Plotting to Kill Jesus

The Point of the Gospel

The Plot to Kill Jesus {John}

The Pharisees and chief priests were afraid that everyone would believe in Jesus and his miraculous signs, and thereby cause the Romans to take away their temple and their nation.

Caiaphas, high priest that year, said, “You know nothing. You don’t realize it is better to let one man die for the people than for everyone to die.”

Inspired not from within himself, he prophesied as high priest to the death of Jesus for the Jewish nation and all the scattered children of God, so he might bring them together into one body. The Jewish leaders then plotted to kill him.

No longer moving freely in public, Jesus withdrew to Ephraim, a village near the desert. Many were going to Jerusalem to prepare—take part in ritualistic cleansing—for the Jewish Passover. Everyone kept looking for Jesus and asking if he intended to show up for the feast. The chief priests and Pharisees had ordered that anyone finding out where Jesus was must report it so they could arrest him.

Anointed for Death {John}

John places the story of Mary anointing Jesus with an expensive perfume after Lazarus’s raising and says it was during a dinner at the siblings’ house in Jesus’ honor. Here she poured it on Jesus’ feet rather than his head and wiped them with her hair. Judas, instead of all the disciples, objected to the waste, not out of concern for the poor, but because he was a thief, kept the group’s money, and used it for himself.

The chief priests decided to kill Lazarus as well as Jesus since his story brought so many to Jesus.

Personal Thought: John doesn’t mention anything more about Lazarus, leaving us wondering what happened to him or if he paid any consequences for the leaders’ determination to stop Jesus.