Bible Story Topic: Jesus’ Trial
In Matthew 26:47-27:31, Faithwheel.com

Click HERE for Previous Bible Stories

Jesus was still speaking when Judas, one of the twelve disciples, arrived. With him was a large crowd armed with swords and clubs and sent by the chief priests and the elders. The traitor had given the crowd a signal: “The man I kiss is the one you want. Arrest him!”

Judas went straight to Jesus and said, “Peace be with you, Teacher,” and kissed him.

Jesus answered, “Be quick about it, friend!”

Then they came up, arrested Jesus, and held him tight. One of those who were with Jesus drew his sword and struck at the High Priest’s slave, cutting off his ear. “Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him. “All who take the sword will die by the sword. Don’t you know that I could call on my Father for help, and at once he would send me more than twelve armies of angels? But in that case, how could the Scriptures come true which say that this is what must happen?”

Then Jesus spoke to the crowd, “Did you have to come with swords and clubs to capture me, as though I were an outlaw? Every day I sat down and taught in the Temple, and you did not arrest me. But all this has happened in order to make come true what the prophets wrote in the Scriptures.”

Then all the disciples left him and ran away.

Those who had arrested Jesus took him to the house of Caiaphas, the High Priest, where the teachers of the Law and the elders had gathered together. Peter followed from a distance, as far as the courtyard of the High Priest’s house. He went into the courtyard and sat down with the guards to see how it would all come out. The chief priests and the whole Council tried to find some false evidence against Jesus to put him to death; but they could not find any, even though many people came forward and told lies about him. Finally two men stepped up and said, “This man said, ‘I am able to tear down God’s Temple and three days later build it back up.’”

The High Priest stood up and said to Jesus, “Have you no answer to give to this accusation against you?” But Jesus kept quiet. Again the High Priest spoke to him, “In the name of the living God I now put you under oath: tell us if you are the Messiah, the Son of God.”

Jesus answered him, “So you say. But I tell all of you: from this time on you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right side of the Almighty and coming on the clouds of heaven!”

At this the High Priest tore his clothes and said, “Blasphemy! We don’t need any more witnesses! You have just heard his blasphemy! What do you think?”

They answered, “He is guilty and must die.”

Then they spat in his face and beat him; and those who slapped himsaid, “Prophesy for us, Messiah! Guess who hit you!”

Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard when one of the High Priest’s servant women came to him and said, “You, too, were with Jesus of Galilee.”

But he denied it in front of them all. “I don’t know what you are talking about,” he answered, and went on out to the entrance of the courtyard. Another servant woman saw him and said to the men there, “He was with Jesus of Nazareth.”

Again Peter denied it and answered, “I swear that I don’t know that man!”

After a little while the men standing there came to Peter. “Of course you are one of them,” they said. “After all, the way you speak gives you away!”

Then Peter said, “I swear that I am telling the truth! May God punish me if I am not! I do not know that man!”

Just then a rooster crowed, and Peter remembered what Jesus had told him: “Before the rooster crows, you will say three times that you do not know me.” He went out and wept bitterly.

Early in the morning all the chief priests and the elders made their plans against Jesus to put him to death. They put him in chains, led him off, and handed him over to Pilate, the Roman governor.

When Judas, the traitor, learned that Jesus had been condemned, he repented and took back the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. “I have sinned by betraying an innocent man to death!” he said.

“What do we care about that?” they answered. “That is your business!”

Judas threw the coins down in the Temple and left; then he went off and hanged himself.

The chief priests picked up the coins and said, “This is blood money, and it is against our Law to put it in the Temple treasury.” After reaching an agreement about it, they used the money to buy Potter’s Field, as a cemetery for foreigners. That is why that field is called “Field of Blood” to this very day.

Then what the prophet Jeremiah had said came true: “They took the thirty silver coins, the amount the people of Israel had agreed to pay for him, and used the money to buy the potter’s field, as the Lord had commanded me.”

Jesus stood before the Roman governor, who questioned him. “Are you the king of the Jews?” he asked.

“So you say,” answered Jesus. But he said nothing in response to the accusations of the chief priests and elders.

So Pilate said to him, “Don’t you hear all these things they accuse you of?”

But Jesus refused to answer a single word, with the result that the Governor was greatly surprised.

At every Passover Festival the Roman governor was in the habit of setting free any one prisoner the crowd asked for. At that time there was a well-known prisoner named Jesus Barabbas. So when the crowd gathered, Pilate asked them, “Which one do you want me to set free for you? Jesus Barabbas or Jesus called the Messiah?” He knew very well that the Jewish authorities had handed Jesus over to him because they were jealous.

While Pilate was sitting in the judgment hall, his wife sent him a message: “Have nothing to do with that innocent man, because in a dream last night I suffered much on account of him.”

The chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask Pilate to set Barabbas free and have Jesus put to death. But Pilate asked the crowd, “Which one of these two do you want me to set free for you?”

“Barabbas!” they answered.

“What, then, shall I do with Jesus called the Messiah?” Pilate asked them.

“Crucify him!” they all answered.

But Pilate asked, “What crime has he committed?”

Then they started shouting at the top of their voices: “Crucify him!”

When Pilate saw that it was no use to go on, but that a riot might break out, he took some water, washed his hands in front of the crowd, and said, “I am not responsible for the death of this man! This is your doing!”

The whole crowd answered, “Let the responsibility for his death fall on us and on our children!”

Then Pilate set Barabbas free for them; and after he had Jesus whipped, he handed him over to be crucified.

Then Pilate’s soldiers took Jesus into the governor’s palace, and the whole company gathered around him. They stripped off his clothes and put a scarlet robe on him. Then they made a crown out of thorny branches and placed it on his head, and put a stick in his right hand; then they knelt before him and made fun of him. “Long live the King of the Jews!” they said. They spat on him, and took the stick and hit him over the head. When they had finished making fun of him, they took the robe off and put his own clothes back on him. Then they led him out to crucify him.