This is your daily reminder. God has not run
out of mercy, not for you, not today. Welcome
to the New Mercies Podcast. Welcome. Today is
Monday, March the 16th. If you are new to the
podcast, welcome. Glad you are here. Take a moment
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the things so that you never miss an episode
Monday through Saturday every single day. About
an 8 to 12 minute episode to get you started
for your day or maybe as your day ends to wrap
up in a little bit of Bible study. I want to
encourage you as we go through the scriptures
to listen to the Lord, see what he has to say
to you. If you are new, you may notice we don't
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are aligned with its mission, and that is to
get in the Word and know the Lord in a deeper
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the link in the top of the episode description.
But now, today, we want to jump right in and
get to our reading for the day. We are in Luke
22. Once again, last week we read Luke 22 a couple
of times. I preached Luke 22 yesterday. I loved
being in it. It's 71 verses. It's very long.
I hope and pray you read it again today. Fresh
eyes, fresh ears. And I just want to share with
you a little bit at the very, very end of Luke
22. As I was reading through it again and looking
and seeing what the Lord would have me to learn
and know today, here was an encouragement that
I found. The story in Luke 22, it begins with
Jesus and his disciples getting ready for the
Passover meal together. But just before that
happens, a guy named Judas betrays Jesus. He
has a secret meeting. All that goes down. Jesus
then gets some disciples together to find a place
to serve Passover. Then institutes the Lord's
Supper together. Institutes this wonderful time
that they get to remember not only the Exodus
anymore, but now what Jesus is going to do to
deliver the mankind from sin. So we first see
in Exodus, we looked at last week, the Passover
meal was instituted whenever they left the bondage
and slavery of Egypt. Now Jesus is instituting
a new Passover meal. Passover meal, a new meal
that's the Lord's Supper, where he is going to
say to remember this day. Passover is now over.
The Passover meal is no longer going to be the
same. Now you're going to remember the time I
freed you from sin. There is one more meal coming
that has to do with a lamb. We find that in the
book of Revelation. It's the marriage supper
of the lamb. I love how the Lord has shown us
through multiple meals in the Scripture. There's
the Passover that was the lamb that was slain.
Then there was the Lord's Supper about Jesus
being the perfect lamb that's slain. And then
there's the marriage supper of the lamb. lamb
where everything is restored and we're all back
to good with the Lord and everything's restored.
It's wonderful. It's beautiful. There's a lot
in scripture. I don't want to get into that much
today, but... As we look at this, after the Lord's
Supper is instituted, then we see Jesus saying
that there's a betrayer that's there, and they
all kind of freak out. Then there's a debate
that breaks out that says who's the greatest,
which one of us is better. Then Jesus tells Peter,
listen, I've been praying for you. Satan wanted
you, but I've prayed for you. And because I've
prayed for you, your faith may falter a bit,
but it's not going to fail. You're going to get
up and you're going to strengthen your brothers.
I want you to keep going, keep fighting for this
faith. Then there's some scene that happens.
that take place next in the Garden of Gethsemane.
And again, the Garden of Gethsemane is a wonderful
place. I'll give you just a little bit of extra
today. I shared with my small group yesterday.
And that is, there's three gardens in the scripture
as well. So just like there's three meals of
the lamb, there's also three gardens. There's
the Garden of Eden where sin entered in. There's
the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus fought the
battle of sin to go and take on the cross. And
then there's the Garden Tomb that Jesus stepped
out of the tomb into a... new garden, giving
us a new hope and a new life and a restoration
from all things. And it's beautiful and incredible
and awesome. There's a lot to be said about that.
I would love to jump into that with you. But
here's what I want to tell you today. As we read
through after Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane,
he's praying. He's praying like sweat, like drops
of blood. The people come. Judas leads a mob
to come and arrest Jesus. He gets arrested, and
then he gets taken into custody. Here's where
I want to pick up just a little bit of reading
today in Luke 22, beginning down in verse number
63. I want to read some scripture with you today,
and I want to just talk about it for a second,
give you a little bit of a new mercy maybe that
God gave me today, and I hope and pray it's encouraging
to you, and whatever God's telling you, write
it down. I promise. Write it down. The more you
write down, the more you can remember. The more
you can remember, the more you can grow. The
more you can grow, the closer you get with the
Lord and the more effective you become in your
ministry that God's called you to. Here we go.
In Luke chapter 22, down in verse number 63.
Now the men who were holding Jesus in custody
were mocking him as they beat him. They also
blindfolded him and kept asking him, prophesy,
who is it that struck you? And they said many
other things against him, blaspheming him. I
want to stop and take a pause right there and
just say this is a horrible scene. Jesus is about
to go on trial. He's in custody, being held.
And what's going on? The people that are holding
him in custody are the ones who are mocking him
and beating him. I want to take a second here
and just say I would like to take our perspective
up into the heavenlies. And I want you to think
about this. Jesus has been arrested for nothing
he did wrong. Now, as they're holding him in
custody, why is he in custody so long? What's
going on? Well, if you read in other gospel accounts,
Mark and John specifically give a little bit
more instruction on what happens during this
time. But Jesus was taken to Annas' house. Annas
was a high priest, a former high priest. He was
one that had a lot. He was very wealthy. He was
very powerful. He wasn't the current high priest.
That was Caiaphas. But here's what's going on.
These guys are trying to now negotiate with people,
pay the right testimony. Get false accusations
to come and make sure everybody's on their side,
that nobody's on Jesus' side. I think that is
a very maybe important thing for us to notice.
The world is going to try to get you on their
side. That's what's going to happen. In this
scene, that's what's taking place. The more I
read it, the more it makes me a little bit chilled
to think about you're on one side or the other.
And this is when these moments that while Jesus
is in custody getting beat up, The world is trying
to lure you in. They're trying to build a case
against Jesus. And what goes on? These soldiers
that are holding him, the men that are watching
him, are not just letting him sit in a cell by
himself. They're beating him. They're slapping
him. They're hitting him. They're blind. They're
making a game out of this. Can you imagine? Let's
go up to the heavenlies for just a moment. Can
you imagine the angels in heaven seeing this?
I cannot, I mean, we're talking the swords drawn
the way Peter had drawn a sword just a couple
of hours earlier and cut off the high priest,
the guard's ear. I see now the angels in heaven
ready and saying, this is not right. They should
not, these are men under authority that are now
mocking the one who came to save them. As they're
slapping him and as they're beating him, they're
blindfolded and they're saying, why don't you
prophesy and tell us which one did it? And Jesus
doesn't say a word. Can I tell you this? Why?
Because Jesus didn't come to smite them. He came
to save them. Like this is a love in these few
verses that blows my mind. Like how many times
have I mocked what Jesus was trying to do? Or
how many times have I done something that went
against his word and his will? And honestly,
I think about these guys and the whole time Jesus
thinking, I've come here to save you. And the
one that hit him, he probably named his name
in his head. I know you struck me, but I came
to save you. You realize, here's the Christian
faith, if these men who were mocking Jesus and
beating Jesus, if these men, a few days later,
accept the gift of salvation, you realize they're
in heaven with him, right? You realize they get
to spend eternity in his family. If they don't
accept the gift of salvation, then they're going
to stand before a great white throne judgment
and their names and their beatings and all their
mockery will be recalled. That is going to happen.
This is not just a couple of words we read on
a page. This is the son of God who is getting
beaten by a bunch of people who have no business
even having him in custody. They have no business
in any of this. And yet Jesus is quiet. They
say, prophesy, tell us which one. And they said
many other things against him. And, you know,
the Holy Spirit has inspired the word, and I
think it is very important to note, here's what
the Holy Spirit wanted to make sure and have
communicated through Dr. Luke to us was that
in many other things against him, blaspheming
him. They blasphemed him. Because why? He's the
Son of God. I cannot imagine the angels in heaven
ready. We're putting an end to this. Don't slap
him. He's God. He's the one who seated on the
throne. He's the one who made everything. He's
the one that through him, everything is made.
And now you are making a mockery of this. You're
beating him. What is going on? The scripture
keeps going. Let's read a little more. The Bible
says in verse 66, when the day came, the assembly
of the elders of the people gathered together,
both chief priests and scribes, and they led
him away to their council. And they said, If
you are the Christ, tell us. But he said to them,
If I tell you, you will not believe. And if I
ask you, you will not answer. But from now on,
the Son of Man shall be seated at the right hand
of the power of God. So they all said, Are you
the Son of God then? And he said to them, You
say that I am. Then they said, As I continue
to be in awe. of what Jesus went through and
how he stood up and how he stayed and how he
was courageous and how he was loving and kind
and how he didn't let anything stop him from
his ultimate mission, which was sacrificing,
willingly giving up his life to be our substitute,
to be the one that would stand in our place.
I look at the scripture over and over again,
and I keep seeing the power. I mean, the power.
When he says the Son of Man, that is the title
Jesus used for himself, referring back to Daniel,
referring back to the Psalms, referring back
to different places in the Old Testament that
prophesied that the Son of Man would be a title
of the Messiah, the Son of God. And the people
said, so are you saying that you're the Son of
God? Or are you just saying the Messiah will
be at the right hand? We all agree the Messiah
will be at the right hand of the power of God.
Are you saying that's you? And Jesus uses a phrase,
uses a term here when he says, What you say is
exactly right. Yes. And they say, what you just
said was offense enough to kill you. Could you
imagine? I read through this, and if I'm not
careful, I will just think Jesus is standing
there talking regularly. He is already bruised.
He's already bleeding. He's already been slapped
and beaten. He's been verbally abused. He's been
physically abused. He's been held under false
pretenses. They've done all of this work to finally
seize him. They're not letting him go. You realize
that. There's no option out. There's no way out.
Nothing Jesus would have said. That's why he
even said, if I told you, you're not going to
believe me anyway. You went through all this
trouble. I was with you every single day in the
temple teaching, and nobody came up to arrest
me. Nobody. You waited until the cover of night
because you're a coward. No matter what I say,
you're not going to believe it. And in this whole
time, I can again picture the angels in heaven
ready to come, ready to show up and say, we are
turning all of this upside down. This is not
right. And the love of Jesus kept pursuing and
kept persisting that this was worth it. In the
book of Hebrews, it tells us, for the joy set
before him, he endured the cross. What was the
joy that was set before him? Well, obeying his
father, one, and having us, two. The first is
great. The second, he got kind of a raw deal
in a lot of us, in all of us. We're not worthy
of this kind of love. We're not worthy of this
kind of connection to God. Revive us what we
deserve, right? We deserve complete separation.
As I read it over and over again, I just can't
help but think about this power that he has,
and yet he was withholding all of that and willingly
giving his life. As we will read in the next
couple of days, these may be harder for me to
get through these episodes because this has changed
my life. This has changed my heart. This has
changed the way I live, my purpose, my meaning.
Everything in my life has been changed because
of this Jesus who came and did all of this for
the purpose of bringing me into his family. I
hope and pray. You know this Jesus. I hope and
pray you have this same connection to him. I
hope and pray that it gets richer and deeper
every day. And I hope and pray whenever you read
the scripture, whenever you look and see what
he did for you and what he did in your place,
how he was your substitute, and all of his love,
I hope and pray that you share that with somebody.
It gives you the passion to share it because
people need to know they're loved by this great
God.