DRINKING THE CUP:  THE TRIAL

JOHN 18:19-24, 28-32

AUGUST 10, 1997

 

Every step of our Lord's passion demonstrates the greatness of God's love for sinners and the infinite lengths He has gone to redeem us through Christ.  The Jewish leaders conducted a secret and illegal trial-of-sorts before sending our Lord to Pilate for a Roman sentence of death.  Every act was manipulated by sinful men who seethed with hatred for the Lord of glory.  But behind it all was the wondrous plan of the ages by which God Himself would redeem sinful men.

 

I'm afraid that too often we take for granted the details of the passion.  We sing of what Christ has done; we talk about being saved; but do we give thought to the fact that every single detail had to go according to the divine plan or man's redemption would not be accomplished?  

 

The trial was not simply a minor detail along the way of Christ's suffering.  It led to Calvary where Christ became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (II Cor. 5:21).  The trial of Jesus Christ demonstrates that God's redemptive promises are sure.  As we investigate the trial, we will hopefully see the redeeming love of Christ against the backdrop of man's wretchedness.  What Christ promises He also fulfills.

 

I.  The Assault on Christ

 

John's Gospel is full of irony.  Perhaps we have read the Gospel so many times that we overlook the unexpected  and the surpises.  The fact that wicked men would put the sinless Son of God on trial is irony.  That they would falsely accuse Him, strike Him, and ultimately crucify the Judge of the universe is ironic, for all of these men will one day face Jesus Christ as their Judge.

 

The assault upon our Lord came in two areas:  His relationships and His doctrine.  Actually, the matter of His relationships is secondary in the minds of His accusers.  Their primary concern was His teaching.  Later when sending Jesus to Pilate, the Jews feigned political concerns as the reason Jesus was deserving of death.  But the overriding matter for the Jews was the teaching of Jesus Christ.

 

1.  Questioning His relationships

 

You will notice that John offers commentary on what was taking place on the night of the trial, switching between the scenes of Peter denying Christ and Jesus before His accusers.  John tells us, "The high priest therefore questionned Jesus about His disciples, and about His teaching."  We have already been told that this particular "high priest" was Annas (v. 12-13), who was the father-in-law of the high priest Caiaphas.  As a matter of detail, Annas had served many years earlier as the high priest.  The Jews recognized the high priest as a position for life, not something that changed as with a political term of office.  But the Romans wanted to control this important and pivotal office in Judaism, so they selected the 'official' high priest.  Jewish historians tell us that five sons of Annas and his son-in-law, Caiaphas, served as high priest during this period of Roman occupation.

 

The question we may have is why is Annas interrogating Jesus rather than Caiaphas at this point?  Though our text does not tell us, we can only surmise that in the eyes of the Jews, Annas was still the high priest and the man with the most authority in the nation.  In all likelihood, Caiaphas probably reported to Annas for the affairs of his office.  The old high priest would not let go of his power over the nation.  He led the way in scheming to rid the nation of Jesus Christ.

 

He asked Jesus about His disciples, we are told.  But our Lord told Annas nothing about the disciples as to who they were or their whereabouts.  Annas wanted to get a better handle on the sphere of influence that Jesus had in the nation.  Perhaps he was concerned about possible 'converts' within the ranks of the religious leaders of Israel.  So he wanted to know who these disciples might be and how far ranging his influence was over others.

 

Spurgeon suggests that Annas may have asked about the disciples as a bit of a slur, since they had all scattered from Him with the exception of John and Peter, though Annas may not have known about Peter.  When you consider the lot of the fellows who followed Jesus Christ they may not have cast a very good impression of the teaching of the Master at that point.  They lost their courage and fled the scene (MTP, vol. 49, 100-101).

 

But the real question was not 'who are your disciples' but rather who is this one who heals the blind, raises the lame, and gives life to the dead?  Who is Jesus Christ?  That is the question which Annas avoided.  Men do not mind talking all around the subject of Jesus Christ, but to be confronted with the plain reality of who He is and what He did is too much for the sinful mind to endure.  If a man really comes to terms with the reality of Jesus Christ, He will inevitably bend the knee to Him in glad submission.  So to avoid being humbled in conversion, sinful men will focus their attention on Jesus' disciples just as Annas himself did.

 

It is not hard to find a weak disciple.  If someone is looking for one to accuse of failure, weakness, and lack of Christlikeness, then he can find it quickly.  But it is not a disciple before whom we will one day given an account.  It is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself with whom we have to do.  It is He who will judge us.  We will all have to give account of what we have done with our knowledge of Christ.  Have you been giving excuse for your own neglect of dealing with your relationship to Christ because your focus has been on one of His disciples?  Learn a lesson from wicked Annas.  It is not the disciples but the Lord Himself with whom we have to do.

 

2.  Questioning His doctrine

 

The real heart of Annas' question related to the teaching or doctrine of Jesus Christ.  Granted, the religious crowd reacted against the miracles of Christ because that drew attention away from them and onto Christ.  But they could have lived with this had Jesus left out His teaching.  For it was in His teaching that He exposed their own sin, the error of their teaching, and the end result of their lives.  It was His teaching that turned upside down the erroneous concepts people had of the Messiah.

 

What was so different about the teaching of Jesus from that of the priests and other religious leaders?  Their typical pattern was to repeat what they had learned from others.  They would memorize the quotations of particular rabbis from various eras and offer their words in answer to questions.  But none spoke with authority nor depth of understanding and experience.  That's why the crowds were amazed when they heard Jesus teach for "He was teaching them as one having authority, and not as their scribes" (Matt. 7:28-29).  

 

Jesus Christ explained the Law.  While the scribes taught the cold letter of the Law, Jesus taught the heart of it, showing that we are law-breakers when we offend the Law even in our hearts.  The religious leaders spoke of the Messiah, but they really had no interest in the Messiah of the Scriptures.  They only wanted a political leader who would join them as an ally in ruling over the nation and enjoying the fruits of power, prestige, and profits with them.  Their concern was not for the spiritual but the physical realm.  This is particularly seen in the Saduccees, of whom Annas was a part, since they essentially denied anything supernatural, including the resurrection.  Over and over, Jesus Christ exposed the deadness of their teaching, showing that it was not only unbiblical, but that it led to eternal ruin.  Our Lord never hesitated to tell them of their hypocrisy and their error.  Matthew records Him telling the Pharisees and scribes, "You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying, THIS PEOPLE HONORS ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEART IS FAR AWAY FROM ME.  BUT IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME, TEACHING AS DOCTRINES THE PRECEPTS OF MEN" (Matt. 15:7-9).

 

Jesus defied the political ideologies of the Messiah.  The Jews were looking for a man to come and deliver them from Roman oppression, giving them prosperity along the way.  But Jesus came "preaching the kingdom of God" and calling for men to repent of their sins and believe the gospel (Mark 1:15).  The religious leaders were bent on following their own teaching, with the exception of a few like Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea who were delivered from the darkness of sin through faith in Christ.  Jesus told these proud leaders, "But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me" (John 8:45).  They could not believe the truth because they were "of [their] father the devil and [they] want[ed] to do the desires of [their] father" (John 8:44).  They were repulsed by truth because it revealed the darkness of their own hearts.  They would rather silence the bearer of truth, Jesus Christ, than face the truth and live.

 

Do you find yourself with the same mentality as Annas and the other religious leaders?  By that I mean, do you find yourself trying to shut out the truths of the gospel of Christ so that you might believe what you want to believe about salvation and eternity?  What we see in the trial of Jesus before Annas is not unusual in the least.  Everyday there are multitudes of religious people who will go to great lengths to avoid the purity of the gospel.  They do not mind a person making some kind of Christian profession nor do they deny the need for prayer.  But they do not want to admit that apart from the grace of God they have no hope for eternity.  Nor do they want to cast themselves upon the mercy of God and the merits of Jesus Christ alone for their salvation.  Yes, they will gladly cling to a profession or to a baptism or to some other form of outward claim to salvation.  But they avoid any wrestling of soul with their own sinfulness or any abandoning their own works of righteousness for the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ.  Just as the acts of Annas on that fateful night were folly, so are the acts of self-righteousness which any of us may cling to to place us in a right relationship to God.  Let us see the folly of self-generated religion in Annas.  And let us run from it all the way to the cross of Jesus Christ where we cast ourselves in great confidence that Jesus Christ alone saves from sin.

 

II. The Response of Christ

 

The response of our Lord relates directly to the assault upon Him by Annas.  We find Him delcaring openness in regard to His doctrine and conscientiousness in reference to the relationships He had with others.

 

1.  Demonstrating the openness of His teaching

 

Jesus answered Annas' inquiry concerning His teaching with a reference to His public ministry.  Annas attempted to find Jesus in some controversy or contradiction, but to no avail.  "Jesus answered him, 'I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in synagogues, and in the temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing in secret.  Why do you question Me?  Question those who have heard what I spoke to them; behold, these know what I said'."

 

Our Lord's ministry was conducted right in the midst of Jewish circles.  He taught in synagogues where He obviously worshiped on a regular basis.  The synagogues were begun in the period following the exile of the Jews from Judea in 586 B.C.  Since the exiled Jews could not worship in Jerusalem at the temple as had been their practice, they began synagogues for the purpose of worship, though not for the purpose of offering sacrifices.  The typical synagogue service had a systematic reading through the Law or Pentateuch (yearly in the synagogues east of Palestine and triennially in the lands farther west).  The reading in the Hebrew text was followed by an oral rendering in either Aramaic or Greek, depending on the region where people lived.  Following the lesson from the Pentateuch, a related lesson from the Prophets would be read and expounded.  Luke mentions a classic case in Nazareth where Jesus read from Isaiah 61 and expounded these verses as being prophetic of Him as Messiah (Luke 4).

 

The synagogue service would open with a call to worship and a reciting of the Shema ('hear') which summarized the Law (Deut. 6:4-5), various benedictions and the Decalogue (Ten Commandments).  It continued with prayers, benedictions, singing of the songs of Zion, and the reading of the Law and Prophets, with an exposition followed by a blessing [F.F. Bruce, New Testament History, 143-144].  In the openness of this kind of setting Jesus Christ taught the truth.  He explained the Scriptures concerning Himself.

 

This particular era was a time of mystery religions and secret teachings.  Paul encountered this frequently in his missionary travels and addresses this in his epistles, particularly in Colossians.  Though our Lord certainly explained various aspects of His teaching to the disciples in private settings, there was nothing of its essence hidden.  There was no such thing as a secret doctrine or a mystery initiation.

 

We need this reminder in our day, for there are various religious bodies and organizations that have "secrets" or "hidden messages" which only the so-called 'initiated' are permitted to know.  This is not Christian at all!  If you have studied Mormonism, you know that they have secret ceremonies which they conduct in their temples which exclude all outsiders.  The New Age practice of giving someone a 'mantra' or a secret word for meditation puts it in total contradiction to the Christian faith.  There are various fraternal organizations that have secret oaths or hidden messages in various parts of ceremonies.  None of these things are consistent with biblical Christianity!  Jesus declared, "I have spoken openly to the world...and I taught nothing in secret."

 

There are some within the ranks of evangelical Christianity who claim to have tapped into an unknown power or secrets to a higher form of Christianity.  This text ought to warn us about falling prey to such ideas.  What Jesus taught, He taught publicly for all to hear.  Certainly, there were many who did not understand what He taught because of the hardness of their hearts, but He laid the Word out in clarity.  We must guard ourselves of trying to dig around and find some hidden secrets which no one else knows.  We must beware of those who claim to have revelatory prophecies to add to the Word of God or to inform us about the secrets of life.  The writer of Hebrews states this truth with clarity:  "God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world" (Heb. 1:1-2).  We need not add to what God has given us in the sixty-six books of the canon of Holy Scripture.  There is more here than we could understand in a hundred lifetimes.  We need not look elsewhere for truth when God has given it to us clearly through His Son in His Word.

 

2.  Demonstrating His conscientiousness in relationships

 

Our Lord carefully avoided saying or doing anything that would put His disciples in jeopardy.  As we saw in John 17, Jesus guarded all that the Father gave to Him, keeping all of them from destruction (17:12).  He continued that in the mock trial before Annas.  

 

This is a wonderful reminder of the constant faithfulness and care of Jesus Christ over His own.  There was not one word of self-pity on the lips of Christ nor one word to draw attention away from Him and onto the disciples during this trial.  There is a sense in which we see a picture of the 'keeping' power of Christ even in the face of wicked accusers.  He kept His own.

 

But we also see that Jesus does not back down from Annas, though he was a powerful man in the religious court.  He reproves him for his illegal handling of the trial.  Here we see His conscientiousness even with those who are unbelieving in seeking to point them to truth.  "Why do you question Me?  Question those who have heard what I spoke to them; behold, these know what I said."  There was a law in Judaism regarding someone being tried in court, that he could not be forced to incriminate himself.  There had to be witnesses who would testify against the man before he was counted guilty in a Jewish court.  "By the mouth of two or more witnesses every word shall be established."  But Annas grossly violated this law in the middle of the night.  His informal trying of Jesus was his way of getting around the formality of the law.  Our Lord points this out in verse 21, so that Annas was dumbfounded in knowing how to respond.  In reaction to Christ's words, one of the high priest's officers slapped Jesus with his open palm, reviling Him who is the eternal Judge for answering the wicked high priest as He did.

 

Jesus followed Jewish legal protocol when He responded, "If I have spoken wrongly, bear witness of the wrong; but if rightly, why do you strike Me?"  The whole scene exposed the darkness of the religious leaders' hearts.  They plotted and schemed to arrest Jesus.  They decided His guilt before ever trying Him.  They tried Him at an illegal hour in Jewish practice and in an illegal way, all in vain attempts to adduce some criminal statement from the pure, spotless lips of Jesus Christ.  Later, when Pilate asked the Jews of a specific crime which Jesus had committed, they replied, "If this Man were not an evildoer, we would not have delivered Him up to you."  They evaded stating anything, for they had nothing on Christ.  Every witness they put forward to accuse Him contradicted the others before him.  The priests did double-talk because of the intensity of their hatred of Jesus Christ and their desire to be rid of Him.  

 

The scene before Annas is a microcosm of humanity.  What person can justly accuse Jesus Christ of any offense?  Men will twist and squirm their way around, trying to rid themselves of Him who exposes their sinful hearts.  They will deny the teaching of Scripture or scorn the witness of a believer as a way of evading the truth.  They will do anything to keep from sitting under the proclamation of God's Word.  They will water down the gospel to the point that it does not even resemble the gospel, so that they can feel good about themselves in spite of their condemnation before God.  They will re-interpret Scripture to soothe their guilty conscience and avoid an encounter with the Holy Spirit.  That is sinful man!  If salvation were left in our hands we would turn away 100% of the time!  Thankfully, God Himself has pursued sinners to bring them to Himself in righteousness for all eternity.

 

III. The Word of Christ

 

Our whole salvation rests upon the promises of God in His Word.  That is why we believe this Book in its entirety as "the only sufficient, certain and authoritative rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience" [Abstract of Principles, J. P. Boyce, 1858].  Yes, there is plenty we do not understand completely about the Bible, but we stand firm upon it as THE WORD OF GOD which cannot change or be improved upon or fail.  Those who chart their own course for salvation will wreck eternally upon the foolishness of man.  It is God alone who knows what is necessary for sinners to know Him and come to Him.  So it is God alone, through the means of His Word, that reveals this truth to us in our helplessness.

 

It is with this in mind that we consider vv. 28-32, which constitutes the third stage in the trial of our Lord.  First, He stood before Annas who tried to find some fault in Him but could not.  Then He stood before Caiaphas and members of the Jewish council who put forth false witnesses in order to put Christ to death (Matt. 26:57-68).  John only capsules this event in verse 24, "Annas therefore sent Him bound to Caiaphas the high priest."  The third stage was that of sending our Lord to Pilate, the Roman procurator, who had the power to sentence Him to death.  Here Pilate calls for the accusation but receives nothing of substance from the Jews.  He knew what they were doing, but he sought to stay within the boundaries of the Roman law in the process.  It is in this dialogue between Pilate and the Jewish officials that we see the power of God's Word for our salvation.

 

1.  A sure word in its utterance

 

Jesus Christ had already prophesied that He would be crucified, buried, and raised from the dead.  Matthew records that after the experience of the Mount of Transfiguration, "From that time Jesus Christ began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day" (Matt. 16:21).  To Nicodemus, Jesus foretold of His crucifixion in that wonderful passage in John 3:14, "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of Man be lifted up," with the phrase "be lifted up" picturing the cross.  Later in dialoging with the multitudes, Jesus stated, "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself."  John adds, "But He was saying this to indicate the kind of death by which He was to die."  The multitudes obviously understood that He was referring to His death when they replied, "We have heard out of the Law that the Christ is to remain forever; and how can You say, 'The Son of Man must be lifted up'?  Who is this Son of Man?" (John 12:32-34).  Before the Triumphal entry into Jerusalem, Jesus took the disciples aside and told them plainly, "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, and will deliver Him to the Gentiles to mock and scourge and crucify Him, and on the third day he will be raised up" (Matt. 20:18-19).

 

This is where every detail of the trial is essential.  The Jews had no ability to put anyone to death by crucifixion.  They evidently retained one measure of death penalty under the Roman rule and that was death by stoning.  This could not be used randomly but only for a particular offense: desecration of the temple. The Jews tried to find Jesus guilty of desecration through false witnesses, but their testimonies lacked consistency so that would not work (Mark 14:55-59).  So why did they not opt for pursuing stoning Jesus as was typical of executions among Jews?  They knew that Deuteronomy 21:23 stated that "anyone who is hung on a tree is under God's curse," so they desired to make sure that all the multitudes knew that this Man was accursed of God.  But to arrange this was not an easy thing.  Though Pilate was an unbeliever, he was still under the authority of Roman law and held liable for his actions before Caesar.  So for Jesus to be crucified, He had to be accused and found "guilty" by both the Jewish court and Pilate's Roman tribunal.

 

When the Jews could not produce any firm accusation or evidence of Jesus' guilt, Pilate told them, "Take Him yourselves, and judge Him according to your law."  But the Jews would not give up.  They could only stone a desecrator to death but they could not crucify, so they replied, "We are not permitted to put anyone to death."  They relinquished any right they might have to stone the Lord.  Now the stage was set for Pilate to crucify Jesus, but he had to have a charge.  In that case, the Jewish religious leaders intimated that Jesus was causing political problems contrary to the Roman law.  Luke records their accusation, "We found this man perverting our nation, and forbidding us to give tribute to Caesar, and saying that he himself is Christ a king" (Luke 23:2).  Politcal treason and anarchy would have been the charge in a formal sense, certainly charges worthy of death in a Roman court.  Though their reason was in reality theological, they pursued political charges before Pilate to ensure crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

 

Why did all of this happen?  John explains, "that the word of Jesus might be fulfilled, which He spoke, signifying by what kind of death He was about to die."  Do you remember those occasions where the Jews tried to kill Jesus earlier?  They picked up stones to stone Him but He walked away.  In Nazareth they tried to cast Him over the brow of the mountain on which the city stood to put Him to death, but He walked away.  All of this happened so that Christ might become a curse for us.  "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us--for it is written, 'CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE'-- in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3:13-14).

 

2.  An omnipotent word in its accomplishment

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