Sunday, June 30, 2024

PT-2 "The Illegal and Unjust Conduct of the Court" (Matt. 26:67-68)

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/30/2024 8:09 AM

 

My Worship Time                           Focus:  PT-2 "The Illegal and Unjust Conduct of the Court"

 

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                    Reference:  Matt. 26:67-68

 

            Message of the verses:  67 Then they spat in his face and knocked him about, and some slapped him, 68 crying, "Prophesy, you Christ, who was that who hit you?’”

 

            I am not sure but it makes sense that the older ones from the council were the ones who just slapped Him.  And instead of spitting on Jesus they threw verbal abuse in His face.  After blindfolding Him as Luke says in Luke 22:64 they demanded sarcastically, Prophesy to us, You Christ; who is the one who hit You?”

 

            MacArthur writes “Luke also reports that ‘They were saying many other things against Him, blaspheming’ (22:65).  The true blasphemers here were the accusers, not the accused.  Jesus had not blasphemed because He was indeed God, but the ungodly Sanhedrin blasphemed repeatedly as they condemned, humiliated, and abused the sinless Son of God.  And when these judges of Israel tired of tormenting Jesus, they turned Him over to the Temple police for further maltreatment (Mark 14:65).

 

            “As the later mob reaction before Pilate would prove conclusively, the ungodly religious leaders who rejected and profaned Jesus were a microcosm of the Jewish nation.  Spiritually and morally Israel was a rotting carcass waiting to be devoured by vultures, as indeed it was devoured by Rome less than forty years later.  In A. D. 70 the Temple was burned and razed, most of Jerusalem was destroyed, and hundreds of thousands of its citizens were slaughtered without mercy.

 

            “Every person who rejects Christ spits in His face, as it were, and is guilty of blasphemy against God, who sent His beloved Son to save that person and all mankind from sin.  The irony is that all who misjudge Jesus will themselves be rightly judged by Him one day.  Men continually misjudge Jesus, but He will never misjudge them.  The tables will be turned.  The criminals will no longer unjustly condemn and crush the innocent but will themselves be justly condemned and crushed.

 

            “Even in the midst of the cruel injustice against Him, our Lord’s grace shined undiminished.  Throughout His ordeal, ‘while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously’ (1 Pet. 2:23).  This was His divinely-apointed time, and He resoulutely and gladly faced hell’s moment of seeming victory.  He would not turn or be turned from suffering and death, because only in that way could he bear ‘our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness’ (v. 24).”

 

            With this SD we end this 16th chapter in John MacArthur’s fourth commentary on the gospel of Matthew.  There is one more chapter, 17 on this 26 the chapter of Matthew which, Lord willing we will begin tomorrow.    6/30/2024 8:30 AM

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