“Who Killed Jesus?”
Matthew 12:1-14
When we look back at the life of Jesus, I find it helpful to look at it in segments and each segment comes with a theme. We see his birth and dedication in the temple; we’ll call that phase one. Then we don’t hear anything of anything in the life of Jesus until the age of 12 when He makes that famous trip to the Temple and when Mary and Joseph leave to return home and Jesus decides to stay an extra 3 days. He baffles the wise men in the temple with his questions and his answers.
Then, from the time He is 12 until He is 30 we have 18 years. We don’t really know ANYTHING about that time. The scriptures are actually silent. We do have the passage Luke 2:52 that tells us that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. For me, this is a summary of those 18 years that describes how Jesus grew ---- in every way. Jesus then enters public ministry around the age of 30 and would continue His ministry for 3.5 years. We know of at least 38 miracles He performs but we also must remember the words of John who tells us “there are many other things Jesus did as well. I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” So while the Bible tells us everything we need to know, the Bible does not tell us everything. Here’s the deal.
Jesus is more wonderful than even the scripture describes.
But one day there was a group, more than one over time who turned on Him and the scripture relates it in this way. The setting was the Sabbath. Jesus and His disciples were walking through the grain fields. His disciples were hungry and they began to pick some corn and eat it. This upset the Pharisees and they said in verse 2: “look, your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.” In reply, Jesus who knew the scripture far better than they said, “don’t you remember what David did when he and his friends were hungry? They went into the temple and ate the bread that had been dedicated to the Lord---that was only for the priests to eat. In other words, they broke the law. And did you also read that the priests were allowed to work on the Sabbath? Then He made an amazing statement. There is here who is greater than the temple; referring to Himself. And then He says the Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath. Then in v. 9ff….
At this point it is perhaps not a surprise that we see these words----“then the Pharisees called a meeting to plot how to kill Jesus.” And that would be the first of many meetings that would be held by a variety of people to carry out the task of getting rid of Jesus. There are at least 5 individuals or groups that people throughout history have blamed for the death of Jesus.
The Sanhedrin. Composed of 70 men and also the high priest; the Sanhedrin was basically the Supreme Court. Once they made a decision there were no appeals. However, they couldn’t execute a death sentence. Also interesting, that they never tried a case on a Friday if it involved the possibility of a death sentence. Most of the members were Saducees. They didn’t believe in the resurrection so they were sad-u-cee? Because they could not rule on a serious case on Friday; remember Jesus was arrested on Thursday evening; so the trial happened very quickly. False witnesses were brought in. They said Jesus was trying to destroy the temple. So they found him guilty of blasphemy. Romans are like, so what? So Jews change the charge from claiming to be the Son of God to claiming to be King of the Jews. Now He was meddling in politics and that was serious. We just mentioned one. The Pharisees. They are mentioned dozens of times in the scripture. According to church history at their peak there were about 6000 of them. Their name meant separated ones. Mentioned dozens of times in the gospels. They were legalists, always holding the law over others. They claimed to be more religious than anyone else. They believed they were the only group who knew how to interpret God’s word. Jesus called them hypocrites.
The Jews. Most popular answer. The Jews have received quite a bit of trouble over this. A lot of bloodshed. There is good evidence that the Jews did not have the right/authority to demand capital punishment but if they did it likely would have been through stoning, not through crucifixion. The Jews have been persecuted as a result. They in fact turned him over to the Romans. Jesus told the High Priest that He was the Messiah. He told them they would face judgment for their actions.
Caiaphas. Caiphas declared it would be better for Jesus to die than the nation destroyed. He did so---said this because following the resurrection of Lazarus, many of the Jews then believed in Jesus. Some were jealous however so they reported the whole thing to the Pharisees who then gathered a group and said, if we don’t do something, more people will accept Him and the Romans will destroy the Jewish nation.
Pilate. Pilate was the Governor of Rome. It was the time of Passover and the Governor could set one prisoner free. He asked if they wanted to crucify Jesus or Barabbas. They chose to free Barabbas. And shouted out that they wanted to crucify Jesus. So it would seem that the crowd had a powerful voice and caused him to be put to death. Jewish leaders found Jesus to be guilty so they took him to Pilate. Pilate doesn’t think Jesus deserves death; but doesn’t want to anger the leaders. Pilate’s wife had a dream that Jesus was innocent. Pilate asks them, well what did Jesus do? Their response ---- crucify Him! They couldn’t answer actually, so Pilate says fine. I’ll just wash my hands of the matter. Perfect political storm. Everyone wins here. The crowd decided and Pilate kept his popularity.
The Romans. Crucifixion was a Roman style of punishment. They never crucified another Roman because this punishment was so severe. They were the only group who could actually put Jesus to death. Jesus was not really a serious threat to the Romans. In fact He told them to give Caesar what belongs to him. But because they felt that Jesus had declared Himself to be king, they mocked, him, spit on him, dressed him in a scarlet robe, like a king; put a crown on his head, like a king except this was made of thorns and put a staff in his hands like a king but then hit him with it. Look at the king!
Later the soldiers would say He really was the Son of God. The truth finally set in. Frankly at some point everyone will say those words.
Rembrandt was a Dutch artist who lived in the 17th century. One of his most famous paintings is the Raising of the Cross. That painting hangs in a gallery in Germany.
As the Roman soldiers are lifting up the cross, there is another figure helping. If you look closely, you will see a man at Jesus’ feet wearing a blue painter’s beret/cap. He is obviously not a character from the first century. It is the artist himself!
Why? Did he just want to put himself into a painting? No! It was Rembrandt’s way of saying, “I am a sinner. I was there too. I helped crucify Christ.” He also painted himself into the crowd in one painting. All of us are responsible.
Matthew 26.
