Shalom and welcome to veahavta Yisrael, a Hebrew phrase, which means you shall love Israel. We hope you’ll stay with us for the next 30 minutes as our teacher, Dr. Baruch shares his expository teaching from the Bible. Dr. Baruch is the senior lecturer at the Zera Avraham Institute based in Israel. Although all courses are taught in Hebrew at the Institute, Dr. Baruch is pleased to share this weekly address in English.

Speaker 1:

To find out more about our work in Israel, please visit us on the web at loveisrael.org. That’s one word, love israel.org. Now here’s Baruch with today’s lesson.

Dr. Baruch:

When you find yourself in a difficult position with many problems and hardships, what do you pray? Now, most people simply say, God, get me out of this mess. But what we need to see biblically speaking is that we have been called and also predestined to be an overcomer. That is, that God has designated us for success. That is to fulfill his will. And that means sometimes that He’s not going to take us out of that situation, that hardship that trial, but he is going to supply the power and the strength and the patience to be more than an overcomer. Why? Through overcoming, we find the glory of God being manifested through our life.

Dr. Baruch:

Do get your Bible and look with me to the book of Mark in chapter 14. Now we left off last week with Messiah in the garden of Gethsemane. We talked about that term, gat shamin, meaning wine or excuse me, oil press being pressed, stress in other words. And we’re going to see that Messiah He didn’t run away from the situation. He wanted to verify this was indeed the only way for God’s will to be done. And he finally said, “Not my will, but Thy will.” And He remained faithful and obedient. He did not flee from the difficulty, but He overcame that trial three days later.

Dr. Baruch:

So what we left off with last week is Messiah in this garden. And He knew that the time for prayer had come to an end. You see, there’s a time for preparation and there’s a time for performance. And the only way that will perform in a way that’s pleasing to God, that is glorifying to Him, if we take seriously the time of preparation. And unfortunately, those disciples, although Messiah came to them three times and admonished them to pray, they kept falling to sleep. They did not see the significance of the hour.

Dr. Baruch:

And likewise, it’s not an accident that before chapter 14, we had that chapter dealing with the last days. And unfortunately, most people, most believers will not see the significance of the events that are leading up to the time of the end, this transition from this age, the age to come, that is until the establishment of the kingdom. So it’s why Messiah was speaking concerning the one who would betray Him. That he was fastly approaching. And what happens?

Dr. Baruch:

Well, let’s begin our study today. Mark’s gospel chapter 14 and verse 43. And immediately, while he was still speaking, we see that Judas, some Bibles will say Judas, Iscariot. He approached. And it says that he was one of the 12. He approached, and with him was a crowd, a crowd of people, but more precisely, we’re going to see that it was soldiers, soldiers carrying, like it says swords and clubs. And they came from three groups of people, that is three groups of people gave them the authority to come and arrest Messiah. Who were they? Well, we see it was the high priests, the scribes and the elders.

Dr. Baruch:

Now those three groups of people are very significant. The high priests, they were anointed by God. That is, the priests were chosen by God. Secondly, we had the scribes, we’ve talked about those scribes. They were experts in the scripture. So because of their knowledge, not because of some divine selection, but because of their knowledge in the scripture, they were chosen by the people to be the teachers of the Jewish community. And finally, we have another group, the elders. And the elders were as well chosen by the people because of their conduct, because of their morality, ethics, integrity.

Dr. Baruch:

So imagine that. He was arrested. There was this group of soldiers who were set by the high priests, by the scribes and by the elders to arrest Messiah. All of Israel’s leadership, but here’s an important truth, not the people in general, but all of Israel’s leadership they stood in opposition to Messiah.

Dr. Baruch:

Let’s look again at the following verse, verse 44, it says, that the betrayer had given to them a sign saying the one who I kiss it is Him. That is, he is the one. It tells us at the end of that verse, you are to seize Him and lead Him away securely. Now that last word lead Him away securely. That was based on the supposition that He might flee from those who wanted to arrest him. And that just shows that Judas did not know Messiah at all, because he had taught several times that it was for this person to lay down His life for this purpose, that he’d come into the world. He wasn’t going to flee and run away as a coward, as one who lacked faith rather, he was going to overcome and rise three days later.

Dr. Baruch:

So we read in that verse, verse 44, that there was a sign, a kiss. Now, one of the things we see about Judas, is that Judas was someone who behaved one way and said one thing, but inwardly, he was very, very different. He did not come to this place as a man of integrity saying that I believe it is a proper thing to arrest him. No, the reason why he conspired and betrayed Messiah was for money. Not for any spiritual reason that he had, not because of any commitment only to himself.

Dr. Baruch:

So we read this passage verse 45, and he came immediately and he approached Him, that is approached Yeshua. And he says, “Rabbi.” Now some manuscripts have the phrase “Hail, rabbi,” which is a term of adoration, a term of respect, a term of honor, but in this text, it’s simply says, rabbi.

Dr. Baruch:

Now here again, we’ve learned the truth that this term rabbi does not mean as some simply say a teacher, but rather it means a great one. So everything about Judas, he is trying to present a falsehood. He is trying to present that he is a follower, that he has adoration for, for Messiah, Yeshua, and that he had nothing to do with what was about to happen. That is His arrest. So we see how far removed his life was from the truth. And what takes place? Well, middle of that verse, verse 45, it tells us that he came and approached Him greeted Messiah, and it says he kissed him.

Dr. Baruch:

Now there’s a change and words are very important. Earlier on in the previous verse, it says that Judas had given those who were going to arrest Messiah a sign. What was that sign? A kiss, the one whom I kiss, but here, although it’s translated the same way in English, it is a different word, the same book, but it has a prefix attached to it. And the scholars teach us this prefixed has to do with the endearment or great affection. So he’s trying to say in this kiss, how much that he loves, how much that he is a faithful follower, that he has adoration for Messiah as his spiritual leader, and everything about him was false. Now, why is that being emphasized in the texts? Because Judas, he is in a conspiracy with those three groups of people, the high priests, the scribes and the elders. And everything about not just Judas, but everything about these individuals. And we’re going to see this in a moment, it is all based in falseness. That is falsehood.

Dr. Baruch:

Now, why do I say that? Well, notice what’s taking place. He is being rested at what time? Well, this is the night of what we talked about, the Lord’s Supper. And the Lord’s Supper would end very late, approximately 12 or one in the morning. And what happens? He goes out to the garden of Gethsemane. He prays there for approximately an hour, according to the text. And so the journey there was probably about a half an hour. So we’re talking close to three in the morning. Why was he arrested at that time? Well, because the leadership feared the people. We have seen that He was at this time, still very popular with the masses. In fact, this chapter open up with them. That is the leadership saying, “we don’t want to arrest Him during the festival because of the people.” But because it presented himself, that is that the situation to arrest Him, presented itself at this time, the leadership agreed.

Dr. Baruch:

Now that was of course a part of God’s will because the scripture speaks of Messiah as a Passover lamb, therefore would have to die on that very day on Passover. Well, let’s move on to verse 46. These individuals, this group from the Sanhedrin as we’ll see in a moment, they placed their hands upon him and seized Him. But there was a certain one, verse 47. There was a certain one who was standing that he unleashed his sword. And what did he do? It says that he struck the servant of the high priest and lifted up his ear. That’s what it literally says.

Dr. Baruch:

Now why is that there? And we have to be very careful because it simply says a certain one. Now we know from another gospel that we’re talking about, Peter, we also know that after this ear was cut off, another gospel tells us that Messiah touched that place and healed. That is restored almost created in one sense, he just touched that ear and a new ear was created. It was perfectly restored. But we don’t see those things in this gospel, even though they’re factual, those were historical events in this gospel. Mark’s gospel. There’s another point that is mentioned.

Dr. Baruch:

And sometimes when we’re looking at a gospel, we don’t want to bring in all the historical information about a given event when we study one particular passage. Because this passage has been inspired by the Holy spirit in a manner in which we find a revelation. That is a message. And what is that? The thing that is being emphasized is that the servant of the high priest, this connection between the servant and high priests, his ear is removed. That is an expression. He is not listening. He is not paying attention. And this word hearing can also mean response. To hear and obey same concept in the biblical language. And this is going to be applied, not just to the servant of the high priest, but the high priest in general. He is not open, he has turned a deaf ear to the truth.

Dr. Baruch:

Verse 47, and one who was there standing. He unleashed his sword. He struck the servant of the high priest lifting up his ear and Messiah, that is, Yeshua said to them, “As a thief, you have come out with swords and clubs in order to apprehend me for each day … verse 49, “For each day, I was with you in the temple.” Now make a note of that word temple, because we have learned in a previous study, there’s two different biblical words in the new covenant for temple. And even though they’re always translated the same way in English, they have a very different meaning. Now this word, the word heron means the temple in a general sense. That is that whole structure up there. The whole temple Mount. It can refer to everything each building, not just the sanctuary.

Dr. Baruch:

So once again, verse 49 Messiah says, each day I was with you, literally I was before you, He wants to say, I was available to be arrested while I was teaching. But He says, you didn’t arrest me on those days. He says, “You seize me … When now. Why was that? Well, notice what He says in order that the scripture might be fulfilled. Now, the thing that’s being emphasized as the new covenant always does is everything that takes place through Messiah, it’s all done to fulfill scripture. And ultimately the fulfillment of scripture is this establishment of the kingdom. And that’s what we’re moving to. A kingdom experience. And that kingdom experience becomes a reality because of a resurrection.

Dr. Baruch:

Vividly speaking, there’s this inherent relationship between resurrection and the kingdom, but that’s for later time. Well, look on in our study to verse 50. Verse 50 tells us that all, meaning all the disciples and any other people who were there, who were His followers, what does it say? They left Him and they fled, exactly how Messiah said they were going to behave. Because they did not prepare themselves. They did not take seriously His words of admonition. They would not pray. They would not stand guard. And therefore, when this moment to identify Him as their Lord, what happens? Well, they scattered once again, and they left Him and that word Him is in emphatic. They left Him and they fled. That is on verse 51.

Dr. Baruch:

Now in this passage, there’s an interesting piece of scripture that we see. There’s another individual, a disciple, not one necessarily of the 12, but another disciple. And that is what it says in this verse, verse 51 about him. There was a certain young man who had followed Him. Literally it says two follow with, emphatic, who followed Him. And he had been clothed with simply a garment and outer garment over his body. That is his naked body. And they seized Him and what happens? And he laid that garment aside and he fled. How? Naked. Now, why is that verse there? What is the purpose of it? Everything that’s included in the scripture is for us to have a greater understanding of God’s purposes, His plans, His truth, His revelation to us.

Dr. Baruch:

And there’s some important things that are mentioned. First of all, this term for body, which always refers to a naked body, why is that? Well, he left without his garment. That is, he left naked and naked has to do with shame. So what we’re seeing here in the same way that this one fled after the fact, after the other disciples, it tells us, it teaches us that those who left, left shamefully. And something else, it tells us he cast off. He laid aside his garment. Well, according to the rabbinical literature, and I believe this is true biblically as well. This garment, we see this many places in the scripture, a garment, a mantle can be associated with a calling. And what we see is this, they set aside their calling, what they were admonished to do and be according to Messiah, they set that aside and they fled and they did so shamefully.

Dr. Baruch:

Once again, if we’re not prepared, if we don’t take seriously this time of preparation and the manner of preparation being on guard, and prayfully watching, we’re going to miss out when the time comes for us to stand up for Him, to be counted as his followers.

Dr. Baruch:

Verse 53. And they led Yeshua, that is Jesus to the high priests and had gathered meaning gathered at his place, the high priests place, all the high priests and the elders and the scribes. But Peter, verse 54, but Peter at a distance followed Him even until inside the courtyard of the high priests. And what was he doing? Well, he didn’t come and say, “You know what? I shouldn’t have fled. Messiah, you are my Lord. You have promised to be my savior and I’m going to be with Him.” That’s not what we see. We see that he came in and another gospel tells us, he came to see what was happening. He wasn’t there to play a role of faithfulness to be identified, to be counted as a follower. He simply came out of curiosity. He wanted to know what was going to happen.

Dr. Baruch:

And we read in the last part of verse 54. And he sat with … and this shows a congruency. It shows a coming together with, he wasn’t just sitting by chance, but he came together with those, the very battalion who had arrested Messiah. And what was he doing? He was warming himself. That is, he was thinking about his flesh, himself. And whenever we put ourself our physical wellbeing above truth, we are going to miss out. We’re not going to be with Messiah. We’re not going to be a proper witness for Him.

Dr. Baruch:

Well, verse 58, and the high priest and all the Sanhedrin, they were doing something. Now, Mark down verse 55, because in verse 55, we learn some very important truth concerning the leadership. And I want to emphasize, that we’re not talking about the Jewish people in a general sense. We’re talking about those leaders that were there that day, not all the leaders of Israel, but those who were there, who participated that night. And we’re going to learn an important thing concerning them. It says, look again, verse 55, the high priests and all the Sanhedrin was doing something. They were seeking against Yeshua testimony with a purpose, testimony in order to put him to death.

Dr. Baruch:

Now, what that tells us is that they were violating their own protocol. We’re speaking about the Sanhedrin and you can learn in various places, some of the protocol of the Sanhedrin. And they were not supposed to prejudge a circumstance, a situation, an individual, they were not called to seek witnesses for a specific outcome. They were called to allow witnesses to come forward and speak truth for the purpose of arriving at a Mishpat setting, a proper judgment, a righteous outcome, but they were seeking specific witnesses for the purpose of putting Him to death.

Dr. Baruch:

Now, let’s talk about the term witness. The Sanhedrin that is that ruling council. We might say the government of Israel during the Second Temple period, they had specific rules on who could witness. And according to the ancient writings, there were two types of witnesses. One type was known as a Kosher witness. The other type of witness was a false witness. Now who could be a Kosher witness? Could a woman? Never. Could a Gentile? Never. Could a Jew? Well, it depends. The only Kosher witnesses were those of a Jewish descent who were men, who had a testimony, a reputation that they obeyed the word of God. That doesn’t mean that they were perfect and without sin, but it meant that they applied the Torah to their life, that that was the truth for how one should live. So only those who were observant to Jewish law, they could give testimony. Everyone else was considered to be a false witness.

Dr. Baruch:

Now understand the time period. We are speaking about a time period where the next day, in fact, it’s early in the morning of that day, that the Passover sacrifice had to be offered. That is, that Passover, and I’m speaking about the feast of unleavened bread. That holiday was one of three festivals that every Jewish male had to come up to Jerusalem, to observe. Now, why is that important? Because for Passover and shovel or Pentecost, and also the Feast of Tabernacles, those three festivals would have the greatest amount of Jewish men who were observant.

Dr. Baruch:

So what it tells us here is the time is this, there would have been the greatest amount of potential witnesses, Kosher witnesses in Jerusalem. There would never have been a time where there would have been more. And what do we learn here? And this states volumes. It tells us that none were found. That is none of those who are God-fearing. None of those who applied the Torah, that is the word of God, to their life who saw that as truth, none of them would come forward to speak to testify in a way that would bring about His death. That is to say something negative against Yeshua. Verse 56, but there were many who witnessed falsely against Him, but their witness that is their testimony did not agree. And there were certain ones who stood up and they bore witness against Him And by the way, it’s always that word [foreign language 00:25:02] against him, these false witnesses, ones that should not have been able to testify another violation of the Sanhedrin protocol. They allowed people who were false witnesses, who should not be able to testify according to their structure to give witness.

Dr. Baruch:

They did give witness, but none of it agreed and notice what they said. Verse 57, and certain ones stood up to testify, falsely against Him, verse 58. And they said, “We have heard Him saying that I will destroy the … What does your Bible say? Temple. But it’s very important that it’s the word … not [heron 00:25:45], but the word naon, which means the sanctuary, the place where, where the [foreign language 00:25:50], the glory of God dwelt. It says, we heard Him say that he will destroy the sanctuary, this sanctuary that was built by hands. And after three days, He will rebuild it without human hands. But once again, it says that their testimony did not agree with one another.

Dr. Baruch:

So what do we have here? Well, we have an example where there was not sufficient testimony. There was no agreement. And by the way, someone saying, “I’m going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days,” that didn’t bring someone a death penalty. I mean, that would been a miraculous event that no mere human being could have done. Someone makes us statement of that, you would think that they’re either Messiah or they’re crazy. Well, it’s interesting what took place next, because this trial wasn’t going as the high priests wanted it to go. There had been no testimony in agreement that would bear a outcome of what they wanted, and that was the death penalty.

Dr. Baruch:

So what do we see next? Well, what we’re going to focus in on next week, and that is the high priests setting aside, everything taking charge in order to manage things so that it would bring about the outcome that he wanted. And the thing that’s so significant is how Messiah answered that one question that we’re going to see that the high priest asked next week. And that testimony Messiah is going to tell us who He is, why He’s come and why we should respond to Him with an absolute obedience in the faith that is provided through the scripture.

Dr. Baruch:

So we’ll close with this until next week when we see this conflict between the high priests and Messiah Yeshua.

Speaker 1:

Well, we hope you will benefit from today’s message and share it with others. Please plan to join us each week at this time and on this channel for our broadcast of loveisrael.org. Again, to find out more about us, please visit our website, loveisrael.org. There you will find articles and numerous other lectures by Baruch. These teachings are in video form, you may download them or watch them in streaming video until next week. May the Lord bless you in our Messiah Yeshua. That is Jesus, as you walk with Him. Shalom from Israel.