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Isa. 53:4-5, ‘Surely He has borne our grief and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed….’
Isa. 53:2-3, ‘He has no form or comeliness, and when we see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him. He is despised and rejected by men. A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.’
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That would damage your reputation to such an extend that Caesar will remove you from office. But that would be the least of your worries. If you do not do your duty as the prefect of Caesar but rather, show sympathy for this revolutionist, you may find yourself crucified as a traitor to Caesar. This Man Jesus is a political rebel who plans to take the Roman Empire in a coup d'état, and if you do not crucify Him, you are jeopardizing Caesar’s rule.” Their blatant blackmail and threats must have stunned Pilate, even if it was just for a moment. By now, Pontius Pilate had to realize that the Sanhedrin was firmly in control of the situation. Suddenly an emotional and maybe even a physical captive himself, he had to feel the powerlessness of being steered by secret powers beyond his control.
“AWAY WITH HIM, WE HAVE NO KING BUT CAESAR!” “When Pilate heard them say, “If you let this man go, you are not Caesar’s friend,” (Jn. 19:12-16,) he brought Jesus forth, and sat down on the judgment seat in a place called The Pavement.” The Pavement was a heavily guarded area outside the Praetorium, the elevated judgment seat of Pilate. It seems Pilate took the chair on The Pavement with stately dignity. This move could have been either to ‘befriend’ or to intimidate the crowds. It probably meant Pilate descended to the level of the Sanhedrin and the crowds to squash the impression that he looked down on them from the Praetorium because he might have planed to put the revolt down by force. Probably, this was to show that Pilate, not sure of Caesar’s favor under such a clear and current threat, began to yield to the demands of the Sanhedrin and the multitudes; his shoulders supposedly sagging under his royal robes. Pilate must have mustered control of his staccato voice in the greater area of the Pavement as he made one last attempt to save the life of this innocent Man. He shouted, “[Seeing that you Hebrews have made Him a political King… Well then…”] And presenting Jesus to them once more, he continued, “Behold your King!” (Jn. 19:14.) However, the venom-spitting mobs continued to violently insist, “Away with Him! Crucify Him!” Pilate must have raised his hand to quiet the multitudes. Once he had their attention, he glanced at the tortured Jesus and shouted sarcastically, “Shall I crucify your King?” Without hesitation and as if with one voice the chief priests shouted, “We have no king but Caesar!” The multitudes immediately began to imitate them, “We have no king but Caesar! We have no king but Caesar!” The Jews were loudly proclaiming Caesar as their only king, thereby publicly renouncing the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; the Theocratic, Old Testament King of the Hebrew nation. They were openly rejecting the Almighty God, Who is Spirit, and pledging allegiance to a mere human, pagan ruler, who placed himself on the level of divinity, (Mt. 4:21-24; Jn. 4:21-24.) Pilate’s heart sank further as this dreadful predicament fully dawned on him. On the one hand there was the innocent Jesus, this Devine Man from the real heavenly sphere, Whom Pilate knew, was a Victim of this evil pharisaical sect, who had the power to inflame the Hebrews and, within such an incredibly short time, could turn nearly a whole nation against Him! On the other hand, the Jews also had the power to topple his, (Pilate’s) reign. If this riot could not be resolved now, the Sanhedrin could pose more than a serious danger to Pilate’s protectorate and life. They could even threaten the throne of Caesar. What Pilate could not have comprehended, was the fact that under the influence of the beast who “causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the [political] beast…” (Rev. 13:11-18,) the Hebrew nation actually communistically declared, “Away with this Spiritual Christ and His Spiritual Kingdom that suppress our human rights! We want to do our own will! We are gods! To hell with heaven; ‘we want our gold now!’ Crucify this imposter! We will wait for another christ; the political activist, who will liberate us politically, and who will give us equality, wealth, peace, prosperity, and happiness in god’s kingdom here on earth!”
‘When Pilate saw that he could not prevail at all, but that [an uncontrollable] turmoil was rising, he called for a washing bowl of water and washed his hands before the multitude, loudly stating’ “I am innocent of the blood of this just Man. You see to it.” In other words, “I again declare this Man innocent. As you insist on crucifying Him as a political activist, you must take the blame and responsibility for this unspeakable crime you are committing.” · However, all the Hebrew people shouted, “Let His blood be on us and on our children!” The Jews were all saying, “You just give the order to strip Him of His Divinity by humiliating and parading Him in public on the cross, and we and all of our descendants will deal with the eternal spiritual consequences of all this.” What a most terrible curse they placed on them and all their Hebrew/Jewish descendants! Then an angry Pilate must have waved his accusing, pointed finger over the crowds, shouting in a mighty voice, “Very well then, you make it so!”
PILATE’S FINAL VERDICT The Hebrew nation finally executed their plan to brutally murder the innocent Lamb of God. “And He, [willingly laying down His life to pay in full for the redemption of all believing humanity, Jn. 3:16,] bearing His cross, went out to a place called the Place of the Skull… [Golgotha,] where they crucified Him… “Now Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross. And the writing was: JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.” If anything, Pilate’s inscription on the cross must have been to reinstate his autocratic power. Some commentators allege he did that as some form of revenge, because the Sanhedrin had entrapped him to condemn Jesus to death, and so, as the prefect of Caesar, he did this to have the last say in the matter. If one studies the trial of Jesus, and understands the predicament of Pontius Pilate, it becomes clear what Pilate, literally ‘steered’ into crucifying Jesus, intended with this inscription. Pilate was adamant that everyone should know the nature of the makeshift ‘crime’ for which the Hebrew nation had convicted the innocent Jesus. Pilate did not crucify Jesus as a Kingdom-Now terrorist or a rival to the throne of Caesar. Pilate, believing Jesus, wanted everyone to know that Jesus was, (and still is,) truly the King of the Hebrews — and in reality, the King of the whole world, which He, Jesus Himself, had created, (Heb. 1:1-14.) Pilate certainly knew, although maybe not really understanding, that Jesus was the Eternal Spiritual King, innocent of political activism; and innocent of planning a coup d'état to lay hold of the physical kingdoms of this world, (Mt. 4:8-9.) And so, the pagan Prefect of Caesar, Pontius Pilate, crowned Jesus King of the Hebrews, and made a mockery of the Sanhedrin’s ridiculous charge against their Spiritual Christ.
THE WONDERFUL GOD WHO TURNED EVERYTHING AROUND The Satanic Sanhedrin intended the cross as the final victory over Jesus, but the cross became God’s spiritual altar of everlasting victory over evil; triumphing over the devil and all his demons at that cross, (Col. 2:13-15; Jn. 3:16.) At the cross, Satan the so-called ‘conqueror,’ suddenly found himself completely conquered. Paul declared the unquestionable victory of the Lord Jesus Christ in Col. 2:11-15. He rejoiced, “… God, Who raised Him from the dead…. having forgiven all your trespasses, wiped out the handwriting of requirement that was against us. [All our transgressions of the ceremonial, Old Testament law, as well as our transgressions of the Moral Law.] And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, [parading them in public like they planned to do with Jesus,] triumphing over them in it.” (Jn. 12:31; 14:30-31.) Fact is, the unconquerable Spiritual Kingdom of God will remain forever unshakable, while all the kingdoms of this world will pass away, (Rev. 11:15.) While the Most High God allowed Satan this blasphemous atrocity for the sake of humankind’s redemption, He turned it all around for good in the spirit world. Instead of murdering the Man Jesus, Jesus rose bodily after three days and three nights in the grave! The grave could not entomb Him. Satan could not rule over Him! Suffering could not disfigure Him. Death could not snuff out His Truth, Light, Life, or Eternal Gospel. Christ Jesus is alive, ascended on high, and lives forever more! From His Eternal throne in heaven, He will return to call to Himself all those who personally accepted Him and His Divine blood-sacrifice in their place; proving their love for Him by following Him as His totally committed disciples by obeying His Moral Law of love, (Jn. 13:34.) Instead of making Jesus a cursed man on a cross, Jesus “became a curse,” [or the entire cursed position without God that all unsaved humanity occupy, was transferred or imputed to Jesus] so that we may inherit not earn, all the blessings of Abraham,” (Deut. 28; Gal. 3:10-14.) Instead of upholding the physical dispensation of the Old Testament, the Sanhedrin sacrificed the Blameless, Final Lamb of God to fulfill and annul the Old Testament temple Covenant of the ceremonial law as a whole, inaugurating Jesus’ blood-atoned, Eternal, Spiritual, New Testament Covenant, (Mt. 5:17; Heb. 8:13.) Instead of enforcing death and the outward, temple with its ritual or ceremonial laws, the last of this physical priesthood ushered in God’s Eternal spiritual Life and Grace through Christ! (Heb. Chapters 7-9.) Instead of confirming themselves as the hierarchical, Levitical priesthood of the physical temple, they also annulled their positions as physical priests, and ushered in a completely new order of priests – a humble spiritual priesthood after the Order of Melchizedek, (1 Pet. 2:9-10; 1:18-19; 2:5-10; Heb. 8-10; 7:14-28.)
JESUS WOULD NOT BE THE ONLY VICTIM OF KINGDOM-NOW THEOLOGIANS The despotic fake lamb with the ‘voice of a dragon’ never tolerates competition or insurrection, (Rev. 13.) Because God still allows Satan, for the time being, to rule all the deceived people of this world, the devil always perceives preachers of the Spiritual Kingdom of God as a serious threat to his kingdom, where he pretends to be “god” here on earth. Therefore, Paul wrote in Eph. 4:12, “For we [sincere, born again believers] wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers, the rulers [of the deception] of the darkness of this world, and against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places,” - (1 Jn. 5:19; 2 Cor. 4:3-4; 10:3-5; Eph. 2:2; Jn. 14: 30; 12:31.) Since that day when Satan made the greatest mistake of his life in his attempt to destroy Jesus, and miserably lost the battle for humankind’s souls, he turned his full attention to the followers of the Real King. Since that day, he has the Scripturally born-again disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ in his sights, as we witness right now in his full-blown onslaught of deception in the Pentecostal/Charismatic churches of reborn believers. From all the churches throughout history, these are the end of the end-time believers, whom God has chosen to bring His light and life to this dark and dying world, but they have utterly lost their way by following church religion instead, (Mt. 7:21-24.) In the centuries that followed Jesus’ cross on Golgotha, many of those who had to suffer and die for His Name sake, and for the truth of His Word, would have remembered the words of their Spiritual King, shortly before He was arrested that dreadful night, “They will put you out of the synagogues [and churches,] yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service. And these things they will do to you because they have neither known the Father nor Me…” (Jn. 16:2.) In the years after Jesus’ ascension, the fake lamb with the two horns and the voice of a dragon would continue to play his role on the stage of history, ruling the kings of this earth, and in the process, killing and torturing an estimated 68 million [church] martyrs, (Rev. chapters 17-18.) To that horrible statistic we may add the uncounted millions, who refused to become part of Kingdom-Now cults of all ages. As a result, most historians did not honor them, and their names and excruciating circumstances were merely omitted from most of the history books, (Heb. Chapter 11.) Related post: Can our Charity (Love) save people and change the world? · Continue to PART 2, Martyrs At the Gates of Hades; Jesus’ Baptism with fire · Read PART 1 again, The Kingdom Now Beast that Crucified Jesus
PART 3, The Roman Catholic Assault from Within PART 4, Christian Giants, Fairy Godmother Mary and the Church Ring PART 5: The Way or Ecclesia Converted to Roman Catholic Christianity
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