Second Quarter 2005 Adult Sabbath School Lessons:
Jesus Through the Eyes of Mark

Insights to Lesson 12
Tried and Crucified
June 11-17

(Produced by the Editorial Board of the 1888 Message Study Committee)

The emphasis for this week’s lesson is on the three closing scenes of Christ’s life on earth: Jesus (1) before the Sanhedrin, (2) before Pilate, and (3) on the cross.

The first part of this “Insight” is presented in outline form as we trace the so-called court proceedings conducted by the highest religious authority of Judea and by the government of Rome when Jesus was arraigned and condemned.

Following the outline we will consider, in more detail, Christ and Him crucified and its significance with regard to the end-time message of justification by faith. Both church and state “trashed” liberty of conscience in their treatment of Jesus, the author of this freedom.

1. Jesus is denounced by the Sanhedrin (Mark 14:55-65)

   1. Arraignment before this august assembly.

      1. Frantic efforts to indict Jesus on false charges.

         1. Witnesses were assembled to bring several false testimonies against Him.

         2. Futile were the efforts to incriminate Jesus. The witness program was in confusion because no testimony agreed with the others.

   2. When asked about His divinity, under solemn oath, by the high priest, Jesus affirmed it.

   3. The sitting members of this sanctimonious Supreme Court agreed that Jesus should be put to death as a blasphemer.

   4. Jesus was blindfolded, spit upon, struck, and ridiculed by those Supreme Court justices who put on a senseless circus-like performance. Instead of affirming the principle of presumption of innocence, as given in the Old Testament legal system, this principle of heaven was denied. Christ was presumed guilty by an inquisitorial system.

   5. Because that farce of a trial was conducted at night it was illegal by Jewish law. So, Jesus had to be held over till morning to make it “legal.” They did so by putting him in prison until daylight. “The guards received him with blows” as they took Him off to the guardhouse (Mark 14:65, RSV). The next morning they fulfilled Isaiah 53:8 in that “He was taken from prison” and formally, but fraudulently, charged with crimes against the church and the state.

2. Under the influence of church leaders Jesus was put on trial a second time by the state and sentenced to death by means of crucifixion (Mark 15:1-25).

   1. The conspiracy: the Sanhedrin placed Jesus in chains and brought Him before Pilate.

   2. Pilate became confused and asked Jesus if He is King of the Jews. Jesus answered in the affirmative: “It is as you say” (Mark 15:2).

      1. False charges by the Pharisees. They accused Jesus of many crimes; Jesus made no reply.

      2. It was Pilate’s custom to release one Jewish prisoner each year at Passover.

      3. The mob in that mass of confusion demanded two things: the deliverance of a murderer and the death of Jesus.

      4. Pilate ordered that Jesus be flogged.

      5. Jesus is handed over to the Roman soldiers.

      6. He is mocked, mistreated, and finally crucified.

Christ and Him Crucified

Our Lord quietly suffered and did not fight back, a lesson that Mark’s readers would need to learn as they faced official persecution. We, likewise, need to learn the same (1 Peter 2:21–24).

While we do not know the exact place where Jesus was crucified, it was outside the city walls, the place of rejection. This also signified that He died for the sins of the world (Heb. 13:11–13; John 11:48-52). With this in mind, we proceed with Mark’s historical perspective of Christ’s trial and execution. Along with the other Gospel writers, Mark does not give us a description of crucifixion for this is not necessary. The aim of those writers is not to arouse our pity, but to assure our faith. Most of their readers had witnessed crucifixions, so any details would have been unnecessary.
Crucifixion was such a detestable thing that it was not discussed in decent society. It was one of the most horrible methods of execution ever devised by man. (Read Psalm 22 for a description of some of the mental agonies our Lord’s suffered as He was crucified.)

The condemned usually wore a placard that declared their offense. Pilate wrote the one that Jesus may have worn. It was later hung above Him on the cross. It read: “This is Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.” The Jewish leaders protested, but Pilate for once stood his ground (John 19:19–22). That placard was written in three languages—Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. It preached the universal gospel of Christ and Him crucified. The King of Kings must die for His subjects.

Nature, likewise, proclaimed the gospel. The sun refused to shine. This spoke of the darkness that engulfed the mind of Jesus. The heaving earth and the rent rocks testified to the convulsions of agony that ripped through His mind and heart--that we might be saved.

Not only was there darkness over the land and in the mind of Jesus. There was a deeper spiritual darkness in the minds and hearts of the people who crucified Him (2 Cor. 4:3–6; John 3:16–21; 12:35–41). They did not know they had killed the Lord of glory, their Redeemer.

It was at noon when that miraculous darkness came over the land, and all creation sympathized with the Creator as He suffered. This was not some natural phenomenon, such as an eclipse. It would not be possible to have an eclipse during full moon at Passover. By means of this darkness, God was saying something to the people. For one thing, the Jews would certainly think about the first Passover. The ninth plague in Egypt was a three-day darkness, followed by the last plague, the death of the firstborn (Ex. 10:22–11:9).

The darkness at Calvary was an announcement that God’s Beloved Son, the Lamb of God, was giving His life for the sins of His people and for those of the world. In His death we have life; in His darkness we receive the rays of righteousness (2 Cor 4:6).

Let’s fast-forward 1857 years and beyond.

In words that we can not fully fathom, we are told that if Jesus had been present at Minneapolis, in 1888, He would have been treated “in a manner similar to that in which the Jews treated” Him (The Ellen G. White 1888 Materials, p. 1479). How can this be? First, Jesus comes to us in the proclamation of a message—the gospel. If the gospel is rejected, so is Jesus. Second, when God’s chosen messengers are mistreated, Jesus is abused and crucified afresh. Why was and is this so?

The message of the cross searches our hearts and reproves our hidden sins we love. Like Ahab, it is our tendency to throw blame on the messenger for troubling us (1 Kings 18:17). When rebuked by God through messages He sends us, let us not respond in retaliation as did both religious and civil authorities to Jesus.

In rejecting God's chosen instruments, Christ is rejected and the Spirit of God is insulted. Just as when the Sanhedrin rejected Christ they rejected the Foundation of their faith, so likewise when leadership in Minneapolis rejected the message of Jones and Waggoner, they rejected Jesus, the Foundation of their Advent faith. How is it with you and with me? How do we respond to God’s heaven sent messages today?

Not only did the Sanhedrin reject Christ themselves, but they took the most unfair means to prejudice the people against Him, deceiving them by false reports and gross misrepresentations. History shows that these practices did not end then.

The message of Christ and Him crucified has always been unpopular to the natural heart. For some it is mere folly, while for others it is a stumbling stone. Nevertheless, we must “preach Christ crucified” even though this may be “a stumbling block” to some and “foolishness” to others. To those who respond to God’s call, Christ is “the power of God and the wisdom of God.” (1 Cor 1:23, 24).

Jesus went before both church and state where He was tried and crucified. He went before His beloved church in Minneapolis where again He was tried and crucified in the message and in the messengers sent by heaven. Will this be repeated? “While it seems astonishing to us that the Jews rejected Christ, we ourselves will act out the same thing if we refuse the light for this time” (Manuscript Releases, vol. 3, p. 79).

So, what about you and me?

Will we put Jesus on trial and crucify Him afresh in the end-time? or shall we fulfill His heart longing in that we will be brought to the foot of the cross in heartfelt repentance for what we do to Him? As we respond with sorrow and in faith to the pull of the cross, believing that He forgives, we will be restored, renewed, and strengthened to hear and to obey His voice.

At the ninth hour, Jesus expressed the agony of His soul when He cried out, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Mark 15:33-34). When the Father forsook Him there was such mental and emotional anguish that it caused His heart to rupture. Our sins were the cause of this excruciating experience. Both the Father and the Son suffered and sank under the weight of our sin and guilt. These Heavenly Persons had never been in a like circumstance ever before.

Back in the days of eternity they laid out a plan that would entail untold sufferings within Themselves as they would risk everything in order to save a race who would will to sin. They entered into a solemn covenant to redeem us, no matter what it might cost Them, at some future time. The time had been set by God in His atomic clock, and “when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son . . . to redeem those who were under the law . . .” (Gal. 4:4-5).

In our Redeemer’s saying on Calvary, “My God, My God, Why have You forsaken Me?” we observe two things. The first is the faith of Jesus, which spoke first and twice, “My God, My God.” Secondly, we notice that Jesus also gave voice to His feelings when he cried with a loud cry, “Why have You forsaken Me!?”

From these observations we learn that the faith of Jesus spoke first, and it spoke twice, while His feelings spoke last and only once. Jesus believed, not only in the absence of feelings but against them. This is “the faith of Jesus.” This is the faith we are to “keep,” especially in these last days. This is the “third angel’s message in verity” (Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, April 1, 1890). This is our justification—by the faith of Jesus.

In his rebuke to Peter, Paul clearly joined justification with the faith of Jesus: “a man is . . . justified . . . by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ . . .” (Gal. 2:16, KJV).

Justification “by the faith of Jesus” is the message God would have brought to “Loud Cry” proportions in fulfillment of Revelation 18:1 had it been accepted at Minneapolis. As far back as 1852, in reference to the mighty power of the message of the coming Bridegroom in the summer of 1844, Ellen White wrote concerning the multiplied power of the latter rain: “I saw the latter rain was coming as the midnight cry, and with ten times the power” (Spalding and Magan Collection, p. 4).

Luther considered personal justification by faith “the article upon which the church stands or falls.” Reformational Protestantism is pictured in the book of Revelation as falling and in time will be completely “fallen” (Rev. 14:8; 18:1). This must be consequential to the fact that they have fallen away from the “article” of justification by faith. We, at a personal level, must understand that it is this “article” upon which we stand or fall also. Christ in the “loud cry” message of justification by faith, in the end-time setting of the cleansing of the sanctuary, will be renounced, resisted and rejected as He was in person when He was “Tried and Crucified” by both church and state, as recorded by Mark in this week’s lesson.

—Gerald L. Finneman

[Note: Bible texts are from the NKJV unless otherwise noted.]

Read the study notes for Lesson 13