The Jewish Leaders

We are in the third week of our sermon series entitled The Supporting Cast. We are spending time looking within scripture of people and people groups that allow us to better understand Jesus and his ministry even before he began his ministry. This week our focus is on the Jewish Leaders and specifically a discussion they had with John the Baptist. We will be looking at John 1:6-8 and 1:19-28.

6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

19 Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders h in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. 20 He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.” 21 They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?” He answered, “No.” 22 Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” 23 John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’ ” 24 Now the Pharisees who had been sent 25 questioned him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” 26 “I baptize with water,” John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know. 27 He is the one who comes after me, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.” 28 This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan, where John was baptizing.

Please pray with me…

If there were bad guys in this sermon series it would be these guys. But the problem with that is that they really were not bad. They were misinformed. They had a certain expectation on the Messiah that was not correct. They had fear of the Lord. They were afraid of what would happen if the Messiah came down and the people weren’t ready.

I have talked about this group before. They wanted to be so sure that the Jewish people were ready for their Savior who would conquer their enemies that they made rules around the God made laws to make sure that God’s laws were not going to be broken.

Some of these rules included that you could only walk so far on the Sabbath so that you would be sure that your walking would not be considered working on the Sabbath. You needed to not only wash your hands before you ate but you needed to wash them a second time as a purification ritual to make sure you were clean.

In short,the Jewish leaders believed that they were fulfilling the role that John the Baptist said that he was there for. They believed that they were already preparing the way for the Lord. This is why they wanted to know under whose authority John was acting under, hence the reason why they questioned him.

There were two main groups of Jews during that time. One of them was the Pharisees. They were the keepers of the law. They were the ones that would be able to best interpret the prophecies and try to discern how John fit into them.

The questions that were being asked seems to lead us to believe that this is the group that was talking to John since all of their questions seemed to be related to the prophesies of the coming Messiah.

The other groupwas the Sadducees. They were those that mainly ran the government and worked closely with the Romans who were in charge of this area during this time. These two groups seem to not usually interact with each other.

But the possibility of the Messiah being among them would have also been important information for the Sadducees to know since it may affect the relationship between the Jewish people and the Romans.

One question that we may be led to ask based off of the questions asked to John the Baptist is what is the importance of them asking John specifically about the prophet Elijah. Our first scripture reading this morning gives us our answer.

It was a Messianic prophecy that Elijah would come before the Messiah would arrive. In fact,these are the last words from the book of Malachi which is the last book of what we call the Old Testament.

We will have the disciples of Jesus basically ask him the same question. He responds by stating that John the Baptist fulfilled the role of Elijah by preparing the way for the Lord. They also must have insinuated that they thought it was possible that John was the Messiah.

This would have been in order to allow for them to be able to arrest John. There were false Messiahs before Jesus who claimed to be the Son of God. The Pharisees felt it was their responsibility to get rid of these false Messiahs since they could corrupt the Jewish people. What usually happened is that the false Messiah along with his disciples would be crucified.

Therefore, this gives us two reasons why the Jewish leaders were questioning John. One would be that they really wanted to check and understand how he believed that he should be able to baptize for the forgiveness of sins. The second reason would be that they were looking for a way to get rid of him.

So, what can we learn from the interaction between John and the Jewish leaders? The first thing we can recognize is that John did not quit pronouncing the coming of the Messiah just because he was confronted by the Jewish leaders. We are also called to continue serving the Lord and spreading the word of God even when we face those that are against us.

When we look within the scriptures at Paul, we see someone who was willing to spread the word to places that worshiped multiple gods and he was often mistreated. In 2Corinthians 11 beginning in verse 23 he says

“I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. 24 Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was pelted with stones, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and a day in the open sea, 26 I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my fellow Jews, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false believers. 27 I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked.”

Quite the list,we should feel blessed that we live in a country where we do not have to face most if not all of these things faced by Paul but yet we are often afraid to talk to even our friends about the relationship that we have with Jesus. We need to find a way to get over that fear and let others know about what believing in Jesus has done for us and what believing in Jesus could do for them.

One way we can help those around us is that when we talk to others about our Lord and Savior is to let them know that their hope should not be in human things. Their hope needs to be in Jesus because he is the hope of the world.

Hope is one of the things that many people lack right now around us. I believe it is one of the many reasons that we find people seeking out vices that can allow them to forget about their struggles.

We have people that are trying to fill the emptiness that they are feeling by artificial means. They are giving themselves a short reprieve from their feelings of hopelessness only to have it return and then they begin the cycle again.

This might be you. You may have been trying to forget about your struggles. You may be in person or watching online and you are trying to find hope in the situation that you are currently in. There is someone that you can find your hope in, that person is Jesus.

If you believe in him believe that he is your hope. We can end up allowing the hopelessness of the world be greater than our faith in God. Turn your troubles over to God remove the weight of what you are going through over to him.

If you don’t believe give God a chance. Ask for him to intervene in your life. Cry out to him. Give him the opportunity to be your anchor in your sea of uneasiness and hopelessness. God loves you as you are and desires to be there for you.

This is why believers in Jesus need to let people know that there is someone who cares about them so much that he died on a cross so that they could have hope and so that they can have the joy in knowing that they are loved. This joy, hope, and love are received through a relationship with God through Jesus.

We, as Christians, are not only called to say it but we are also called to show others this love. This is where the Jewish leaders got it wrong. They showed their love for the people by attempting to protect this group of people.

There was no joy or love for others as individuals in their belief system. It was about trying to get the people to follow the law. There was no grace. There was no forgiveness. A person was either doing good or they were bad.

It was all about showing God that they were good enough. It is for this reason that many of them were never able to get passed their understanding of what a Messiah would be and recognize Jesus as the Messiah.

We also may find ourselves in a situation where other Christian’s question what we are doing and why we are doing it. Their questioning you does not mean what you are doing is wrong. It might mean that their theology is different than yours. I hope you noticed that I did not say that their theology was wrong. I only stated that it was different.

If this happens to you just walk away. It is not going to do any good to try to argue with someone who confronts you on what you believe who is already a Christian. In fact, I believe the devil is the one who has caused these divisions. The devil wins whenever Christians argue with each other because who would want to be a part of a group of people that bicker amongst themselves.

By the way this also means that you don’t have to respond to that post or response to a post on social media. You don’t have to tell this person that they are wrong just because they have a different way in which they are following God. Social media has made the division between fellow Christians even more visible. We do not have to respond to it.

What we should do is make sure we are not wrong in our beliefs. We should check scripture and check with God to make sure what is being said is not true. We may discover that we need to change what we believe.

No matter what, our focus needs to mirror John’s focus. Verses 6-8 say that “6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.”

What if we as Christians focused on spreading the word about Jesus instead of arguing amongst ourselves? Both John and Jesus did not let disagreements with Jews that did not agree with them define their ministry.

John continued to let those around him know they should repent and why they should repent. Jesus’ focus was on those that were willing to consider that he was the light of the world.

There are people all over the world that are risking their lives to spread the word of God. I recently received a book written by a friend of mine which is focused on the female saints of Rome including those that were martyred, which means they were killed because they were Christian and were unwilling to change their beliefs.

Some of the things that were done to these women and their children are so atrocious that they can cause you to ask the question how did someone even think of that kind of punishment.

In Acts we have the story of the first Martyr Stephen who after being arrest spoke boldly about all the times the Jews had killed the messenger and ending with these words

“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. 52 Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, 53 you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.” It was after these words that he was stoned.

Yet I and many if not everyone in person and online often are afraid to speak up. We are afraid of what a person will think or how will they react. We allow our fear factor to be greater than our faith factor. We allow the world to have a greater impact on us than God.

Let us be willing to trust that if God has provide us a chance to show our love for God through our words or actions that he has prepared the way just as John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus.

This doesn’t mean we will not face conflict but what we should believe is that what we say and what we do can allow God to be at work in the lives of the people that we are facing. John the Baptist didn’t let the Jewish leaders stop him from fulfilling his calling and we should not allow those around us to stop us from being the hands, feet, and voice for Jesus.

Let’s pray…