AUSTRALIAN BIBLE CHURCH February 3, 2008

A CONTINUATION OF THE THRUST AND BASE OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
OF AUSTRALIA ON BIBLICAL LINES …  

THE CONTEST FOR CHRIST JESUS, THE LORD, 

IN HIS DAY AND IN OURS

Part II

PILATE'S MEANINGLESS QUESTION

Let us resume from last week.

Christ then replied to the Judge, Pilate, that yes, He was a King and came INTO this world, born to "bear witness to the truth." Roman and Jew alike having conspired to kill Him, this world has been categorically disoriented ever since, and awaits judgment. The escape route to Christ voids death, our lives in His keeping, the only way either out or on (Hebrews 6:18-19).

HIS kingdom, He attested, is not of this world; BUT everyone who is of the truth, hears His voice.

Pilate Asks a Meaningless Question

What is truth ? shrugs Pilate, the spiritually intoxicated judge! Thereupon, as if turning on his heel, he went out. He was not interested in the reply. He was on the spot, and squirmed.

The answer therefore would have to be given in two ways: firstly what had already been said, and secondly, by what would be done. Pilate would deny the truth as it spoke to him, deciding that Christ was INNOCENT (this was apparently 'truth' since he did not utter it in order to make a vibration of air particles only), and yet commissioning crucifixion. Well might he ask what truth was, when it could be squashed by fear, distorted by inequity and deprived by excommunication from the judge's lips! He would not recognise it if he saw it; and in fact, did not, though he was deeply drawn, for it was The Truth to whom he was talking. 'What is it ?' he asks as he proceeds to sanction its murder.

Christ had so wisely declared, "I am the life, the way and the truth!" (John 14:6). Small wonder then that Pilate did not at first desire to kill Him. A life without truth is a form of insanity which is common, and leads to just such behaviour as mars this world, but the cause is not always realised. It leads to equivocation, inequity and murder; for if the truth may be murdered, what may not! Militant Islam is, as it has been from the start with Muhammad great use of force, an illustration of that fact. Even a scimitar does not change the shape of truth, through it does have power to alter the destiny of murderers. But what of Pilate's question ?

As we have already seen in the introduction, any question of the existence of truth is nonsense, since it uses truth to tell us about it, while questioning the very power to affirm anything, including even this, that it is a question whether truth may be found. If there were no truth, there could be no truth declaring truth was questionable or non-existent. It would all be bogus or meaningless.

Anyone making an affirmation concerning what is true, even when permitting himself the eccentric luxury of saying there is no truth,  is guilty of a flat self-contradiction. If this statement were true, then its content must be false.  If it is not there, this truth, it is not possible to make a true assertion concerning it, without its participation in order to validate the contention. Even if you were to declare that it MIGHT not be there, you would still be assuming access to truth in order to declare this negative possibility.

The world is finding in denial of truth the truth of the word of God which has its number and has foretold its works.  It is like a pilotless ship, on a stormy sea, being ruptured by rock, the captains steadfastly ignoring both charts and provisions for rescue.

Pilate is no different, but faced with Christ direct, the absolute folly of such a position is revealed directly. The Roman judge lacks in this, a pilot! He equivocates, berates, queries, founders, desires, is frustrated, gives way for his neck, ignoring both heart and head. He is out of his depth and merely avoiding the issue, like millions in our own time.

Nevertheless, having made this ludicrous question, Pilate does not wish to violate the obvious at least in the judicial realm, and at once declares, "I find no fault in Him at all" (John 18:38). There is an inclination with some to regard Pilate as simply weak, and in the spiritual realm he was, indeed vacillatory until his throat was exposed. Only then was he very definite, like many another worldling, in or out of ecclesiastical dress. He did not quite know what to say until he found the cost of not saying what they wanted him to say. Then he said it, however reluctantly: Crucify Him then (John 19:16).

As judge he was unwilling to gratify the lusting eye and murderous hand of the junta ruling Israel. Similarly, if the worldling often despises the contemptible seeming weakness and other-worldliness of the Christian, he is often less disposed to bring on a new plethora of crosses for them to bear - unless of course it will hurt if they do not do so. Then there is non-intervention, or delay or at all events, nothing much is done. Even if it is, there is as with the USA in Israel, what is found with it ? There is alas every effort to placate this world's power, and even to diminish the much robbed State of Israel, a ghost of what was promised to it by the League of Nations and by Britain. Israel is helped, as Pilate helped Christ a little; but in the end, it is subject to more slicing, as in a deeper incision, was Christ. This world has its standards, held very low.

Nevertheless, Pilate at least refused to be stampeded, just as he declined to face the truth. That alas is an unstable position, and it does not hold.

GOD'S WAY, UNALTERABLE OVER TIME, SURE IN PLACE

In this conversation between Christ and His judge, we have seen amidst the follies of Pilate, God's own way in John 18:36-37. It is not crucially a matter of force but of light.  Truth maligned in the end, is an abutment into reality, and this cannot stand, since fiction merely fries itself in fantasy and phantasm. Yet to obtain place and grace, this is no matter of force at all; it is a matter of truth. It is not a matter of terrestrial real estate or army alike; it is a kingdom which by its very nature is not from here. It is celestial, eternal, innate to God, where alone CAN truth be, because of knowledge and power, purity and eternity, creation and control.

A king ? Yes HE is the king, but His rule is not that of the mere maestro using gas as a control for Europe, or the theft of atomic plans as a means of sustaining fictions unable to live on their own. His truth does not depend on guile or force, trickery or treachery, events and chances; it depends on who the Lord is, whose rule enables all the liberty given to man in this amazing gift of being in God's own image. His rule is indefeasible (Isaiah 14:27), who makes all history follow His written word and has done so for millennia (cf. The Pitter-Patter … Ch. 4, SMR Chs. 8-9). Yet man is defective: sin has marred him just as he marred Christ! If the Lord shows mercy, His it is; and if He brings on justice as man proceeds inexorably to his dynamically sought doom, then that is His decision. He would have all, but shanghais none.

Yes, Christ is a king, but His kingdom is not from this created source; it is what MADE it and man in it, so that man may even think of the logic to be found implicit in the creation, of the God who made it and of the nature of reason itself. He has come, moreover, we learn in these two verses, to bear witness to the truth.

As in the period before the universal flood (Genesis 6), where folly focussed itself to the point it was better for that cosmos of culture to be removed after much divine patience, so the time will come when not flood but fire will end the vast episodes of history on this earth (II Peter 3, cf. Matthew 24:35, Revelation 20). Surely God came FIRST, in PERSON so that He could  bear a divine testimony, not mixed with sin or spiritual weakness at all, but as predicted and predicting the future from His own day on earth, BOTH.

Surely God came first, in PERSON to this earth so that He could bear a divine testimony, not mixed with sin or spiritual weakness at all, but filled with power and wonder, while moving categorically to fulfil the redemption required for man's peace and pardon.  Just as God in Christ acted as predicted (cf. II Corinthian 5:17ff., Galatians 3), so He proceeded to predict the future from His own day on earth, to ours and His coming - BOTH. Some grow weary of hearing about it; but truth does not change because it hits.

Showing that compassion which is so deep in His heart,  in the midst of the pain of hypocrisy from many false religionists, even those using the divine name and speaking of the covenant which He had given, Christ nevertheless did not allow the matter to be fudged. Neither His pity for man nor man's rebellion from Him could deter Him (cf. Matthew 23:37ff., Luke 19:42ff.). The truth was told, boldly ... Let us all who know Him, follow this lead!.

Thus we find these glorious words from Jesus:

"For this cause was I born, and for this cause I have come into the world,
that I should bear witness to the truth."

ONE aspect of this truth is this, that "The Son of man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28, cf. Galatians 6:14). Here, on the Cross, inclination becomes performance, desire becomes reality and love becomes history. There is no equivocation with God.

In Christ's coming, power, grace, kindness and kingliness, the celestial has entered the terrestrial, the Creator the creation, the perfect the realm of those imperfect and the Redeemer the world of sin. In this He points, portrays, exhibits, acts so that it is not only without excuse, but with every appeal, testimony, evidence, verification validation comes in like a storm. Indeed He said more to Pilate in the very teeth of the gale of gross distortion and abortion of truth: "Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice."

Impending death of His body no more  inclined Him to rant than to clam: He spoke as always, with majestic bearing, practical realism, the vision of truth a mere residue of His own being, the Truth itself; for it is He in the Trinity who generates it (John 15:26, 6:62, Acts 2): He is the truth (John 14:6). Accordingly, when they could not find His body, His truth prevailed, for if they had found it in the tomb, that would have been the tomb of the Gospel. His disciples found Him, and if they had not, after the crucifixion, in full bodily array (John 20, Luke 24), then that too would have been the end of all evidence and attestation of the glory of God to man.

Small wonder Thomas was so keen TO BE SURE (John 20:24ff.). History has followed His predictions: necessary, it is also true!

The conditions are stringent when it comes to GOD speaking to MAN. We are not given minds to bypass them; and while the proof of truth is not the end of the matter, it is one of its facilities. Truth is like that. It speaks and all else must be still. The will of man in his sinfulness merely warps; it does not alter (cf. Romans 1:17ff.). When you find Him, for the truth is personal, vested in the Creator and Redeemer, then all else is mere subterfuge and life is coincident with truth. As with Thomas, the more one investigates, the more investigation hugs faith and faith smiles.

THE RELUCTANT RULER AND THE FIERY FURY

This next step is in principle a composite which reaches back and on.
Thus it comes to this, in the world's way:

No truth, No fault, Avoid issue, Let Things Flow.

Despite the decision to attribute no blame to Christ, Pilate merely seeks a canny move to escape the imposition of justice in name, and injustice in fact. It is never pleasant to do so, and those who seek pleasantness for themselves may nevertheless cringe a little before actually murdering; though in the end, they may consent willingly enough, as they seek to save their lives, instead of being saved, like a ship covered with 10 metres of barnacles which simply cannot STAND dry dock.

Thus Pilate brings up a convention. If you do not have morals, at least a convention may do dubious service for a little, by which time perhaps your tour of duty may be over. It was a custom to release a prisoner of popular choice at the Passover. It was a kind of governmental sop to the religious character of the nation being occupied. What about releasing ... 'the King of the Jews' ? asked Pilate, his heart, though beating rather feebly at this time, in his mouth, which so spoke.

Israel, pursuing Israel's Way 2, as above, are adamant.

No sop for them. Blood is roused, and will be spilt first in Christ, the Mediator who ALONE is for man (Acts 4:11-12), their Keeper. What madness is this that their Keeper is not kept, but swept as far as may be, from the universe. Then they must wait, without the keeping of the Keeper as Shepherd, until the time comes (as in Matthew 23:38-39), when the mercies of God mitigate their folly. Then, having brought them back from the coming exile to be a nation once more (as Isaiah predicted in 66:8ff. in terms of the final confrontation epoch), does the Lord open their eyes. This is to come as in Zechariah 12:10, where the prophet foreseeing their murder of Christ, also foresaw their ultimate repentance for it, in the case of a singular mass of the people.

How amazing that foreseeing that Israel would not congratulate (as a nation) but condemn their Messiah, to Zechariah it was given both to know that this would be so, by what means they would remove Him (they will look on the Lord whom they have 'pierced' and ask 'What are these wounds in Your hands?' - Zechariah 13:6ff.) and that they would at last be back in Jerusalem to realise in large numbers suddenly, what they had done ... and to REPENT! All the rest has happened; this great climax in history is near (Answers to Questions Ch. 5, Luke 21).

It is coming in a rush in this, our day, when God's will has for so long been wrought. This is now. But what did Pilate do then ? The Jewish leaders said NO, we do not want this 'King of the Jews'.  We see from this that it is well to consider heavily what one does. After all, Kings are not born every day, and God was born into human form ONCE in history to provide ONE salvation in ONE name, and does not dither, whatever man may wish to invent. It was with their own lives that they were all dealing. Let us see it graphically.

What is Pilate to do ? The Jewish leaders say NO, we do not want this 'King of the Jews' (kings are not born every day, and God was born into human form ONCE in history to provide ONE salvation in ONE name, and does not dither, whatever man may wish to invent).

They are vexed, they are aroused, they even go further as men in passion often do. They want ... well, Barabbus, a robber. They thus robbed themselves of national, city and racial life to an extreme degree, to the point that when it came to Hitler, the gallows were by no means a poetical figure. It was just that it took a more massive exterminatory form. Thus do many, Jew and Gentile, prefer in life to rob God of His glory, and invest it in themselves or those chosen by them, in a madness which  needs to be felt to be realised in full. No, say the starving, we do not want steak: give us arsenic! They say it with passion.

They took it, and Him. They took Him however the wrong way, like food doing this. Rightly taking Him is not, you see, to murder Him, but to obtain life. There is that little difference when it comes to receiving Him as in John 1:12, and becoming thereby children of God (I John 3:1ff.). Pilate now in evasive mode, has Christ scourged anyway. It is like declaring the prisoner innocent,  this judgment, and then fining him 4 million dollars, with penal servitude for life. It was like that ... only worse.

Pilate now in evasive mode, has Christ beaten. It is like declaring the prisoner innocent , declaring this judgment, and then fining him 4 millions dollars, with penal servitude for life. It was like that ... only worse.

Thus first Christ was scourged anyway, for something to pass the time, perhaps while Jewish tempers cooled ?

After that, he let them mock Christ, put on Him a purple robe. This is rather like the SA Government's continued atrocity in declaring all religion in effect subjective and not susceptible to a rigorous testing routine, and using this to make a concoction of subjectivity that aborts fundamental principles of the Bible, without ground, without reason, without debate and without law, since it aborts also the UN Declaration against Discrimination, now law in this land (cf. Mystery of Iniquity). In this, they assault God Almighty, the God of the Bible, the Lord's Christ.

They flay this religion by flaying all religions, but do this distinctively relative to the Bible in this, that in so doing they deny its affirmations; and in doing this invidiously and perfidiously, they work out what to teach the young!

This is simply both irrational and antichristian.

What then of the miseducative passion now so prominent ? Indeed, in this, they assault God Almighty, the God of the Bible, the Lord's Christ. Such assaults, on young and old, are scattered over the earth like weeds, and in places, like furnaces. They are used to make, if it were possible, genetically modified men, things of culture, people of another king, the fling king, who seeks to exploit what is created, and ignore Him who made it, the evidence, the truth, the principles and scientific method itself: making hay and ordering in the calamities which now beset this world.

These exterminative enterprises against manifest truth ^*1 are used to make, if it were possible, genetically modified men, things of culture, people of another king, the fling king, who seeks to exploit what is created, and ignore Him who made it, making hay and ordering in the calamities which now beset this world.

It is so  now, it was so then; but if it is in spirit now, then it was also in flesh, that of Christ. The mockery routine, not based on truth or works, but on hatred of truth, proceeded. Thus as Christ declared in John 15:18, "If the world hate you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you." Remember: He was scourged anyway! Do not therefore hate your sufferings, but love the One for whom they are made. Rejoice for in His kingdom, truth is paramount and love is its kin. Truth endures and love loves to do it! Let us then be valiant and vigorous in Him who is victorious. Here is a confrontation, which mirrors history and instructs the spirit.

NOTE

*1

See Bonvoyage Chs. 1-2, TMR Chs. 1, 8, Beauty for Ashes Ch. 3, The gods of naturalism have no go! SMR pp. 140ff..