October 27, 2024 - How to Overcome the Pressures of Making Wrong Decisions - Pastor Paul Vallee

HOW TO OVERCOME THE PRESSURES OF MAKING WRONG DECISIONS The earliest form of a confessional statement of faith was in the second century, known as ‘the Apostles Creed.’ In describing the person and work of Jesus Christ, the Apostle’s Creed states it this way: I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord,  who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,  born of the Virgin Mary,  suffered under Pontius Pilate,  was crucified, died, and was buried;  he descended to the dead.  On the third day, he rose again;  he ascended into heaven,  he is seated at the right hand of the Father,  and he will come to judge the living and the dead.   In John 19, we see exactly how Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate. Pilate had evaluated Jesus and found that there was no basis for the charge against Jesus and presented an option to the Jewish religious leaders and the crowd that had gathered to release a prisoner. The crowd shouted back that they wanted Barabbas, the known insurrectionist, to be freed and Jesus crucified. In this exchange of dialogue between Pilate and the religious leaders, including a Judean crowd sympathetic to their antichrist viewpoint, there is pressure exerted to subvert or undermine justice. Four times in Pilate’s engagement with Jesus, he concludes that there was no basis for the charge against Jesus. Still, rather than letting him go, this examination became a source of attack upon Pilate’s leadership. If he lets Jesus go, he will lose control of the crowd and possibly his political standing before Caesar. We all face times in our lives when we experience pressure to make an uncomfortable and even a wrong decision that will affect not only ourselves but innocent people. How can we overcome the pressure of making wrong decisions? What we need to understand are some of the underlying factors that contribute to these kinds of decisions.