Called in again

John 12:42: ‘Nevertheless among the chief rulers also many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue.’

Jordan says, “Being put out of the synagogue was a fearful thing for these Jews. In Luke 9, when Jesus began to tell His apostles about His going to the Cross, one of the things He says is He’s going to be rejected of the elders.

“That’s saying, ‘You’re not a part of Israel.’ When you did that to a Jew you completely cut his whole hope; his whole identity. All of his connection with his family and his heritage; you cut it away. They were going to hate them so much. I mean that favored nation held together. They struggled together; they stayed together. They’re going to put these guys out.

“Then He says, ‘Not only will they put you out of the synagogue, thinking they are doing God’s service (‘We’re serving God by putting you out’) they’re going to kill you!’

“That’s not just hatred and rejection; that’s physical attack that winds up in your death, and before they get you dead, they do all the things necessary to get you dead. They didn’t come up and shoot people because they didn’t have guns back then. They stoned them.

“It takes a little bit of time to stone somebody to death. I was reading an article the other day about how difficult it is to kill somebody by strangling them. You can shoot of knife somebody, but to strangle them isn’t just that you have to physically overpower them, which you do, but you literally have to hold them until their very life ebbs out of them.

“It takes more than physical strength; it takes a psychological toughness, meanness, hatred, anger, passion, whatever it is, because you have to hold them to the point where they don’t breathe anymore. In your hands you literally feel it and you literally feel it go away.

“You see, killing people is not…modern American Gentiles have made killing so easy. We send an airplane at seven miles up into the air and drop a bomb on somebody. Where the bomb lands is terrible but the dude that dropped the bomb goes back home and eats supper and goes to bed and never thinks about it.

“If that same guy had to put his hands around the neck of the woman that his bomb destroyed and squeezed the life out of them, well there’d be a different kind of situation I bet.

“One of the things the Gentiles do is they constantly become better and better at killing people. We’re talking about modern science and the improvement of things, and you know what, every modern advancement and technology has been used, not just for the good of mankind, but to make it easier to kill people. You name it! In fact, most of the technological advancements that trickle down to you and me in life comes from military advancements where they’re trying to stay ahead of the other guy so ‘he can’t kill me; I can kill him first!’

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“But these guys are doing this because they thinking they’re serving God. This murderous rage where they’re going to kill you. You’ll see it in the Book of Acts. Acts 4-5. Verse 5:29 says, 29] Then Peter and the other apostles answered and said, We ought to obey God rather than men.
[30] The God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree.

“Because Peter and John had healed that man at the temple in Acts 3 they got called before the religious leaders and told, ‘Don’t do that again; you filled the city with this man’s doctrine,’ and because they kept preaching about the Lord Jesus Christ, they get called in again.

“Acts 5:28: ‘Saying, Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name? and, behold, ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this man's blood upon us.’

“When they murdered Him they said, ‘Let his blood be on us.’ Pilot had the big ceremony where he washed his hands of the blood of this innocent man. They said, ‘Let his blood be on us.’ But now, when the blood guiltiness is laid at their feet . . . You see the Cross wasn’t good news to them. There’s no message of love and forgiveness of enemies and sinners there in that for them. They’re mad!

“You see, when men contradict what God says, who do you obey? You obey God. Now, if the rulers tell you don’t do something God says to do, and you go ahead and obey God, that means the rulers might come down on you. You’re not doing it to be rebellious against rulers; you’re doing it to be faithful to God.

“Somebody says, ‘Well, I thought you were supposed to be subject to the powers that be? Well, you are, but duties never conflict. And you can’t take one verse of scripture and sit it up against another verse of scripture, and say, ‘Because of this verse you have to deny that verse.’ Duties don’t conflict. And when God tells you to do something, you do what God tells you.

“It’s like back in John 9 with the Pharisees arguing, ‘You healed a guy on the Sabbath. You made him see on the Sabbath. How dare you! Don’t you know what happens to people who work on the Sabbath day?!’ You remember what Jesus told them back there? ‘Well, you circumcise people on the Sabbath day.’

“Paul said, ‘I was circumcised the eighth day.’ Why’s that important? Lev. 12 says when a little boy was born on his eighth day he was to be circumcised and it didn’t make any difference if that day happened on the Sabbath day or not. Now there are two ceremonial laws. There’s nothing morally connected with the Sabbath day or circumcision. They were picture doctrines. They pictured something. A moral commandment would be like ‘Thou shalt not kill.’

“What happens when two ceremonies conflict? One of them took precedence over the other and they all knew it. They knew the circumcision took precedence over all the others and they would disobey the Sabbath instructions of rest in order to accomplish the greater law; the greater sign. Which is better? Which is really more important?

“What Christ was teaching them was there was something bigger than their religious ceremonies: ‘Boy, when you break the religious rules of people . . .’ There’s no hatred like religious hatred and be it a pope or a Protestant or Imam, there’s no hatred, no persecution so fierce as that fired by a zeal for God and a zeal for ‘what’s right’ as you want it to be, as your religion says.”