John 18:18-24 (NIV)
It was cold, and the servants and officials stood around a fire they had made to keep warm. Peter also was standing with them, warming himself.
Meanwhile, the high priest questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching.
“I have spoken openly to the world,” Jesus replied. “I always taught in synagogues or at the temple, where all the Jews come together. I said nothing in secret. Why question me? Ask those who heard me. Surely they know what I said.”
When Jesus said this, one of the officials nearby struck him in the face. “Is this the way you answer the high priest?” he demanded.
“If I said something wrong,” Jesus replied, “testify as to what is wrong. But if I spoke the truth, why did you strike me?” Then Annas sent him, still bound, to Caiaphas the high priest.
While Peter and John were warming themselves by the fire in the courtyard, things were heating up inside the house of Annas. Jesus was being grilled over His teachings and about the people who were in His circle of followers. But Jesus would not take the bait.
Jesus statement (it was not a defense) was very simple: He had been teaching for well over three years, most often in the temple or other public places. Plenty of people had heard what He had taught, including most of the people gathered in the room that night. If Annas had not heard Jesus teach personally, he had plenty of people whom he could have asked without arresting Jesus and having Him brought before him bound to give an account.
Jesus was still so obviously in control of the situation, not cowering or timid before the authority and majesty of the former high priest, as the group felt was proper for someone in His position. So, one of the officials near Jesus slapped Him across the face, upbraiding Him for speaking disrespectfully to someone in such a position of authority.
But Jesus was not intimidated by this show of brute force. He looked the official straight in the eye and demanded to be shown how He had misspoken. (He hadn’t!)
This whole process was getting nowhere. Annas was unwilling to push things further himself, so he dismissed the hearing, sending Jesus, still bound and under guard, to his son-in-law, Caiaphas, the current high priest. If Jesus was not impressed with the status of the former high priest, maybe he would be more compliant standing before the man who currently held the office of God’s representative to the Jewish people.
Father, it’s ironic that this man who only recently had been one of a vastly small group who could enter the Holy of Holies to stand in Your presence didn’t recognize Your presence in Jesus when He was standing mere feet away. But his eyes were so blinded, and his heart hardened by jealousy and the felt need to maintain the status quo, that he couldn’t see or sense Who it was that was standing before him. Lord, it is so easy for us to get so caught up in our own agendas, our own sense of self-worth, that we totally miss You when You show up. Protect us from that kind of self-focus, so that our hearts always stay soft and our wills conformable to Your agenda. Amen.
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