Passion Sunday (Palm
Sunday) April
17, 2011
Matthew 27:11-66 Silence
in Golden?
Dear fellow redeemed,
It's something young children have never understood. Silence may be a good thing.
* You volunteer to
have the grandkids stay at your place for a few days so your daughter
may go on a well-deserved vacation. Three of the five days have gone by and you
think
you're going to go crazy. What do you mean you've seen enough movies
and you want
to play?
* Then again, maybe
adults have just as much trouble with silence.
* A friend comes to
see you at the funeral home after your mother has
died.
It's the last few minutes of the visitation, and
she wants to comfort you.
* However, she can't
find the right words, and you can see the uneasiness in her face.
A few moments of silence seem like an eternity
for her.
* Finally, you speak
first. "It's all right. You don't have
to say a thing.
Actually we're all talked out, are quite
exhausted, and would prefer some quiet.
Just coming here means more to us than you'll
ever know.
* Silence is
Golden. It may never seem so at
first, but often times we come to understand.
So what about the silence of our Lord?
* He's on trial for
treason, blasphemy and for claiming to be king over and against Caesar.
Every charge is fabricated. The religious leaders are simply envious of
Christ and do not
want to lose their authority over the people.
Should they get their way? What are we to make of Christ's silence?
* We comment first
on the governor and how:
I - Pontius Pilate reacts to Christ's silence.
* "Do you not hear how many things they testify against you?" he asks Jesus.
The idea that Silence Should
be Golden, that Jesus should see some purpose in failing to
defend himself, was
inconceivable. If Jesus could help
Pilate make a case for "not
guilty", why not let the governor
in on it? He had every reason to believe
Jesus was
innocent.
* But Jesus "gave him no answer, not
even to a single charge."
This left Pilate
amazed, frustrated and fearing a revolt among the Jews.
* Finally, he can think of nothing more to say to the people.
The easier thing in his opinion instead of
defending Christ, was to follow suit, become
silent himself. So he washes his
hands before the crowd and says, "I am innocent
of this
man's blood." You don't want to listen to me? Fine!
Next there's
II - Many onlookers (who) react to Christ's silence.
* The possibility
that Silence was Golden never crossed their minds.
1 "If this were God, surely he would say
something.
2 He would do something to get himself out of this
predicament.
3 Or he would have prevented this debacle from happening in
the first place."
* "But look at this
pathetic scene. There he stands and
utters not a word!
He must be a fraud just like the pharisees and chief priests have been claiming."
* So they mock him.
The soldiers twist together a crown of thorns and, kneeling before
him pretend to honor him saying, "Hail, King
of the Jews."
* In addition, those passing by taunt him. "You who
would destroy the temple and rebuild
it in three days, save
yourself! If you are the Son of God,
come down from the cross."
* The religious
leaders say the same thing. "Let him come down from the cross, and we
will believe in him."
Well, we can understand it when the world makes no sense out of a Silence
that is Golden.
* Unfortunately, we
may also comment on how:
III - The believer
reacts to Christ's silence.
* Yes. It's two thousand some years later. The crucified Jesus has risen.
He's ascended to heaven and now sits at the
right hand of the Father.
* But we still sense
there are times when, for his own name's sake, he could speak up.
People are still having trouble with his identity. They need more proof who he is.
* It wasn't so long ago
when the Jehovah's Witnesses last stopped by your home.
Deep down you didn't want to turn them
away. You wanted to say something about
the
God-Man. You wanted to point out
that Jesus is no Savior unless the blood he sheds on
the cross is God's blood, since God alone can take our sins away.
* And your
instruction has been everything it should be.
You're thinking: "I went through confirmation
instruction. I attend Pastor's Bible
study.
I get to church and hear the sermon on a regular
basis."
* "But sometimes my words are not convincing enough. Why can't we have a passage that
settles the argument once and for all, something that "the man, Jesus
Christ, is also the
eternal and only true God?" as though God's Word is insufficient.
* In other instances we want a word that will persuade our
relative that the only one
forsaken by God was his Son. "God
is not silent in your life. Just read
God's Word!
He's talking to you! If the Lord has redeemed you eternally, he'll
take care of you
today." "Sufficient for the day is its own trouble" (Matthew 6:34).
* But you're
thinking: "nothing I quote from the Bible gets through to this loved one."
Is your silence, Lord, really golden?
* In some form or
another, I suspect, we all
ask that question, and more than just once
or
twice. We just wish we could get some reaction
out of Jesus, an indication of some kind
that he's not he's not standing
before us as he did Pilate, that today his Word can be
heard. It's enough both for us and that relative or
friend of ours who's feeling abandoned.
* You want a
reaction? Let's comment on how Jesus
reacts to our situation as sinners.
You talk about a pathetic scene. After Adam's fall, we had
nothing we could say had we
wanted to. Our sin had absolutely cut us off from
God. We had no defense against the
immeasurable charges that stood
against us.
* Had our future depended upon our ability to argue our case,
we'd have lost all hope.
Sometimes the words are just not there.
* I'm reminded of my
longest moment as a child. It was at the
children's Christmas service
when I was about five years
old. And yes, back then we all memorized
our lines.
* So I knew what I
was supposed to say, word for word.
But I simply could not get my line to come
out. There I stood. It was my turn to speak.
But as surely as I aware of this, so was
everyone else. And that was all she
wrote.
* You know,
sometimes there's a subtle difference between being frightened into
silence
and being frightened because
of silence.
* That's how it is
for those condemned by God's Law. In the
first case, it's the sinner's
own silence that haunts him. What can he possibly say to God to change his
destiny.
And in the second case, it's God's silence that
haunts him. Say something, please?
* But that's why
Jesus was silent for us. In our
place he faced his mockers and
executioners. "I gave my back to those who strike, and my
cheeks to those who pull out
the beard" we read earlier:"I hid not
my face from disgrace and spitting."
* It may get us
thinking. Humiliation and ridicule are
indignities everyone of us may
expect to endure as believers in
Christ. But no Christian, so long as
he's by nature a
sinner, can put up with such things willingly and
gladly.
* Only Jesus Christ,
the Holy One of God, who's without sin, was capable of that.[i]
Jesus was silent both before God and sinners, so that we wouldn't
have to be.
* And as we make
sense out of it, that the silence of our Lord Jesus truly is golden,
we note one more reaction to his silence.
V -
The Father reacts to Christ's silence.
* In the words of
the apostle: "therefore God has highly
exalted him and bestowed on him
the name that is above every
name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under
the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
* Paul speaks of the
day when the dead shall rise from their graves and Christians will
never again be troubled by Jesus'
apparent silence.
* For his name will break the silence, inasmuch as everyone
will be confessing his name.
All people, whether they trust in Christ or not,
whether they're in heaven or on earth or in
hell, or on their way to heaven or hell, will acknowledge that Jesus
is Lord.
* He is the God of
our salvation.
What a day to behold, when the Father exalts his Son, Jesus
Christ, and puts his name on the
tongue of every
last person of the human race!
* But, you know, he
also breaks the silence today by letting his Son's Word be heard.
Listen again to the words of our Lord quoted by
Isaiah. "He who vindicates me is
near...
Who is my adversary?...
Who will declare me guilty?"
* To be vindicated is to be exonerated, declared "not guilty"
before the world.
And the point we get from this is very clear and very
comforting.
If Christ is vindicated, the One without sin, so
are you and I whose sin has been removed
by Christ, who trust in him because of his death on the cross.
* In the words to
the Romans: "Who shall bring any charge
against God's elect?
It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns?"
* That's right! Not only has our Lord broken the
silence. He get's
the last word.
He's justified us by his blood, and there's no
one left to accuse us.
* So, guess who's silent
now? Let me give you a hint. If Pilate, the soldiers, the chief
priests, scribes and pharisees have no charge against Jesus, neither has anyone
a charge
against you who believe in Jesus
Christ and confess him has Lord.
And yet, even if we, as a result, have quite a bit to say,
sometimes our silence or quietness is hard
to
overcome.
* Perhaps I've told
you that growing up I was often speechless.
I was the quietest of ten children. Members of my family used to joke, "Peter.
I wish you would
stop talking so much."
In a funny sort of way this is how they tried to
bring me into the conversation.
* To be absolutely
honest, I didn't drive my parents or grandparents crazy with my noise.
If anything, I drove them
nuts by how quiet I was. It just didn't
make any sense to them.
* And eventually I came to agree with them. If I wanted to become a pastor with the job
of
talking, at least from up here, I'd have to make a choice not to be
silent quite so much.
* Jesus, of course,
obligated himself to make a different choice.
His choice was to stop talking, to be silent, "like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and
like a sheep that before its shearers is silent" (Isaiah 53:7).
* At the time, it
didn't make a whole lot of sense to people.
He would die because he was
quiet. But the real question is whether believers
may make sense of it today.
* Is silence
golden? It is when this silence is
replaced with Jesus assuring us that we are a
part of his flock. "My sheep
hear my voice...", he says,
"and they follow me. I give them
eternal life...and no one will snatch them out of my
hand."
* How are those
words for breaking the silence? Amen.
May the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your
hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.