The Examination Of Jesus Before The Sanhedrin

The Gospel of Mark and the Consistency of Jesus’ Identity

For our study this evening, we will be in the Gospel of Mark, Mark chapter 14, as we just read, Mark chapter 14. Let's ask the Lord's blessing upon our time together. Fathers, we conclude this study. We ask that once again you would help us to remember that we would be encouraged in seeing the testimony of the scriptures concerning our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, the glory of his person, the many ways in which your word testifies as to his true identity and who he was.

But may we be good servants of his as testifiers, as witnesses in this, indeed, as we saw this morning, this adulterous and evil generation. Lord, help us to have the ability to speak forth your truth, to remember these things, and to glorify your name, we pray in Christ's name.

Amen. In our time together over the past couple of weeks, we have been looking at the subject of what the Gospel of Mark testifies concerning the person of Jesus Christ. We have been doing so in light of the fact that it is commonly asserted and not just within, quote unquote, academia, but now within just, well, you can turn it on CNN and find people saying that, well, the Gospels don't agree about who Jesus was and they tell different stories about Jesus.

There is just so much falsehood that goes around in our society on this subject that it seems to me that we should be the very first ones to not only detect it, but to be quick with a word of correction, that we should be the ones who demonstrate ourselves to be students of Scripture, to be those who are able to bring light into darkness, even when that darkness may well be purposeful.

It may come from those who are specifically wishing to deceive others. We are the ones who have been entrusted with this word. We should be the ones who are very quick to give a response when that happens.

And we have already seen so much evidence in the Gospel of Mark of the fact that the Jesus that is presented, yes, he is a human. There is no book of the New Testament that presents Jesus as merely some sort of heavenly figure that floats about and his feet never touch the ground.

And when he walks down a seashore, he doesn't leave footprints because he doesn't really have a physical body. There were people who taught things like that. In fact, the New Testament warns against that kind of teaching.

No one is suggesting otherwise. But what is normally said is that John presents to us this divine Jesus whose humanity is de-emphasized. Of course, you can't really read John to come to that conclusion.

In John, Jesus becomes tired. He has to sit in the well and talk to the woman. He has been tired of the journey. But leaving that aside, John allegedly presents this very divine Jesus who is in control of everything.

But Mark Jesus is very much just human. There is no divine element. It is very common to hear today people saying that, in fact, Matthew, Mark, and Luke together do not present to us evidence of the deity of Christ.

Well, we have seen so much counter-evidence to that already in looking at Mark chapters 1 and 2, 8 and 9. And now, of course, we could have spent much more time on this, but we had a limited amount of time, so we've had to choose the text that we want to look at.

Now I want to sort of look at the end of the Gospel of Mark and see how this particular theme continues and is consistent throughout what we have seen. In the text, which has already been read in our hearing, we have the arrest of Jesus and His examination, not so much a trial, but examination before the Sanhedrin.

And so, beginning of verse 55, the chief priests and the whole Sanhedrin, that is the very term that is used there, but it's the council, it's the ruling Jewish council, were trying. This was not something that they did just once.

They were seeking to do this over and over again to obtain testimony against Jesus. And they had a purpose for this. They were trying to obtain testimony so that they might put Him to death. So they were looking for a specific kind of testimony.

Testimony that would lead to a charge that would stick in seeking to put Jesus to death. Obviously, this is the end of the rather long and drawn out escalation of the conflict between the Jewish leaders and Jesus.

He has exposed their hypocrisy. He has told parables about them. But even in the process of telling those parables, He has put Himself into those parables. He has made Himself one that is seen even in those parables as having a special relationship, being sent by the Father in a way that none of the Old Testament prophets could be identified as having been sent in that way.

And so, this has been an escalation. And finally, they have gotten to the point where they have bribed Judas. They have gotten into the inner circle. And so, Jesus has been delivered to them. Of course, Jesus knows this is coming.

Jesus has told His disciples that this is coming. He has rebuked Peter for standing in the way of this happening. He has been teaching His disciples that it's necessary that the Son of Man go to Jerusalem.

And now, they are seeking testimony against Jesus so that they might put Him to death. But interestingly enough, it says they were not finding any. It's not that they weren't finding false testimony, but there were many giving false testimony against Him.

But their testimony was not... And then, how we translate this from the original language is interesting. Those of you who remember your... What grade was that? 7th or 8th grade. It might be earlier these days.

I don't know. Certainly, these were summer's favorite classes. But you remember your math classes, especially your geometry classes. And you had such thing called an isosceles triangle. Do you all remember your isosceles triangles?

Yes, Jamie remembers his isosceles triangles. And afterwards, we'll be having a 47-minute seminar on exactly how to identify isosceles triangles. The isosceles triangle, how do you identify? The equal nature, the equal angles that this presents to us is one of the ways that...

I actually enjoy geometry. It's actually a rather enjoyable thing. But this is the same term. And what it's saying is they could not find testimony that was equal, or in other words, consistent. Now, I didn't want to stop here just simply to give you a Greek lesson.

But I did want to stop here just for a moment to remind you of something. A number of years ago, back when I had hair and big glasses, I took some classes. And one of the classes that I took was on logic.

And my professor, who is wearing a very bright colored shirt in the back of the room tonight, my professor started off, I believe, in the very first night of that class talking to us about truth and how you can identify truth.

And one of the things that I remember that he said, and this is one of the things that stuck in my mind, is when you're a teacher, make sure that what you say is exactly what you mean to say because people might remember it many, many years later.

He said, you cannot talk about truth without talking about consistency. Consistency. Today, in our society, people talk about truth. But they rarely are concerned about consistency. They will talk about things and they will assert the truthfulness of things, but then when you start probing and you start asking questions, they don't care about consistency.

In fact, it was years later, in preparing for a debate that I did at Biola University with Shabir Ali, a Muslim apologist, that I developed a phrase that I've used over and over again and I've used it so much that other people are starting to use it and I guess I should have credited Brother Callaghan for it because even though I didn't make the connection at the time, the assertion that I made was I examined Shabir Ali's arguments and I saw that he used one standard in talking about the New Testament, another standard in talking about the Quran, and I said, inconsistency is the sign of a failed argument.

And I've used that line over and over and over again. I think we as Christians should recognize that we as believers, when we present arguments, we need to be consistent. We need to be consistent in the standards we bring the New Testament.

We need to be consistent in our methods of interpretation. That's something we strive for around here. I mean, some people might call it boring. I mean, you know, if you're going to hear Pastor Fry preaching, you pretty much know the methodology he's going to use.

You pretty much know the kind of exegesis he's going to use. And that's a good thing. It's a wonderful thing to know that when I go to the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church, they're going to open the Word of God, they're going to apply consistent standards of exegesis, they're not going to be running around, you know, Pastor Fry and I would get together each week going, well, you know, I heard the church down the road has come up with this way of doing things.

Maybe if we interpret this text this way, we come up with a new way of exciting people to do this. We don't do that. And it's good that we don't do that. Now, we might have a whole lot more people here if we did things like that.

But hopefully you recognize that there's something very right and very proper about consistency. And the arguments that these people were bringing, the testimony that they were presenting, they were not consistent.

There was inconsistency. And you see, God has made us in such a way that the reason the scribes and Pharisees keep looking for people to bring testimony is even they recognized that these folks were contradicting each other.

There was no consistency. And that bothered them. They recognized that there could really be no truthfulness to what was being said if there was inconsistency in the testimony. You can really tell when a society is in a world of hurt.

Well, they don't care about whether their leaders are consistent anymore. And about whether what they're saying is consistent anymore. And so they keep looking for people to bring testimony. But not even in this respect, verse 59, was their testimony consistent.

False Witnesses, Consistency, and the Charge Against Jesus

So the high priest... Well, I'm sorry, I skipped past a second. So then there's this very interesting section where some came forward and began to give false testimony against him saying, we heard him say, I will destroy this temple made with hands and in three days I will build another made without hands.

Now, there was an element of truth there, wasn't there? Because we can go to the Gospel of John and we know that Jesus said something similar to that. But what was he actually talking about? He was talking about his body.

He was talking about the resurrection. And evidently what makes this testimony false, aside from the fact that it doesn't seem to be overly accurate, is the context in which it was placed. Here is a man and he was threatening to destroy this great temple.

Well, no, he wasn't doing that. And even, verse 59 says, not even in this respect, was their testimony, again, consistent. There was no consistency in their testimony. So finally, the high priest has had enough of this.

If we can't get cooperation from these people, some of whom I have a feeling they were sort of greasing their palms just a little bit, the high priest stood up and came forward and questioned Jesus saying, Do you not answer?

What is it that these men are testifying against you? And so now he wants to try to get Jesus to give self-incriminating evidence against himself. He wants to drag him into basically having an argument with liars.

And you know what? You never come out ahead when you argue with liars. The very fact that they have muddied the landscape and fouled the air with their lies means that the truth is not what the people around you are actually after in the first place.

And so he wants to get Jesus involved and he says, Do you not answer? What is it that these men are testifying against you? I have wondered many, many times at the incredible patience of Jesus. When people brought questions to him, meaning to catch him and to trap him, so often he didn't even bother to answer their question.

He gave an answer that went directly to their motivations. He gave an answer that went directly to what he was attempting to accomplish. But especially in the trial of Jesus, in the examination of Jesus, such tremendous patience.

What is it that these men are testifying against you? Did you know the Lord was fully capable of pointing out all the inconsistencies and embarrassing these men? And he would have been fully capable of demonstrating the illegal nature of the proceedings and the violations of God's law.

Goodness, he actually could have looked into the hearts of all these people and started testifying truthfully about all the sins they had committed that day. But you see, he didn't have to do that. He didn't have to do that because he knew that what he was undergoing was necessary.

It was required. And so the question does not get an answer. Verse 61, but he kept silence. He kept silence and he did not answer. So again, the high priest, he can't let this happen. He cannot allow, I mean, they're committed now.

They've committed bribery, they've arrested a man in the middle of the night, which was against Jewish law. What they're doing they know is not appropriate. They've got to get something to stick here.

And so again, the high priest questions him and says to him, now we get to the real issue. And can you imagine for just a moment, we're so familiar with this story, but can you imagine for just a moment, what motivated the high priest at this point?

What motivates the high priest? Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One? You need to realize there was a lot in that question. That is as loaded a question as you will possibly ever get. We know, we've commented briefly on the fact that you have what sometimes scholars call the Messianic secret.

The Messianic secret. What do I mean by that? Well, when Jesus would reveal himself as the Messiah, what would he say? Tell no one. Why? Because we know all of the false ideas that were floating around about the identity of the Messiah at this time.

There had been many false Christs. There had been many false Messiahs. And almost all of them shared one thing in common, and that was a militaristic, revolutionary idea. They'd gather some zealots around them, run out into the wilderness.

Sometimes they'd descend upon an unsuspecting small cadre of Roman soldiers and kill some Roman soldiers and think that we're overthrowing the terrible, horrible Romans. And the Romans had had to chase these people around and wipe them out numerous times already.

And it would happen a few more times even before the destruction of Jerusalem. And so there was a lot of misunderstanding as to what the nature of the Messiah was and what his function would be. And so Jesus said, don't tell anyone.

Especially because until his death, burial, and resurrection, how could anyone really have an understanding? Until the Spirit was poured out, Jesus opened the minds of the disciples to understand the Scriptures, they're going to have a misunderstanding.

And even after Jesus does this, at the ascension, there's still, well, is now the time? It really is going to take the work of the Spirit. And for some folks, like Peter, it's going to take miracles. Peter, three times, sheet.

You know, there's vision. It really took some major work to get through the tradition that was blinding even spirit-indwelled people to the truth of what the Scriptures said. And so when the chief priest says, are you the Messiah?

That is a politically charged question. Maybe he's coming with the reality, if the Romans are really going to let us do this, there needs to be something to this. And we know, looking at Matthew, we only have one King, Caesar.

And so we know that they were willing to sell themselves out, to use political influence to bring about the desired result here, and that is the death of Jesus. But it also says, are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?

And so there was a theological aspect as well. There was a question. Are you making yourself out to be the Son of the Blessed One? Not a son, but the Son in a special way. And remember, last Lord's Day, we connected the beginning of the Gospel that says the Gospel of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, with the confession of the centurion, which would come in the next chapter, where upon Jesus' death, the centurion, who is standing right there at the cross, said, surely this man was the Son of God.

And we talked about what his understanding could have been, whether it was a son or the son, and things like that. But we saw the bookends, and we saw the fact that this testimony of Jesus as the Son of God is part of the very fabric of the Gospel of Mark.

And so here you have the high priest, the representative of God's people, and he says to Jesus, are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One? Now how did Jesus understand this question? His answer, I think, is probably, as if we needed more than we already had, one of the fullest refutations of the misrepresentation of Mark to be found anywhere in the Gospel.

First, Jesus' response is, Ego, I me. I am. The very same terminology used in the Gospel of John in very, very significant contexts. Now many would say, well, Jesus is just simply responding emphatically.

But if we recognize that Mark is drawing from the very same tradition that John did, and when we see what Jesus says after this, I think there is a connection between what Mark has here in John 14 .62 and what John presents to us as well.

Quite ironic in light of the accusation that is normally made against Mark and against John. But he says, I am. And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming with the clouds of heaven.

These words are a conflation of two extremely important Old Testament texts. And whenever you see those, don't pass those by. Don't just go, um, Old Testament texts, I'm going to move on. Something should have told you, even if you didn't take the time to look back, that you might want to look back at what these texts are, because what's the response of the high priest?

He tears his tunic. And this was the universal sign of great angst on the part of a Jewish person. He says, what further need do we have witnesses you've heard the blasphemy for yourselves? And Jesus isn't recording.

They go, oh, you misunderstood me. Remember, we've already heard the charge of blasphemy. Remember Mark 2? This man blasphemes. He claims to forgive sins. And Jesus says, so that you might know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive the Son of Man.

Well, here's the Son of Man again. So, where is the blasphemy? Well, there's two texts. One of them you should know really, really well by now. Because if you've been awake during our study of Hebrews, you've run into this more than once.

It's good old Psalm 110, verse 1. Yahweh says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. That one we know. We've looked very, very carefully at that and its use in the New Testament.

One of the most popular Old Testament texts to be assigned to Jesus. But notice how Jesus identifies this as the Son of Man. The Lord says to my Lord. So, the Lord, who is the Lord of David, is the Son of Man who sits at the right hand in Psalm 110 .1.

Okay, we know that one. But it's the second one that really catches our attention. And it comes from the book of Daniel, chapter 7. Beginning in verse 13. Daniel 7 .13 I kept looking in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven one like a Son of Man was coming and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him.

And to Him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom that all the peoples, nations, and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.

We don't have time this evening to go deeply into Daniel chapter 7, but if we did, we would note that in the Greek version of that, the service that is given to Jesus is the highest form of service. That is, literal worship.

And His dominion is an everlasting dominion. These texts, when you put together Psalm 110, which was clearly understood in a Messianic sense, you put this together with Daniel 7, and Jesus is identifying Himself as the Son of Man, as an exalted and divine person.

And the Jews catch this and Jesus does not object. They solely hear it and the high priest says, what further need do we have of witnesses? He thought He had won. I got Him! I got Him to do exactly what I want Him to do.

He has given us, interestingly enough, the exact basis of accusation that we find in John 19. This man called Himself the Son of God. We have a law. He should die. He blasphemed. He made Himself out to be the Son of God.

It sounds like Mark and John are telling the exact same story. They're drawing from the exact same historical realities. You have heard the blasphemy. How does it seem to you? And they all condemned Him to be deserving of death.

And we ask the question, why? These men held the Scriptures in their hands. They had heard the Messianic prophecies from the time they were little children. And oh, we could spend a good deal of time talking about the dangers of tradition.

Jesus had warned these men, you undo God's Word. You cover it over for the sake of your traditions. You blaspheme it for the sake of your traditions. You can have a tremendous amount of light. You can possess the very Word of God, and yet pervert it in your mind and your thinking.

There is much that we could learn from that. But what I want you to think about as we close this evening is these men stood in the very presence of the Son of Man. The One whose kingdom is everlasting, whose dominion will no, no end.

They stood in His presence, but they were blind to who He was. Why? I was listening to a debate that took place recently between two men that I know, a friend of mine as a Christian apologist and a Muslim that I have debated and will be debating again next month.

And one of the Muslim's arguments was if the Old Testament testimony is so clear to Jesus, if Isaiah really does talk about Him in Isaiah 52 and 53, if the Messianic prophecies are there in the Psalter, then why didn't these people see it?

And the only response that can be given is because it's a spiritual thing to recognize who Jesus really is. A high priest tears his clothes and says, blasphemy! Why don't we do that? Because the Spirit of God has opened our hearts and our minds to understand.

It even took the special ministry of Jesus in Luke 24. He had to open their minds to understand the Scriptures. It's one thing to read the words. It's another thing to see the reality. And so, two things in closing.

First, we have seen that the common statement that the Gospel of Mark presents to us a merely human Jesus falters upon any meaningful, fair examination of that text. It's simply untrue. But secondly, the danger that we need to be aware of is that we may hear the stories.

We may hear the words. You may sit here and go, ok, well, you know, over the past two weeks James has explained to us that the Gospel of Mark presents to us an exalted Jesus. Not merely a human one, but one that is consistent with what we've always taught and believed.

Consistent with the message of the Gospel of John, etc. etc. But what are you going to do about it? What does that mean to you? It's one thing to hear these words. But if Jesus is the Son of Man, and if Jesus has servants and an everlasting dominion, and His servants give Him the highest form of worship, and you call yourself a servant of Christ, what does that mean to you?

How will that impact you? You put that together with Jesus' words from this morning. Deny yourself. Take up your cross. That's a high calling. It is a high calling to serve this One who will come on the clouds of glory, in company with the holy angels in the glory of His Father, and He will judge.

It's a high calling to be a servant of Christ. And I don't know about you, but in our day where we see justice perverted, we see truth denied, we see that which is evil called good, and that which is good called evil, I'm awful glad there's going to be a judgment, and I'm awful glad the judge is one that I know.

And that I'm in right relationship with Him. And that He's going to judge justly. And yet He's given Himself for me. I'm glad to know that One. I'm glad to praise that One. And if you have not yet bowed the knee before Him, in repentance and faith, I call you to do so.

For the only way to have peace with the Father in Heaven is through His Son whom He has sent. The very Son of Man who will come. The Son of Man sitting at the right hand of power and coming with the clouds of Heaven.

That is the Jesus of Mark and Matthew and Luke and John and Paul and all the other witnesses who gave their testimony in Holy Scripture. The Spirit of God has preserved that testimony for us to this very day.

And I pray that by His Spirit He will reveal that Jesus to you. I call you to repent and believe in this One. Receive the forgiveness of sins. For outside of Him, there is no salvation. Let us pray together.

Indeed, our Heavenly Father, we thank You so much that You have preserved Your Gospel. You've preserved it in Your Word. You have given that Word to us. And Lord, we pray that that Gospel would go forth with power even this evening.

If there is any in this place who have only been playing with the Gospel, playing with the truth, may they realize You are not one to be trifled with. May they see their own sin, their need of a Savior.

May they see the glory of Christ and turn in repentance and faith to Him. For those of us who have already bowed that knee in repentance and faith, may we be encouraged once again to recognize the glory of our Savior.

The majesty of His self-giving. The awesome glory of the Gospel by which we stand. May we be encouraged and in that encouragement go forth to serve Him this coming week. We pray in Christ's name, Amen.