Hartland Spring Convocation 2025: Stand Firm

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Hartland Institute of Health and Education

Eric Walsh

Standing Among the Fallen

I'm gonna do this a little different than I was going to.

Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection and the life.

He that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.

And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.

A message for tonight is entitled, Standing Among the Fallen.

Father God, we thank you for this opportunity to once again study your word.

And Lord, I ask in a special way now again that you speak.

Lord, we need a word from you as we move into a new week of difficulty, trial, and responsibilities.

We want to hear a word from the throne room of grace now.

Bind Satan for us, Lord, and cast him far away from here.

And Lord, allow us in this message to receive tangible blessing to bring into this week.

This is our prayer in Jesus' precious and holy name.

So, Luke chapter 23 and verse 32, Luke 23, verse 32 says, as Jesus, and let's paint the picture again, this weekend the world is looking at this and thinking about these stories, Jesus has gone through a kangaroo court with the Sanhedrin.

They had falsely accused him, brought in false witnesses.

I wanna say, we talked about the faith of Jesus earlier.

If they brought in false witnesses against Jesus back then, what will they do to us now with social media?

What would they be able to do to the people of God in the last days?

When I went through the thing I went through 11 years ago, and it was so public, and they attacked me for my religious beliefs, and I actually lost jobs over it.

And because I preach the scripture, and I will preach the scripture no matter what happens, whatever the consequences are.

But when they go online and they begin to attack your reputation, let me tell you something.

It is almost, if not impossible, for you to actually reverse what they're doing to you.

The world has become such that fact is simply what's put out there about you.

People sometimes don't even know folk and they have hard feelings for or against them.

When Jesus was going through this, they falsely accused him.

Imagine what it must have been like to Jesus after living and being with his disciples somewhere around 3 years.

Imagine what it's like when 1 of them betrays him, 1 of them denies him, and everyone else runs for cover.

How is it that he, the God of the universe in human form, how is it that he was able to stand among so many who had fallen.

Imagine as they take him, beat him, by his stripes we are healed.

They spat upon him, called him all kinds of vile names, brought him before Herod, he went before Pilate.

Pilate's wife even warned him, Pilate, not to come against Christ and yet he did.

He had to stand between, next to Pilate and Barabbas and he had to hear the people choose a malfactor, a murderer, and a thief over the perfect, sinless Son of God.

We often think that we have seen injustice, we think we've seen people suffer, nothing compares to what Christ went through.

Imagine that it was his own creation spitting on him.

And then they took him and gave him the cross to carry, and he gets to Calvary, and the cross goes up, and Christ, before the cross goes up, Christ is nailed to the cross.

Imagine the shrieks of agony As nails go through his, penetrate his flesh, fracture him.

Blood spewing out, and here's the real thing you always have to think about when you think about the crucifixion of Christ.

Remember that it was our sin, not the nails that kept him on that cross.

He was lifted up between earth and heaven and all those people witnessed what happened to him.

Story gets interesting as you get to Luke chapter 23, verse 32.

It says, and there were also 2 other malfactors led with him to be put to death.

When they were come to the place which is called Calvary, there they crucified him.

And the malefactors, 1 on the right hand and the other on the left.

Not only is Jesus crucified, He is crucified with notorious criminals.

And in the way that they did it, the guy in the middle was always the most guilty.

But when we see injustice in this world, we must have, as we talked about earlier today, the faith of Jesus.

How did Jesus respond when he was mistreated?

Here it is, Luke 23 and verse 34 says this, Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

And they parted his raiment and cast lots.

You read that and you think, man, this was such a, Jesus took the high road.

He was mistreated and he forgave the people.

He asked his father to forgive the people that were mistreating him.

But you have to understand Jesus was, and what was going on, was being witnessed by the entire universe in the crowd around were the demons and the devil himself.

When they said crucify him, crucify him, the way the Bible presents it, there's a point in there where it's as if the demons' voices are lifted up and heard and convinced Pilate finally that Jesus should be crucified.

Can you imagine that the devil himself, like he was in the Garden of Eden, here he gloats, not at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but now he gloats at the tree that is the cross.

Can you imagine as the devil moved through, witnessing this, waiting for Jesus to break, to say an ill word, to sin in anger, so that all of his perfect life would be destroyed, and the sacrifice would not go through.

And instead of Jesus cursing those who treated him so terribly, He says, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

I would imagine when the devil heard that, he shuddered.

You know, there are people who celebrate this.

I was in Haiti preaching and doing medical missionary work many years ago, and I have to tell you, people talk about Haiti bad.

Let me tell you something, the best Christians I've ever met in my life, I met in the country of Haiti.

The strongest Christians I've met anywhere in the world are Haitians.

The smartest people I've ever met are also Haitian.

But I can tell you, when I was in Haiti, I was shocked at the level of Christianity among the faithful, because they live in a situation where you can't be a half Christian.

Playing around with it will get you in trouble.

And they had these things called rah-rah bands.

And we were there around this time of the year.

And they would come and play the drums and dance.

And I asked 1 of the Adventist elders, because when we were going to do the medical work, we had to meet with the kind of the, you know, the chiefs, the leaders of the town we were in.

And we had to meet with the voodoo priests as well as with the Adventist pastors.

And when I asked, I said, what is the meaning of these rah-rah bands playing this music and these women dancing so provocatively?

And they said, they are celebrating the death of Christ from the perspective that Satan won.

And part of the reason he didn't win is right in this verse.

It's because Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

What if when we were mistreated, this was our response?

Verse 35, and the people stood beholding, and the rulers also with them derided him, saying, He saved others, let him save himself.

If he be Christ, the chosen of God, they started to mock him.

Ah, if he's really who he says he is, he should be able to save himself.

If he's the Christ, if he's the chosen of God, why can't he save himself?

The Roman soldiers joined in, the Bible says in verse 36, the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him and offering him vinegar.

It was a crescendo of mockery of our Lord.

And I would imagine the demons and the devil himself goading them on and shouting out words that were hurtful and painful to Christ.

The Bible records it this way in Luke 23 verse 37, and saying, if you be the king of the Jews, save yourself.

And a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew.

The Jewish leadership did not want that put over his head.

Because you know, it's funny, Pilate plays an interesting role.

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Standing Among the Fallen

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