SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/11/2024 9:31 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-2 “The Presumption of Peter”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
26:50b-53
Message of the verses: “Then they came and
laid hands on Jesus and seized Him. 51 And behold, one of those who were with
Jesus reached and drew out his sword, and struck the slave of the high priest
and cut off his ear. 52 Then Jesus said to him, "Put your sword back into
its place; for all those who take up the sword shall perish by the sword. 53 “Or
do you think that I cannot appeal to My Father, and He will at once put at My
disposal more than twelve legions of angels?’”
I want to continue to quote from MacArthur’s
commentary: “The church has never made
advances by physical warfare, and every time it has tried, the cause of Christ
has been severely harmed. There are no
holy wars. Every war fought in the name
of Christ has been utterly unholy, contradicting and undermining everything His
Word teaches. The kingdom of God does
not advance with fleshly weapons or by fleshly strategy. The battleground is spiritual, and it makes
no sense to fight with physical weapons.
“Jesus
told Pilate, ‘My kingdom is not of this world.
If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting,
that I might not be delivered up to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not
of this realm’ (John 18:36). Wars such
as the Crusades that are fought in the name of Christ are an affront to Christ. In reality, they are crusades against the
very One who is claimed to be served.”
Now
we want to look at two important reasons that Jesus gave to Peter and these
explain why the use of physical weapons cannot be used to defend, much less
extend His kingdom. First of all, to do so is fatal as seen in verse 52 where
Jesus tells Peter "Put your sword back into its place; for all those who
take up the sword shall perish by the sword.”
Now Jesus was not philosophizing by declaring that everyone who takes up
arms will himself be killed by arms or that a person who uses violence will be
killed violently. Here is His point: that
those who commit acts of violence to achieve personal ends will face punishment
by civil authorities, the sword representing a common means of execution in the
ancient world. Jesus was simply
reiterating the divine standard that was set up in Genesis: “Whoever sheds mans blood, by man his blood
shall be shed, for in the image of God He made man” (9:6). In order to protect the sanctity of human
life, God declares that the one who wantonly takes the life of another person
is subject to capital punishment.” The
problem through history is that this was not followed, and because of that
great problems came about. In fact when
society gets so bad usually the “righteous” ones will be killed and the “unrighteous”
ones will go free.
MacArthur
goes on to say that “God has given human government the right to execute
murders. ‘It does not bear the sword for
nothing’ Paul said; ‘for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath
upon the one who practices evil’ (Rom. 13:4).
The apostle willingly applied that law to himself. In his defense before Festus he said, ‘If
then I am a wrongdoer, and have committed anything wrong of death, I do not
refuse to die’ (Acts 25:11).”
Jesus in telling Peter to put his sword back into
its place He was saying something like “No matter how wicked and unjust My
arrest is, you have no right to take vigilante action. If you take a life while doing that, your own
life will justly be forfeited as punishment.”
MacArthur
adds “Jesus’ arrest and subsequent trials were clearly unjust, but they were
nevertheless carried out within the framework of the legal systems of that
day. Although it exercised its power
only by the permission of Rome, the Sanhedrin was a civil as well as religious
governing body in Israel. Pilate was the
duly appointed Roman governor. Jesus’
point was that personal violent action against even an unjust governing body is
wrong. God has the sovereign right to overrule
human governments as He has done frequently throughout history, but no
individual has such a right.
“Jesus
was not speaking about self-defense or the defense of loved ones or friends
from an attacker. Nor was He talking
about fighting in the armed forces of one’s country. He was referring to violently taking justice
into one’s hands. Under no circumstances
does a Christian or anyone else have the right to dispense personal justice,
even to defend Christ’s name or Word.”
Now
we move onto the second point, the second of two important reasons that explain
why the use of physical weapons cannot be used to defend His kingdom. “Do you think that I cannot appeal to My
Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of
angels?” MacArthur adds that “trying to defend
Christ with a sword not only is morally wrong according to God’s law but s also
pointless. After having seen Jesus’ divine power demonstrated hundreds of
times, why did Peter think his Lord needed the puny help of one sword, or even
a thousand swords?”
I
want to end this section by talking about how many angles that Jesus was
talking about as compared to looking at the Roman legion which is 6,000
soldiers. More than twelve legions of
angels would therefore be in excess of 72,000.
If a single angel of God could slay 185,000 men in one night, which is
seen in 2 Kings 19:35 then the power of 72,000 angels is unimaginable. Jesus was explaining to His impulsive
disciple that He had immediate access to supernatural forces that easily could
destroy the entire Roman army, and that is not to mention the mere cohort of
600 soldiers (John 18:3), which they were not facing. Peter’s demonstration of self-willed bravery
was therefore unnecessary and it was also absurd. The truth is that the Lord’s battles are won
in His power alone, and any human efforts on His behalf that are not made in
submission to His divine will and strength are presumptuous and futile.
This
ends this section and Lord willing we will look at a short section in tomorrow’s
SD entitled “The Fulfillment of Prophecy” from verse 54.
I
mentioned a few weeks ago about an unknown problem that my wife had with rapid
hearing loss in her left ear, which was upsetting to us, especially when one
looks at the internet in trying to answer why this can happen. My son and also her doctor both give good
advice and that is not to look at the internet to find out what is going
on. At any rate the doctor’s visit
yesterday gave us great news as to the severity of her problem and she has
fluid behind her eardrum which can be drained to not only take care of the
problem but will restore her hearing. We
are both very thankful to find this out.
PRAISE THE LORD!!
6/11/2024 10:16 AM
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