Asia Bibi was falsely accused of blasphemy in Pakistan. The Scriptures describe how the Saints have been falsely accused of the same, including the Martyr Stephen and the Apostle Paul.----Paul was a blasphemer, but Jesus saved him by dying in his place at Calvary-----The Revelation foretells that the Anti-Christ will be a blasphemer, and except for the Redeemed, the whole world will worship the Beast and approve of his blasphemies.----When God judges the world, they will blaspheme God themselves, even as their so-called savior the Beast is unable to rescue them- Folks would rather blaspheme the God Who judges and Who alone can save, and would rather worship false Gods who blaspheme the only Real God-----The most notorious example of false charges of blasphemy recorded in the Old Testament was the murder of Naboth by King Ahab and his wicked wife Jezebel. They falsely accused Naboth of blasphemy so they could kill him and steal his inheritance.----But the worst examples of false accusations of blasphemy were those by the Jewish rulers against the Lord Jesus Himself- They accused Christ of blasphemy when He forgave sin, even though as God, He has the power to do so- They denied His deity, and thereby, they accused God incarnate in human flesh of blaspheming God Himself-----In the end, those wicked rulers repeated the crime against Naboth, when they murdered the Lord Jesus on the false charge of blasphemy. They refused to believe Christ's truthful testimony, under oath, that He is God's Messiah. They crucified the Lord of Glory on a trumped up charge.----Jesus told us that we, as His people, would be mistreated just like He was, but we are still completely safe in Him-

Christians rejoiced this week at the acquittal of Asia Bibi by the Pakistan Supreme Court of false charges of blasphemy against Mohammed. Bibi had been jailed under sentence of death for over eight years, but God showed His mighty power over the rulers of this world-----The Court held that the charges against Bibi had not been proven, and that on the contrary, the witnesses' testimony didn't agree with each other, and some of them were liars.----Truly we can say, the Lord hath done great things for us, whereof we are glad-----The Lord's people are often falsely accused of blasphemy by their enemies. The first example was the false accusation brought against the martyr Stephen, who was accused of blasphemy against Moses and the temple.----In the end, Stephen was murdered by stoning when he testified to seeing Jesus in glory at the right hand of the Throne in Heaven.----Sometimes, the Lord does rescue His loved ones from these false accusations. In Corinth, envious leaders of the Synagogue led a mob to accuse the Apostle Paul falsely, because many Jews were believing on the Lord Jesus.----But when Paul's accusers dragged him before Gallio's court, the judge cut them off short. He noted that Paul wasn't even accused of any wickedness or public misconduct, but rather only a dispute about words and names. Gallio told them he wasn't going to waste his time dealing with such nonsense, and drove them all out of his court-----What wisdom and justice that poor pagan ruler showed-----In Ephesus, the idol makers whipped up a mob to accuse Paul of hurting their business by siphoning off idol worshipers unto the Savior, but the town clerk demanded they all go home.

We as believers marvel and glory in the beauties of our Savior, for He has laid down His life to save us from wrath and judgment.----Yet there is little extravagant love for Jesus these days. Sinners don't love God's Lamb, because they don't fear God's wrath for their sin.----It would be wrong for us to think that our love for Christ is due to our great insight and perception, or that we have a natural love for that which is pure and holy. Thus, we must also question why we love Him so-----In the incident of Jesus' dinner with the Pharisee, our Lord specifically addressed both the lack of love by sinners, and the overflowing love by believers.----The Pharisee was inwardly indignant that Christ would allow a sinful woman to anoint Him with spikenard, and wash His feet with her tears. If Jesus were truly a prophet, the Pharisee seethed, He wouldn't permit her to even touch Him.----The Pharisee was implicitly self-righteous, and he falsely assumed that Jesus would only knowingly consort with good folks like he was-----Thus the faulty conclusion- Christ would agree with him if only He knew what she really was, ergo, Christ was no real prophet at all-----Jesus then showed the Pharisee that He knew everything, including the private thoughts of the Pharisee-----Jesus got the Pharisee to agree with Him, that those who are forgiven the most, will love their benefactor the most.----Then Jesus pointed out that the Pharisee showed no love for Jesus, but this poor woman showed great love and respect for Him.----That's because, Jesus concluded, she had been forgiven of great sin-----The Pharisee was left to ponder the fact that, showing no love for Jesus just proved he was unforgiven-

We have spoken of the beauties and glories of our Lord Jesus, Who laid down His life as our substitute in the judgment of our sin, so that all who trust in Him are rescued from judgment and wrath and brought into a glorious everlasting life together with Him-----But most do not see the beauty of Jesus, just as Isaiah foretold- -when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.-----Lost sinners don't think they need a savior from their sin. They don't want a savior. They won't trust in a savior.----Therefore, they have no thanksgiving and praise at all for Christ. And that being the case, they have nothing to celebrate around the Lord's Table.----Lost sinners do not fear God's wrath for their sin, else they would flee to the Savior for cleansing and forgiveness.----Sin began in the Garden of Eden, when God's explicit command was disobeyed, and the result, as promised, was dying and judgment. Only one sin was all it took to plunge mankind into wretchedness and doom.----But sinners think that they are pretty good, in comparison to all those other people out there, and that God will let them by.----But God says otherwise- all have sinned, and the wages of sin is death.----We condemn ourselves when we behave inconsistently with our own declarations of what is right. There is nobody that is good enough to escape God's wrath and condemnation.----Jesus Himself made it clear that the judgment for all sin is everlasting torment in hell-fire. He taught that the judgment is so severe that, were it possible to avoid sin by cutting off one's hand or plucking out one's eye, that would be a wise act-----He promised hell for all who do not listen to God's word and obey.

The incident of Abraham offering Isaac was a foretelling of Christ-s being offered up as God-s Lamb to rescue sinners. Isaac was saved by a substitute provided by God, but for Christ, there would be no such rescue, for Jesus is the end of the line for the substitution of Lambs for sinners.----In the incident of Abraham offering Isaac, humanly speaking, there could be no happy outcome. It was an intensely sad and horrific thing Abraham had to do. What good could it possibly bring- How could Abraham survive the killing of his own son-----But instead, God used this incident to burn into Abraham-s heart, as well as all the saints, the promise of the substitution of Christ one day for all His people-----God wanted His people to rest in that promise, and rely upon it, that one day He would provide The Lamb as a sacrifice for sinners-----Looking back on it all, we recognize that God did make this incident work together for the good of Abraham, Isaac, and us all- What looked hopeless and awful, turned out to be glorious- What would have been a great torment, was turned into great rejoicing for us all-----Yes, the Lord will provide- That is the lesson from that startling incident.----Abraham is never recorded as offering up another sacrifice after this. The lesson is, that when the substitute has been provided by God and offered up, there is an end of offerings for sin. Where sin is finally purged, there can be no more Lambs slain in our place.----Likewise, when the Lord Jesus went to the cross, there was terror and sorrow in the disciples- hearts, because they had not grasped the meaning of the story of Abraham and Isaac, or the words of the prophets of old.

The Lord Jesus' sacrifice was a deliberate act by Him to fulfill His anointing as God's Lamb. The Lamb was sent as a substitute for poor sinners in the judgment, that our crimes might be judged in Jesus' body at Calvary, and our guilt be expunged by His blood-----The reason that Christ did not come down from the cross, as the mockers demanded, was that He is God's Anointed One.----Had He not been anointed, He would have come down from the cross. His death proved the rulers were wrong when they condemned Him to death for claiming to be the Anointed One.----There is a haunting parallel, as well as a contrast, between Jesus and little Isaac, whose father Abraham was instructed by God to sacrifice on an alter.----Abraham knew that God's promises could not be broken, that through Isaac all the blessings of God would come. Abraham believed that God would raise Isaac from the dead after he, in obedience to God, offered Isaac up as an offering.----But Abraham was thinking too small- God had a far more glorious plan to save Isaac - the provision of a lamb as a substitute in Isaac's place-----As they went to the place God had designated for the sacrifice, Isaac had asked his father, where is the lamb for a sacrifice-----Abraham had spoken by the Holy Ghost, not understanding the meaning, when he replied to the question, -God will provide Himself a lamb for a sacrifice.-----Just as Abraham was about to plunge the knife into little Isaac's heart, God stopped the sacrifice, and directed Abraham's gaze upon a lamb caught in a thicket.----God had provided a lamb to save Isaac, but Abraham grasped God's wider meaning- one day, God would provide His Lamb as a substitute for poor sinners-

The current spectacle our nation has descended into regarding uncorroborated accusations brings to mind how Christ was falsely accused at His trial.----The rulers sought testimony to put Jesus to death, but found none-----Notice the evil that preceded the trial- they had arrested Jesus without having first formulated any charges or found any evidence against Him. This amounted to -false arrest,- or put in plain words, kidnapping.----They intended to -fit up- the Savior with false charges to convict Him and put Him to death, but couldn't find any witnesses who could agree on anything He had done wrong.----The law was clear- only the testimony of two or three witnesses was sufficient to condemn or judge a man. Not only that, but the law prohibited even considering accusations from a single person at trial.----The reason is simple- anyone can make up any accusation, or be confused, or mistaken, and out of plain fairness, such an accusation must not be permitted to tarnish a man.----Both Paul and Jesus Himself confirmed this rule of justice and fairness in the New Testament.----Nobody could truthfully testify against Jesus of any wrongdoing, because He is without sin entirely-----Jesus declined to even answer the accusations, because He had no duty to provide a defense against uncorroborated accusations from one person.----He should have been released then and there, but the rulers were determined to put Him to death.----But when they asked Jesus, under oath, to declare whether He is the Christ, God's anointed one, He was required by the law to answer truthfully, and not remain silent.----So they condemned Jesus for telling the truth about His anointing by God as our Lamb-

The people demanded a barbarous thing when they cried out for Jesus to be crucified-----Even for the guilty person, it is important that his humanity not be destroyed, for he is still made in the image of God.----And yet, in our society, how often we hear of demands for the most barbaric treatment of people we assume are guilty of some crime. Gratuitous cruelty is a grievous sin, and yet we indulge in it. There was a time when western Europeans burned those they disagreed with alive at the stake, and called it their Christian duty. What blasphemy-----But Jesus was not guilty of any crime, or of harming anybody. He was acquitted by Pilate, and yet they screamed that He be crucified.----Most amazingly, they demanded that the Roman occupiers, the ones they hated most, carry out the barbarous act- They called upon Rome to cruelly murder one of their own-----They hated the occupiers, but desired them to destroy a Jew for them.----But when He was crucified, there was a remarkable testimony given to the fact that Jesus made Himself a deliberate offering for sin.----The centurion who oversaw Jesus' murder, when he saw how Jesus cried out loudly, and surrendered His life deliberately, exclaimed that surely, this Man was the Son of God-----Crucifixion victims died after a prolonged, slow, agonizing death by asphyxiation and cardiac failure, due to the physical strain placed upon their thoracic cavity by being strung up by their arms.----Jesus was far from expiring naturally, because He could still cry out loudly, and yet He bowed His head, and deliberately surrendered His life to His Father in Heaven.----The Centurion knew, all at once, that Jesus was in charge of His own death-

Our nation was shocked to see the forced removal of children from their illegal refugee parents, the cynical and cruel reason for their removal, the false appeals to the rule of law and Romans 13, and the hypocrisy on many sides in the matter.----This raises the larger issue- just who is our neighbor who God commands we must be kind towards-----Jesus used the story of the good Samaritan to rebuke the lawyer who sought to minimize his duties under God's law to love his neighbor. So long as we are trying to obtain righteousness by law-keeping, we will always fail, because we will not love our neighbors as God commands.----The lawyer sought to pare back the number of people he had to love, but Jesus expanded it to include strangers and outcasts. He pointed out that the priest and the Levite disobeyed the commandment, but the despised Samaritan fulfilled it.----Like the lawyer, we all like to pretend that we don't have to show love to foreigners and strangers, because we claim they are not our neighbors.----In our country, we disobey the command to love our neighbors, when we rip apart families and send people back to the countries they fled from due to oppression, fear, and poverty.----We justify what we do with lies, and cruelly shift the blame onto the poor parents off of ourselves.----Last year in our own community, a hard-working, decent man was deported, along with his wife and five American children, all because his parents illegally brought him over as a minor 20 years ago. We showed him and his family no mercy, no love.----Praise God, He found a way to be kind to His people, we who deserved condemnation- He tore down the legal wall and reconciled us by Jesus-

When Jesus healed the ten lepers, only one returned to glorify God and worship at Jesus' feet.----He was a Samaritan. Jesus commented that only the stranger amongst the ten gave glory to God.----Samaritans were despised and hated by the Jewish people, and yet only this poor man treated the Lord Jesus as He deserved to be treated - as God manifest in the flesh to save helpless sinners-----No wonder the Apostle John lamented that His own people received Him not. This leper was not a natural born child of God. It was God who converted his heart and opened his eyes to receive and worship the Savior.----The Lord approved of this man's conduct, and sent him away made whole because he believed in Jesus.----This was a rebuke to the self-righteous Jewish people who despised this poor man, because he was a Samaritan. They excluded him as a stranger, and yet Jesus accepted him-----Ethnically, the Samaritans were a mixed breed, Jews long ago intermarried with pagans, and departed from the true worship of Israel.----It all started with David's kingdom split by his grandson Rehoboam's harshness towards the people. He promised to make their burdens heavier, and they rejected him. Their new king Jeroboam then constructed an idolatrous religion to keep the people from worshiping at Jerusalem, and slowly being reconciled to David's house.----So the Samaritans were estranged by idolatry, different places of worship, different sacrifices, and a different priesthood.----This alienation could only be taken away by a better temple, a better sacrifice, and a better priest, our Lord Jesus-----He reconciled strangers, Jews, and Gentiles by His offering and His priesthood, uniting us all in Him-