Well, good morning. If you'd
open your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter 26. Matthew 26 before we begin, let's
bow before our Lord in prayer. Our father, how thankful we are
to. Be able to bow in my presence. He come before throne of grace.
not a throne of justice or merit, but a throne of grace, pleading
the person, the obedience, the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ,
and to be able to come boldly, knowing we're accepted in the
beloved, not in anything about us or anything that we've done,
but in who he is and what he's accomplished for his people.
And Father, we're thankful. How we thank you for the Lord
Jesus Christ. How we thank you for a Savior
who puts away the sin of his people. By his obedience is the
only way we could ever be made righteous. By his sacrifice is
the only way our sin could be cleansed away. And Father, we're
thankful. Thankful for your mercy and grace
in providing such a Savior. And Father, we're thankful for
your mercy and grace in sending forth your gospel, the gospel
of your Son out into the world to call out your sheep, to save,
feed, to comfort, to edify, to call to Christ. Father, I pray
you bless us this morning as we meet to preach and hear your
gospel, to open and read and study your word, to sing your
praises. Father, enable us to worship you in spirit and in
truth. Let the name of Christ our Savior
be exalted and give us a heart of faith to lay hold upon him
and believe him and rest in him. And Father, what we pray for
ourselves in this hour, we pray for our children's classes. Father,
how we thank you for these little ones that you've given to us.
I pray you'd bless them, bless our teachers and bless our children
that they might learn, that you might use this as a time that
you'd plant the seeds of faith in their heart. And Father, we
dare not forget to pray for those who are in times of great difficulty. They're heartbroken, they're
bereaved, they're sick. We pray especially for Novi,
Father, that you'd undertaken her behalf to touch and heal
her body, enable her to get this transplant that she needs quickly,
if it could be thy will, use it to restore her to health.
All these things we ask, Father, that we might see your glory.
Show us your glory in our day, we pray. For it's in the name
of our Lord Jesus Christ, for his sake and his name, we pray. All right, our text begins in
verse 57 of Matthew chapter 26. I'm gonna read this and then
we'll come back and make some comments on it. Verse 57. And
they that had laid hold on Jesus led him away to Caiaphas, the
high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled.
But Peter followed him afar off into the high priest's palace
and went in and sat with the servants to see the end. Now
the chief priests and elders and all the council sought false
witness against Jesus to put him to death, but found none. Yeah, though many false witnesses
came yet found they none. They found none that their stories
agreed. At the last came to false witnesses and said, this fellow
said, I'm able to destroy the temple of God and to build it
in three days. And the high priest arose and
said unto him, answer style, nothing. What is it which these
witness against thee? But Jesus held his peace, and
the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure thee
by the living God that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ,
the son of God. Jesus saith unto him, thou hast
said. Nevertheless, I say unto you,
hereafter shall ye see the son of man sitting on the right hand
of power and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest
rent his clothes, saying he has spoken blasphemy. What further
need have we of witnesses? Behold, now you've heard his
blasphemy. What think ye? They answered
and said, he's guilty of death. Then did they spit at his face,
and buffeted him, and others smote him with the palms of their
hands, saying, prophesy unto us thou Christ. Who is he that
smote thee? Now that is the mock trial of
our Lord, where the scribes Pharisees and the chief priests gathered
together and did what they had wanted to do, put the Lord to
death, sentenced him to death. Now these men who were doing
what they were doing under the cloak of darkness, these men
are the religious leaders of the day. And when you think about
this, this is the best man's religion has to offer. And it's
obvious as the noonday sun that they hate the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I'll give them that they
tried to appear orthodox. They wanted all this to look
very legal. They want to make sure they dotted
every I and crossed every T. They wanted to make it look like
we followed all the right parliamentary procedure, so it's legal. But it's far from it. It's far
from it. They were not interested in truth,
in justice. They were more concerned with
their parliamentary procedure than they were the truth, weren't
they? They just wanted to put the Lord Jesus to death. That
was their whole goal. These religious leaders who were
so zealous of the law actively sought out people who had perjured
themselves and lie on the stand to put the Lord to death. And
they found many, many willing to do it. And you know why they
found so many people willing to bear false witness? because
man by nature hates God. They hated the Lord, too. They're
willing to bear false witness, which is one of the notable laws
in their laws, I shall not bear false witness. The law that they
claim to love so much, it was easy to find people who were
willing to bear false witness against the Lord. But the problem
was, nobody could get their lies straight. No two people could
agree in their lies. Look over at Mark chapter 14.
They finally found two that kinda sorta, you know, agrees. It was
close, but it wasn't exact. They didn't really agree. But
look how Mark describes this in Mark 14. Beginning in verse 56. For many
bear false witness against him, but their witness agreed not
together. And there rose certain and bear false witness against
him, saying, we've heard him say, I'll destroy this temple
that is made with hands. And within three days, I'll build
another made without hands. But neither so did their witness
agree together. I mean, their witness didn't
even agree together, but these men are so bloodthirsty, that
was close enough for them to sentence the Lord to death. Now,
after they violated their own law all night long, Then they're
gonna return to their orthodoxy. You know, they're gonna tell
Pilate, now we can't go into the judgment hall, because we'll
be defiled. We can't be around this, you
know, sentencing this man to death. We'll be defiled and won't
be able to eat the Passover. You know, they tried to look
so orthodox. They were so concerned with how
they looked on the outside, looking orthodox and straight. But inside,
they were empty. God looks on the heart, and in
the heart, They were empty, they're empty of spiritual life, they're
empty of righteousness, they're empty of love, they're empty
of faith. They had a religion that was empty of Christ the
Savior. And there he was in bodily form
right in front of them. And they couldn't see him. These
men who could not see, this is the Messiah. These men read and
transcribed the Old Testament scriptures Every single day I
guess with the exception of the Sabbath they didn't transcribe
it, but they read it didn't they? They read these scriptures every
day. They these are the ones that
transcribed it and They never one time Realized it never crossed
their mind This sounds familiar what we're doing here sounds
familiar. This is fulfilling the scriptures. This is exactly
the those prophecies that we that we've been reading for years
and They never one time realized it. They were so concerned with
being orthodox and doctrinally straight, but they had no regard
for the word of God at all. Now they said they did, but you
know what they did? Same thing men do today. They
pick out parts of it and, you know, make that all important
because it already suits what I want to do. And they ignore
the rest. These men had no concern whatsoever
with the truth. of God's Word, as religious as
they were. As much as they own copies of
God's Word, they were not interested in what it said, in the message
of it, in the truth of it. And the real reason that they
put the Lord to death is over the issue of his sacrifice, because
that tells you who he is. Look here again at verse 63.
But Jesus held his peace, and the high priest answered and
said unto him, I adjure thee by the living God that thou tell
us whether thou be the Christ, the son of God. Jesus saith unto
him, thou hast said. Nevertheless, I say unto you,
hereafter shall you see the son of man sitting on the right hand
of power and coming in the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest
rent his clothes, saying he has spoken blasphemy. What further
need have we of witnesses? Behold, now you've heard his
blasphemy. What think ye? And they answered and said he's
guilty of death. And then they began to spit on
him and beat him and mock him and so forth. But the issue that
made them so angry was the sacrifice of Christ and the results of
it. These men understood exactly what the Lord was saying. They
understood he was saying he's going to be put to death. He's
going to suffer and die, but he's coming back again. He's
not going to stay dead. He's coming back again. as the
successful Savior, and he's coming to judge the earth. This time
he came as a servant. This time he came as a lamb.
This time he came humbled. Next time he's coming as a lion.
Next time he's coming as God. Next time he's coming as the
judge of the earth. He's gonna die, but the Father's
gonna raise him again. You know why he's gonna come
in glory? Because his sacrifice accomplished what God sent him
to do, what the Father sent him to do. These men understood that
the Lord was saying, you're not gonna be made righteous by all
your legal religious works. You're not gonna be made righteous
by your orthodoxy and how you've, you know, electioneered to get
these leading positions in the church. The only way a sinner
can be made righteous is by the sacrifice of Christ. And we know
that sacrifice got the job done. That sacrifice put away the sin
that the father laid on him. Otherwise the father wouldn't
have raised him. He wouldn't be coming back exalted. His death
accomplished everything that the Messiah was sent to do. That's
why he's going to come back in glory. And that message takes away all
hope in Maine, doesn't it? All hope in our works, all hope
in anything that we can do. That message takes away all hope
that salvation is up to us, doesn't it? It's not up to man to decide
what he's gonna do with Jesus. We're in the hand of Jesus of
Nazareth and he'll decide what to do with us. This one who's
coming in power and glory, we're in his hand. He's not in our
hand, we're in his hand. He decides what to do with us.
And these religionists hated that truth so much, they just
practically foamed at the mouth and just, they couldn't wait
to try to kill him. Began spitting on him and buffeting him with
their hands. Blindfolded him and hit him and said prophesy
and tell us who hit you, you know, just horrible. They hated
that message of a sovereign, successful, reigning Savior. If you're going to be saved,
you're going to have to bow to him. Matter of fact, one day everybody's
going to bow to him. You're going to bow to this man,
Jesus of Nazareth. They hated that so much, they
just wanted to kill him. They almost couldn't restrain
themselves. Almost did it right there, didn't they? Just almost
beat him to death. And that's the message that the flesh still
hates today. The only reason any of us love
that message is God's given us a heart to love this message,
to love Christ and trust him, the sovereign, successful savior. All right. That's what took place
at this mock trial. And I know everybody here sees
the error in these religionists, and I certainly hope that we
can avoid repeating them. But now in the time I've got
left, I want to preach Christ to you from this passage. This
mock trial is the beginning of the Savior's soul suffering for
sin. And we see who he is. We see
him fulfilling so many Old Testament types and prophecies of the Messiah.
The first thing I see about Christ in this mock trial is he is the
willing sacrifice. He allowed them to take him.
He allowed them to lead him to Caiaphas's house. And there he
stands, there he stands. Now the Lord had the power to
walk right out of that room, walk right out of that house.
He had the power to make it where nobody could touch him, where
like suddenly they couldn't even see him and he'd just walk away
from him. He'd done it before. He had the
power to do it again. He could have used his power
to escape all of this suffering. He's still God. God in human
flesh. He had the power to escape it.
But he didn't. He stayed right there. And he
did that because him staying there, him suffering and dying
for his people, is the only way their sin could be put away.
There's got to be a sacrifice. He's the only sacrifice that'll
put away sin. So he stayed. He stayed because
he loved his people. And he willingly went to the
slaughter. They didn't have to drag him
there. He willingly went. The Lord stood there and says,
many false witnesses came. He stood there and listened to
them lie on him for how long? Many, he heard, stand there and
lie on him, accuse him of things that he never did. Now, has that
ever happened to you? I mean, the first time that you
hear that happen, what do you do? No, we defend ourselves,
don't we? That's not so. He never said
that. He kept his mouth shut. He stood
silent and never one time defended himself against these false charges.
And they couldn't get their charges all together, so he had to finally
give them one, didn't he? They couldn't do it. I tell you
the reason he didn't defend himself is because he's bearing the sin
of his people. We're guilty. every charge they
cast against the Savior. You and I are guilty. He's not,
but we are. And now the Lord, our substitute,
is bearing the sin of his people. Our sin has now become his. And
he's bearing that sin. He never defended himself because
in that sense, in the fact that he was made sin by his father,
he was guilty. Those sins did become his sin
and he willingly sacrificed. He willingly took that sin into
his holy, precious body upon the tree and sacrificed himself
for it so his people could be redeemed. Look over to Isaiah
chapter 53. When he did that, when he took
the sins of his people and sacrificed himself for it, he fulfilled
this Old Testament prophecy of the Messiah. Isaiah chapter 53. Verse four. Surely he hath borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten
of God and afflicted, but he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.
The chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes
we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray.
We've turned everyone to his own way. and the Lord hath laid
on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was
afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He's brought as a
lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers,
is dumb, is silent, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from
prison and from judgment, and who shall declare his generation?
For he was cut off out of the land of the living. For the transgression
of my people was he stricken. See, this is why he kept silent
and this is why he suffered and died for the transgression of
my people. The father made the sin of his
elect to rest on Christ and it became his and he stayed silent
against all of those charges because he was guilty. Let me
talk to you for a minute here about Christ being made sin.
I don't ever remember this even remotely being an issue or ever
questioned when I was growing up, but it is an issue today. Let me talk to you about it.
For some reason, people get all bent out of shape about this
issue of Christ being made sin. But you know what? That's exactly
what the scripture says, so I don't know why I get mad about it.
I don't know why you have to disagree with it. This is what
scripture says. Now there's no question, People
say, if you say Christ was made sin, you're saying Christ was
a sinner. Nobody says that. Nobody. Even false prophets don't
say that. Nobody's saying that. There is
no question whatsoever that the Lord Jesus Christ never committed
sin. Never. He's holy. He's harmless. He's undefiled. He's separate
from sinners. His personal holiness, his personal
righteousness that he earned under the law is beyond question. It's beyond reproach. That's
why they had to find so many people to lie against him. He's
perfect. Now, I tell you why this is important.
Now, his obedience is perfect. That's important because if our
sin is going to be put away, we have to have a sinless sacrifice.
He can't put away our sin if he has any sin of his own. He
is the perfect sinless sacrifice. That lets him take the sin of
his people away from them, take it into his own body upon the
tree, and put it away by his pure, precious, sin-atoning blood.
He's perfect. And everybody at this mock trial
knew it. Everybody did. The high priests
knew it. The chief priests knew it. The
scribes and the Pharisees knew it. That's why they sought false
witness, because they knew there's no true charge against this man.
He's innocent. Here in a couple hours, they're
going to take him to Pilate, and Pilate's going to spend some
time with him. And you know what Pilate's going to say? I find
no fault in him. He found no fault in him because
there wasn't any. There was no fault in him. He's
perfect. Everybody knew he was innocent, yet they condemned
him to death. They treated him so horribly,
I mean, just beating him. They did this to a man they knew
was innocent. Now, why on earth would the father
ever tolerate that going on, happening in his creation to
his son? If that has happened to one of
my children, you can betcha I'd put a stop to it. Why didn't
the father put a stop to it? Because the son had been made
sin for his people, and he must suffer the full consequences
of that sin. And if you look back at Psalm
22, That fulfills the scriptures too. This was nothing new, God
said it was gonna happen. Psalm 22. Verse six. But I am a worm and no man, a
reproach of men despised of the people. All they that see me
lack me to scorn. They shoot out the lip, they
shake the head, saying, he trusted on the Lord that he would deliver
him. Let him deliver him, seeing he delighteth in him. But thou
art he that took me out of the womb. Thou didst make me whole
when I was upon my mother's breast. I was cast upon thee from the
womb. Thou art my God from my mother's belly. Be not far from
me, for trouble is near, for there's none to help. Many bulls,
these strong, rulers in Israel. Many bulls have compassed me.
Strong bulls of patient have beset me round. They gaped upon
me with their mouths as a ravening and a roaring lion. See, why'd
all this happen? Because the savior had been made
sin for his people. Let me show you one more scripture.
Psalm 40 over a few pages of Psalm 40. Psalm 40 verse 12 tells us why
all this has happened. For innumerable evils have compassed
me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me so that I'm not able to look up. They are more than
the hairs of mine head. Therefore, my heart faileth thee. Now, how is it possible that
the savior who knew no sin, who did no sin, neither was any guile
found in his mouth, who always did what pleased his father,
how could he say, mine iniquities. There's only one way. The father
made the sin of his people to be his and they belonged to him. The savior calls the sin of his
people mine iniquity because the sin of God's elect was made
his at Calvary and the savior suffered everything that sin
is with the exception of the commission of it. He felt the
guilt of sin. He felt the shame of sin. That's
why he said, I'm not able to look up. For the first time ever,
he is not able to look his father in the eye. Because he felt the
guilt and the shame of sin. And this transaction, making
Christ sin, is not just a fine doctrinal point that, you know,
we like to hang our hat on and it somehow makes us different
than everybody else. We want to defend this. I'll tell you
why this is so important to you and me. This transaction Christ
being made sin for his people. If that transaction of sin being
made Christ. If that's not real. If that's
not actual. Then our sin still on us. If
our sin was not actually transferred to Christ, he didn't put it away. But if it was. If the sin of
God's people was actually made Christ. Brother, nothing can
condemn you. B. Fraser used to say they were
shouting words. This is shouting words. If Christ was made sin
for you, nothing can condemn you. This is nothing to get mad about.
This is something to get glad about. Oh, Christ took the sin
of his people and put it Now there's hope for salvation for
sinners. Now there's good reason for us
to preach the gospel and tell sinners, look to Christ. Oh,
come to Him. Believe on Him. Cast your soul
on Him. He put away the sin of His people.
He can't fail. He can't fail. Here's something
else, how important this is. It's this matter of Christ being
made sin to the salvation of His people. God the Father is
holy. Injust. Now, if I know anything
about the father, I know that. Well, the father can't put an
innocent man to death. We were talking about this last
night. Who put the Savior to death,
you know? Well, the Romans did. The Jews did. But the father did. The father
is the one. I'm going to plunge the sword
of justice into one who is my fellow. Well, the father can't
put an innocent man to death. That wouldn't be just. It wouldn't
be right. It wouldn't be holy. If Christ was not made sin and
the father killed him anyway, the father's not just. And you
can't trust your salvation if somebody's not just. No. Christ was made sin and justice
was satisfied by the death of Christ. That means if he died
for you as your substitute, justice is never going to come looking
for you, ever, because Christ fulfilled it for you. As a matter
of fact, it would be unjust for the Father to send you to hell.
And he can't be unjust. See, this thing of Christ being
made sin is the guarantee for the salvation of his people.
This is things to get happy about. Somebody can argue about it all
they want to, but I ain't listening to them. I'm not having none
of it. Let the potsherds of the earth strive the potsherds of
the earth. This is the joy of salvation, the joy of salvation. If our righteousness before God
is only as true as the transfer of sin to Christ. The sin was really made Christ. His righteousness is truly made
ours. This is good news. This is the
good news of the gospel. And since that happened, he put
away the sin of his people. This is what you can expect.
He's coming again. He's coming again, and he's going
to do it in justice. He's going to gather his people
to himself in justice and take them to glory and be with him.
That's good news, isn't it? All right, here's the second
thing. When Christ died, he died for sinners. You know, Peter
followed him afar off, and somehow snuck his way into the high priest,
chief priest's house, or high priest, whoever he was. Now,
Peter is somebody I can identify with. Can't you ever believe
what I'm sure it says? I can identify with Peter. Peter is
not afraid to shoot off his mouth. Peter is absolutely sure, I will
never fall. I will never do that. And even
after Peter did everything he said he wouldn't do, deserted
the Lord, you got to give it to Peter. Now he ought not done
it. I mean, he, he, he snuck back
in. He's, he's following the Lord close enough at least to
get into the house of the high priest. Cause he wants to see
the end of the matter. Now, when the Lord told him you're going
to deny me, it might would have been better for Peter not to
put himself in this situation, but this is what Peter did. Cause
he thought I won't do that. But I think the important thing
here is Peter loved the Lord. He's going to fall. He's going
to do it again. And he's going to do it again
later. I mean, Paul had to correct him. Oh, he's going to do it
again. But Peter loves the Lord. And
he wanted to see the end of the matter. And here's another reason, a
way, I'm like Peter. I want to follow the Lord. I
want to go into the judgment hall. I want to go to the foot
of the cross and I want to see the end of the matter. I want
to follow the Lord there and I want to see what happens. The
Lord endured this mock trial. Do you do it for me? Cause I'm
a weak and simple man. Do you endure this to put my
sin away? Cause that's the only hope I
have of salvation. When all these false witnesses came up against
him, did he really keep his mouth shut? Because he'd been made
guilty of my sin? See, that's the only hope I have
for my soul. You know, what happened when
sin was placed on the Savior? What happened when his blood
was shed? What happened in those three hours of darkness when
he took his blood and placed it on the altar before the Father?
Did that really put my sin away? Did that really satisfy God's
justice for me? See, I want to look into these
things and see the end of the matter, don't you? I want to
see how this thing is going to turn out. I want the Holy Spirit
to take these things in scripture and reveal them to me. So this
is what I find out. Christ is the only sacrifice
for sin that there is. And I trust him. I believe him
that he is all I need to be eternally redeemed before the father. And
if you're interested in the end of the matter. Here's the end
of the matter. Verse 64, Jesus said, saith unto
him, thou hast said, nevertheless I say unto you hereafter, shall
you see the son of man sitting on the right hand of power and
coming in the clouds of heaven? Here is the end of the matter.
When Christ suffered, he saved everybody that he intended to
save. Everybody he suffered and died for is eternally redeemed. See, the only way that the Lord
Jesus can return as judge of the earth is if he was raised
from the dead. I mean, if he died, he's got
to be raised from the dead. He's got to send back to the
father. He's got to be seated on the right hand of the father
in glory so that he can come again in power. Now, the only
way the father is going to raise him from the dead is if sin is
gone. The sin that was laid on him
is gone because his blood washed it away. The only way the Father
is going to cause him to send back into heaven a glorious homecoming
and say, sit here on my right hand. Don't make your enemies
your footstool. The only way the Father will
ever say that to you is that Christ Jesus got the job done
when he suffered and died for his people. Well, he did. He did. And he tells us this
is going to be the end of the matter. I don't know what's going
to happen between here and then, but I know what's going to happen
then. He's coming again. He's coming again in power. He's
coming to gather his people to himself. And that makes my soul
happy. Go to yours. All right. Lord
bless you.