“Inside, the high priest began asking Jesus about his followers and what he had been teaching them. Jesus replied, “Everyone knows what I teach. I have preached regularly in the synagogues and the Temple, where the people gather. I have not spoken in secret. Why are you asking me this question? Ask those who heard me. They know what I said.” Then one of the Temple guards standing nearby slapped Jesus across the face. “Is that the way to answer the high priest?” he demanded.”
John 18:19-22 NLT
A clash of two kingdoms emerged that night, as the Jewish world based on a strict but skewed interpretation of the Law of Moses came up against God’s Son and His world of grace and love. Annas, the high priest’s father-in-law, would have been hoping to trap Jesus, forcing Him to say something that could be construed, to his warped perspective, as blasphemy, thus facilitating a death sentence. But Jesus was not going to play any of his games, and received a slap across His face in the process. But the arrogance of a mere man questioning the God who created him is incongruous, to say the least. But we know that one day that same high priest will stand before Jesus, as He sits on the Great White Throne (Revelation 20:11-15). What will he say, I wonder? Will he gibber and splutter and continue in his arrogance? Even when the guilty verdict is passed down? Will he even try to point out the error of God’s ways to His face? Or will he stay silent, as the enormity and realisation of what he had done penetrated his dark soul? But even for a died-in-the-wool Jew determined to eliminate Jesus from the face of the earth, his ultimate fate doesn’t bear thinking about.
Jesus correctly pointed out that nothing that He had said was said in secret. It was all public, in the Temple and synagogues, and as He walked the highways and byways of Palestine and Judea. As He fed the crowds of men, women and children. As He taught from a boat just off the sea shore. Jesus had a very public ministry and one that founded the faith that drives us pilgrims forward in our journeys towards the Land of Glory. Jesus asked Annas why he asked Him the questions about His teaching and about His followers. Of course, Annas knew all about Jesus’ ministry and teaching because otherwise Jesus wouldn’t have been standing before him. The potential for entrapment has always been a possibility in the courts of history.
Before we pilgrims climb up onto the moral high ground, we should pause. We look at Annas and recoil from any thoughts about doing what he did. But didn’t we too point a finger of disbelief and antagonism to the Son of God through the sins that beset us before the wonderful day when we discovered the truth? Was it not a possibility that Annas, and any malignant leader before or since, had a light bulb moment before they died, thus ensuring their salvation, plucking them from a fate worse than death? The thief on the cross, in his dying moments, was promised a life in Paradise after reaching out to God’s Son. Our God is in the recycling business – He takes rubbish, because that is what we were, and produces from it something beautiful and fit for a life with Him one day.
We should also pause before we point fingers at anyone around us who behaves in a way that is sinful and that violates our cosy Christian ways. We mustn’t and cannot judge others, because in the same way that they behave, we are also guilty. In John 8:7, we read about Jesus’ response to demands that a woman caught in adultery was stoned, in accordance with the Law of Moses. “They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!”” We might never have been in such a situation, or so we think, but whatever the cause, we are not entitled to throw stones. In the John 8 account, everything went quiet, as the executing committee, with stones already in their hands, stopped to think. We then read in John 8:9, “When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman.” With the sound of rocks and stones hitting the ground still in our ears, we pilgrims too must also “slip away” leaving our judgements behind, because we are sinners, albeit saved by grace, but sinners nevertheless. And the story ends with Jesus’ loving and gracious response, “Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?” “No, Lord,” she said. And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more” (John 8:10-11). That message is a personal one to each of us, pilgrim or not. And on our knees this morning we come to our wonderful Saviour, confessing our sins in repentance, and asking for His grace and love, His forgiveness, to once again flood over us.
Dear Lord Jesus. There are always sins lurking in our human lives, waiting to emerge into the light of day. Please forgive us and help us to focus on You rather than those around us. And we pray for forgiveness today, once again, because only You have the power to forgive sins. In Your precious name. Amen.
Being a Pilgrim 