Sermons, Articles, and Other Things

There have been many accounts provided of the deaths of individuals. Some of them were martyrs, others were courageous soldiers, others were coping with diseases. Some of the accounts have been embellished with details that the readers cannot know if they are true or not. Matthew presents facts about the death of Jesus that people had observed taking place and they could be verified by individuals still alive when he wrote his account. The demeaning of Jesus After Pilate had pronounced the death sentence on Jesus, some soldiers took Jesus to their barracks and forced him to endure the entire battalion’s contempt. It is possible that they engaged in a game called The King’s Game which may have included the various details mentioned here. Yet it may also be the case that their actions reflected the reasons why Jesus was condemned by Pilate – he had been accused of involvement in an attempt to overthrow the Roman authorities. The intention of the soldiers was to demean Jesus an...

Matthew now brings his readers closer to the cross and does so by referring to some of the trials that Jesus experienced on this important day. The religious trial (Matthew 27:1-2) Events start to move quickly as Friday morning comes. Matthew here describes the official meeting of the Sanhedrin, which probably occurred at daybreak. It met to ratify the decisions taken earlier about Jesus by the Jewish leaders.  ‘When morning came, all the chief priests and the elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death. And they bound him and led him away and delivered him over to Pilate the governor.’ This trial was followed by the trials before Pilate, although Matthew combines them and does not mention that Jesus was sent by Pilate to appear before Herod and then sent back by him to Pilate. The disciples of Jesus are not part of the account, apart from what Judas said and did, because they have fled from the situation. Nevertheless, several people and grou...

Philippians 3:1 is the introduction to a new section in Paul’s letter which initially is concerned with true service of God and then moves on to other aspects of sanctification.     Since he begins this section with a reference to joy, and inserts similar terms throughout the section, it is reasonable to assume that, for Paul, joy was a feature of all aspects of the Christian life.   Obviously, a believer should have joy because of his conversion (Paul describes his experience in this section); Paul also mentions joy coming from progress in the faith, from anticipating the transformation that will occur in believers when Jesus returns, from working towards unity in the church, from a healthy prayer life, from suitable meditation and from practical expressions of brotherly support. The first area of life to which Paul applies joy is the area of worship. The importance of spiritual joy Why is spiritual joy so important? One aspect that we must consider is that th...

We have seen that this prophecy is largely a collection of interactions between the Lord and the Israelites, sometimes with the priests and at other times with the people in general. They have complained against his providences, although as Malachi points out, these troubles came because they were not honouring the Lord as they should have done with their sacrifices and tithing. In verses 13 to 15, we see a repeated complaint that the people had. They accused the Lord of failing to bless his people, despite their perceived outward adherence to his commandments. Their eyes looked only on external matters, and therefore they noticed that they were worse off than those who did not acknowledge God. It is clear from the passage that these complainers were practising formalism . They wore the attire of mourners, but they did not have a broken and a contrite heart. The words of Jesus, ‘Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted,’ did not apply to them. Instead they were goi...

Matthew omits a detail found elsewhere (Jesus was taken first to the house of Annas, the father-in-law of Caiaphas) and instead focuses on the trial before Caiaphas. The fact that there were two high priests shows that those leaders paid no attention to the instructions of God about that role – the law stipulated that there could only be one high priest at a given time. Annas should have been the high priest, but the Roman authorities had also made his son-in-law Caiaphas high priest in a form of rotation. This particular trial does not seem to have involved the full Sanhedrin because it met later that day (Matt. 27:1). Perhaps Caiaphas had invited those members he could rely on or maybe some could not attend because the meeting was arranged suddenly. Jesus went through six trials at this time: (1) At the home of Annas, (2) at the home of Caiaphas, (3) the Sanhedrin, (4) before Pilate, (5) before Herod, and (6) before Pilate.  The people present here had met in anticipatio...

The Bible is full of many unknown characters who served Jesus in their day. Take, for example, Tychicus; in Acts 20:4 he accompanies Paul on his last journey to Jerusalem; he was with Paul in Rome during his first imprisonment and carried Paul’s letters to Ephesus (6:21) and to Colosse (4:7); later he went back to be with Paul (Titus 3:12) and he was with Paul during his second Roman imprisonment (2 Tim. 4:12). Or take Priscilla and Aquila: they helped Paul evangelise Corinth (Acts 18); then they moved to Ephesus where a church met in their house (1 Cor. 16:19); later they moved to Rome where again a church met in their house (Rom. 16:3-5). Paul valued these forgotten servants of Christ. He describes Tychicus as ‘a dear brother, a faithful minister and fellow-servant in the Lord’ (Col. 4:7), and he describes Priscilla and Aquila as those who ‘risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them’ (Rom. 16:4). Paul founded the church in Phi...