Out of Order Trivia Quiz

Answer: He healed someone on the Sabbath.

A man with a paralysed hand went to Jesus in the synagogue. Under Jewish law, it was forbidden to do any work on the Sabbath because it was a day of rest. There were strict rules concerning what was allowed, and healing was not permitted. According to Mark 3, some people in the synagogue were watching Jesus to see if he would do something they considered to be wrong.

When the paralysed man appeared before Jesus, Jesus said to the people, "What does our Law allow us to do on the Sabbath? To help or to harm? To save someone's life or to destroy it?" Jesus cured the man and the Pharisees went away to plot his death.

Answer: Jesus had risen from the dead.

Peter and John were telling a group of people that the dead will rise and that Jesus was proof of that fact. They had already healed a man at the entrance to the Temple, and claimed that the miracle occurred by the power of Jesus' name. This upset some priests, Sadducees, and the head Temple guard officer. The two men were arrested and jailed; the next day, they were questioned by the High priest.

The picture is the empty tomb left behind when Jesus was resurrected.

Answer: Stephen

In Acts 6, some men had been bribed to make false accusations against Stephen. Stephen was taken before the Council. He compared them to their ancestors who had rejected Moses in the desert. He called the Council members stubborn and resistant to God's message.

He also accused them of betraying and murdering God's servant, Jesus. After listening to his speech, the Council threw Stephen out of the city and stoned him until he died.

Answer: Paul

Paul wrote 2 Corinthians, a letter to the church in Corinth. Paul had a somewhat rocky relationship with the church there, and some members were questioning whether Paul was a true messenger from God. At first, Paul justified himself by pointing out that he was a Hebrew and one of Abraham's descendants. He then went on to list all the things he had suffered since becoming Christ's servant: he had received 39 lashes for false teaching on five different occasions; he had been beaten by Romans for disturbing the peace; he had been stoned once and imprisoned numerous times.

The picture is of an eye - a clue to Paul as he was blinded at his conversion to Christianity.

Answer: She committed adultery.

The teachers of the Law brought the woman to Jesus because she had been caught committing adultery. They told Jesus that, according to the Law, she should be stoned to death, and then they asked what they should do. Jesus didn't condemn the woman to death or say that the Law of Moses was wrong.

Instead, he wrote in the sand and said, "Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her." The people who were accusing the woman left one by one. There is no record of what Jesus wrote on the ground that day.

Answer: John told the king that his marriage was unlawful.

John the Baptist told King Herod that his marriage to Herodias was against the Jewish Law. Herod was married to an Arabian princess, and Herodias was married to Herod's brother, Philip. Herod became infatuated with Herodias. He divorced his wife and took his brother's. The circumstances of their relationship were the thing that John repeatedly objected to.

Herod wanted to kill John the Baptist, but he was worried about the public's response if he did. Herodias saw an opportunity to have John killed in Matthew 14:6-8, and the king could not refuse.

Answer: Jesus

King Herod (a different one to the Herod in Matthew 14) heard from the wise men who had travelled from the east that a new "king of the Jews" had been born. The birth of a new king was unacceptable in the eyes of the current ruler, whose authority was now under threat.

When the travellers refused to reveal the location of Jesus, Herod ordered all babies in Bethlehem and the surrounding area to be killed. Luckily, Jesus' parents had been warned in a dream to flee to Egypt until Herod died.

Answer: Dragged them from their houses and put them in jail.

Saul (who later had his name changed to Paul) wasn't part of the Early Church in Acts 8. In fact, he was violently opposed to it. He persecuted Christians, and in Acts 8:3, he "tried to destroy the church". He dragged believers, both male and female, from their houses and put them in prison.

Answer: They were Roman citizens and had not been found guilty of a crime.

Silas and Paul were accused of "causing trouble" among Roman citizens. The two men were taken to Roman officials, who whipped and beat them before putting them in jail. During the night that they spent in jail, there was a severe earthquake. The prisoners' chains broke and the doors opened. When the jailer went to check on the prisoners, he found the men waiting there so that the jailer wouldn't get into trouble. The jailer invited Paul and Silas into his house, and he and his family were baptised.

In the morning, Roman officers went to the jail to tell Paul and Silas that they were free to go. The two men objected to the treatment they had received on the grounds that they were Roman citizens and had not been found guilty of a crime - they had been punished without being convicted. The Roman officials visited the two men and apologised. The picture is a dove - a symbol of innocence.

Answer: Pilate had the power to sentence people to be executed.

When Jesus was arrested, he was taken to a few different people. First, he was taken to the High Priest who questioned the teachings Jesus had given. In Luke 23, he was taken to Herod, the ruler of Galilee, where he was mocked and then sent to Pilate, the Roman Governor of Judea. According to John 18:31, the Jews took Jesus to Pilate because they were "not allowed to put anyone to death" themselves. Even though Pilate couldn't find Jesus guilty of any crime, at the end of John 18, he was sentenced to death in place of Barabbas, who the public called to be set free.