Grace Bible Church
Pastor Teacher
Robert R. McLaughlin
Sunday, May 18, 2014
The word testified is the aor-act-part of the verb martureo which does not mean witnessing as we know it and as it is used today for evangelism or personal evangelism.
Witnessing here as an entirely different connotation. It means to testify in a courtroom.
The aorist tense is constantive which means that it points to the entire period of time when Jesus Christ gave testimony before Pilate which caused Pilate to declare His innocence.
The active voice, Jesus Christ in the trials before Pilate produces the action of the verb.
The participle itself is circumstantial to describe a unique circumstance in all of human history.
the good confession is the accusative direct object of an adjective and a noun, we have the definite article ten plus the adjective kalen meaning honorable and then the noun homologian translated confession.
1TI 6:13 I order you in the presence of the God, who preserves alive the all things, and of Christ Jesus, who has testified the honorable confession before Pontius Pilate,
before Pontius Pilate is the correct translation, it’s the prepositional phrase epi plus Pontiou Pilatou, which is correctly translated before Pontius Pilate.
So the entire translation looks like this; 1TI 6:13 I order you in the presence of the God, who preserves alive the all things, and of Christ Jesus, who has testified the honorable confession before Pontius Pilate,
Now, there were six trials for the Lord Jesus Christ, not one but six.
Who was on trial? The unique Person of the universe, undiminished deity and true humanity combined in one Person forever, the Lord Jesus Christ.
1PE 2:22 “He committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth;”
One of the greatest systems of jurisprudence was used to condemn this One who was not only innocent, but who in His humanity, was also ABSOLUTELY PERFECT.
Of the six trials recorded throughout the Gospels, two were held before Pontius Pilate, where Scripture declares that Jesus witnessed or testified an honorable confession, 1TI 6:13.
The first trial was before Annas who was the father-in-law to Caiaphas, who was the high priest that same year according to JOH 18:12-14.
By the way, don’t worry about his ear because LUK 22:51 tells us our Lord put it back.
Annas was not a judge, therefore, this was an illegal trial.
Annas was engaged in gangster activities connected with every system of corruption in Jerusalem, as well as with the bands of robbers in the Negev, who owed their protection to him.
The people who brought the Lord to him and to trial were all the self-righteous religious people, the chief priests, scribes and Pharisees.
It was the Sanhedrin which was the religious organization in which all Judaism centered.
The Bible teaches that religion is the worst thing that ever hit this world and self-righteous people are very religious.
Covered by their veneer of piety, these self-righteous legalistic religious individuals proudly and efficiently plotted and secured the death of our Lord Jesus Christ.
At least three times a day, every day, they prayed in the Temple and seven times a day they would pray at home.
Therefore, Annas, the most religious of them all, approved this case, and following the counsel of Caiaphas, he said, in effect, “Take Him in and kill Him!” (JOH 18:14).
From the palace of Annas, our Lord was taken to the palace of Caiaphas who was the legitimate high priest at the time.
In the second trial, Jesus was already considered guilty, for Annas had given Him “thumbs down.”
Caiaphas (the high priest), and the scribes and elders were all gathered together. The chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death, MAT 26:59.
How many witnesses are necessary according to their law? The answer at least two eyewitnesses of the same act or event or sin, DEU 19:15.
DEU 19:15 “A single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed; on the evidence of two or three witnesses a matter shall be confirmed.”
The liars were gathered together; this was the greatest liars’ club that has ever existed.
Caiaphas was the one who had said, “It is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation do not perish” (JOH 11:50).
At this trial, the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death, MAT 26:59.
They needed to find two eyewitnesses of the same act or event or sin, according to their law in DEU 19:15.
1. First of all, the first trial was held at night, which was contrary to Jewish Jurisprudence.
They had to get their dirty work out of the way so that they could partake of the Passover with “clean hands.”
The fact that the Passover spoke of Jesus Christ dying for their sins was a point which, even if they had understood, would have mattered little in their evil calculations.
They were anxious to bring about the destruction of the One who had not only upset their religious apple cart, but who was the perfect patsy for their devilish activities.
2. Secondly, there was no defense attorney, which was illegal.
3. Thirdly, the court also sought false witnesses, obviously illegal.
4. The court was prejudiced, and there was violence in the court.
He had not been talking about the actual Temple building; He was referring literally to His death and resurrection.
If Jesus had possessed an old sin nature, which is resident in every other member of the human race, He would have reacted.
From their own Bible they should have been reminded of ISA 53:7 He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth.
There was a time to speak, and there was a time to be quiet as ECC 3:7 teaches.
That is one of the most amazing of all the attributes of the human race, to know when to use the tongue and when not to use it.
The Lord Jesus Christ put the whole matter in the Father’s hands, revealing His perfect orientation to grace and to the Plan of God.
“Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (ROM 12:19).
Gossiping and maligning, returning evil for evil, whether it is the truth or not, are among the worst sins a believer can commit.
Many Christians, thinking they can do a better job, try to trot some other person into the “woodshed,” only to find out that the Lord is waiting for both.
Every moment the Lord Jesus lived, He lived in the moment-by-moment Sabbath, the faith-rest life.
While these religious people could not see the uniqueness and power of His life, a brilliant Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, would soon perceive the truth concerning Jesus.
Many of these men were scribes who daily studied the Old Testament, where hundreds and hundreds of passages that point to the Person of Jesus Christ say, “He is the Messiah.
The kingdoms of the earth rest on His shoulders.
He is the Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God.
Religion is blind, and these people were blind to the Person of Christ.
Why must we wait for Pontius Pilate to say, “He is a just man”?
Why must we wait until a Roman centurion looks up at the Cross and says, “Truly, this is the Son of God” (MAT 27:54)?
Here’s what the problem is; He is so loaded with religion that he could not see the grace of God.
The Greek says su eipas, and it is the strongest of all affirmatives, “Emphatically yes!”
He added, and this was grace, the next few items on the agenda: resurrection, ascension, session, and the Second Advent.
Something else in Jewish jurisprudence – No one can condemn himself by his own statements, apart from a confession of guilt.
Caiaphas took a clear statement of fact, which in reality did not condemn our Lord, and said it was a confession of guilt, which it was not.
This was a courtroom under one of the best systems of court procedures that has ever been set up – procedures which God Himself set up in the Mosaic Law.
ISA 52:14 His appearance was marred more than any man, And His form more than the sons of men.
When they were through with this second trial, Jesus no longer looked human. They kept punching Him until His face was destroyed.