The King is Judged

You may be seated. Over the next couple weeks, we're going to be singing a lot of Psalm 22. Psalm 22, I am convinced, well one, Jesus quotes Psalm 22 when He's on the cross, but I'm convinced as we sing through and think about Psalm 22 over the next few weeks, you're going to see more and more the experience and heart of Jesus Christ as He has that Psalm on His mind. Well, this morning we're going to turn in our Bibles to Mark chapter 14. Mark chapter 14, and we'll begin on verse 53, and we'll work our way through verse 56. Or 65, that should be. Mark chapter 14, beginning at verse 53. You should be able to find that on page 900 of the New King James Pew Bibles provided for you. Brothers and sisters, hear now God's perfect Word.

And they led Jesus away to the high priest, and with Him were assembled the chief priests, the elders, and the scribes. But Peter followed Him at a distance right into the courtyard of the high priest, and he sat with the servants and warmed himself at the fire.

Now the chief priests and all the council sought testimony against Jesus to put Him to death, but found none. For many bore false witness against Him, but their testimonies did not agree. Then some rose up and bore false witness against Him, saying, We heard Him say, I will destroy this temple made with hands, and within three days I will build another made without hands. But not even then did their testimony agree. And the high priest stood up in the midst and asked Jesus, saying, Do you answer nothing? What is it these men testify against you? But he kept silent and answered nothing.

Again, the high priest asked him, saying to him, Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? Jesus said, I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the power and coming with the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his clothes and said, what further need do we have of witnesses?

You have heard the blasphemy. What do you think? And they all condemned him to be deserving of death. Then some began to spit on him and to blindfold him and to beat him and say to him, prophesy! And the officer struck him with the palms of their hands.

Prayer for Illumination

Well, in the reading of God's Word there, brothers and sisters, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God endures forever. Let's pray. Father, we have read a historical account, verified by multiple witnesses, attested to by your Spirit, preserved in time. Lord, we pray now that your spirit would work in our hearts, that we might not just hear a familiar story, but Lord, that you would do a heart work in us, that we might see who you are, and that it would change how we think, how we feel, and how we live. We need your spirit to do this, Lord, we pray in Jesus' name, amen.

Sermon

Who is Jesus? Who is Jesus today? Who do people say that Jesus is today? If you go out and even go into different seminaries, or if you go into the streets and you ask people that question, you would get a huge array of different answers for that. Who is Jesus?

Some people will say that Jesus, they believe, is a liberation Jesus. He lifts up the poor. He came as Messiah to care for the afflicted and to break the chains of anybody in oppression. Other people, modernists, will say that, well, Jesus was just a good moral teacher. We don't need to necessarily believe his miracles, you know, because that's pre-modern type stuff, but he taught us good morals we can follow.

Other people will come to you and they'll give you almost this Plato Jesus, right? Make him into whatever form you want. A lot of counselors will do this. They take different things of Jesus they like and they'll make Jesus into this way, but they'll just ignore different parts that they don't like. Whatever it could do to make you feel better.

Other people will try to convince you that today Jesus is all about social justice and he's a social warrior Jesus. Other people will... just want to sing their little folk songs to their boyfriend Jesus and follow the Jesus people movement. There are people who will try to tell you that Jesus was almost like a proto-socialist. Right? And that Jesus came and taught us to sell all of our goods and to live in a commune together. There's many cults out there who will try to teach you that that's what Jesus is.

Some people will just go along with, if they're non-believing at all, they'll just agree with Karl Marx. People just like Jesus because it helps. It's an opiate for the masses. Having an idea of Jesus just helps poor people get along with life. And you poor fools have just fallen into it.

There's many examples of who people will say Jesus is. Some will just try to make Him into all about their politics and all about their power, ignoring a number of other things that Jesus speaks specifically about morality. And then there are ultra-super-spiritualist people who will just take Jesus and however it makes us feel whole and calm our guilt that that's who Jesus is. But we notice that the question the high priest asks is getting at the heart of this. Again, the high priest asked him saying, Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? Who are you? is what he's asking. And we live in a day and age where people want to make Jesus to be the king of this present world and this present age, but we'll see as we work through these groups that time and time again they mold Jesus into the image of their liking and not the image that Jesus says that He is.

Jesus says He is the anointed Son of God. who sits at the right hand of the power and is coming with the clouds of heaven. So my proposition to you this morning is that you would believe, that you would believe that Jesus is the Messiah. That Jesus is divine. That Jesus is the judge of the world. That Jesus is our High Priest and Jesus is our Messiah. That's who Jesus is.

But before we get there, we need to understand the unjust scene that's going on here. There's an unjust scene that's going on. Remember, Jesus has just been taken like a criminal. It's past midnight, the torches were lit, the people were searching for Him in the Garden of Gethsemane. They drug Him out like a common thief, all His disciples scattered away. And he's brought almost to this kangaroo court. We don't have it in ours, but in the book of John we have. First he's taken to Annas. He doesn't answer anything to Annas. Then he's taken to Caiaphas.

And so now we have the actual reigning high priest of the time. And Caiaphas is a politically savvy dude. He's been in power for 19 years. Or he will have been in power for 19 years by the time he's dethroned. Normally high priests only serve for 4 years. This guy knows how to stay in the central of things, knows how to hold on to his power.

And he assembles together all the leaders. Did you notice? It's almost like all the brass walked into the room in verse 53. And with Him were assembled all the chief priests of Him and His whole family, the elders, and the scribes." Right? These are all the important leaders of Israel are joined together. This, as we'll read later, is almost like a joining together of the Sanhedrin, all the council of those who can authoritatively declare somebody's fate.

It was cold that night. Somehow Peter goes, and we're going to pick up on Peter next week, but Peter finds himself by the light, that's how the literal translation is, but he's by the fire, with the fire lighting his face, warming himself there. But notice the leaders have already come with a verdict in mind. The leaders didn't come because they wanted justice, the leaders came because they wanted blood. Look at verse 55. Now, the chief priests and the council sought testimony against Jesus to put Him to death. This was pre-judged. They could have done this in the Garden of Gethsemane, but they didn't.

Instead, they try to cobble together a whole bunch of people who could possibly throw things. It's like throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what's going to stick. Right? Some people are saying he did this. Some people are saying he said that. What's going to eventually stick to Jesus? Right? And the issue is you've got to have a testimony of two or three witnesses. That's what the law required. Deuteronomy 17 verse 6. Whoever is deserving of death shall be put to death on the testimony of two or three witnesses. He shall not be put to death on the testimony of one witness.

And people are coming to him, one at a time, throwing accusations against Jesus. Nothing is sticking. He's not answering any of their accusations. It's almost like Jesus is pleading the fifth. He's just not going to self-incriminate. They're getting mad.

And the closest thing that seems to stick is what Jesus said about the temple. And they ripped Jesus' words out of context. John chapter 2 verse 19, Jesus said, "...destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." But it's clear from context, Jesus isn't talking about the temple that's in front of them, He's talking about His own body.

And people must have associated that with Mark chapter 13. We just went over that in a series of, I don't know, like five different sermons, right? Where Jesus predicts or Jesus prophesies the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. But Jesus never said in Mark chapter 13 that He was going to rebuild that temple with His hands in three days.

And so these testimonies aren't lining up. And what should have happened is a mistrial should have been declared right away. Right away, when the testimonies aren't sticking and there's contrary witnesses, right away it should have been, okay, hold on, stop. We're done. But they don't.

And worse than this, in Israel, if you were to go to a capital trial, a trial where somebody was to be put to death, and you bore false testimony, Immediately, you were supposed to be the one now on trial. Because if you bore false testimony in a capital trial, that same thing was supposed to happen to you. That's what Deuteronomy chapter 19 says, Deuteronomy 19, 16-21, If a false witness arises against any man to testify against him of wrongdoing, then both men in the controversy shall stand before the Lord, before the priest and the judges who serve in those days, and the judges shall make careful inquiry. And indeed, if the witness is a false witness, he who testified falsely against his brother, then you shall do to him as he thought to have done to his brother, so you shall put away the evil from among you."

A just scenario would have been here that they come and they want to hear the actual case. And then when there's contrary witnesses, a mistrial is proclaimed right away. And then those who are bringing false testimony should have been put on trial themselves.

But none of this happens because none of this is just, because they're not even following their own rules. The Sanhedrin had their own rules. Every time that the council met together, they were to go to the chamber of Hewnstone in the temple, and there the 70 elders with a high priest sitting as judge, and two clerks on the floor, the person who's accused in the middle, clerk to the right, clerk to his left, semicircle around him.

That's where they were to make this judgment. And they're not there. They're in the courtyard of the high priest. At his own house. They're not supposed to make judgments at night. It's supposed to happen during the day. And yet here we are, in the middle of the night, in a secret trial. And they're not to make any type of decisions regarding death during the Passover. These are their own rules, by their own rabbis, and they're not following even their own procedures. And then something dramatically changes.

As Jesus keeps his mouth shut, as Jesus doesn't answer, the high priest gets ticked off. He goes from just being judge to being a prosecutor. He moves from being the one who's supposed to hear the case to the one who's going to get the evidence himself. He is going to get Jesus to talk so he can incriminate him. And the high priest stood up, verse 60, in the midst and asked Jesus, saying, Do you answer nothing? What is it these men testify against you? But he kept silent and answered nothing.

Again the high priest asked him, saying to him, Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed? Jesus said, I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the power and coming with the clouds of heaven. Jesus wouldn't answer his accusers beforehand because he was going to be like a lamb led to the slaughter without opening his mouth. But when Caiaphas asks him directly, are you the Christ?

Are you the Son of the Beloved? By the way, he's calling the Beloved, this is what theologians call circumlocation, right? So they want to say the word God, but they don't want to blaspheme His name, so they'll say the Blessed instead. Are you the Son of God? Are you the Son of the Blessed?

And their jaws must have dropped. For the first time in the trial, Jesus opens His mouth. I am. The entire book of Mark, Jesus has been telling people, don't tell anyone about this. Don't tell people I'm the Christ. When even the unclean spirits rise up and they say, you know, what are you going to do with us, Son of the Most High? Jesus rebukes them and tells them to be quiet. The entire book of Mark there has been this messianic secret, this kind of keeping things quiet for 14 chapters, almost 15 chapters, and now the secret is out.

The entire book has been pointing to this moment that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Blessed. And so we'll pick up on Jesus' words here for the remainder of this sermon, now that we have this unjust context, but this moment that Jesus is filling with all the meaning of who He is. At first, Jesus is the Messiah. Jesus is the Messiah. The high priest asks him, are you the Christ? This idea Christus, Christ, is from the Old Testament with anointing.

Like when Samuel went to the house of Jesse, and he went to go find the new king to replace Saul, he found David eventually, and he poured oil on his head to anoint him as king. God had promised David in 2 Samuel 7, that your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you, and your throne shall be established. And the people of God had been waiting for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years, waiting for the day that somebody who would eventually be anointed would come and be their king forever, sitting on the throne of David.

But you need to understand that that is an existential threat to the Jewish leaders. Right? That will keep them up at night with anxiety and worry. Because if Messiah comes, what happens to their power? If the Christ appears, what happens to their role? What happens to their places of position and privilege? Evaporating. Gone. But Jesus is this Messiah. It may threaten them, but it is who Jesus is. He is the Christ. But notice the second question that the high priest asks him. Are you the son of the blessed? And Jesus says, I am. Jesus says, I am, but then he goes on further and he says, and you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power.

Jesus is referring us back to Daniel chapter 7. Daniel chapter 7 verse 13. Jesus is showing us once again that He is the Divine One. He says, I was watching in the night visions, and behold, one like the Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He came to the ancient of days, and they brought Him near before Him. It was Jesus that Daniel saw in Daniel chapter 7. And if you go to the book of Revelation, you'll see this same Jesus who comes in white, and comes to judge the world, because He is the Divine One. And in Psalm 110, what Elder Smith read this morning, Jesus is getting at this when He says, "...and at the right hand of power, and coming with the clouds of heaven."

Psalm 110 verse 1, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand till I make your enemies your footstool. Jesus was this long-awaited one. Jesus was the one whom David himself would call Lord. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand." How can David call Him Lord if He's already King? Because Jesus, the Messiah, the Divine One, would be far greater and grander than anything David had ever imagined.

Because see, when Jesus merges these together, He says, coming with the clouds of heaven, Who in the Bible comes again and again in the clouds of heaven? Did prophets come in the clouds of heaven? No. Did a king ever come with the clouds of heaven? No. Did any of the priests ever come with the clouds of heaven? No, actually the closest a priest ever came to being near the clouds was when God filled the tabernacle. God himself fills a tabernacle with a cloud and the priests aren't even able to get in there because he's so filled with his presence. When the clouds descend upon Mount Sinai, the prophet Moses trembles and the people are in fear. This is the glory that Jesus says, I'm going to come with the clouds of heaven.

You remember Sinai? You remember the tabernacle? You remember the temple? I'm coming like that. Because Jesus is the Ancient of Days. He said in John 17, verse 5, And now, O Father, glorify Me with Yourself, with the glory which I had before the world was. And then when Jesus is speaking to the people, He says, Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am. Jesus answers the high priests, Ego e mi. I am. And he says to the people, before Abraham was, ero emi, I am.

He is the one who is eternal. Jesus is, make no doubt about it, claiming for himself divine personhood. You can imagine how that's going to go over with a high priest. But notice Jesus is also the judge. Jesus is the judge. We believe that Jesus is the judge. We may miss what Jesus is claiming here, but He as Messiah has power and authority and will come to judge the living and the dead.

This is exactly what we get a little bit squirmish about, right? When John was reading Psalm 110, we think, oh, he's going to execute kings, he's going to... This kind of makes us nervous, right? Because I think there's a little bit of pacifist in all of us.

We don't want a Jesus whose robe is dipped in blood. But that's the Jesus who is proclaimed. Revelation 1-7, Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, and even those who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of him, even so, amen. Jesus, the Ancient of Days, is the one that John saw in Revelation chapter 1, and knew that he was going to come and judge even those who had pierced him. Jesus' words to the leaders are a solemn warning.

And I gotta tell you, there are a lot of people who don't like this Jesus. There are a lot of evangelicals who don't like this Jesus. There are a lot of people who call them Christians who don't like this type of Jesus. Most people in our day and age want an unlimited Jesus, an unlimited atonement of Jesus, right?

Jesus just loves every single person everywhere. And they want a Jesus who never condemns anyone. But that's not the Jesus we find in Scripture. People today want a Jesus who never says hard things. But as we've gone through Mark, sometimes you've been confronted with things that you're not comfortable with what Jesus said, but it doesn't change who Jesus is. People today wanted Jesus who forgives universally. People today wanted Jesus who loves everyone, everywhere, and at all times.

But brothers and sisters, I gotta warn you. That's making Jesus into an idol. You want a Jesus who's like this, but if He's not like that, then you're not actually loving or worshipping Jesus who He is. You're worshipping somebody you've created in your own image.

I think we all have a tendency to do this. But we have to ask ourselves honest questions when we come to the Bible and we interact with the historical Jesus that we find here. Is that the Jesus we love and worship and follow? Because if it is, then we got some good news. Because that Jesus is also our High Priest. That Jesus is our High Priest. You see, it wasn't just kings who were anointed. And David was anointed, his sons were anointed, all the kings were anointed by a priest somewhere, or by a prophet, but it was also the priests who were anointed.

If you work through the book of Exodus, you've worked through this book where God in painstaking detail describes every piece of clothing and every article in the tabernacle, everything that was going to happen. And it's like there's an entire owner's manual, but nobody's actually started the car until you get to the book of Leviticus. And then when you get to the book of Leviticus, something amazing happens in Leviticus chapter 8.

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Take Aaron and his sons with him, and the garments, the anointing oil, a bull as the sin offering, two rams and a basket of unleavened bread, and gather all the congregation together at the door of the tabernacle of meeting. So Moses did as the Lord commanded him. And the congregation was gathered together at the door of the tabernacle of meeting. And Moses said to the congregation, this is what the Lord commanded to be done. Then Moses brought Aaron and his sons, and washed them with water.

And he put the tunic on them, girded them with the sash, clothed them with the robe, and put the ephod on him. And he girded him with an intricately woven band of the ephod, and with it he tied the ephod on him. Then he put the breastplate on him, and he put the urim and the thymine in the breastplate. And he put the turban on his head, also on the turban, on its front, and he put the golden plate, the holy crown, as the Lord had commanded Moses.

And Moses took the anointing oil. By the way, If I was to read this a little bit more Hebraic, also Moses took the oil for Messiah-ing and anointed the tabernacle and all that was in it and consecrated them. He sprinkled some of it on the altar seven times, anointed the altar and all of its utensils and the laver and its base to consecrate them. And he poured some of the anointing oil on Aaron's head and Messiah-ed him. to separate him as holy, or to consecrate him. We sing of this in Psalm 133. It's like the precious oil poured out upon the head, which flowing down upon his head, down his beard, and on his garment spread.

Caiaphas wore that turban that on its headplate said, Holiness of the Lord. Caiaphas knew what it was like to have the breastplate with the 12 stones on it, and each stone inscribed with a name, and connected at his shoulders with an onyx stone on each shoulder with the names of the tribes of Israel on it. He knew what it meant to be anointed by God, to be the representative for his people, because in a sense, he was in a moment. meant to represent God and be a mediator between God and his people. One of the most important memories of Caiaphas's life was when he was anointed as high priest.

And now he's asking Jesus, are you the anointed one? See, Caiaphas's days were numbered. His priesthood was about to be eclipsed. His ministry was going to end. He was mediating to a covenant that was growing old by the day. His anointing was about to fade away. And the true anointed one was about to rise to an everlasting priesthood to minister in a tabernacle or a temple not made by human hands, but which is in heaven.

In this scene, we see a transfer of power. From the power-hungry high priests who distort justice and will do anything for their own, to seeing a Jesus Christ who will lay down His life and will even through this injustice bring it for good, whose sacrifice would be better than any sacrifice Caiaphas had ever offered on the altar of God. Because we see Jesus is our sacrifice. Jesus is our high priest, but Jesus is also our sacrifice.

I alluded to Isaiah 53, 7 before, but these words were fulfilled in front of Caiaphas. He was oppressed and he was afflicted. Yet he opened not his mouth. He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shears of silence, so he opened not his mouth.

Jesus did that for us, because you see, Caiaphas may have gone into that temple regularly and created sacrifices and offered blood, but they all pointed to Jesus. They all pointed to the Messiah in front of him. Hebrews chapter 10 tells us, and every priest stands ministering daily, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. And then verse 12, But this man, being Jesus, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God. From that time, waiting till his enemies are made his footstool, for by one offering he was perfected forever those who are being sanctified.

But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us, For after he had said before, this is my covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord, I will put my law into their hearts and in their mind I will write them. Then he adds, their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more. Now where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin. If you had to strand me on a deserted island and only give me one book of the Bible, I'd take Hebrews with me every day.

Because Jesus is our high priest. He's our sacrifice. Everything that Caiaphas thought was most real about religion with the temple was all just a shadow pointing to Jesus, who He was as the Anointed One, who He was as the Divine Person with the power and authority of God, who He was as the One who would judge the living and the dead, who He would be as our Priest and as our King and Judge and our Sacrifice. This is the Jesus that we find here in Mark chapter 14.

We don't believe in a liberation Jesus who is used as nothing more than a pawn for political goals. No. No, we have a far greater anointed one than that. We don't believe in the moral teacher Jesus of the modernists. We believe that He was truly and is truly divine and lives forever.

We don't go along with modern counselors' Plato Jesus. No, we receive and believe Jesus' moral judgments. It's not Jesus who needs to change, it's not Jesus' words that need to change, but it's my heart that needs to be conformed to the likeness of the image of Christ. We don't twist Jesus' words to make us feel better, but we seek to have our lives conformed to His will.

We don't believe the social warrior Jesus. But we believe wholeheartedly in the Jesus whose throne is established in justice and righteousness. We hold to a Jesus far greater than the Jesus people, the hippies of Jesus' movement. We believe in a Jesus who does separate the sheep from the goats. But we understand, we understand with our mouths open and our hearts in awe, that we don't deserve to be numbered among the sheep. But He's called us to be His sheep. He's transformed our hearts. He's given us His Holy Spirit.

Jesus didn't come to set up a type of Christian commune, nor is He some type of opiate for the masses. We believe Jesus is the eternal Son of God. This is not mythology. We believe in a Jesus who truly did humble himself into the likeness of man suffered under the hands of Pontius Pilate. was crucified, died, buried, rose again from the dead, but the grave had no power over Him. He rose from that grave. He ascended up into heaven. He sits down at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. And we believe that He is coming to judge the living and the dead.

We believe that Jesus because it's the Jesus that He says He is here. And we believe it because it even cost Him His life. If we didn't believe it, then why did he die? If he didn't believe it, then why did he die? But we believe in the Jesus of the Scriptures, who is our Messiah, who is our King of Justice, who is our Judge, who is our High Priest, and who has laid down his life to be our sacrifice.

Closing Prayer

So brothers and sisters, don't let the world dupe you into their twisting of who they want Jesus to be. Behold to the Jesus that He says He is and that the Scriptures reveal Him to be. Because there we have peace, there we have hope, there we have a sacrifice, there we have life everlasting if we are in Him. Let's pray. Father, we pray that You would not lead us into temptation. There are many people who speak very well and eloquently. Who are able to take biblical concepts and ideas. And will take hobby horses of theirs and will try to force Jesus into being just about that. Or will try to take Jesus out of context. And make Him into something that you have shown us our Savior is not.

But we thank you. that you have given us a high priest who bears our sins, who has our names written upon his breastplate of righteousness, who gives us a shield of faith and a helmet of salvation. Lord, we pray that as we go out in this world, that our hands would be on the sword of your spirit, the word, and that we would know when the lies are coming at us and trying to twist who you are. Father, we pray that you would give us hope That as we see who you are in your word, that it would warm our hearts and direct our lives. Because we know that our King lives. That he sits at your right hand with all power and authority and he will come again to judge the living and the dead. Thank you for giving us our Messiah. In his name we pray. Amen. let's stand together and we'll sing of our messiah in psalm 110 selection a please stand