Likewise, the execution of Jesus was part of a conspiracy. There was an organized effort to get a guilty verdict and a death sentence for a man who had committed no crime. In his account of the matter, Matthew writes that
the chief priests and the elders of the people gathered in the palace of the high priest, whose name was Caiaphas, and plotted together in order to arrest Jesus by stealth and kill him. But they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar among the people.”
The conspiracy was to be carried out with stealth - another translation offers the adverb 'sly' - and among the conspirators, Matthew notes elders and chief priests. This was a conspiracy among the powerful, not among the common people. In his narrative, Marks adds the scribes to the list of conspirators:
the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth and kill him, for they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar from the people.”
This conspiracy would seek to have Jesus arrested in a low-profile manner: a public arrest in front of crowds was not their goal. Once arrested, the conspiracy would stir up public opinion against Jesus, and pressure on the Roman governor to issue a death sentence - this, despite the lack of any reasonable or valid charge against Jesus in terms of Roman law.
Now, however, the events take a bizarre turn. The conspiracy is not well thought-out. Governor Pontius Pilate sees that Jesus is innocent, and is not easily swayed to give orders for His execution. At the end, it seems that this conspiracy might fail, until it receives assistance from an unlikely source. Although the conspirators do not know it, Jesus has been aware of their plot since its beginning - indeed, since even before its beginning. And it is Jesus Who will assist the plot and finally bring about its success.
In the final analysis, the conspirators were incompetent. Jesus, seeing their plans unravel, realizes that if He is going to receive the death sentence He is trying to get, will have to intervene on their behalf. Jesus is manipulating His own trial to ensure that He is executed. At several points in the narrative, a few words from Him would have secured His release. He must calculate His words, and His silences, to obtain death. Although the conspirators do not know it, Jesus has become part of the conspiracy.
Just as there was a conspiracy against Jesus 2,000 years ago, so there is also a conspiracy against us today - a conspiracy against you and against me. Who are the current conspirators? Sin, death, and the devil; in addition, the world, and our own sinful natures.
They conspire to cause us to lose sight of Jesus and His central role in our lives and in the world. They conspire to get us to think that life is about getting an education, getting a good job, and being relatively happy and content. They conspire to prevent us from spending time with God; they conspire to prevent us from helping others.
This conspiracy has a number of tactics it uses against us; one of them is busyness. If we are busy, we won't take the time to talk to God, to listen to Him, and to meditate on His Word. Having not done those things, we won't spend time helping others, either.
Against this conspiracy, we are powerless. In fact, we are part of the conspiracy against ourselves. Jesus, however, stands powerfully and effectively against this conspiracy. He rescues us. As John writes, addressing us,
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
There was an organized conspiracy out to get Jesus. It wanted Him dead. It succeeded, but only because He caused it to do so. And in succeeding, it failed, because the conspirators did not know that after killing Jesus, He would rise from the dead, unleashing His amazing power to transform people and transform the world. In killing Jesus, the conspiracy set into motion a process which would ultimately install Jesus as supreme and ultimately erase the conspiracy.
There is an organized conspiracy out to get us. It wants us dead - spiritually dead. Our own sinful nature is part of that conspiracy. But Jesus stops the conspiracy. Jesus breaks into the conspiracy, and into our lives, and shatters the plans which would lead us away from Him. Foiling this conspiracy, Jesus leads us to the truth. Conspiracy is always about deception; Jesus is always about the truth.
