(Matthew 26:59 GW) The chief priests and the whole council were searching for false testimony to use against Jesus in order to execute him.
This stood out in my daily reading. The religious overseers, the ones entrusted with the stewardship of the things of God, were not seeking truth or righteousness, but false testimony to support their cause against the Messiah.
What went wrong?
Now before we caricature these folks as evil-meanies and despicable dunderheads, let’s examine the story for a moment. These people were the honorable, upstanding community leaders. Part of our problem when reading the Bible is that we often miss where we would be “in the story” if we lived back then. We are always the hero, not the villain, the good guy, not the bad guy.
We wouldn’t have been so stupid and stubborn as to cling to our religion instead of embracing Christ. Or would we have? The majority of those in the crowd yelled crucify him. The majority weren’t in on the secret meetings and judgments but they also didn’t question what surely most of them knew in their hearts must be wrong. They had seen this man, heard him teach in the temple, listened as spoke with heaven’s authority, watched him heal their sick and cast demons out of the tormented among them.
But they went along with the waves of accusation anyway. To not go along might mean the loss of everything. And after all, these were their spiritual leaders, their counselors and preachers, their pillars of the community. No, these men would embrace the Messiah, not spit on him and hit him with their fists and mock and ridicule him. These men wouldn’t hire riff-raff to lie in their religious courts.
There’s no way that their spiritual leaders would be so far off base as to kill the Son of God!
Or is there?
Just what extremes will a man or a woman go to if someone dares mess with their religion anyway?
