The sermon 'The Son of (another) Father' by Peter Allison explores the trial and crucifixion of Jesus as depicted in Luke chapter 23. It highlights how Jesus was falsely accused and brought before Pilate and Herod, emphasizing Pilate's reluctance to convict an innocent man and the manipulation by the chief priests and the crowd. Despite Jesus' innocence and Pilate's acknowledgment of it, the crowd demanded his crucifixion and the release of Barabbas, a known insurrectionist and murderer. The sermon underscores the theological significance of Jesus' silence during his trial, portraying it as a fulfillment of God's sovereign plan where Jesus willingly accepted his role as the sacrificial lamb. It discusses the involvement of both divine and evil forces in this event, showing how God's purpose was achieved through what Satan meant for evil. The sermon also draws a parallel between Jesus and Barabbas, illustrating the choice of the crowd as a reflection of humanity's rejection of Christ. Additionally, it delves into the historical and symbolic significance of the lineages of Jacob and Esau, with Jesus standing before a descendant of Esau, Herod. The sermon concludes with a message of hope, emphasizing the grace of God and the redemption available through Christ's sacrifice.

Please turn to Luke chapter 23. So thankful that we have a faithful Savior, a faithful judge, who has given to us in his word these prayers and these Psalms and who is our sin bearer so that we can call out to him. Luke chapter 23 I'd like to read from the beginning, we'll be looking at verse 6, but I'd like to read from the beginning for the context. Then the whole multitude of them arose and led him to Pilate, and they began to accuse him, saying, we found this fellow perverting the nation and forbidding to pay taxes to Caesar, saying that he himself is Christ, a king. Then Pilate asked him, saying, Are you the king of the Jews?

And he answered him and said, It is as you say. So Pilate said to the chief priests in the crowd, I find no fault in this man. But they were the more fierce, saying, he stirs up the people, teaching throughout all Judea, bringing beginning from Galilee to this place. When Pilate heard of Galilee, he asked if the man were a Galilean. And as soon as he knew that he belonged to Herod's jurisdiction, he sent him to Herod, who was also in Jerusalem at that time.

Now when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceedingly glad, for he had desired for a long time to see him, because he had heard many things about him, and he hoped to see some miracles done by him. Then he questioned him with many words but he answered him nothing and the chief priests and the scribes stood and vehemently accused him and then Herod with his men of war treated him with contempt and mocked him and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe and sent him back to Pilate. On that very day Pilate and Herod became friends with each other, for previously they had been at enmity with each other. Then Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests, the rulers, and the people, said to them, you have brought this man to me as one who misleads the people and Indeed having examined him in your presence I have found no fault in this man concerning these things of which you accuse him no neither did Herod for I sent you back to him, and indeed nothing deserving of death has been done by him. I will therefore chastise him and release him, for it was necessary for him to release one to them at the feast.

And they all cried out at once, saying, Away with this man, and release to us Barabbas, who has been thrown into prison for a certain rebellion made in the city and for murder. Pilate therefore wishing to release Jesus again called out to them, but they shouted saying, crucify him, crucify him. Then he said to them, the third time, why? What evil has he done? I have found no reason for death in him.

I will therefore chastise him and let him go." But they were insistent, demanding with loud voices that he be crucified. And the voices of these men and of the chief priests prevailed. So Pilate gave sentence that it should be as they requested. And He released to them the one they requested, who for rebellion and murder had been thrown into prison. But He delivered to Jesus, but he delivered Jesus to their will.

This law of his mouth is better than thousands of coins of gold and silver. Heavenly Father, Thank you for your word. It is precious to us. We ask that you would open our eyes and our hearts that we may understand it. Ask that you might preserve my lips from error and that you might be worshiped as we glorify and Your Word proclaimed in faithfulness in our midst.

In Jesus' name we ask, Amen. So the chief priests, the scribes and the elders of the people, the elders of the Jews wanted Jesus to die. And they stirred up the crowd that appeared at Pilate's Judgment Hall. So this crowd also wanted Jesus to die. And they followed Jesus to Herod to press their cause, to see Jesus executed.

This crowd that wanted Jesus to die a few days before were laying down their palm branches and their coats for Jesus' donkey to walk across, crying out, Hosanna, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. It just goes to show you how careful you have to be when you pick your leaders. Good leaders can do great good, and bad leaders, wicked leaders, can do great evil and lead others with them. The chief priests, the scribes, and the elders wanted Jesus to die. They stirred up the people to want Jesus to die.

Satan wanted Jesus to die. And He moved Judas to betray Jesus into the hands of the chief priests in order to further His plan. He moved Peter to abandon Christ and to deny that He even knew Him. He moved Roman rulers to crucify their enemies, hanging them on trees to die slow, excruciatingly painful and humiliating deaths. But God the Father also wanted Jesus to die.

Wanted Christ to hang on the cross and to die the death that He did. And He used Satan. And He used the chief priests and the scribes and the people to do it. You see, what Satan meant for evil, what Satan meant as an attempt to destroy Christ, God used. God planned it.

And God used that to accomplish the greatest good. The greatest demonstration of love and the greatest demonstration of mercy that this world has ever or will ever see. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law having become a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is everyone who hangs upon a tree." That's a quote that Paul gave to the Galatians. It's a quote from Deuteronomy 21, where God gave in His law instructions that if a man had committed any sin deserving of death and he was put to death and he was hung on a tree, that he was to be buried that same day so that the land was not defiled, this land that God was giving them as an inheritance.

For he who is hanged is accursed of God." Deuteronomy 21, 23. God knew when He gave this law that Christ, His anointed, would become a curse. Not that Christ would be cursed, but that He would become a curse for us on this mountain of God. This mountain that David, the lion of the tribe of Judah, Jesus, the son of David, but Jesus also David's Lord. This mountain that David captured and on which the temple was built.

This mountain was where Christ became the curse and hung upon the tree, where He was accused. Jesus died because God the Father wanted Him to die. But Jesus, because He came to earth to do the will of the Father, Jesus also Himself wanted to die. And so when He is illegally captured, He doesn't evade them as He did before. When he is illegally and unjustly tried and condemned, he doesn't call twelve legions of angels, which he's told Pilate he could do, to rescue him.

As he stands before Annas and Caiaphas and Pilate and Herod and Pilate again, and is unjustly condemned and accused, he held his peace. You see, everything happens according to God's sovereign plan. According to God's sovereign plan, His only begotten Son would be unjustly condemned to death and would die a cursed death on the cross. According to God's sovereign plan, Christ's innocence would be plainly evident and proclaimed at this trial. And according to God's sovereign plan, Christ would be the faithful witness throughout that trial.

He truthfully testified before the ecclesiastical court that he was the Son of God. He was God. A claim they regarded as blasphemy. And he faithfully testified before this civil court of Roman authorities that He was the King. And so Jesus has been brought before Pilate now.

An accused of stirring up rebellion against Roman authority. He's accused by an angry crowd and by powerful people with connections in high places. These chief priests, Sadducees, were connected. They were powerful. They were connected to Rome.

Revelation portrays them as riding the beast. And so Pilate is in a hard position politically. If he asserts Jesus' innocence, he opens himself up to the Jews going over his head to Rome with a complaint that he isn't loyal to Caesar for allowing this competing king to live. And in tyrannical governments, not being loyal to the people in office is treason. On the other hand, if He condemns Jesus, his conscience will bother him, it already is bothering him for condemning an innocent man.

Even wicked people have consciences. Even his wife had warned him to have nothing to do with that just man because she had suffered many things in a dream because of him. But even she recognized he was a just man. While Pilate is sitting on his judgment seat, his wife sends word to him saying have nothing to do with this just man. So what to do?

He can't please everybody here. He can't please his wife and the people and his boss in Rome. And so after asking Jesus if He was a king, and hearing Jesus' faithful testimony that yes, He was a king, He was the king, Pilate returns the first of his three judicial opinions that Jesus is not guilty. He didn't proclaim Jesus' innocence in the first stance, merely that he didn't have any evidence of his guilt. He could find no guilt in him.

So this is a political answer. It's a cautious middle-of-the-road answer. He didn't immediately capitulate to the wicked demands of the priests and the scribes to condemn him to death, but neither did he declare that he was innocent. He said, I find no guilt in him. I can't find it yet.

In other words, he's opening the door for them to bring more evidence, to make further accusations. He's leaving them open to respond. And respond they do, bringing a host of false accusations about Jesus stirring up rebellion against Rome throughout Israel, including Galilee. Including Galilee. Matthew adds a detail at this point that Luke omits.

While he is being accused by these chief priests and scribes and elders and the people, he answered nothing. Pilate said to him, Do you not hear how many things they testify against you? Matthew says, but he answered him not a word. So the governor marveled greatly. Now Why was Jesus silent?

Did he just give up? Did he conclude that any defense would be useless in this situation? So why bother? No. No, emphatically no.

A well-reasoned and coherent answer could have prevented and certainly delayed these proceedings. Jesus was very adept at answering the accusations and traps of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. He's done it many times. He's turned the tables on them when they thought they had him trapped with impossible questions. He always found a way to turn it exactly on its head and embarrass them, make them look foolish.

He could have said something that would have strengthened Pilate's position. He could have given him some support. He could have given some cause for Pilate to find him innocent. But he doesn't. And that's why Pilate is marveling.

Jesus is not standing like people ordinarily do when they're condemned to die. He's not standing begging for His life, asking for leniency. He's not agitated, he's not concerned or worried, and this amazes Pilate. Most people on trial for their life would at least answer his questions and not openly defy Him by being silent. But Christ did not engage in any defense because He came to do His Father's will, which was to become a curse, to die at the hands of Jews as a sacrifice that would fully satisfy the wrath of God for all the sins of all of His people in all time.

Undoubtedly, Satan was seeking to get Jesus to fail. Remember he tempted him after his baptism. Tempted him in the garden. Jesus could have sinned if he'd been silent about the good confession that he had to proclaim, that he was the King of the Jews, that he was the Son of God. But he didn't.

He wasn't silent on those points. But He was silent to everything else. He only said what the Father told Him to say. Jesus told His disciples in John 8.28, I have many things to say to you and to judge concerning you, but He who sent me is true, and I speak to the world those things which I heard from Him. I speak those things which I heard from Him.

They didn't understand that He spoke to them of the Father. Jesus said to them, when you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He and that I do nothing of myself. But as my Father taught me, I speak these things. And he who sent me is with me. The Father has not left me alone, for I always do those things that please Him." Jesus was silent, because that was the will of the Father.

Jesus was silent and He was obedient, even to the point of death. And his death was ordained for this day on which the Passover lamb would be killed. He remained silent because his hour had come. See, Jesus was not just an innocent victim, because He was not a victim. As He stood beaten and bound and bloody before Pilate, Jesus was the sovereign by whom all things were made, who held all authority, as He told Pilate, and who was working all things according to the counsel of His own will, all the while perfectly submitted to the will of the Father.

What a great mystery. What a great mystery that God should be manifest in the flesh. What great love that Christ would be obedient, even to the point of death for us, so that we might be redeemed from the curse of the law. But Jesus was also silent, because if he allowed himself to be acquitted on the basis that his kingdom was not a threat to Pilate, and that was the charge that Jesus is going around stirring up an insurrection against Rome. That was a false charge.

He wasn't doing anything of the sort. But if he had allowed himself to be acquitted on that basis, he would have, in one sense and another sense, condoned a lie. If he had refuted the Jews that his kingdom was a threat to Rome, he would have ceased to testify to the truth. His kingdom, after all, is a great threat to the beast of Rome, but just not in the way that the Jews were asserting, and not in the fashion. And he wasn't doing the things that the Jews were accusing him of doing Because his kingdom is not of this world.

It's a spiritual kingdom. It's a kingdom that Jesus said is within us You're not gonna see it coming like a regular kingdom because it's within us. It has no army. It has no navy. It has no swords.

It has no spears. But oh, it is very much a threat to the Caesars. See, His spiritual kingdom calls the dead to life. It is by the preaching of the gospel of His kingdom, that people are converted and brought into this kingdom of marvelous light. It is by the power of God that hearts are changed, that Those who are dead are made alive.

And it's by the power of this, the gospel of this kingdom, that these people with new hearts who are now alive seek to bring everything they touch under the lordship of Jesus Christ. It builds a people who are militantly opposed to everything that exalts itself against God. And Rome denied Christ's kingship. Rome proclaimed herself to be sovereign. Rome was the satanically driven beast that opposed and attacked Christ at every point.

That Roman kingdom was very much threatened by Christ's kingship. Because Christ's kingdom is going to transform every facet of life on this universe. Christ as king will reign until He's put all His enemies under His feet. Not just the Roman Empire and the Greek Empire. Yes, they were destroyed.

Rome was destroyed by the Kingdom of God as the church suffered and were killed as martyrs. Torn in two, sawn in two, burned as torches. But they prevailed. By the blood of the martyrs and the prayers of the saints, God's kingdom prevailed. His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom.

It will never pass away. Of the increase of His government, there will be no end. And Christ came to bear witness to this truth. And he does this both by his silence, by his testimony, and by his silence. And so, come back to Pilate in his difficult quandary, this prisoner who is silent before him, not answering a word.

But then he hears something that gives him a glimmer of hope. He hears Galilee mentioned. Galilee. And he immediately sees a way out of his difficulty. If Jesus is a Galilean, then Jesus is really, or could be Herod's problem and not his.

Now Herod was no friend of his. They were at enmity Luke says with each other at this point. And so Herod or Pilate has has no qualms about sending Jesus to Herod and just dumping throwing this problem as it were over the wall to him and letting him figure out what to do. This Herod that Luke refers to is Herod Antipas. He's the grandson of Herod the Great.

That's the Herod that was king when Jesus was born that ordered all the babies under two and killed in Bethlehem. He's his grandson. Not a much better guy. He's the uncle of the Herod who later would put James to death and who imprisoned Peter in order to put him to death, but God delivered. And he's the uncle to the herod that was later eaten by worms, died and was eaten by worms in Acts.

But this is the herod that put John the Baptist to death. He had imprisoned John the Baptist because he didn't like his preaching. He didn't like the fact that John the Baptist was rebuked him for having his brother's wife. He ended up putting him to death. He this here it is the tetrarch of Galilee and Peria.

That's Peria's region trans-Jordan west of the Jordan and Galilee is up around the Sea of Galilee. Those are actually regions that are not connected, but he's the tetrarch because when his grandfather died, essentially his kingdom was divided between his four descendants and in a rather indirect way, he ended up with a fourth of that. And so that's what the tetrarch means. It's a fourth. He's Herod the fourth of his kingdom.

But this Herod is a Udemyan, a Udemyan, an Edomite, and a descendant of Esau. The Udamians were a people part of Edom that came migrated north and into the south southern part of what's of Judah, of Judea. He's a descendant of Esau, and that's significant here, that Jesus is standing before this descendant of Esau. You see, Jacob and Esau were brothers that had a feud. And Their feud was over the birthright.

Esau despised his birthright by selling it to his brother Jacob for a bowl of porridge. Something he later regretted. And Jacob supplanted his brother Esau by extorting the birthright for a bowl of porridge when his brother was exhausted and weary. And this feud between these brothers split their family right down the middle, forced Jacob to flee for his life, and divided their family. This great battle between Esau and Jacob is written across the pages of Scripture.

Twenty years later, after fleeing, when Jacob is coming back to the land, Jacob is still afraid of Esau. And he took elaborate precautions to protect his family and himself from the wrath of Esau, somebody he hadn't seen in 20 years, and he presumed was still seeking to kill him. Remember, he sent his family, he divided them up in all these different groups, separated them to make it harder for them all to be destroyed, give them more of a chance to escape, and he sent them across. And Jacob then, you remember, is alone that night, all by himself on the other side and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day and when Jacob saw that he didn't prevail or sorry when When this man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched the socket of his hip. And the socket of Jacob's hip was out of joint as he wrestled with him.

And he said to him, let me go for the day breaks. But Jacob said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. So he said to him, what is your name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel.

For you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed. And Jacob asked Him, saying, Tell me your name, I pray. And he said, Why do you ask about my name? And he blessed him there. And so Jacob called the name of that place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved." This meeting where God touches Jacob's thigh And he's lame for the rest of his life.

When Israel, a few years later, some couple hundred years later, was marching on the land of Canaan, the people of Moab were very afraid of them and they hired a prophet to curse them. If I were to curse these people, we might have a chance at defeating them, because they had just destroyed a couple of very mighty nations. But God would not let this prophet curse the children of Israel. God would not let Jacob be cursed by those of Esau's line. You see, for Esau here represents all of the people that are opposed to Christ.

Remember, Jacob have I loved. Esau, I have hated or loved less. So Balak tried four times to get Balaam to curse Israel, but each time he blessed him. And in his fourth prophecy, Balaam said, "...the utterance of Him who hears the words of God and has the knowledge of the Most High, who sees the vision of Almighty, who falls down with eyes open wide. I see Him, but not now.

I behold Him, but not near. A star shall come out of Jacob." He's referring to Christ. He was still far off at this time, some almost 1, 500 years before Christ. But He said, I see him, but not now. A star shall come out of Jacob.

A scepter shall rise out of Israel and batter the brow of Moab, and destroy all the sons of Tumal, and Edom shall be a possession. Seer also his enemy shall be a possession, while Israel does valiantly. Out of Jacob, one shall have dominion and destroy the remains of the city." That was Balaam's prophecy. That a star and a scepter would come out of Jacob and would destroy Edom. Some years later, Saul is commanded by God to destroy the Amalekites, but he lets Agag live.

Balaam in his third prophecy had said, he shall pour water from his bucket and his seed shall be in many waters. His king shall be higher than Agag and his kingdom exalted. The Agag is here representative of this Edomite people. This battle surfaces when Doag the Edomite destroys the priestly line of the Himalek. And in the book of Esther this battle again is seen when Haman the Agagite seeks to destroy Israel, entirely wipe them off the face of the earth.

And he is opposed by Esther and her righteous uncle Mordecai, who was a descendant of Kish, King Saul. See, Jesus is that star that has come out of Jacob. He's the scepter that has arisen, and he now stands before a Eudaemian, a representative of Esau and his descendants. Something must happen to Jacob. The star that arises out of Jacob and the scepter out of Israel will triumph, but it will be through Peniel.

God will attack His own Son. Isaiah tells us He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we were healed. All we like sheep have gone astray.

We have turned everyone to His own way, and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him. He, Jehovah, God the Father, has put him to grief. When you, speaking of God, make his soul an offering for sin. He shall see his seed, he shall prolong his day, and the pleasure of Yehovah shall prosper in the land.

Jacob, of I loved, Esau, I have hated. Christ would prevail, but only through Peniel. Only as God attacked him and bruised him for our sin. And so Christ is silent before Herod. He doesn't say one word.

Herod gets frustrated with him. Herod wanted to see something. He wanted to see some miracles. He wanted Jesus to perform for him. Jesus doesn't even speak a word to him.

And as a result, Herod and Pilate become friends. You see, there really only are two classes of people. Jesus said that all those who are not gathering with Him are against Him. He said that several times. The disciples found some demons, people casting out demons, and they said, Lord, they're casting out demons, people that don't follow You.

And Jesus said, don't forbid them, for He who is not with against us is on our side. And in the passage on the Lord's Prayer, He said, He who is not with Me is against Me, and He who does not gather with Me scatters. See, the light of the truth exposes which side people are really on. And we see examples of that all the time. All the time.

There are only two classes of people, Jacob and Esau. Jacob of I loved and Esau I have hated. Those whom God loves love the light. And of course, it's only grace. It's only grace that God loved Jacob.

There's nothing in Jacob that he should be desirable. I think that's a point that needs to be emphasized. There is a, I was just reading a liberal sermon message and this liberal pastor was criticizing Jesus in his interaction with the Syrophoenician woman. Remember she had asked to be healed and Jesus had said, what's not right for me to give to the dogs the food that's meant for the children. And this preacher, this woman, this preacher happened to be a woman in the Orthodox Church.

And she thought that that was offensive. She said, if I was that woman, I would have been offended. Jesus, she said, basically sinned at that point in offending this woman and speaking in so insensitive way. But the reason I mention this is because she said, this woman showed Jesus that she had a right to His grace. Now there could be nothing more absurd, illogical, wrong, and blasphemous than to put right and grace in the same sentence.

Nobody has a right to grace. If we have a right to something, it's not grace, it's work. And Paul belabors that point in Romans 11. If it's of works, then it's not of grace, otherwise Work isn't a work. If it's of grace, then it's not a work.

Otherwise, grace isn't grace. Grace is what we don't deserve. Work is what we deserve. So nobody has a right to the grace of God. Jesus wasn't insulting that Syrophoenician woman.

He was simply pointing out the obvious, no one has a right to grace, otherwise it's not grace. There are two classes of people and Christ the light exposes which side people are really on. And this exchange over with Barabbas is just another example. Pilate Herod sent Jesus back to Pilate and the two became friends because they were on the same side. They were both Udameans, those of Esau, not of Christ, not of Jacob.

And so they are united in their hatred of Christ. And because of that, being united together in their hatred of Christ, they become friends. But we see this again with Barabbas. Pilate called the people back together and he said, you have brought this man to me as one who misleads the people and but he says I can't find anything wrong in him I find no fault in him in other words I don't find him guilty yet And he offers, and he says, and he also says, well, neither did Herod find any guilt in him. And so let me chastise him and I'll release him.

He's making a deal with them now, trying to. And you want to crucify somebody, you can crucify Barabbas. He's an insurrectionist, he's actually guilty of doing what you're saying Christ is doing, He's stirring up rebellion. And in the course of stirring up this rebellion, he's murdered. And you can have him crucified.

Now, here's an interesting irony. Jesus is the Son of God. The Son of God the Father. What does Barabbas' name mean? Bar what is Son.

And Remember in Romans 8 we cry out, Abba, Father. Abba is Father. Bar-Abba is the Son of the Father. Here we have These two people that Pilate has in his authority, the Son of God and the Son of another Father, the devil, an insurrectionist, a murderer. And he offers to set the Son of God the Father free, and to allow the Jews to crucify Barabbas.

But the people have none of it. They want Barabbas, the son of another father, to be released to them, and Jesus, the Son of God the Father, to be crucified. Why? Why would they make such a terrible, terrible choice? Jesus is the light of the world.

He came bringing a light in the darkness. That light shines in the darkness and the darkness didn't comprehend it. See, man is sinful. Psalm 14, Psalm 53, Romans 3, all proclaim that man is sinful, wicked, desperately wicked. It's very clear.

There is none righteous. No, not one. There is none who understands. There is none who seek after God. They have all turned aside.

They have all become unprofitable. Their throat is an open tomb. With their tongues they have practiced deceit. Their mouth is full of bitterness and cursing. Their feet are swift to shed blood.

Destruction and misery are in their ways. In the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. There is none righteous. No, not one.

Jesus is the light. He shines that light on this great darkness. And the world hates that. Those of Esau's side hate that light. They're okay with it if that light isn't too bright.

Remember when Jesus started speaking that light brilliantly. When He started saying that no one can come to the Father except the Father draw them, then people started turning away from Him. He wasn't quite so popular. These people, these Pharisees, these scribes, and the people that they are leading are the descendants of Esau. They are in darkness, and they hate the light.

And so when they have a choice to either receive the Son of God the Father or the Son of another father, They want Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, crucified. This also happened because the church was apostate. This is the church that's calling for this. The church leaders were stirring up the people against Jesus. It's the leaders that are doing this.

The leaders who should be teaching the truth, who should be testifying to Jesus Christ being the Son of God, the Messiah, the long-promised Messiah. They are the very ones stirring up the people to have Him crucified. Christ said they were serpents because they, like their father, the devil, hate Christ. They made the Word of God of no effect by their tradition, And they so twisted the Scriptures as to make the Messiah unrecognizable to the people. But you see that the people are just as responsible.

The people here are just as responsible. When we talk about the church, the church is being apostate, the church is the elders and the deacons and the people and and so they are they and so they must be just as responsible. The people have the teachers and the leaders that they want. They have the teachers and the leaders that they want. They have the teachers and the leaders that they want.

When Paul urged Timothy to preach the Word of God. To preach it in season and out of season, to convince, to rebuke, to exhort with all longsuffering and teaching. He said that was because there would come a time when the people won't endure sound doctrine. But according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap for themselves teachers who will say what they want him to say and they will turn their ears Away from the truth and be turned aside to fables Why do the Jews have such apostate leaders It's because they have the leaders that they want. They don't want to hear the truth.

They didn't want the light. They wanted teachers that would tickle their ears and say the things that they wanted to hear that made them feel good. And that's the leaders that God gave them. The responsibility of shepherds is to sound the warning. If shepherds sound the warning and it's not heeded, God's Word says that the people die in their sins, but the messenger, the watchman who sounded the warning is preserved.

But if the watchman does not sound the warning, he doesn't spread the alarm, he doesn't speak the truth, and the people are destroyed, then that watchman is also responsible. The people die in their sins, and the watchman is also guilty, because he didn't sound the warning. These people that are here are just as guilty as the leaders, because they're the ones that got those leaders. They're the ones that didn't want to hear the truth. Pilate, three times, declares to this apostate church the truth.

I find no guilt in this man. Isn't that ironic? That God would raise up from this agent of the beast a witness to the truth and that this apostate church would deny it. Pilate Calvin said that God intended that Pilate should so frequently acquit him with his own mouth before condemning him, that in His undeserved condemnation, the true satisfaction for our sins might be the more brightly displayed. God intended that Pilate should so frequently acquit Jesus three times with his own mouth before he condemned him, that in his undeserved condemnation, the true satisfaction for our sins might be the more brightly displayed.

Christ was innocent, And that is proclaimed throughout His trial, even by Pilate. It's only because Christ is innocent that in His death, He can satisfy the wrath of God for our sins, for our rejection of Christ. The extreme wickedness of these people is exemplified in that they chose the son of another father over the son of the living God. May God in his grace bring us into the kingdom of his marvelous light through Christ's sacrifice. Through Christ's sacrifice.

Father in heaven, we cannot even begin to understand the great mystery of the incarnation. That your son, the God, very God of very God, should be manifest in the flesh. The second person of the Triune God should have flesh and blood to live among us, to live under the law, to stand as a human in our place and to bear your wrath in our place. To stand beaten and bloody and bound before a descendant of Esau in order that we might be set free and partake in your light, in your reign, in your righteousness, in life with you. Well, Father, we thank you that you have so loved us, that you gave yourself for us.

We thank you for that great promise that whoever believes in you will not be condemned but shall pass from death into life. Shall not come under condemnation but have everlasting life. Lord, thank you for this blessed hope and thank you