Matthew 28:11-15

REPORT OF THE WATCH

Matthew 28:11-15. “ And they going, behold, certain ones of the watch, having come into the city, announced to the high priests all the things which have taken place. And they being assembled with the elders, and taking counsel, gave much money to the soldiers, saying, Tell it that His disciples, having come by night, stole Him away, we being asleep.

And if this may be heard by the governor, we will persuade him, and make you safe. And they, taking the money, did as they were taught. And this report was current among the Jews even unto this day.” Matthew wrote his Gospel there in Judea fifteen years after the crucifixion of the Savior. He wrote it for the Christian Jews. We see from his testimony that even at the time of his writing fifteen years having rolled away since the wonderful events of Calvary, Olivet, and Pentecost this report, was current among the Jews, the leading men of the fallen Church having made its circulation a specialty, doing their utmost, even to the last, to bury the very name of Jesus in the oblivion of shame and crime, and vindicate their own rejection of His Messiahship and cruel treatment of His person at every hazard.

You see how the high priests and ruling elders i. e., the men in authority, standing at the head of the Church condescended to bribe the soldiers to propagate what they knew to be positively false. Doubtless they had to bribe Pilate also, thus pouring out the Lord's money, which the people had contributed to the temple treasury, to hire poor heathens to tell lies for them. You may think there is nothing of this kind in the fallen Churches of the present day; but you are entirely mistaken. Many years ago, when I was a youth, prosecuting my education, vigorous efforts were repeatedly made by Church leaders to buy me with filthy lucre. I am so glad I did not sell. You all see the transparent sophistry in any attempt possible for infidelity to use the report of the soldiers to the detriment of Christianity; for it is not probable that any of them slept, as they well knew it was a penalty of death for a Roman soldier to sleep on guard. If some of them did give way to a napping spell, it is not at all probable that the whole number, at least sixteen, slept so soundly, all at the same time, that the stalwart, mechanical effort necessary to remove the stone would not have awakened them before they could get away with the body. Hence you see, like all the dogmata of infidelity, founded on falsehood, any argument deducible from the above report would break down of its own weight.