then the high priest stood up and said to Jesus, are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you? But Jesus remained silent. The high priest said to him, I charge you under oath by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God. Yes, it is as you say, Jesus replied. But I say to all of you, in the future you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and you will see the Mighty One coming on the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, he has spoken blasphemy. Why do we need any more witnesses? Look, now you have heard the blasphemy. What do you think? He is worthy of death, they answered. Then they spit in his face, struck him with their fists. Others slapped him and said, prophesy to us, Christ, who hit you? This story in Jesus' life is the beginning of his crucifixion event. Jesus was facing all kinds of trials and one of the most difficult was his friends abandoning him. Jesus didn't get angry about it, he didn't get upset, he didn't express anguish because of what had taken place. He knew that the mission the Father had given him was his to have. What scripture does is it tells us a story of how Jesus put into practice the promises that he made to us. How Jesus lived the life that he told us would be victorious, even under the most difficult and trying circumstances, when all of your friends have turned against you, who is there left? It is the Lord. And in this story what you see is how the presence of God and the life of Jesus allowed him to face some of the most difficult things a person would ever face. The presence of Christ gives us a picture of what it is like to live this life of submission to God. What Jesus does is he faces all the fears that people would have, and he faces them with strength. What Jesus does is he tells the truth even though it means his own death. In this story Jesus is called to the chief priest in the Sanhedrin. He had been under the control of the Father all of his life, twelve years old he said I have to be about my Father's business, and he chose between obeying God or being with his parents, he chose to be what God wanted him to do, the Father. When he first started his ministry and he came to be baptized, the scripture said the Spirit drove him out into the wilderness, pulled him out into the wilderness. He was under the control of the Holy Spirit forty days and nights he was there listening to the Father, communing with him, talking with him. He knew what it meant to surrender to the authority of his Father in heaven. All of Jesus' life he consulted the Father about decisions that he had to make. When he was facing a big choice he prayed for hours with the Father, what is the choice I should make? So when he comes to this place at the end of his life he has already taught his disciples what it means to follow the Father, yield their lives to him. Now he lives that too. In this moment he is showing us what it is like when you face difficult circumstances and your human nature cries out in terror and fear and anguish because of the circumstances that you are in. He shows us that the things that he has taught us really are true. Here Jesus is asked to do something entirely different than he has done before. He has always been under the Father's authority, under his parents' authority, legitimate, and he always trusted his parents to do the right thing, he always trusted the Father to do the right thing, but here all of his friends have abandoned him. When I read this first sentence of this paragraph, those who arrested Jesus took him to Caiaphas. The word is they controlled him. He was under their control and authority, and you get a picture of someone who is shackled or someone who is held in bonds and led off like you would lead a dog. Here is Jesus, the creator of the universe, with all power and authority, being led like an animal to Caiaphas. When he enters the room with Caiaphas, the high priest, everyone in the room has more power and authority than Jesus had. He was here, just a humble person in service and obedience to God, but under the control of wicked human beings. Now for most of us, this would be a very frightening circumstance. To be imprisoned would be dangerous, would be scary. To be in the presence of someone you know who hates you and has been planning to kill you would be terrorizing. To know that you have no support whatsoever in the human race would cause you to feel abandoned, but this is where Jesus was. He gave himself to human beings under their authority and control, and he seems to have no distress about this. What was there about Jesus that allowed him to face these things with such confidence and such sense of purpose? He taught us, seek first the kingdom of God, and everything you need will be given to you. Seek first the control of the father over your life, and everything you need will be provided to you. Those were Jesus' words to us. He not only took those words to heart, he lived them. I think you'll see in this story the confidence Jesus has in the fact that the father is going to provide every single need that he has. Jesus knew what it meant to give himself to God, and now he discovers the power to be able to give himself, yield himself completely to his very worst enemies to allow them to do whatever they choose to do to him. And you don't see in this story any anger of Jesus' part, any remorse on his part, any resentment on his part. He just gives himself without any human emotions that we would normally have. In this story, Jesus is brought into the trial. Sanhedrin composed of 70 people, they usually would be seated in a circle and the person who was presenting their case would be in the middle, it would be governed over by the high priest who was in charge at that time, he would act as the chairman of the group. But this was sort of a separate meeting, it was kind of a meeting called in the middle of the night. Not everybody was there probably. They knew the plan and they probably said whenever the word goes out that we have him everyone come and those that were available would come. But they had to have at least two-thirds to be able to have a real meeting with Sanhedrin. So they come to trial. Now the task was to bring someone with the charges that they would be able to convict Jesus. So whenever they bring people in who bring charges against him, it says they were looking for false testimony, they were looking for someone, Matthew is saying, to say something bad about Jesus even though it wasn't true. And there were a string of people who were ready to do it. The text talks about being a longer period of time, they were bringing people in, there was a progression in this word. So Jesus is sitting there. One after another the people come into the room and they're telling lies about him. I don't know if you've ever had anybody tell lies about you and he gets back to you and you can't do anything about it and you just wish that you could be there where the people were telling the lies and you would straighten them out. Have you ever had that feeling? Here's Jesus sitting in front of these people, liar after liar with story after story, never opens his mouth. Why did he not need to defend himself? If you seek first my control over your life, I will give everything that you need. What you need now is to listen and trust me, I will take care of your enemies. So Jesus is in silence there. One after another of the lies are told about him. It's not like human beings. I read about this man named Whitey Bulger, I guess that's how you pronounce his name. He's a criminal figure and he's killed a lot of people and he's on trial because they caught him finally. One of his friends who was a criminal with him came in to testify against him and the paper I was reading said that they stared at each other menacingly like if I could get to you, I'd kill you. They were both looking that way because Whitey knew that the man was going to say I saw him choke his wife to death, his girlfriend to death and accused him of a lot of other murders that he saw him commit. They were all the truth. But Whitey didn't want anybody to know the truth. Here Jesus is sitting and they're lying about him. How much more do you want to make sure that whoever's lying about you is straightened out? But Jesus never worried or tried to intervene. He had such confidence that the father was in charge of his life and all the circumstances around him that all the lies in the world would not change his life or his ministry or what he was going to accomplish. He had the confidence that the father was reliable and trustworthy and so he sat and listened one after another of the lies. Now the job of the Sanhedrin was when somebody came in and told a story, a lie or truth whatever it was, it was up to them to question vigorously that person to make sure that their testimony when they finally got to the real trial would stand up. And so the job of all the people there was to drill that person that came in and one after another they found their stories didn't match so they had to send them out. Finally two guys came in with the same story. That's what you needed. Two people who'd tell the same story for the death penalty to be enacted. So here are two who finally come in and their story is the same. They said about Jesus that they'd heard him talking. This fellow said, I'm able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days. Now Jesus did say the temple would be destroyed and he did say that he would die and he'd be raised after three days. They sort of got all that mixed up, maybe on purpose, maybe by accident, but here was finally a charge that could be given, a charge that would say this man said he was going to destroy the temple, the most precious building they had. This man said that he could build it back up in three days when it had taken hundreds of years to get the temple completed. Now this charge would have made the Jewish people angry because it was their temple. To destroy their most precious building would have angered them. The Romans would have been upset about this because it would have indicated some kind of revolt going on in this country and they were in charge of it. This would have brought the Roman government into the issue. So it was a dangerous charge that they'd made against Jesus. But Jesus listened to the charge. Now the Jewish leaders are aware. Jesus is not saying anything. Why isn't he acting like a normal person who's afraid? Why is he not upset that these things are being said about him? Here are some, finally, some good charges to bring. The high priest gets up out of his seat as if he's excited about what's taking place and comes to Jesus and he says, I charge you, he says, are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you? But Jesus remained silent. Now we know that this wasn't his human nature, simply sitting there allowing all this to go on. What was happening inside of Jesus was the Father was guiding him. That's one of the covenant promises. You give your life to me, I'll guide you in all the choices you need to make. And I'm sure Jesus was sitting there listening to all this saying, Father, what do you want me to do? How should I react to this? He said, just be quiet, don't say anything. That's what Jesus did. Finally, in this moment, they've lost their patience with him. They need him in some way to do something that would allow them to bring him to trial. The chief priest then comes to Jesus, I charge you, under oath by the living God, tell us if you're the Christ, the Son of God. Now, in the charge that he makes to Jesus, it's like saying, you're on trial here, and what I'm saying is, you must tell us under the authority of God if you're innocent or if you're guilty. So Jesus is sort of drawn into a place where he has to respond. The charge of the court is for him to give an answer. So he has to give an answer. The answer that he has to give has to be given in truth. So they call an appeal to God himself. You answer under the authority of God whether or not this is true. So Jesus is pushed now into a corner where he has to respond, but he responds in a different way. The scripture here, the translations is here, says, yes, it is as you say, but in the Greek language, and many translations will translate this differently, and I think there's better translations than this, Jesus just said, you said it. Not simply an admission himself, but what he did say was, the announcement of my messianic role does not come from my mouth, it comes from yours. The chief priest has been in the position to announce to the whole community that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. What a wonderful way God has of handling circumstances that we get into. What needed to be said, Jesus never said, but his enemies announced it openly and publicly. And Jesus just agrees with the announcement. But the Father has something far more for Jesus to do. He asks him to be quiet at some times, he asks him to let someone else tell the story, and then he comes to the place where he says to Jesus, I want you to tell them the whole story. Now Jesus knows what's going to happen to him. He knows if he tells the whole story about who he is, that they will see it as blasphemy. He is a human being, born in this world, grows up in this world. Why would anybody believe that he's God? He knows that they'll see this as blasphemy. I don't know if you've ever been put in a spot where you know that you have to say something that's going to get you in real trouble. Sometimes you're placed in a situation where you wish you could tell something else, a different story, lie about it, blame someone else, maybe you do. But there are difficult times when you come and you know that telling the truth is going to be painful and costly to you. And inside of us, what we fear is all kinds of things crop up. What are people going to say? What are they going to think of me? What's going to happen to me? There are all kinds of fears that come to us, you see. Jesus, as a human being, had to have those fears. Now, fear is a very powerful thing in a person's life. I don't ride roller coasters, any at all. It's not because I'm afraid, it's because I'm wise. A lot of people get on those roller coasters and they have no fear. They just get buckled in and they're perfectly confident that everything's going to be okay. Now, I read yesterday that the lady in Six Flags that got on the roller coaster that drops at a 79 degree angle, and when she topped that, she was thrown out and died. People said that when she got on that, she told the attendant, snap this thing again, this restraint on me again. And he said, did it click? And she said, yes. And he said, if it clicks, it's okay. And when she got to the top of that, she just, it threw her out, the top of that crest, the roller coaster. That won't ever happen to me unless I'm bound and gagged and tied into that thing. Because I have fears, I don't trust the restraints. I don't trust those tracks. I know that most of the time they are perfectly safe, but that's most of the time. That means that sometimes they're not. I look at that little, well, it's only one-tenth of one percent, but that's too much for me. Every person you know will fail you sometime in your life. Every person you know, and every one of us have failed someone in our lives too. So there's a reason we're suspicious and careful with each other, and we have fears. And everybody that's lived in this world knows what it's like to think something is going to work and it doesn't. But what God promises is, I will never fail you. No matter where you are or what the circumstances are, I'll never fail you. Give first my kingdom and my righteousness, and everything you need will be provided for you. I will guide you so you'll make the right choices. I'll provide for you so you'll have what you need. I'll protect you so you'll never be destroyed. And I will give your life value, meaning, and purpose. Those promises he made to Abraham when he called him, he made to Isaac, and he made to Jacob, and he made to Jesus, and he makes to us. That's the covenant promise God makes. All I ask, he said, is you do exactly what I tell you I want you to do. If you live in submission and obedience to me, if you live in faith, then I will keep those promises. Jesus was facing a very difficult situation. But he knew that the promise the Father had given to him was reliable. If I tell the truth right now about who I am, I may die, but the Father will make this work out some way. And so Jesus said to them, not only, you've said it, but I say to all of you, in the future, you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven. Two things that Jesus said that sealed his doom. In the future, all of you will see, when you see God, you will see me right beside him. He calls him the Mighty One, but they all knew who this was. When you see God, you're going to see me right beside him. He knew that this was a declaration of his divinity. And he knew that his enemies who wanted to kill him, even though he's never said this, would now have good reason to do so. And then he said, and you will see me on the clouds, when the clouds come down for the judgment day, I will be the one on the cloud coming for judgment for you. They knew that only God could give this judgment. And now his fate was sealed. The high priest always had the responsibility that any place and any time he heard blasphemy. Blasphemy is simply something that degrades God. You can call God by a different name. You can say something about him that would lower his esteem or value. Say something contrary to his nature about him. Anything that you did that lowered God in the eyes of people was considered blasphemy or distorted his character or nature. And the high priest was supposed to, any time he heard that, to take the cloak, this outside cloak, and rip it from the top down as a sign to say how horrible this was. And it was unacceptable to him. And in this moment he takes his coat and he rips it. Everyone there knows what the signal is. You've heard what he has to say. He said to them, he has spoken blasphemy. Why do we need any more witnesses? Look, now you've heard the blasphemy. What do you think? He's worthy of death, they all answered. Jesus knew that telling the truth as the Father had asked him and as he was put in this position to do would seal his doom. But he spoke with courage. Courage is a funny thing. I don't know if you have a shirt that has courage on it or not, but sometimes courage is just stupidity. People don't know any better. And they do things that they shouldn't ever do. Sometimes courage is the result of a person not understanding. But Jesus understood and he knew what was going to happen to him. And he didn't have courage, he had faith. He believed with all of his life that if he did what the Father told him to do, whatever the consequences, it would be the right thing. That's why he didn't have fear. I don't mean that inside of him he didn't have moments of fear as a human being. Of course he did. But he had to respond to this by saying, Father, here's a bad situation. What should I do? How should I react? And the Father told him exactly what to do. At that moment, Jesus now is condemned. They gather around Jesus. They spit in his face. They struck him with their fists. Others slapped him and said, prophesy to us, Christ, who hit you? They came up to Jesus and insulted him. The biggest insult you can get even today is to spit in somebody's face. He didn't spit back. He didn't fight back. He took it. They took their fists and began to beat him. And he took it. And when you have the availability of 72,000 angels and some guys beating on you, your temptation is to say, would a couple of you angels meet this guy and take care of him? Retaliation, protecting ourselves, defending ourselves, all that's human nature. Not wanting to be insulted, all that's human nature. And then someone came up and slapped him. That's an insult too. But Jesus had already taught what you're to do in those circumstances. He said, when someone slaps you in the face, just turn the other cheek. He knew what God wanted to have done. And so now Jesus is living out his teaching to show us exactly how we should live under the most difficult and deadly of circumstances. These are not things for the parlor and games. But this is for real life. When your enemies are attacking you and they have all power and authority, and they're insulting you, and they're ridiculing you, and they're hurting you, and they're even killing you, trust the Lord. Don't worry about getting even. Don't worry about protecting yourself. Worry only about, am I doing, Father, what you want me to do? And they ridiculed him, which sometimes is the hardest thing in the world to take. You say you're the Lord of everything in the world, and they walk up behind him and slap him and say, tell us who slapped you. If you're the Christ, you should know all things if you're God. Jesus is mute and silent. Now in this story, if you just take your Bible and rip out the rest of those chapters of Matthew, this would be a real disaster, wouldn't it? Because what it gives us is a picture of Jesus standing there with spit running down his face, bruises on his body, red on his cheeks, and humiliated in front of everybody. But it isn't the end of the story, is it? Jesus is buried in the tomb, gloriously raised, and now we're telling the whole world who Jesus is, trying to make sure everybody in the world knows about Jesus. But you see what gets us is in the middle of the trial, when they're spitting on us, beating us, slapping us, and we're there, we only see what's happening right now. And we get angry with God, we get frustrated with God, and we think we're losing. Why? Because we do not believe what he's told us. Yes, I know you're going through a tough time, my child, but I'm promising you this will be okay. All things will work together for your good if you'll just hold on and trust me. I meet a lot of people who have given up on God because they went through a trial and they couldn't see the end of it. Now if Jesus had broken loose from the binds that they had on him and ran out the door and hid in the hills, the story would be quite different. And for a lot of people who get in these spots and give up on God and they run away, they have a bitter story to tell about their experience. But the man who stood there and let it all take place until God worked it out is raised in glory and honor for the whole world to see. God has a cure for fear and anxiety, and it is faith. Not courage, but faith. When you have faith in God, then the courage comes because you know that keeping on as you're supposed to keep on going will ultimately result in your victory. So it's easy to be courageous if you know you're going to win. It's really hard if you think you're going to lose. It's hard to be courageous. What God gives us is a perfect example of a man who had every reason to be afraid, who had every reason to give up, who had every reason to get angry, and instead he just lives in submission and obedience to what the Father told him. Not even being able to see through human eyes any good that would ever come from this. But we tell the story because we know the end of it. And we know now that what Jesus said, seek first the kingdom of heaven and everything you need will be provided for you. We know what Brother Paul said, that in all things God works together for good to those that love him and are called according to his purpose. What you have to do is to say, do I really believe in God? No and I don't mean do you believe he exists somewhere in the world. But do you believe that he does what he says he's going to do and has all power and all wisdom to be able to help you through those things? If you do, there should be nothing in this world that would bring fear to your hearts to control you. Nothing that should cause you anxiety. For when those feelings come up inside of you, what you stop and say is, have I given my life to Jesus Christ completely? Then you ask God if that's really true and if there's something in your life that's missing and immediately he'll tell you that. You may not want to hear it but he'll tell you. You correct that and then you say, whatever your fear is, okay God, you've promised me you're going to take care of it. Not 99.9% of the time, but 100% of the time he does that for his children. You may not think that in the middle of those difficult circumstances because it won't look like it. But you have to listen, not to the people around you nor the circumstances you're in, but to the promise of God. And you have to believe that that promise is real regardless of what you see with your eyes or experience with your body. God will take care of me. And once you're sure that that's true, you can stand like the man Jesus, courageously, face your enemies and tell the truth. God has given us a way by which we can live in the most difficult circumstances that people can put us in without anxiety and fear, but with confidence and peace. It's confidence and peace that comes from believing that God keeps his promises to his children. Would you bow your head please for a moment? I want to ask you if your life is ever controlled by fear and anxiety. There's only one thing wrong. It is that in the middle of that situation, you don't have confidence that God will do what he said. Why? Jesus had confidence because he'd not only promised the Father he'd give himself completely to him, but he had seen the Father work in his life and he could sit down and time after time after time after time that Father had done what he said he would do. Fear is really a way of saying, I don't trust you, God. Who are you going to trust, yourself, while you're the most unreliable person in the world? And you know that. Why wouldn't we trust him? Because Satan causes us to be controlled by fear. I want to ask you today to settle this with God. I want to ask you to say to God, I'm going to put my trust in you that no matter what happens I'm not going to be afraid to do whatever you ask me to do. I'm not going to be afraid of the circumstances that come around me, but I'm going to stop every time this fear comes up inside of me and settle it with you. Say, God, give me the courage to trust you right now that everything is going to be just as you said it would. Now if you've never given yourself to God in that way, you may go to church and be a church member, all that stuff, but I'm talking about surrendering yourself to the authority of God. You can do that right now. You just say, Lord, as broken as I am, I want to make a promise to you. You have my life. You need to learn the Bible, what it says about God. You need to put into practice the things you learn, and the more you do, the less fear will control your life. Now for those of us who've made that promise to God, he has something for us. He says, not only do I want to learn, but you'll learn about me and put it into practice in your life. I want you to be a messenger, become a part of a family of God where we're all working together for his kingdom. The doors of our church are open to anyone who's committed their lives to Christ and baptized by immersion to come and say, this is the home where God wants me. I want to be an agent to help the world know God and how he touches and changes people. Maybe you've made that promise to God, and you just haven't been able to put it into practice quite yet. Maybe you need to re-devote yourself to him. You know what it is you've slipped, you haven't been reading the Bible, you haven't been talking to him about these issues, you haven't been faithful in serving him in some way, and you know what he's saying to you. This morning in this quiet time, I ask you to say to God, is there anything in my life that you want from me today? At the end of our services, we give an opportunity for you to respond to what God has asked of you. You may want to share with someone else the promise you're making to God. I'll be here, Marla will be here, we'll pray with you. Maybe you want to become a part of the family, this church will be here to receive you. Maybe you want to make a public announcement that you've decided to let God take full control of your life. We'll be here to rejoice with you and help you to know the next step. What has God put in your mind? And do you have the courage to do it? So Father, we ask in these moments that you would guide us, individually, personally, to take the next step in our life of trust. In the name of Jesus, we ask for this, amen. Would you stand please while we sing this invitation hymn. If there's some promise you want to make publicly, or just to come and pray, this is your opportunity. Every bounty glorified, true belief and true repentance, every grace that brings you nigh. I will arise and go to Jesus, He will embrace me in His arms, in the arms of my dear Savior. O there are ten thousand charms, calm ye weary, heavy laden, lost and ruined by the fall. If you tarry till you're better, you will never come at all. I will arise and go to Jesus, He will embrace me in His arms, in the arms of my dear Savior. O there are ten thousand charms. Do you want to come to the mic? Brenda came and said that she has a couple of opportunities to be of service to God and really wants to be able to do this right and well. Gee, she's working with, she wants to be able to be a good teacher and write her story of her own life, how God has helped her for our newsletter. And she asked us to pray for her son, who needs a place closer to his job to help him keep his job. This is Ashley, and Ashley's come this morning to make a commitment to Jesus. I've known Ashley for a number of years when she was in extended care and was little and she came with Tessa and we were watching her grow and we're really pleased to see her grow in this step. What commitment would you like to make today? I wanted to make something like, did you want to, did you want to promise to be a friend with Jesus? Okay, and do you want to be a part of his family? And you want to trust him and do whatever he tells you to do? Okay. I would imagine we'd want to visit with her family and visit with her and see where this commitment leads her, but we're really excited that she's ready to take this step and be a part of God's family. Tessa, would you and Ashley come up here and stand by me? It's a great privilege to get to do this, so I hope you're thrilled about it. I can see you are. We're thankful. Tessa's made a commitment, you've made a commitment of your life to Christ, Tessa, and she is free to share her faith with her friends and talk to them about Christ, and we want to appreciate very much you doing that, and Ashley, thank you for your interest in letting Christ have your life. We pray for these people, and join me in prayer. We're thankful, Father, for Brenda, who wants to serve you in the best way possible. We're thankful for Ashley, who comes to say, I want to follow God, I want to learn what it means to be his child and serve him. We want to help her grow to learn that. We're thankful for Tessa, who's so open to share her own commitment to you, and we ask that these young ladies will find the great blessing that you give them, your presence, all the rest of their lives. In the name of Christ, we give thanks for the promise that you'll do that, and the reality that you do. Dismiss us in your grace, your mercy, and your peace. Amen. Thank you. This is the second verse of Be Strong in the Lord. Be strong, be strong, be strong in the Lord, and be of good courage, for he is your guide. Be strong, be strong, be strong in the Lord, and rejoice, for the victory is yours.