6-17-22

As Christians these days we are called a lot of things for our beliefs. Right wing radicals, hateful (because we try to tell people that we ALL need to live according to God’s word), they often lump us in with cults that promote white supremacy, but my favorite is “Conspiracy theorists”. A year or so it got me to thinking about Jesus. Jesus was a man who never committed a sin, much less a crime. He spent His 33 years here on earth doing good. Healing SO many, feeding thousands, just telling others the way to God. So, you ask yourself, why did he die in such a violent, horrific way.
At the time of Jesus death, Israel was under the rule of Rome and that was not a good thing. So many people were trying to cause a rebellion that would overthrow the government so that Israel could govern themselves. Now here is where it would be helpful if I were a historian, I do not have many facts BUT we do know that Judas was one of those people. He had always been more interested in rebellion than anything else. Of course, we cannot know exactly what went on in Judas’s mind, but scripture & bible sidenotes indicate that he did not think that Jesus was the Messiah. He never called him “Lord”, but instead called him “rabbi”.
We know that Judas had a love of money as he received substantial payment for betraying Jesus. One bible commentator even mentioned that perhaps Judas was trying to win a spot in the new “rule” over Israel by staying near Jesus, because he thought that Jesus would be the head of the rebellion. Which would give him wealth & power. Judas had free will, right up until Luke 22:3 when the bible says, “then Satan entered Judas Iscariot…”.
After this, the Romans brought Jesus with false charges in front of Pontius Pilate. He had first tried to abstain from any part of this as he knew there would be ramifications, but as we remember, Pilate gave the riotous crowd a choice between a known criminal and Jesus, who no one could really condemn. But the frenzied crowd chose Jesus to be crucified and set Barabbas free.
So, thinking about these events, it dawned on me. Jesus’s death was possibly the greatest conspiracy theory in and of itself. Certainly a “conspiracy”!
We, as followers of Christ have the benefit of the entire bible to draw from. So, we know that every part of Jesus’s life was ordained by God for the benefit of ALL.
God knew. God knew why He sent Jesus and that it would take the most horrific death in all of time to rescue us from sin. God knew that the enemy would play a part. He also knew that when Jesus uttered the words, “it is finished”, We would all be free from our sins by just believing in Christ as our savior and accepting Him as Lord. NOW THAT’S a STORY!! AND PRAISE GOD, it’s TRUE!!

Shirlene Peterson