A Most Divisive Doctrine (Acts 23:1-10) | Worship Service

Resurrection Day Announcements and Scripture Reading

That's where you check. Check, check. Eight minutes until we begin. Is that good? Nate, is that good? Well, welcome on this beautiful resurrection day. Praise the Lord that he has risen. That was very weak.

He has risen. Amen. All right, a few announcements. First, there's some food left over from the breakfast this morning, and that will be available out on the counter at the back of the room after the service today.

Second, there are two weeks left to register for the women's retreat, and you can do that out in the foyer this Sunday. And then today is the last Sunday to get a free copy of God Doesn't Try. And if you are new here, this is your first time, or if you're a visitor, a visiting family here, we'll make sure that you get a free copy of that book, and that's out in the foyer as well.

So make sure you get a copy of that or you have received a copy of that before you leave here if you have not already. Turn with me, please, to the book of Matthew, the gospel of Matthew, to the 28th chapter.

We're gonna read together Matthew's account of the resurrection of our Lord. Matthew chapter 28, and we'll read this entire chapter. Now after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave.

And behold, a severe earthquake had occurred, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled away the stone and sat upon it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing as white as snow.

The guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men. The angel said to the women, "'Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking "'for Jesus who has been crucified. "'He is not here, for he has risen, just as he said.

"'Come, see the place where he was lying. "'Go quickly and tell his disciples "'that he has risen from the dead, "'and behold, he is going ahead of you into Galilee. "'There you will see him. "'Behold, I have told you.'.

And they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy and ran to report it to his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and greeted them. And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him.

Then Jesus said to them, "'Do not be afraid, go and take word to my brethren "'to leave for Galilee, and there they will see me.'. Now, while they were on their way, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all that had happened.

And when they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers and said, "'You are to say his disciples came by night "'and stole him away while we were asleep.

"'And if this should come to the governor's ears, "'we will win him over and keep you out of trouble.'. And they took the money and did as they had been instructed. And this story was widely spread among the Jews and is to this day.

But the 11 disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but some were doubtful. And Jesus came up and spoke to them saying, "'All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.

"'Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, "'baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son "'and the Holy Spirit, "'teaching them to observe all that I commanded you. "'And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.'".

Resurrection Hope in the Prayer of the Church

Will you stand with me as we pray? Let's bow our heads. Our Father, we can gather here together as your people with great joy, for we know and have confidence by the testimony of your word and of eyewitnesses that our sins, those of us here who have trusted in Christ, our sins have been taken out of the way.

The weight of debt for our iniquity and our transgressions and our violations of the law, all the wrath that we were due has been borne by our substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. And then he was laid in a grave and then he rose again on the third day, victorious over sin and over death.

And because of that, he has secured our justification and secured our eventual resurrection to glory. And so we can be thrilled with that and we can place our confidence and our trust in Christ. And because we have, we know that our sin is gone, that our conscience is cleansed and that our glory has been secured.

So we thank you for the forgiveness of sins and we thank you for the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you that death could not hold him, that the grave was not the victor, that his death was sufficient to pay the price for all the sin of all who will trust in him.

We thank you that his resurrection has secured our glory and our forgiveness. And we thank you that by faith, we can stand before you even now justified and not just forgiven of our sins, but declared righteous because of what Christ has done for us.

We have so much to glory in, so much to thank you for, so much to rejoice in and so much to sing to you for. And so we pray today that as we lift our hearts in worship and in praise, in prayer and adoration to you, our great God and Father, that you would be glorified through our words and the meditation of our heart.

Confirm in our hearts these truths and comfort and encourage us as we reflect upon them. May you be honored and glorified through our worship and through the proclamation and preaching of your word today on this great day, the day we celebrate the risen Lord and our King, the Lord Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray.

Amen.

Good morning. And let's sing together this morning, Christ the Lord is risen today.

Christ the Lord is risen today Our Lord Jesus Christ is risen today

Normally sing at Christmas time, but it's also very appropriate for Resurrection Sunday. So let's sing together, Once Upon.

Once upon a midnight song broke through the east And goodwill toward men in Bethlehem Chapter five.

It says, and they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals because you were slain and purchased for God with your blood, people from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.

And you made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God and they will reign upon the earth and every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea and all things in them,.

I heard saying, to him who sits on the throne and to the lamb be the blessing and the honor and the glory and the might forever and ever. We're gonna sing this morning, is he worthy? And so men, if you're new this morning, you're gonna sing the yellow lines in labor.

Ladies, you're gonna sing the pink. We're all gonna sing together on the white.

Do you feel the world is broken. Do you feel the shadows deepen But do you know that all the dark won't stop the light. From getting through. Do you wish that you could see it all they do.

Is all creation groaning. Is a new creation coming. Is the glory of the Lord to be the light within our midst. Is it good that we remind ourselves of him. Is anyone bold to break the seal and open the scroll

You may be seated.

We have to stop ending our service with that song. Will you please turn your Bibles to the book of Acts chapter 23. Acts chapter 23. I'll give you a moment to find your place there. We will pray to begin with, and then we will look at our text.

Acts chapter 23. Let's bow our heads together. Our great God, you are worthy of far more blessing and praise and honor than we are capable of giving you. And even while we gather here, we are limited by our sinful flesh.

We are limited by our fallenness. We are limited by our creatureliness to sing and to praise you as you are worthy to be praised. And we want to give you honor and glory, and we want to give you the praise that is due to your name, even from the sentiments of our hearts to the thoughts in our minds, our affections, our will, our obedience.

Everything should belong to you for you have done all that is necessary to redeem a people for yourself and for your glory. We ask now that as we give our thoughts and attention to the subject of resurrection and the hope that it has for us, that we would be encouraged in your word and we would delight in it.

Keep our minds fixed upon these things, we ask in Christ's name, amen. All right, my nose is running for some reason. I think it's allergies. All right, Acts chapter 23. And we'll begin reading actually in chapter 22, verse 30, and then we'll read to chapter 23, verse 10.

But on the next day, wishing to know for certain why he had been accused by the Jews, he released him and ordered the chief priests and all the council to assemble and brought Paul down and set him before them.

Paul, looking intently at the council said, brethren, I have lived my life with a perfectly good conscience before God up to this day. The high priest, Ananias, commanded those standing beside him to strike him on the mouth.

Then Paul said to him, God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall. You sit to try me according to the law and in violation of the law, order me to be struck. But the bystanders said, do you revile God's high priest?

And Paul said, I was not aware, brethren, that he was high priest, for it is written, you shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people. But perceiving that one group were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, Paul began crying out in the council, brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees.

I am on trial for the hope and resurrection of the dead. As he said this, there occurred a dissension between the Pharisees and Sadducees and the assembly was divided. For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection nor an angel nor a spirit, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all.

And there occurred a great uproar and some of the scribes of the Pharisaic party stood up and began to argue heatedly saying, we find nothing wrong with this man. Suppose a spirit or an angel has spoken to him.

And a great dissension was developing. The commander was afraid Paul would be torn to pieces by them and ordered the troops to go down and take him away from them by force and bring him into the barracks.

The Resurrection as the Most Divisive Doctrine

The doctrine of resurrection is a most divisive doctrine. In fact, I would be willing to say it is the most divisive doctrine that Christians believe. And by divisive, I do not mean that genuine believers are split over the nature of the doctrine of resurrection or who is raised or whether Christ was raised.

You can't even be a believer unless you are willing to affirm that Jesus of Nazareth three days after he was crucified was raised bodily from the grave and was seen by eyewitnesses. That is the core and center of the Christian faith.

So when I say the doctrine of resurrection is the most divisive doctrine, I don't mean that Christians are split on that because Christians are unanimous on that doctrine. And it doesn't matter if somebody stands behind a pulpit and wears priestly garments, investments, and robes and teaches people and calls themselves by some high dollar name, some big dollar name, if they deny the bodily resurrection of Christ, they are a heretic and not a Christian in any sense of the word.

So doctrine of resurrection does not divide Christians from one another. The doctrine of resurrection divides really all men. By divisive, I mean that it divides all of humanity. Either Jesus Christ rose from the dead, victorious over sin and death, three days after he died on a cross, or he didn't.

There are no third options. There's no other option. Either it happened, as Scripture testifies that it happened, as eyewitnesses say that it happened, or it didn't. There's no other option. Either his body was raised in glorious triumph and later ascended to heaven to sit at the Father's right hand, or his body decayed in the grave and was burned, or was burned, or was stolen, or was lost.

There is no third option. Prophecy was fulfilled in him, or it wasn't. He is the son of David who will keep all of the promises made to David regarding a son who would sit on his throne and reign and rule forever, or he wasn't.

Those who claimed to see him alive three days after his crucifixion were either lying or they weren't. Scripture's record of these events is either true or false. It is either accurate or inaccurate. There is no third option.

Now, spoiler alert, it is true. It did happen. That's the spoiler alert. Prophecy was fulfilled. Jesus rose from the dead just as he said he would, and those who had watched him suffer and die and were able to certify his death saw him alive again after three days.

Scripture's record of those events and those eyewitnesses is true. Now, you either believe that or you don't. That is where this doctrine divides. You either believe that or you don't. You are either trusting in the crucified and risen Christ for your forgiveness and your righteousness and eternal life, or you have refused to repent of your sins and place your faith in him.

You're in one of those two camps. Either you have entrusted your soul and your eternity to him or you haven't. All of humanity is divided in relation to Christ along those lines. Either you believe in him and trust in him or you don't.

Either his resurrection is the guarantee and the surety of your eternal glory, or it is the guarantee and the surety of your eternal damnation. One of those two things is true. But the resurrection of Jesus Christ divides all of humanity.

It is either your hope and your confidence and the surety of your own immortality, or it is the guarantee of your coming judgment. He is your savior for whom you will gladly bow on the last day, or he is your judge before whom you will hesitatingly, but ultimately bow on that last day.

He is one of those two things to you because of the resurrection. Now, our passage today demonstrates the reality of the divisiveness of the resurrection in a vivid way. It is one of my favorite scenes from the book of Acts.

It's one of my favorite events in the life of the apostle Paul. We see in this passage two very important things. First, the centrality of the resurrection of Christ in all of Paul's preaching and his ministry, and therefore in the ministry and preaching and belief of the early church.

And then second, we see that the implications of the resurrection divide men, even men who might otherwise agree on a great number of things. So our passage this morning is the first 10 verses of Acts 23.

Paul Before the Sanhedrin and the Charges Against Him

Appreciating this requires a little bit of understanding of the setting. We'd actually jumped in and read our passage beginning at verse 30 in chapter 22. But on the next day, wishing to know for certain why he had been accused by the Jews, he released him and ordered the chief priests and all the council to assemble and brought Paul down and set him before them.

Now there's a lot of he's and him's and them's in that verse, and so we want to sort that out a little bit, and to do this, we have to go back into actually chapter 21. So you're gonna get lots of bang for your buck this morning, because we're gonna go back into chapter 21, jump into chapter 22, 23, 24, 25, and even 26 today.

Now at this point, in the life and ministry of the apostle Paul, he was a prisoner and in the custody of the commander of the Roman forces in Jerusalem, whose name was Claudius Lysias. We don't find that out till chapter 23, verse 26, where he is finally named.

And him being in custody of Claudius Lysias was the result of a whirlwind of activity that takes us back into chapter 21. So you are welcome to go back there. I'm gonna set the backstory for this for you a little bit.

Chapter 21, look at beginning in verse 20. Now Paul's reputation has preceded him. This takes place after his third missionary journey. The apostle Paul's landed back into Jerusalem and his friends came to him and said, look, the Jews are saying all kinds of horrible things about you.

This is the rumor that is circulating that you are speaking against the law and against the temple. Look at verse 20. And when they had heard it, they began glorifying God. And they said to him, you see brother, how many thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed, and they're all zealous for the law.

And they have been told about you that you're teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs. So here was their plan.

They suggested that Paul take four men who were under a vow and had been participating in the ceremony of this vow, and that he was to go into the temple and then offer a sacrifice and help them fulfill their vows.

And that by doing so, he would demonstrate to the Jews that he was not opposed to the temple. He was not trying to overthrow Moses. He was not trying to preach against the Jewish nation. He was no enemy to his own people.

Verse 27, when the seven days were almost over, and now Paul did this, by the way, in an attempt to smooth things over. And listen, by doing so, there's a lot I could say about this, but let's briefly say this.

By doing so, he wasn't in any way compromising his commitment to the exclusivity of Jesus Christ or to the new covenant. He wasn't going back into Judaism and doing something for a show. He was simply going through a cultural custom to demonstrate he was not opposed to the Jews.

He was a Jew and he had grown up among the Jews. Verse 27, when the seven days were almost over, the Jews from Asia, upon seeing him in the temple, began to stir up all the crowd and laid hands on him, crying out, men of Israel, come to our aid.

This is the man who preaches to all men everywhere against our people and the law and this place. That's the temple. And besides, he has even brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place.

For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with him, and they supposed that Paul had brought him into the temple. Now, Paul had done none of the things that they had accused him of doing.

They saw Paul in the city with Trophimus, who was a Gentile, not a Jew, and then they saw Paul in the temple and they made the assumption that Paul had taken Trophimus from the city inside the temple where Gentiles could not go and thus defiled the inner sanctuary of the temple.

They accused him of defiling the temple by bringing Trophimus into it. Now, really, if you read through the rest of the book of Acts you will see that the Jews' accusations against Paul were threefold.

There were three things that they accused him of. They accused him of sedition, sectarianism, and sacrilege. That's not just alliterated because it's easy to remember. It's alliterated because that's actually what they were accusing of.

Sedition. They accused him of sedition, saying everywhere this guy preaches, there's a riot. Well, that was true. But why was it true? Because he was trying to overthrow Rome? No, because everywhere he preached, he preached the resurrection.

And this is the most divisive doctrine among men. Everybody gets upset at him. And so, of course, there would be a riot because they didn't like what he was preaching. And they accused him of sectarianism, saying that he was preaching an illicit religion.

It wasn't Judaism and it wasn't any kind of form of paganism. It was some new religion. Of course, Paul and Luke's answer to that is that Christianity is not a new religion. It's Judaism fulfilled. This is the fulfillment of Judaism.

So if Judaism is an illicit, illegal religion under Roman law, which it was, then the fulfillment of that, which is Christ, the ultimate Jew who has fulfilled all the Judaistic promises of the old covenant, he has come and fulfilled all of that.

Therefore, what Paul was preaching was really the fulfillment of Old Testament Judaism, not a new religion at all. They said, you're starting this sect, this new sect called Christianity. And of course, that was false.

And the third thing they accused him of was sacrilege, that he brought Trophimus into the temple and Paul had done no such thing. They assumed it because he had been in the city with Trophimus and then saw him in the temple with Trophimus, but he must have brought Trophimus, the Gentile, into the temple and Paul hadn't done that.

Sedition, sectarianism, and sacrilege. Now, long story short, they seized Paul in the temple and started beating him publicly. This was mob violence at its worst. And the Romans were summoned because during the feast time, they were on high alert for any kind of a Jewish uprising.

And there was a Roman station right there on the temple grounds and they monitored this constantly. And anytime they saw any kind of busyness going on or any kind of activity like that, they would jump in and try and squelch that before a full-blown riot could ensue.

And so they saw the crowd beating Paul and the commander took some of the soldiers down there and dealt with it. Acts 21, verse 32. At once, he took along some soldiers and centurions, that's Lysias, Claudius Lysias, and ran down to them.

And when they saw the commander and the soldiers, they stopped beating Paul. Then the commander came up and took hold of him and ordered him to be bound with two chains. And he began asking who he was and what he had done.

But among the crowd, some were shouting one thing and some another. And when he could not find out the facts, because of the uproar, he ordered him to be brought into the barracks. Now, Paul later on asked to address the crowd that had just been beating him.

And Lysias was glad to allow Paul to do this because this would give Lysias some idea of what it is, why it is that they were so upset at him. So in chapter 22, Paul gives his speech beginning at the first of chapter 22, and the crowd is listening to that.

They listened to him give his testimony and talk about how he had seen the risen Christ on the road to Damascus. And they listened to that all the way up to the point where Paul says that he was sent by their Messiah to go to the Gentiles.

And then, of course, that just exploded the whole thing. Then they got upset and they said, this man shouldn't even be allowed to live. They were willing to listen to all of that, voice from heaven, road to Damascus experience.

But the suggestion that he would be sent to Gentiles to preach the good news to the Gentiles, this is a man deserving of death, they said. That's chapter 22, verse 22. Look at verse 23 of chapter 22. And as they were crying out and throwing off their cloaks and tossing dust into the air, my goodness, talk about the drama of that, the commander ordered him to be brought into the barrack, stating that he should be examined by scourging so that he might find out the reason why they were shouting against him that way.

Now, you got a feel for Lysias at this point. He's gone down there. He's gotten Paul out of the crowd where he's being beaten probably to death if Lysias hadn't shown up. And he asked, what's going on?

What's this all about? What's your issue with him? They start shouting. He can't even make out because of what the crowd is doing and all the drama queens nonsense going on in the crowd. So Paul says, can I address the crowd?

Oh, this would be a great opportunity to find out why it is that they're so upset. So he lets him address the crowd. The crowd, of course, burst into this thing and all the drama again of all of this.

And so he brings them into the barracks thinking, I got to find out why these people were upset with him. So he suggests that they scourge Paul, verse 24. The commander ordered him to be brought into the barracks, stating that he should be examined by scourging so that he might find out the reason why they were shouting against him that way.

Beat it out of him. He'll tell us the truth if we beat him enough. This sounded like a great idea until verse 25 when they stretched him out with thongs. Paul said to the centurion who was standing by, is it lawful for you to scourge a man who is a Roman and uncondemned?

You don't have to be a history major to know the answer to that question is no. That was not lawful. In fact, it was not lawful for them to even bind him with chains. Lysias had no idea Paul was a Roman citizen.

Verse 29, therefore those who were about to examine him immediately let go of him. And the commander also was afraid for he found out that he was a Roman and because he had put him in chains. That's not how you treat Roman citizens.

That is not how Roman soldiers treated Roman citizens. You don't bind a man not even knowing what the accusations are against him. And then you don't stretch him out across the bench to whip him and lash him when you don't even know what the accusations are against him.

That's not how you treat Roman citizens. He had a bound Roman citizen with no charges and no accusations. He has no information and he is treating him like he is a subject and not a citizen. Lysias for everything that he has done so far could be reprimanded to the point where he would never be a commander of anything other than a dogsled team in the future.

And now he's in a pickle. Because he has to protect Paul, Paul's a Roman citizen. He has to protect him so he can't let him go. Because if he lets him go, he knows the Jews are gonna kill him before he gets off the Temple Mount.

So he can't let Paul go. He can't detain Paul without any charges. If he's gonna detain him, he has to have some reason to detain him. He's put him in chains and so he better be able to justify that. And now Lysias truly has no idea why the people are so upset.

And you could presume that Paul would have told him, this is why they're upset because I go and this is what I preach and this is what I teach and this is what has happened. But you can't trust the word of a presumed criminal or the guy who's been treated like a criminal.

So he can't take him at his word. He's gotta find some way of figuring out why the people are upset with him. Either he's worthy of these charges or he is not. I can't let him go and I can't hold him.

What am I gonna do? It's a great idea. Let's take him before the Jewish council, which is the Sanhedrin with all of the ruling people of the Jews and let him sort of stand trial there and at least hear what accusations they might bring against him in that setting.

So that's what he does in verse 30. But on the next day, wishing to know for certain why Paul had been accused by the Jews, Lysias released him and ordered the chief priests and all the council to assemble.

And he brought Paul down and set him before them. Now this is the Sanhedrin, which you read about in scripture. It is the religious ruling council of the Jews. They had authority under Roman law to try Paul, to bring accusations against him and even to punish him to a certain point, though they could not execute him according to Roman law.

Now, keep in mind that didn't keep them from executing Stephen back in chapter seven and chapter eight because they really sometimes would just do what they wanted. But according to Roman law, they were not allowed to execute Paul, but they could at least try him, put him there, bring the accusations and Lysias then would be able to hear what they say about Paul and what Paul's response and defense to them would be.

And then Lysias could discern, is there something here that I need to hold him for or is there nothing here? And I can go ahead and release him and maybe give him safe passage out of the city. And then hopefully everybody will forget about what I did with this Roman citizen.

And Paul will be glad that I let him go. And it's just wanting an answer. It's all Lysias wants. So he can get an answer here. What is their issue with him? What has he done? What is their proof? Why do they hate him?

So Paul is there with Lysias and probably a good number of soldiers who were tasked with his protection. Now, keep in mind, Paul has a history with this council, the Sanhedrin. At one time he had been, history suggests, some people suggest a member of the Sanhedrin or at the very least, he was very closely allied with the Sanhedrin because the people who ran the Sanhedrin 25 years prior to this, they had given Paul authority to go round up and kill people.

So Paul was their bulldog at one point. And Gamaliel, who was Paul's mentor, had been on this council at some point, whether he was now, we don't know, but we know that Gamaliel was a member of the Sanhedrin and Gamaliel was Paul's instructor.

And we may even presume that there were people with whom Paul had gone to school under Gamaliel's guidance on this council as well. He knows some of these people, which is why he addresses them not as fathers and elders of the people, but as brethren.

Look, bro, I'm here, you know me, you know my history in Judaism, you know my past, you know what I am about, you know that I've done nothing worthy of this. Some of these people are his intellectual and spiritual peers in the sense that they know him and they have a long history with him.

He is not standing before a bunch of strangers. He's standing before people who, yes, hate him, but they know him. Paul stood with this council at one time, falsely condemning Stephen of preaching against the law and against Moses.

And Paul probably had had some part in ginning up those fake charges. And then of course he had stood by and held the robes while people stoned Stephen for that and executed Stephen. And now Paul is on trial before the very same people for the very same accusations.

And now he is the defendant and not the prosecutor. Verses one to five demonstrate that the Apostle Paul could not possibly get a fair trial. Verse one, Paul looking intently at the council said, brethren, I have lived my life with a perfectly good conscience before God up to this day.

He is not suggesting that he's never done anything bad. He is suggesting that he has done his best to live a life in keeping with the word of God as he understood it all the way through his life. When he was a Pharisee and he was persecuting Christians, he had a clean conscience.

His conscience was misinformed, but he had a clean conscience. After that, he has lived faithfully in obedience to God. And what the Apostle Paul is saying at this point is, look, I'm innocent. I've done nothing that I know of that I have violated any law or standard of the Jewish nation.

I've lived before God with a perfectly clean conscience. That's a declaration of his innocence, which you would expect to hear from somebody who was being falsely accused and standing trial to declare their innocent.

And to say, I plead innocence in this matter. And that's what he does. But Ananias would have nothing to do with that. Ananias was a wicked and violent and cruel and corrupt high priest. And he was sympathetic to the Romans, which is maybe why Lysias let Ananias get away with this.

But Ananias, the high priest, verse two, commanded those standing beside him to strike him on the mouth. That word strike is the word that is used of the Roman soldiers striking Jesus in Matthew 27, 30 and Mark 15, 19.

And it suggests a violent, forceful, brutal strike. This is not a slap. It's not backhanding him. It's not smacking him on the lips or anything like that. And it suggests that it was possibly more than one strike because they were beating him on the mouth.

That's the idea, violently so. The rebuke that Paul gives them is deserved, but it was not respectful. Verse three, Paul said to him, God's gonna strike you, you whitewashed wall. Do you sit and try me according to the law in violation of law, order me to be struck?

That rebuke is every bit of it deserved. Ananias was doing that very thing, allegedly trying him according to the standards of the Jewish law while in violation of law, ordering Paul to be struck. No accusations have even been leveled at this point.

No proof has been presented at this point. No verdict has been issued at this point. And yet they are treating him as if he is guilty. That was a violation of the law. And what Paul says when he calls him a whitewashed tomb and suggests that, or a whitewashed wall, and suggests that God is going to judge him, every bit of that is true.

Ananias was eventually judged. He died a few years after this. And the idea of a whitewashed wall is something that on the outside looks good, but interior, it's rotting, it's useless, it's worthless.

It's about to fall over. And Paul's simply saying, for your violation of law, God is gonna judge you. Every word of this is true, but it wasn't respectful toward the high priest, which Paul didn't understand he was the high priest.

There's a lot of stuff behind this that would go into this. Paul's eyesight's not bad. It's not that Paul is ignorant of this. There had been a high priestly change just prior to this, and it's likely that Paul didn't even know who the high priest was.

So when Ananias orders him to strike him, he has no idea it's coming from one who is now actually the high priest of the Sanhedrin. And so when he is reproved in verse four, the bystanders say, do you revile God's high priest?

Paul says, you shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people. I was not aware he was the high priest. So again, the rebuke that the apostle gives is deserved, but it was not respectful coming toward Ananias.

The fix was in with this trial, and that was the point of verses one to five. I wanna jump into all the rest of the stuff that is there, but when I preached through this passage years ago, this was three sermons, what I'm giving you.

This one here, just understand that it becomes obvious at the end of verse five that the apostle Paul understands he is not gonna get a fair trial. There was nobody in the room that was on his side, not a single person.

There was nothing he could say that could purchase his release in that situation. They are content and intent on doing only one thing, and that is condemning him. His only hope was to somehow get a mistrial.

That was his only hope, to get a mistrial, to somehow do something that would upset this proceeding to the point where they could not go forward with their kangaroo court and judge him in that way. So verse six, but perceiving that one group were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, Paul began crying out in the council.