The Testimony of His Enemies
At first, it would seem strange that testimony favorable to the cause of Christ would be found on the lips of his enemies. Enemies are those who set out to harm and destroy those whom they oppose. Yet the enemies of Jesus have provided us with some wonderful evidence that lends strong support to the truths revealed about him.
Modernists and unbelievers continue to contend that miracles are impossible and biblical accounts of them are myth. They tell us that a man named Jesus lived, taught many people, and then was killed, but the miracles, signs, and wonders attributed to him are later embellishments of the story. These miracle-myths were supposedly invented and promoted by eager disciples who were trying to jump-start a religious movement after Jesus’ death. Yet the skeptics fail to consider the testimony of those who hated Jesus when he lived and who desperately tried to destroy his work. If anyone would have wanted to discredit Jesus’ miracles and expose him as a fraud, his enemies were the people. Instead, they provided unwitting testimony to the authenticity of the miracles of Jesus. Jesus’ enemies never did deny that he did miracles. They could not deny the obvious without looking foolish and losing all credibility in the eyes of the people. This is why Peter could stand up on the day of Pentecost and say publicly, “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know” (Acts 2:22).
The Bible states that after Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, “then the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered a council and said, ‘What shall we do? For this man works many signs’” (John 11:47). Let modernists and unbelievers take careful note of this testimony from the enemies of Jesus about the reality of Jesus’ miracles! Unless they try to deny that this Scripture is a reliable historical record (which is their untenable claim whenever they are faced with the conclusions of Scripture), they must face the evidence provided by their own fellow unbelievers in Jesus. The enemies of Jesus would not attribute to Jesus what they knew to be untrue when it would only make him more popular and prove his claim to be the Son of God. The miracles really happened, and Jesus’ enemies had to admit it!
The silence of the enemies of Jesus on the day of Pentecost gave undeniable testimony to the truth of what Peter preached concerning Jesus. Why did they not publicly refute Peter’s claim that Jesus did miracles, if in fact Jesus did none? They could have negated the greatest miracle of them all, the resurrection of Jesus, if they had only produced his dead body. Christianity would have been dead on arrival. But there was no body of Jesus to take out of what was now an empty tomb. The truth about the resurrected Lord and Christ preached that grand day produced faith and obedience in three thousand souls, and continued to spread from that day on. If only people today would believe in what the enemies of Jesus testified that they saw.
After Peter and John healed a lame man in the temple (Acts 3:1-10), they were arrested and interrogated before the Sanhedrin. Peter told them that the miracle had been done in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth (4:10). No one stepped forward to expose that “miracle” as a clever trick or a false claim and thus destroy the credibility of the apostles and Christianity. Would they not have been delighted to do so if they could have? Why couldn’t they? “And seeing the man who had been healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it. But when they had commanded them to go aside out of the council, they conferred among themselves, saying, ‘What shall we do with these men? For, indeed, that a notable miracle has been done through them is evident to all who dwell in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it’” (4:14-16). Sadly, they refused to believe the truth confirmed by the very miracle that they admitted was “evident to all” and that they could not “deny.” Truly as Jesus said, seeing they did not see, and hearing they did not hear (Matt. 13:13).
Will you accept the testimony of Jesus’ enemies about his miracles and determine to believe the truth about Jesus that their hard hearts would not believe? True faith does not come by the testimony of the miracles alone, but by what the miracles confirmed — the inspired Word of God (Rom. 10:17; Mark 16:20; Heb. 2:3-4; 2 Tim. 3:16-17). Resolve to be an obedient friend of Jesus, not an unbelieving enemy.
6708 O’Doniel Loop W., Lakeland, Florida 33809 marcgibson@aol.com
Truth
Magazine Vol. XLV: 9 p10
May 3,
2001