When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away.
Matthew 22:22 NIVUK
Colditz Castle is legendary. It was regarded as impregnable. Its walls are seven feet thick. On one side, it faces a cliff with a sheer drop of one hundred and fifty feet to the River Mulde below. During the Second World War it was often more than a hundred miles from the nearest battlefront.
That made it the perfect place to house Allied prisoners who were an escape risk.
But it’s believed that 32 prisoners managed to escape. And 15 made it home.
The impossible situation they faced and their unbelievable triumph even became the subject of a movie.
Jesus faced a verbal and semantic Colditz here. It was a uniquely designed trap from which He was not supposed to escape.
If He’d sided with the people against the imposition of the unfair Roman tax, the Roman soldiers would have turned on Him.
If He’d sided with the Romans against the people, then the people would have turned on Him.
And all the time, those religious Pharisees would have the ‘joy’ of watching this itinerant preacher, who caused them so much trouble, be torn apart while they kept their hands clean.
This was utterly devious.
And Jesus saw right through it.
Their response to Jesus’ answer is recorded in three different verses in three different Gospels. It’s amazement (Matthew 22:22; Mark 12:17) and astonishment (Luke 20:26).
He had not just answered the question. He had not just escaped the trap. He had turned the whole question around and challenged them back with it.
And they were utterly stumped by it. They had no response. Luke even tells us they were silenced.
They aren’t even the only people He does this to. The Bible tells us He also did it with the Sadducees, who tried to get Jesus to take their side against the Pharisees and disprove the resurrection. They failed miserably (Matthew 22:23-33; Mark 12:18-27; Luke 20:27-40).
But it isn’t just the sheer force of Jesus’ intellect that we should marvel at here. We are not called to win arguments or debates for Jesus. No-one is ever persuaded into the Kingdom. Jesus might have utterly dumbfounded the Pharisees and Sadducees, but we can’t forget neither party believed in Him and both later demanded that He be crucified.
No, it’s the wisdom in these words. It’s their surgical precision. It’s their sharpness, complete lack of verbosity, their directness, authority and impact. These were elements that no teacher at the time could match (Matthew 7:28-29), and I’m sure they knew it.
Yet this should also give us immense hope.
You see, Jesus also said these words to His disciples:
Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.
Mark 13:11 NIVUK
And this happened. It happened frequently. Just a passive reading of Acts will reveal that. Some of the greatest, most courageous, most eloquent sermons Christendom has ever seen were not preached in a pulpit, but in a courtroom. Just look at Peter and Paul’s legal sparring against the Pharisees abd the Jewish leaders, or Paul’s encounters with the secular regional leaders. They are extraordinary – and even more so if you consider the power they had over Paul's life at the time.
So what am I saying? That the disciples and Paul were heroic? To a degree, yes.
But we need to remember that they were not heroic until after Pentecost. The disciples were snivelling cowards who were barely clinging on at times before then. Paul was an expert theologian, yes, but also an arch persecutor of the church.
We need to remember that these are ordinary men – just like us. They were transformed because they had been with Jesus. Even the Jewish leaders noted that (Acts 4:13).
So these men were weak – sometimes like us. They had been with Jesus – like us. They were filled with the Holy Spirit – like us.
And, like Jesus, they were able to give answers to questions and situations that utterly amazed onlookers and glorified God.
Couldn’t we do the same?
I have to say, it’s not impossible.
So when the world seems to have trapped you and has you in its clutches. If the whole world seems to be waiting on you to ‘self-own’ by saying something stupid. If they lie in wait at your door, longing for you to fall, don’t be afraid.
You’re not the first. You won’t be the last.
Jesus has been there.
And if you trust Him, seek His wisdom and follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, you will escape their trap too.
Questions
1. Have you ever felt trapped, like the Pharisees thought Jesus was? What happened?
2. What do you think helped Jesus escape from this trap?
3. What can we learn from these verses? How will it help you respond when others ask you hostile questions?
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