****************************************

From Eliyahu:

Shalom friends,

We are all on trial, every day. Some of us know it, all the time. Some of us know it, but don't think about it. And some of us will never know it, until it is much too late.

This Sabbath we are considering the passage in John in which Yeshua stands before Pontius Pilate, a man so jaded by politics that he doesn't even know what truth is. So often it is such like men who are put in positions to judge and determine the fate of the innocent.

I saw a movie about such a case this week. "The Conspirator" was originally released in 2010, and bombed at the box office. The critics didn't like it very much. I never heard of it, until recently, when it got a new life on Amazon. Dawn and I like to watch historical movies, so it was recommended to us. We watched it a few days ago, just before I started studying the passage for this Sabbath. Perhaps the critics find true stories about liberty, justice and truth - and the opposite - tedious and boring. Personally, I don't care what they think. For me it was one of the most worthwhile films I've seen this century. It was the perfect movie to get me in the right frame of mind for the passage in John. What a "coincidence." Here is what the movie is about:

"The Conspirator" Mary Surratt is the lone female charged as a co-conspirator in the assassination trial of Abraham Lincoln. As the whole nation turns against her, she is forced to rely on her reluctant lawyer to uncover the truth and save her life. IMDb

The attitudes of the judges, the prosecution and the political system behind them are a study in unrighteous judgment. The civil war was recently won against the South and President Lincoln was assassinated. The loss of thousands of Northern husbands and sons in the war was still a fresh wound on the hearts of the victors, and now this! It had to be the rebel scum that did this! They had to pay, right now! The political pressure to find, try, and 'hang the culprits' was immense. Mary Surratt happened to be from the South, and she happened to own the boarding house where the prosecution claimed a conspiracy to assassinate the president was hatched. In the minds of just about everyone, that was enough to make Mary Surratt a co-conspirator. But what of the evidence? What of the truth? What of justice? It is under this kind of popular and/or political pressure that injustice so often wins the day.

Mankind needs a Judge who has born the brunt of such wicked judgment. Court is in session and that very Judge is watching the proceedings unfold. He is the Messiah, and the prophet Isaiah describes Him this way:

"The Spirit of YHWH will rest on him: the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of YHWH! His delight will be in the fear of YHWH! He will not judge by the sight of his eyes, neither decide by the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness he will judge the poor, and decide with equity for the humble of the earth. He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth; and with the breath of his lips he will kill the wicked. Righteousness will be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his waist." Isaiah 11:2-5

Come, Lord Yeshua! The righteous long for your righteous judgments in the earth!

Shalom,

Eliyahu
Tsiyon.Org

****************************************

Editor's Note: USA President Donald Trump announced a new Mideast peace plan on January 28, 2020. It is very different from all previous proposals. It is summed up below.

Check out our latest videos!