Christ Condemned By The Church

Minister:
Date: PM
Text: Matthew 26:63-68
Psalters: 229, 117, 184, 389
  1. The participants.
    1. This trial is before the Sanhedrin, the highest Jewish ecclesiastical court.
      1. It had 71 members, elders and chief priests (former high priests deposed by Caesars), Pharisees and Saducees.
      2. It was chaired by the current High Priest, Caiaphas.
    2. The trial is of Jesus of Nazareth.
      1. For three years He had gone about preaching and teaching and performing great miracles.
      2. They had frequently spied on Him first to gain information and later to trap Him on various issues.
      3. They determined that He should die (Jn. 11:50).
    3. The Sanhedrin and Caiaphas saw only a man they had let irritate them.
  2. The trial.
    1. The Sanhedrin violated its own rules.
      1. They might not meet at night and only in the public meeting place.
      2. A charge to be valid had to have two separate witnesses and could not be from the mouth of the accused.
    2. Completely frustrated, Caiaphas, the High Priest, finally places Jesus under oath (63).
      1. The High Priest was to be a type of Christ.
      2. Now in his official capacity he puts Jesus under oath: “I adjure thee by the living God.”
      3. Jesus quickly adds, “Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man ...”
  3. They sentence Jesus to death - for what He is, not for what He had done.
    1. In itself it was not blasphemy to say that He was the Christ.
      1. They (the church) were expecting the Christ, so it had to be proven that He was not the Christ.
      2. And Caiaphas tore his robes, a most prophetic event.
      3. Then Caiaphas led the real High Priest to the altar to sprinkle the blood of atonement before God.
    2. The heathen rage and imagine a vain thing, taking counsel against the Lord and His anointed.
      1. But they are accomplishing only what God had before determined.
      2. The real High Priest sheds His Lamb-blood for the sake of the people.