Will grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's take this opportunity to find our seats. Be sure to silence your electronics so you won't be embarrassed mid-worship. And let us take an opportunity to prepare our hearts for worship. so so so so so you Oh. We welcome all of you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to Dayspring Fellowship. We're delighted that you have made it to worship with us this Lord's Day morning. And I want to especially welcome visitors and encourage you, if you're visiting us for the first time, we'd love to have a record of your visit. There's a guest register on the hall table that you can sign before you leave here today. And also out on the hall table, there's these booklets, Ultimate Questions. We give these booklets away for free to all who join us for worship as just a token of our appreciation for you being here. So be sure to grab one on your way out. And then I want to direct your attention inside your bulletin. You'll see that we're continuing in the Sunday school hour at 945 through Samuel. We're in 1 Samuel 20 this morning, David and Jonathan's friendship. If you were providentially hindered from joining us this morning, that should have been recorded and you can grab that and be blessed by it online this week. Down the page there, you'll see that the sermon passage for next week is going to be John 18. verses 33 through 40. And so if you want to be meditating on those eight verses during the week in preparation for next Lord's Day, you'd be blessed to do that in your private devotion time or your family. worship time, I encourage you to do that as always. And then across the page there we have a number of announcements, so you'll see that the free monthly online resource that I'm recommending this month in order to encourage you to continue reading, but to save money that you can give sacrificially and generously to the work of the ministry. It is a free resource titled A Wounded Conscience Cured by William Bridge. William Bridge was a reformed Puritan pastor who wrote a very helpful book in a very turbulent time, both politically and religiously, in England that helps people think through issues of conscience. And I encourage you to avail yourself of that this month. Also, the ladies are compiling a Dayspring cookbook and are requesting for you, Dayspringers, to send your favorite recipes to be included in this cookbook to Suzy Phillips. This is for the ladies and the men. Also, if you have a favorite recipe to send to Suzy so that it could be compiled in that cookbook, they would appreciate that. The audio recording for the conference that we did last month on church and politics is now available, and so there's a little link there in your bulletin that you can use to listen to that if you want to just go back and re-listen to it or if you weren't able to attend. You can hear what was said. And then I'm excited that in the year 2025, we are going to move on the second Wednesdays of the month to take a break from just the topical lecture series that I've been doing. And we're going to hear testimonies from you, from Day Springers. to just get to know you better. So I'm encouraging you to, you know, share what the Lord has done in saving you and what He's done since saving you. Bring testimony to the Lord. The Lord is glorified in that. You know, many churches have their members stand up and give their testimony as they're joining the church or right before their baptism. We haven't done that. We've shared sort of informally men's prayer breakfasts, I think of mostly. You've heard my abbreviated testimony that I've shared sometimes in a sermon. I plan on giving my full testimony on one of these months in 2025. I encourage you to do the same. I encourage you to write it down, you know, maybe five or six pages or so. I'd be happy to read it over and give you feedback, but if the Lord's leading you to be one of the 12 who shares their testimony in 2025, just see me and I'll be sure to plug you into the schedule to do that. And be planning on attending next year. We're going to have two more lectures in our Wednesday night series this year. Parenting seminars coming up this Saturday, so at Kenny Avenue Baptist Church, That's in South Austin. My good friends, the Sanchez's and the Hayward's, are going to be leading this parenting seminar titled Reaching Your Child's Heart. So Juan and Janine Sanchez, along with Josh and Christina Hayward, will be helping parents of children to lead their children well. The cost is $10 per attendee and child care is provided. You can register or get more information with the link there, but that is this Saturday. I encourage you, if you have children at home or if you know of anyone who is raising children or who are expecting to raise children soon, I would encourage them to attend this event. And then finally, our day spring retreat is this month. And so we are greatly anticipating our time out at the River End Resort in the beautiful area of Hunt, Texas. It'll be October the 25th through the 27th. This is that weekend where we close this church down. The whole church goes out on retreat, and these doors are locked on Sunday morning because Dayspring Fellowship is worshiping together out there and not here at Dayspring Chapel. And so I encourage you, even if you're not coming to the retreat, to get up early that morning, drive out, and join us for worship. Today is the deadline to pay for your room, and so if you have a check to drop into the offering plate, you can do that today. If you've forgotten all about it, worry not. There's a link on our website, a giving link, and you can just use that link to pay for your room. The deadline is today, and we encourage you to go ahead and make payment. There also remains some service opportunities left to help out at the retreat, and those sign-up opportunities are available in the link there in your bulletin. And then be sure, as you plan, to have in your possession one of these yellow flyers out on the hall table. It gives you all the information you need regarding the retreat, what to bring, what's there. And remember that this year, the River Inn has decided for the first time in forever to not give us a late checkout and to enforce their regular checkout time of 11 a.m., which means that we'll need to be packed up and out of our rooms before worship begins that Sunday morning. And it also means that the ladies will have to figure out some logistics in how we're going to heat up leftovers in the millhouse and not in our individual rooms and set that up. So just be praying for that. that change to go well. And remember what you forgot to bring last year and wish you had, and set those aside. Be planning in advance for our time together out at the retreat. Well, as we begin worship this morning, I want to encourage you to take your red hymnals. Red hymnal should be in the rack in front of you, and turn in that red hymnal to hymn number 110, 1-1-0 in the red. You have something to say, Chuck? Yes, for the ladies that were at the ladies' breakfast yesterday morning, they need to have a meeting right after the service for five minutes. Very good. So ladies who were here for the Brown Bag Branch Bible study yesterday, please gather to share in after the service for just a brief meeting. Well, as you hold your place there and hymn 110, stand together please for our call to worship. Our call to worship this morning comes from the first chapter of the Apostle Paul's letter to the Ephesians. Because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him. Having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, which are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at the right hand. in the heavenly places far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come. And he has put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all. Let us sing together. Alleluia! Praise Jehovah! From the heavens praise His name! Praise Jehovah in the highest! All His angels praise, proclaim! All His hosts together praise Him! sun and moon and stars on high. Praise Him, O you heavens of heavens and you floods above the sky. Let them praise His gift, Jehovah, for His name alone is high and His glory His glory is exalted, and His glory is exalted, and His glory is exalted far above the earth and sky. Let them praise his name, Jehovah They were made at his command Then forever he established His decree shall ever stand From the earth, O praise Jehovah All you seas, you monsters all Fire and hail and snow and vapor Stormy winds that hear his call Let them praise His good Jehovah, for His name alone is high. And His glory is exalted, and His glory is exalted, and His glory is exalted far above the earth and sky. All you fruitful trees and cedars, All you hills and mountains high, Creeping things and beasts and cattle, Birds that in the heavens fly, Kings of earth and all you people, Princes, great-earths, judges all, Praises name young men and maidens, Aged men and children small, Let us pray together. Our God and our Father, we do praise you and worship you today, knowing that your praise and worship will not cease throughout all eternity. We thank you, Lord God, for the tender mercies and provisions that you have brought to each of us this week. We thank you for the breath that we breathe and for the day you've created and for the comfort that you have brought to us in times of sorrow and grief. We thank you, Heavenly Father, for every way in which you have poured out your Spirit upon us and every gift and grace that you have given us through Christ Jesus, our Lord and our Savior and our King. It is in his name, the name of Jesus, the author of life, that we approach you this morning to praise you, to draw near to you, to rejoice in your great salvation won upon the cross the substitutionary life and death and resurrection of your Son, Jesus. And we pray, Lord God, that you would now meet with us, that you would be pleased with our singing, that you would commune with us in the Lord's Supper, that our prayers would rise to you and be heard by you and answered by you for Jesus' sake. And we pray, Lord God, that it would be your voice that we hear when your holy word is read and proclaimed. And may all things be done here in this place by these people for your honor and worship and glory alone. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. You may be seated. Take your blue hymnals this time, and we will be turning to hymn number 372, Our God Reigns. The mountains are the feet of Him Who brings good news, good news Announcing peace, proclaiming news of happiness Our God reigns, yes, our God reigns Our God reigns. Our God reigns. Our God reigns. Our God reigns. He had no stately form. He had no majesty that we should be drawn to Him. He was despised, and we took no account of Him. Yet now He reigns with the Most High. Our God reigns! Our God reigns! Our God reigns! Our God reigns! Out of the tomb He came with grace and majesty. He is alive! He is alive! God bless His soul! See here His hands, His feet, His side. Yes, he will. He is alive. Our God reigns. Our God reigns. Our God reigns. Our God reigns. Amen. Now, stay in the blue. We're going to be turning to hymn number 553. near my God to Thee. Nymph, throw in me a cross that raiseth me. Still all my song shall be nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee. Oh, like the wanderer, the sun come down. Darkness be over me, I rest astone. Yet in my dreams I'd be nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee. All of whom may appear, steps unto heaven, All that Thou sendest me in mercy give. Angels to beckon me, mirror my God to Thee, mirror my God to Thee, mirror to Thee. Then with my waking thoughts, bright with Thy praise, Out of my stony griefs, Bethel, I'll raise. So by my woes to Thee, mirror my God to Thee, nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee. Or if on joyful wing cleaving the sky, sun, moon, and stars from God upward I fly, still all my song shall be mirrored my God to thee, mirrored my God to thee, mirrored to thee. Now we have the reading of God's Word. Morning. Scripture reading this morning is from Galatians 3, 10 through 14. All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written, cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the book of the law. Clearly, no one is justified before God by the law, because the righteous will live by faith. The law is not based on faith, on the contrary. The man who does these things will live by them. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit. We celebrate that redemption of Christ becoming a curse for us and giving us the blessing of the Spirit every Lord's Day here as we celebrate the Lord's Supper. And I want to just remind you that this is the Lord's table and not Dayspring's table. And so all who belong to the Lord are welcome to it. And so I want to make it very clear who is invited to partake of this sacred meal. It is for those first and primarily who have trusted on the Lord Jesus Christ alone for salvation. So you are one who has given up on living for number one and given up on the world and you have cast yourself completely on Jesus Christ for for mercy, knowing that you have no goodness in yourself, no righteousness to offer before God, that your only way to stand in an acceptable way before a holy God is covered in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, the one who lived the perfect life that we have all failed to live in obedience to the Father. who died the death that we all deserved to die because of our rebellion and sin against God. So you are one who has been saved by God's grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, to his glory alone. And then secondly, we ask that you be a baptized believer, but we do leave the details of your baptism up to your own individual conscience. So as you look to Scripture, if you're able to answer in the affirmative, Have I obeyed my Lord Jesus in baptism? And then finally, we ask that you not be under church discipline from your local church where your membership resides so that we might respect our Lord as he continues to sovereignly build his church here in this world. As we prepare our hearts now to celebrate the Lord's Supper as one body together, let's turn in our red hymnals to hymn number 244, And let's remember that our Lord suffered for our sins by turning to hymn number 244, he was wounded for our transgressions. Let us sing together. He was wounded for our transgressions He bore our sins in His body on the tree For our guilt He gave us peace From our bondage gave release And with His stripes and with His stripes, and with His stripes our souls are healed. He was numbered among transgressors. We did esteem Him, forsaken by His God. ♪ As our sacrifice he died ♪ Let the law be satisfied ♪ And all our sin ♪ And all our sin ♪ And all our sin was laid on him ♪ We had wondered ♪ We all had wondered far from the fold of the shepherd of the sheep. But he sought us where we were, on the mountains bleak and bare, and brought us home, and brought us home, and brought us safely home to God. ♪ Who can number his generations ♪ ♪ Who shall declare all the triumphs of his cross ♪ ♪ Billions dead now live again ♪ ♪ Myriads follow in his train ♪ ♪ Victorious Lord, victorious Lord ♪ Victorious Lord and coming King. Vanity of vanity, all is vanity and a striving after wind, says the preacher of Ecclesiastes As he works through all of those vanities, the brokenness and the fallenness, and the futility of this fallen and broken world, he comes to the conclusion at the end that we must fear the Lord and obey Him. The fear of the Lord is a very common theme throughout scripture, and have you ever wondered about the relationship between the fear of the Lord, which is held up as a virtue throughout scripture, the relationship between the fear of the Lord and faith in the Lord? Is there a relationship between the two? I believe that there's a strong one, that ultimately the fear of the Lord is faith in the Lord. It's seeing and reverencing and trusting Him for who He is. And I want to explain this from an obscure offering that is mentioned in Deuteronomy 14. You may or may not remember it. In Deuteronomy 14, the Lord commanded each Israelite to take 10% of everything that they had each year, 10% of their grain harvest, cattle, sheep, goats, wine, oil, et cetera, to set it aside. And then they were to take all of it and they were to go to Jerusalem where they were then to eat it as the most amazing feast that a person could ever imagine. That was their offering. And it gets better, it gets better. The Lord, if he prospered you so much that year that you thought there's just no way that I could transport all of the Lord's provision to Jerusalem, then you were instructed to actually take all of it and to sell it all and to turn that into cash. And then arriving in Jerusalem, flush with cash, you were to spend all of that money on whatever you desired, right? Oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink, whatever you wanted, and enjoy it. Enjoy it there before the Lord, before the presence of the Lord, and rejoice. And why wouldn't you rejoice? I mean, you can imagine taking 10% of your annual pay and using it to provide a amazing feast for yourself. This isn't one of those times where you'd say, you know, should I get the smoked brisket or the pork belly or the sausage or the beef ribs? Yes. The answer is yes. They were even to take an extra 10% every three years and set that aside for the Levites and the widows and the orphans and the migrants, the sojourners, so that all could be provided for and everyone could get in on this glorious feast. But why? Why did the Lord have them do this? Well, the Lord through Moses commanded them to do this so that Chapter 14, verse 23, so that you may learn to fear the Lord your God always. Now how did that work? How did setting aside 10% of your income each year in order to feast like there's no tomorrow lead them to fear the Lord? I think the answer is that they were to learn to fear or revere and reverence and stand in awe of and trust God's goodness and kindness and generosity and provision, right? Each time they were tempted to fear because of the circumstances of this world, to fear the things of this world, to fear man and not fear the Lord. Each time they found themselves you know, anxious about finances or needs that they had, they could stop and say, wait a second, remember that feast. That was a reminder that God graciously provided to us that we can trust in him and so we can trust in him again in the midst of this, whatever it may be. It was a tangible reminder of God's goodness and generosity so that they might learn to reverence and revere and see God for who he is and trust their good and their generous God. Doesn't that tell you something about the heart of God towards his people? That he would actually prescribe this feast offering so that his people might learn to rest in him, to trust him, to thank him, to praise him as their great provider. Well, he's done the same for us, not only giving us Deuteronomy 14 to read, but also by giving us this supper before us, this tangible reminder of God's goodness and generosity to us. And withholding nothing but providing his only son for our redemption, so that we might learn to revere and fear. and trust and worship our good and gracious and merciful and generous God. And so I speak as to sensible people. Judge for yourselves what I say. The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body. For we all partake of the one bread. Whoever therefore eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself then and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. Brothers and sisters, let's take a time of silence before the Lord to examine ourselves. Most gracious and merciful Father, as we come to celebrate the Lord's Supper now, we come celebrating the truth that we're not worthy by anything that we have done, but only by what your son, our Lord Jesus, has done for us in giving his life on the cross to save us from our sins. And so we celebrate and we thank you for his body given, for his blood shed. And so we ask for you to bless this bread and bless this cup. Devote them now to their holy use and bless us in partaking of them. To do so by faith alone, in Christ alone, to your glory alone. And so in a worthy manner. In Jesus' precious name we pray. Amen. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you that the Lord Jesus, on the night when he was betrayed, took bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way also, he took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, You proclaim the Lord's death until He comes. This is the body of our Lord, crushed for our iniquities. This cup is the new covenant in Christ's blood, shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins. This is the new covenant in Christ's blood. Please turn to hymn number 651, He Lifted Me, in the red hymnal. Loving kindness Jesus came, my soul in mercy to reclaim. And from the depths of sin and shame, through grace He lifted me. Seeking sin, He lifted me. With tender hand, He lifted me. From shades of night to planes of light, O praise His name! He lifted me. Don't be long before I hurt, Before my sinful heart was stirred, But when I took Him at His word, Forgiven He'd lifted me. From sinking sand, He lifted me. From tender hand, He lifted me. From shades of night, to plains of light, O praise His name, He lifted me. His brow was pierced with many a thorn, His hands by corn, When nails were torn, and from his guilt and grief forlorn, in love he lifted me. From sinking sand, he lifted me. With tender hand, he lifted me from shades of night. Two planes of light O praise His name He lifted me Now on a higher plane I dwell And with my soul I know it's well Yet how am I? I cannot tell He should have lifted me From sinking sea He lifted me And now with your red hymnal still in hand, if you would turn in the back of the red hymnal to page 790. 790 in the back of the red. We're going to read responsibly Psalm 22, 1 through 22. Please stand together. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning? Oh my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer by night, and am not silent. Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One. You are the praise of Israel. In you our fathers put their trust. They trusted, and you delivered them. They cried to you, and were saved. In you they trusted, and were not disappointed. But I am a worm, and not a man. scorned by men and despised by the people. He trusts in the Lord. Let the Lord rescue him. Yet you brought me out of the womb. You made me trust in you even at my mother's breast. Do not be far from me, for trouble is near, and there's no one to help. Many wolves surround me, strong wolves with a strong uncertainty. Roaring lions tearing their prey open their mouths wide against me. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of choice. My heart has turned to wax. It has melted away within me. Dogs have surrounded me. I can count all my bones. People stare and gloat over me. But you, O Lord, be not far off. O my strength, come quickly to help me. Deliver my life from the swords, my precious life from the power of the dogs. Rescue me from the mouth of the lions. Save me from the horns of the wild oxen. I will declare your name to my brothers in the congregation. I will praise you. Let us pray together. Our gracious and blessed Lord Jesus Christ, we thank you, Lord and King, that you were pierced for our transgressions, that by your blood you have washed away the guilt of our sin. And we thank you, Heavenly Father, that you are working all things together for good to those who love you, who are the called according to your purpose, sovereignly caring for us. And so we pray for all of those in our congregation who are in need of you today, that they would find in you their all in all. And we especially lift up to you, Bill and Susie and Courtney and Cole, as they Grieve at this time of year the loss of grant. I pray Lord that you would bind up their wounds that you would heal them of the recurring stress and nightmare of it all, that you would attend to their hearts and souls to give them hope, to give them comfort, to give them a rest in you. We lift up to you our sister Carol Du Bois and pray, Lord, for her as she grieves the loss of her mom. We pray that you would be her strength, that you would be her all in all and her comfort. We pray for all of those who are sick, that you would heal their bodies, for all of those who are unable to be with us today, that you would bless them in your word. We pray for all who are in various circumstances, who need your grace, who need your provision and your protection, we ask that you would be with them, Lord. We pray, Father, for our world, for those who are living out there in the midst of violence and warfare, that they would know your peace. We pray for President Biden and all of our earthly leaders. We pray that you would bless them, that you would ensure that the gospel is preached in the White House and throughout the world, that you would plunder the house of the strong man whom Jesus has bound, and so add to your church daily as many as are being saved. Be with all of our Dayspring missionaries as they announce this good news throughout the world. We pray that you would fill Pastor Marshall Canales with your Holy Spirit this morning as he proclaims your word to Emmaus Church in Georgetown. We pray that you would be with all of those who labor to spread the gospel, both here at home and this city and across the whole mission field of this earth. We pray, O God, that all Israel would be saved according to your promise, according to your word, and that Jesus would come quickly to restore all things, that the whole earth might be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. In Jesus' name and for his glory we pray, amen. Well, you may be seated, and our children may go out to Children's Church at this time. And as they go out, please turn with me in your copy of what we confess here to be God's inspired, inerrant word, back to John's gospel, the gospel of John, and to chapter 18, where we're going to look today at the very beginning of the Roman trial of Jesus. Jesus is on trial, if you remember over the sermons over the last few weeks, the Jewish leaders had already had Jesus arrested in the middle of the night out in the Garden of Gethsemane. And then they dragged him back to the house of the high priest. That Jewish trial had three stages to it. There was this initial questioning by Annas, one of the high priests, then a preliminary trial before the rooster crowed by a kind of subcommittee of the court, and then the whole Sanhedrin, all 71 of them, the whole great Jewish court got together after the rooster crowed. in order to declare Jesus guilty. Well, now in verse 28, with Jesus duly condemned by the Jewish officials, these Jewish leaders dragged Jesus, his hand bound in some way or another, through the city to the headquarters of the Roman governor. So I'll begin reading for us here in verse 28. Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor's headquarters. It was early morning. They themselves did not enter the governor's headquarters so that they would not be defiled but could eat the Passover. So Pilate went outside to them and said, what accusation do you bring against this man? They answered him, if this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you. Pilate said to them, take him yourselves and judge him by your own law. The Jews said to him, it's not lawful for us to put anyone to death. This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. Now over the next chapter or so, like the middle of chapter 18 down through the middle of chapter 19, John's going to be giving us all kinds of details about Jesus's Roman trial that no other gospel writer actually gives us. But for today, we're looking at these five verses that show us just the very first few minutes of Jesus's Roman trial. And we want to do it in three sermon points this morning, three points to the sermon. Number one, the Jews' hypocrisy, the hypocrisy of the Jews. Number two, Pilate's choice, Pilate's dilemma. And then number three, something I'll give to you later. That's not the name of the point. I will literally give you the name of the third point later. Here's the main idea that through these three points John wants you to see and I want you to see. The main idea of our passage is this. For all the theater of what's going on here, for all the politics, for all the drama, it wasn't ultimately Jesus who was on trial here. It was his enemies, and it's you. For all that's happening here, it wasn't ultimately Jesus who was on trial here. It was his enemies who were on trial, and it's you. What you need to understand in John's story is that Pilate's ultimate decision was not whether to put Jesus to death. Pilate's ultimate decision, far more important than whether to put Jesus to death, and underneath that and deeper than that, Pilate had to decide, first and foremost, what he really thought about Jesus. whether he really believed the things that Jesus was saying about himself. And that's where the drama of this story really lies. So let's start looking at it with point number one, the Jews' hypocrisy. So we see here the hypocrisy of the Jews, that's the first thing. that I want you to see here. John actually, he gives very little time in his book to Jesus's Jewish trial. Probably, like I said last week, because it's told in such great detail in the other three gospels. So he's just kind of, he's filling in the details about Jesus's initial questioning by Annas, but then he didn't tell us anything about the other two phases of the Jewish trial. But what you gotta understand is that by around six o'clock a.m., The Jews had already done their part. They had condemned Jesus of blasphemy, and now the next step is for them to put Jesus to death for blasphemy. The problem, remember, is that they couldn't do it themselves. They couldn't sentence anybody to death. They couldn't carry out a death penalty because they were a conquered, subjugated people. And so they had to get the Romans' permission in order to put anybody In fact, they had to get the Romans to actually do it, to perform the execution, because they couldn't do it themselves legally. So here they are hoping for a really quick sort of, you know, check-the-box decision from Pilate, saying, yep, I trust you guys, my soldiers will go ahead and crucify this guy if that's what he thinks best. Now, if you look at verse 28. They led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor's headquarters. It was early morning. They themselves didn't enter, etc. The they there that begins that sentence is undefined, but it's probably some kind of collection of Jewish temple guards and Roman soldiers who've arrested him, and you've probably got some of the Sanhedrin, some of the Jewish leaders that went with him, maybe even Caiaphas, though we don't have any idea. It probably was not the whole, you know, 71-member Sanhedrin, but some of them obviously went because they're the ones that carry out this dialogue here with Pilate. And notice to where they lead Jesus. They lead Jesus to the governor's headquarters. That's the word praetorium in both Greek and Latin. the governor's headquarters, which moved, depending on where he chose to set up shop. It's the seat of the governor, the seat of the emperor's representative, wherever he happens to be, and during this feast season, he is in Jerusalem. And it's early morning, the sun has just come up, the roosters crowed, so you've got all this scene-setting detail here in verse 28. But then in the second half of that verse, really kind of unexpectedly, John, the writer of this book, strikes like a cobra in the face of the Pharisees. So look at the second half of verse 28. The Jewish leaders themselves did not enter the governor's headquarters so that they would not be defiled, but could eat the Passover. OK, now a surface level reading of that may look just like more scene setting. I mean, it explains why over the next few verses and on into the next chapter. Pilate's going to have to keep running back and forth from the judgment hall out to the courtyard and back into the judgment hall and then back out to the courtyard. Why he does this seven or eight different times, why? Because the Jews would not go inside his house, and it's explaining that, you know, historical In fact, the Jews, they wouldn't go inside any Gentile house because they believe that according to Old Testament law, to go into a Gentile home, well, that could too easily make them ritually unclean and therefore unable to participate in any of the Jewish religion's rituals. but all the more so when it came to the house of a Gentile Roman in particular, because it was thought and really known that the Romans, they would regularly, regularly bury the remains of aborted babies in the floors of their houses. There's even a passage in the Jewish law book, the Mishnah, which is sort of a rabbinic commentary on the Old Testament that talks about the Roman Gentiles having corpses the size of olives that were buried in the entryways to their homes. And Jews, they couldn't be anywhere near that without rendering themselves unclean. So these Jewish leaders, they wouldn't go in for fear of defiling themselves and not being able to eat the Passover. Now this is Friday, the Jewish leaders had eaten the initial Passover meal the night before, just like Jesus and his disciples had, but the reason it says they wanted to eat the Passover is because there were a lot more ritual meals to be eaten over the course of the whole Passover week, and eating all of those meals throughout the week, it was often referred to as eating the Passover. It wasn't just that one initial meal. It was all of them, a whole week's worth of them. And these guys, they didn't want to miss out on any of those sacred meals. They wanted to eat the Passover, the whole thing. And so they don't go inside Pilate's house. How noble and religious of them. How noble and religious of them, right? I mean, these guys are the cream of the religious crop. They're getting every jot and tittle of the law just right. They've got everything in order so that they can very piously go through all the rituals that a good religious person goes through. And at the very same moment, they just made a mockery of Jesus's trial. They had just twisted the Old Testament scriptures to their own purposes. They had just bald-faced lied to get the results that they wanted, and all because their position and their own pride was threatened if they didn't get Jesus. out of their way, and yet they're still thinking highly of themselves as religious people who need to observe these religious things. So here in the fact that the Jews would not step foot inside the Gentile praetorium, John does not want you to see religious piety here. He wants you to see rank hypocrisy in these men. He wants you to see this group of men who were meticulously fastidious about the law, about religious ritual, but they had zero of what really counts to God in their hearts. They were devoid of true virtue. They had zero love, zero regard for justice, and zero recognition of their own Messiah, zero faith. That's what John wants you to see. Now, most of us here at Dayspring, we take Christianity very seriously. And insofar as there are routines and even rituals that are inherent to Christianity, we tend to take those things seriously too. And so we show up here on Lord's Day mornings, and we sit under the preaching of the Word of God, and we sing, and we pray, and we read scripture, and we recite psalms. We do all of those things which are in fact rituals and liturgy. We celebrate the Lord's Supper together every Lord's Day. We read our Bibles. We pray through the prayer directory during the week. We do all of those things, and those things become just a kind of life rhythm for us. And that's good. That's a good thing. I'm glad that we do those things as a church. I'm glad that we have those good and healthy routines and rhythms and even rituals. But the challenge of this verse right here, verse 28, is this. Do you ever let those routines and rhythms become for you what the Jewish rituals have become for these Pharisees? Just routines that don't actually affect how you live. I mean, it's early in the morning on this day, and these guys, they already have blood on their hands, and yet at the same time, just zombie-like, they're suddenly stumbling forward with this concern about religious ritual cleanness, about doing all the right religious stuff, right? That's a real challenge. It's a real question for Christians, for Dayspringers. How does all of this that we do affect your life outside of all of this, right? When you go to work, when you get off of work, when the weekend comes? Do you go to work and leave work and live through the weekend as a Christian, determined to live and act as one? Or do you tend to sort of drop your Christianity like an overstuffed robe when you walk out those red doors and all the ritual is over? I sure hope and pray that your Christianity is not, for you, just a liturgy. I hope it's a whole life. Because if it's not, then no matter how many times you go to church, no matter how many times you sing the songs and sit under the preaching and celebrate this supper, at the end of the day, you're no better off than these Jewish leaders were. Jesus says that your righteousness, it must exceed that of the scribes and the Pharisees. All these things that we do as Christians, whether you call them rituals or liturgy or something else, all of them are useless, absolutely useless, if your hearts are empty. You can't just go to church with an empty heart, with no real virtue, no real love, no real faith, and expect grace just to come to you. come to you just by doing the ritual, as the Roman Catholic Church falsely teaches. Ex apere apparato, they say. Just in the doing of it, you receive grace. No, it doesn't work that way. That's why John nails the Pharisees here. They had religion. They had all the trappings of religion, but they had no real virtue, no love, no hope, no faith. So their religion was worthless, it's worthless. Here's number two, the second thing this morning, Pilate's dilemma, Pilate's choice or Pilate's dilemma. If you look on into verse 29, We're finally here introduced to one of the most famous, without a doubt, and frankly, one of the most enigmatic characters in the entire story of Jesus's life, a guy named Pontius Pilate. I mean, he is just notorious, and he's notorious in all kinds of different directions. You can see some of the notoriety of Pontius Pilate just in the fact that John here, he calls him just Pilate. There's no Pontius Pilate. much less all three names that the Romans always had, right? Gaius, Julius, Caesar, you know, they always had those three names. Here, John just calls him by one, his last name, Pilate. Now, the other Gospels introduced us to him with his second name, Pontius, but obviously, by the time that John's writing, everybody knew who this guy was, so he didn't even have to say the full name. He just says Pilate. Everyone knows who he's talking about. But people only know Pontius Pilate because of these few hours of history right here. I mean, this is it for him. This is his whole life career. This is his legacy, these nine hours or so. Pontius Pilate was just this mid-level manager in the Roman Empire that no one knows about. He's been appointed procurator, which is a Latin Roman word for a representative of the emperor. He'd been appointed procurator over the region of Judea, which included Jerusalem. We don't know much about him. We know he was married, but we don't know to whom he was married. We know he must have had some connections in the Roman imperial hierarchy because, you know, if he had really big connections, he wouldn't be out here in the deserts of Judea. He'd be back home in Rome or at the head of an army or something like that. So he's not really that big of a deal. And we just don't know much about him. What we do know, though, is that over the course of these nine hours or so, this no-name bureaucrat became one of the most famous people in the history of the world. I mean, can you imagine? I mean, there's literally no other man, other than Jesus Christ himself, who is named in the Apostles' Creed, which is recited every Lord's Day in churches all over the world, right? Suffered under Pontius Pilate. It's just stunning. He's one of the most famous people in the whole world, and he's a no-name bureaucrat. But even so, for all of that, he's still a puzzle. He's a bit of an enigma. I mean, if you compare Pilate to the Pharisees, you don't get this straightforward cartoon character of evil, right? He's not like, ah, another Jew to crucify, yes. No, no, no. I think we sometimes get a false understanding of the Romans sometimes because we think of you know, all of the homosexuality, the brutality of the Roman Colosseum, the orgies of Emperor Caligula. And there were some dark times in the Roman Empire. But for the most part, like Romans, they upheld ideals like truth and justice and goodness. And they were raised to sort of, if you think back to the British Empire and the ideals of the British Empire, The Roman Empire was very similar. They were very patriotic and very religious, and they saw themselves as bringing order and bringing civilization to the barbaric and uncivilized world. Pilate would have been interested in order and peace and justice. He's not, you know, Dr. Evil. Pontius Pilate. He's just not, compared to the Pharisees. I'd say he even seems fairly level-headed. I mean, three times through these verses, he's going to declare Jesus to be innocent. And he genuinely seems to want to apply Roman law legally, and not just go along with the Pharisees' sham trial. He's not interested in railroading Jesus. And look at verse 29. You can see that there. Pilate goes out to them and asks them this question. What charge do you bring against this man? Now that's a question, but it's also what you're supposed to say as a Roman procurator when you're starting a trial. It's the beginning of a formal Roman trial seeking to do justice. And the Jews were absolutely not expecting that question. It's not what they wanted. They wanted to walk in and just get the box checked on a particular document and then have him handed over to the Roman soldiers to be crucified. That's why they're answering verse 30 is so weird. Notice how they answer him. If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you. That is not an answer to the question, what charge do you bring against this man? It's not an answer at all. It's just a trust us. Don't worry about the charges. Just trust us. We know what we're doing here. They just wanted Pilate to go along with them, just sign Jesus's death warrant and let's get on with the crucifixion. But here, Pilate is stepping into the middle of this whole thing as procurator and saying, no, I'm not gonna do that. We're gonna have a trial. It's weird that he does that because for all of his notoriety, for all of the hand washing and all of the rest that's coming later, Pilate, he shows a significant amount of regard here for getting to truth, getting to justice. And he even shows a significant desire to let Jesus go free. He tries to do that in several different ways to let Jesus go free. I mean, you look at the rest of the story. First, he tries actually to argue the Jews out of this. And then he decides, well, maybe if I can just have him flogged I can make them see that he's not as big a threat as they think he is, and they'll let him go. And then finally, he tries the whole thing with Barabbas, you know, to do the swap and get Jesus released. He tries several different things to set this innocent man free until the end when he throws it all away because he's scared, because he's scared. But he's complex, he's complex, I mean, We here, as Reformed Protestants, we generally think of Pilate as the sort of, you know, sniveling coward who tried the whole washing his hands of Jesus routine. But there are other traditions in Christianity. Christendom did say that Pilate ultimately became a Christian. That's old Christian tradition. The Eastern Orthodox Church even calls him Saint Pontius Pilate. Did you know that? He's complex, and we're gonna be getting to know Pilate pretty well over the next few weeks. But I think for now, for now the most important thing to notice here about Pilate is that as soon as the Jews walk into his praetorium with this captive in their arms, Pilate is caught on the horns of a dilemma. It's a hard dilemma, but it's not an impossible dilemma. He's got a choice to make here. He's got a choice to make about who he's going to stand with. And ultimately, ultimately, he's got a choice to make about who he's going to believe. And John really dramatizes that dilemma. He dramatizes the choice, the fact that Pilate's kind of swinging back and forth between two options, back and forth and back and forth. How does John do that? Well, look at that phrase there in verse 29, that Pilate He went outside to them. Why does he do that? Why does he go outside to them? Well, he goes outside, of course, because in their religious hypocrisy, the Jews wouldn't come inside. They're not going to go in. But that's also, him going outside to them is also the beginning of something that the Apostle John does over and over in the next few verses. So look at verse 33. Pilate entered his headquarters again. Verse 38, after he said this, he went back outside to the Jews. Chapter 19, verse 4, Pilate went out again. 19.9, he entered his headquarters again. 19.13, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat. You see what's going on there? John is showing Pilate shuffling inside and outside, back and forth, seven or eight different times, over and over again. You see the point? He's swinging back and forth between Jesus inside the judgment hall, Jesus telling him about God's heavenly kingdom, and the Pharisees outside warning him that he's going to lose his position in the emperor's earthly kingdom. And Pilate has to choose. Which way is he going to go? Who is he going to listen to? He's got to make a decision. And frankly, so do you. So do you. You've got to make a decision about Jesus. I mean, it's like seven different times in this story. Pilate goes running between Jesus and the world. And when he's with Jesus, he seems genuinely drawn to Jesus. He's willing to listen to him, to ask him questions. He seems like he's trying to understand. But then ultimately, when he runs outside to the world, he turns his ear to the Pharisees, to their warnings that you're gonna lose your position in the world if you side with Jesus here, seven times. But how many times has it been for you that you've run back and forth between Jesus and the world, really wanting to listen to Jesus, wanting to understand Jesus, having your heart kind of turned toward Jesus, and yet when you get outside of these four walls and the world starts speaking to you again, you're now being shaped and influenced and seduced by the lies of the world. If that's you, if that's you this morning, you need to let this moment right here, this day, be the day that you stop scurrying back and forth. between Jesus and the world. Make a decision right here, right now. Make a clean break. You know how to do that? It's easy. It's so easy. People have this mystical idea that becoming a follower of Jesus is some weird thing that you kind of have to wait for to have happen to you. It's not. There's no burning in the bosom or something that you have to wait for. There's no weird thing that has to happen to you as you're staring up at the night sky. That's not it. You just sit here, and you listen to what I'm saying, and you trust that Jesus can save sinners like you and me, and you follow him from this day forward. You don't have to wait on a feeling. You don't have to feel a certain way at all. You don't have to cry. You just have to go, yeah, I think Jesus is who he says he is, and I am trusting on him to save me. I am his now, and he's mine. Will that be costly for you? Of course, it'll be very costly for you. It'll cost you your whole life. It'll cost you everything you've got. Because it all becomes about Jesus at that point. No longer looking out for number one, it's all about Jesus. To side with Jesus, it would have been very costly for Pontius Pilate, too. He could have lost his position. He could have lost his life. But he would have gained everything. Pilate was stuck in a dilemma. He was caught between Jesus and the world, scurrying back and forth and back and forth between the two of them. And if you're here today or listening online and you're not a Christian, well, guess what? You are now stuck in a pilot-like dilemma because the Bible has put you there. Me talking to you for this long has put you into that kind of a dilemma. I mean, maybe it's possible that before that, you weren't stuck in a dilemma, that you were free to just pursue this world because you didn't really know anything about Jesus. You'd never been confronted with Jesus, but now you're stuck, and you've got a choice that you have to make. Are you gonna choose the world and ultimately death, or are you gonna choose Jesus and ultimately life, eternal life? Well, here's the third thing, last point, which I haven't given to you yet, but here it is. So the Jews' hypocrisy, Pilate's dilemma, and now third, Jesus' purpose. Jesus' purpose. Have you noticed throughout this part of the story, it's only five verses, but have you noticed who basically has not made an appearance yet in this story? Jesus. I mean, at best, you get this kind of oblique, distant look at him in verse 28 as he's being led to the praetorium, right? He's the prisoner being led. But he's not saying anything, he's not doing anything, he's not active, he's completely passive, right? He's being led off by other people who are the main characters in this particular story. Jesus is just not a major character in this little part of the Gospel. I mean, this part of the story is about the great machinery of the state, right? This is the Jewish Sanhedrin interacting with the Imperium of Rome. This is, you know, great men deciding the fate of a nobody. But then in verse 32, the Apostle John surprises us. We got to get a little bit of a running start. So look at verse 31 before we go to 32. So in verse 30, the Jews, when asked to provide a charge against this arrested man, they say, trust us. Pilate says in verse 31, take him yourselves and judge him by your own law. In other words, why are you bringing this guy to me and why are you bringing me into it if you're not gonna make a formal charge against him? You wanna railroad this guy? Go handle it yourselves and leave me out of it. And they say, well, Of course, the problem is that it's not lawful for us to put anyone to death, because you Romans have taken that right away from us. Now, if Pilate didn't know it before already, he knows now. He knows now that the Jews, their whole purpose for bringing this case before him was because they wanted Jesus put to death, and they didn't have the power to do that. I mean, you can look at places like Acts 7, for instance, where they did stone Stephen to death. They can get away with this kind of winking at mob violence, but they cannot judiciously put someone to death. They cannot execute anybody officially, judiciously, without Pilate signing off on it. And so that's why they've come. But now put your eyes on verse 32. This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. Now, I want you to look at that again and read it carefully. Sometimes we read that sentence as saying something like, the Jews, they said this thing. It's not lawful for us to put anyone to death. The Jews said this thing so that the word would be fulfilled that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was gonna die. As if it's kind of this idea that it's just them saying that they wanted Jesus to die on a cross instead of dying by the stones, and so that's why they say this thing to Pilate. But if you look carefully, that's not what it says. Verse 32 does not say that the Jews said this because. It just says, this was to fulfill. Now what is the this? This was to fulfill. It's not just that they said this whole fact that the Jews didn't have authority to execute people. And here's what I want you to see from that. The fact that the Jews didn't have authority to execute is the result of long centuries of historical events, really going all the way back to the Babylonian exile. And what John is marveling at here is that that whole centuries-long sequence of historical events happened so that the Jews would be under Roman authority so that Jesus would die on a cross. when Jesus himself had said that over and over again. Remember how many times in the Bible he tells his disciples, I'm gonna be delivered over to the Jews and then to the Romans, and they're gonna put me to death by crucifying me on a cross. And all the other times when he says, I'm gonna be raised up and all men are gonna be drawn to me as I'm lifted up like the serpent in the wilderness. All people who look to me will be saved. Even in the Old Testament, right, the plan was already in place. Remember the psalm, we just read it. When David, the king, he says about the action of his enemies against him, they have pierced my hands and my feet. Why on earth would a Jewish king say that 1,000 years before the Romans came on the scene? Nobody was piercing hands and feet at that time. It's just weird. But he says it because the plan that the Messiah, the greater David, would die upon a Roman cross was already in place. You see the point? Even though Jesus never even makes an appearance in this story, John is saying he is still completely in control. He is the one in charge, stretching back for centuries. But still, why? I mean, why did God orchestrate all of these centuries to take the power of execution away from the Jews to give it to the Romans who just so happened to practice execution of non-Romans by crucifixion? Why orchestrate it so that Jesus would die on a cross and not some other way? Well, it's because no other way, no other way would make it so clear exactly why Jesus was dying. According to scripture, to be hung from a tree in death, to be hung on a piece of wood in death, was to be cursed by God. And that's exactly the meaning of Jesus Christ's death on the cross. When he died, hanging from that tree, he died under a curse, under a divine curse, under his father's curse. Only it's not a curse that otherwise would have fallen upon him, right? He didn't deserve it. Who did? Who deserved that curse? His people. His people deserved that curse to be executed against them for their sin, for their rebellion, for their unbelief, and yet he's taking it on himself. This is why the Apostle Paul says, as we heard Cliff read for us earlier, That cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law and do them. In other words, you don't conform yourself to the Bible and do all that the Bible says. That's you, that's me, that's all of us. If you're not complete and whole in your obedience to God, then you are under a divine curse, a curse of death. And then Paul writes this, but Christ redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for us. For it is written, and then he quotes Deuteronomy, cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. So that in Christ Jesus, he writes, the blessing, not the curse, the blessing of salvation might come. to those who simply believe, believe in Him. I mean, do you see it? The whole thing, the whole thing was orchestrated by our sovereign God. The machinery of the Roman Empire, the entire machinery of history was put into play by the providential, sovereign hand of God Almighty. And He did that so that you would see, so that you would look and you would see Jesus dying on the cross and know that He is taking the curse for you. What an incredible truth. What an incredible, amazing thing. What good news. When Jesus died on the cross, when they put the nails through his wrists and the nails through his ankles, they were not taking his life. He was offering it. He was giving it as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, as the true and better David. who is giving his life for the lives of his people to his glory and honor and praise forever. Let us pray. Merciful Father, how we praise you and honor your son Jesus today as the suffering servant of Isaiah, as the Messiah, the King of Israel, as the King of kings and the Lord of lords, as the one whose hands and feet were pierced, as the true and better David. Our Lord Jesus, we honor you as the one who gave yourself to be cursed so that the curse wouldn't fall upon us who deserve it. And now you sit enthroned over all the universe and call all men and women to come to you and be saved. Lord, we pray that there wouldn't be anybody in this place today who would leave here without knowing you as Lord and Savior. God, that is our prayer. And we pray that you would do it this morning for the honor and the glory of your son, Jesus. We pray all of this in his name. Amen. Amen. Well, please stand together. I want to encourage ladies who were at the Brown Bag Brunch and Bible study yesterday to meet up back here with Sharon just for a few minutes. And be sure to greet one another, to greet our visitors, and to pay for your retreat rooms if you haven't done that already. Today is the deadline. And now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of His Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.