The Man In The Middle
THE MAN IN THE MIDDLE – Mark15: 26-32 Luke 23:32-43;
A police lineup (in American English) or identity parade (in British English) is a process by which a crime victim or witness's putative identification of a suspect is confirmed to a level that can count as evidence at trial.
The suspect, along with several other individuals of similar height, complexion and build (these can be prisoners, actors or just random people off the street) stand both facing and in profile while the person making the identification views from behind a one-way mirror. If the victim or witness successfully identifies the suspect from among similar-appearing individuals, the identification is considered valid.
For evidence from a lineup to be admissible in court, the lineup itself must be conducted fairly. The police may not say or do anything that persuades the witness to identify the suspect that they prefer. This includes loading the lineup with people who look very dissimilar to the suspect.
How many folk have been put in jail for crimes that they did not commit? How many sit in a jail today because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time?
What did this Man do who is now sentenced to be crucified?
All he did was:
Be Born in poverty and raised in a ghetto city called Nazareth
At the age o 12 he confounded scholars. Lawyers and doctors in the temple
Turn water into Wine
Heal the Sick
Raise the Dead
Feed 9000 folk. My math is right. One time 5000 and another time 4000.
Walked on water and told the elements of nature to be still
Walk through a crowd of people one day and a woman came up behind him and said if I could just touch the hymn of his garment I will be made hold
Isn’t it amazing that with all of the good that you do somebody isn’t going to like you. You could treat everybody right and try to be nice to people, but yet they will treat you funny, roll their eyes, and talk about you outside of church and in church.
They don’t understand that even while they have you on trial, even while they are scandalizing your name, even while they are about to nail you to a cross that, they too are assisting God to help you get to your destiny. They are helping you accomplish the purposes of God in your life.
Yet he had to go through trials – sound like Double Jeopardy to me.
Trials by the Jews and Trials by the Romans.
Nobody attorney to plead his case. No one there to assist him through the legalities of understanding the Roman authorities.
They were all trying to figure out what was it that he had done. The Jewish leaders could not stand him because he said that he was the “SON of GOD, the Christ, the anointed one.” Up, that is it. The King of the Jews.
Why is that a problem? It’s a problem first because they didn’t believe it. They didn’t get the news of his baptism. How when John fist saw him he said, Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world.
They didn’t get the news that God had opened the windows of heaven and sent the Holy Spirit to rest upon him and declared, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. When nobody else will speak up for you God will speak up for you. It’s the way you live, the way you walk, they way you talk and how you carry yourself everyday. You don’t have to make no special introduction. God already has that covered.
Second, they thought it would be threat to all of the Jews because in that day Caesar was as a god or son of God.
Yet even Pilate declared that He found no fault in him.
Mark 15: 15-20 says that he was scourged and led him to a place called the Praetorium and they called for the whole garrison.
A scourging is a whipping with flagellum consisting of a wooden handle to which metal-tipped leather thongs were attached. One writer says that it was a fearful ordeal ripping the flesh down to the bone, causing severe beating. It was a beating in which often many prisoners died from. To be crucified was a horrible event
They began to beat him, mock him, spit in his face, put a crown of thorns on his head, hit him with a reed on his head. And all of that was the reality of the natural side.
Can you imagine the physical and mental pain that Jesus had to go through?
He is beaten in the Jewish Court and Beaten in the Roman Court.
What happened on the Spiritual side? The devil made a tremendous mistake because Jesus’ blood began to flow. The Bible says that he bore the sins of the entire world? Yet he knew no sin, never committed any sin, neither was sin found in him. Yet:
1 Corinthians 2:7-8 says: “We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the ages of glory, which none of the rulers of this age knew: for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory
Philippians 2:10 – that I may know him and the power of his resurrection. I just don’t want to know
about him, I want to experience him in his power and in his suffering. We need to know him personally for power and for a life changing experience:
Who is the man in the middle: Go to other page
The devil made a tremendous mistake
The Blood began to flow:
Lying, Backbiting, fornication, adultery, hate and the haters, envy and the those who rob and steal, laziness, pride, selfishness, greed, proud looks, he took on abuse of alcohol, drugs and abusers of women, men and children,
The Good News is that there is nothing that you and I have done that God can’t clean up, purged out, or habit that God can’t break out of your life and make you into a new creature because all of these sins can be washed away by the spotless, untainted, unblemished blood of Jesus. The Blood works for your past, present and future sins.
And early Sunday morning, he got up and rose with all power in his hands. That why we call him Jesus the Christ. He is the first to be risen from the dead and he said in Matthew 28 All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.
Now use the other paper: Christ the anointed one.