John 19:1-16a
“Do you not know that I have power to release you and power to crucify
you?”
The whole problem was, Pilate
could not think of one reason to kill Jesus. The governor came to the same conclusion each
time he examined Jesus, “I find no case against him.”
- First, he told the Jews to try the case themselves
- Second, he sent the case to Herod, who was also in town for the Passover
- Third, he tried to placate the Jews by scourging Jesus instead of crucifying him
- Fourth, he tried to make a deal with the priests, but they chose Barabbus.
On the face of it all, it may
seem to us that Pilate was caught between a crook and a cross place. I can
imagine that his fear was bulking up inside him and making him wonder whether
it was he, Pilate, this prefect, this governor or that Jesus, that Jew, that “king of the Jews,” who was on
trial that early frosty, first-century morning. The irony is, he was
considering the wrong crook when he struggled to decide what to do with Jesus.
What was this choice Pilate had
to make? Was it a choice between:
- Doing the popular thing or doing the right thing;
- Setting a guilty man free or sentencing an innocent man to die;
- Knowing what he should do yet being afraid to do it.
Pilate tries reasoning with the
Chief Priests, and he tries reasoning with Jesus. But the priests are inciting
a riot, and Jesus will barely speak to him:
Pilate went out again and said to them, “Look, I am bringing him out to
you to let you know that I find no case against him…Here is the man!” When the chief priests and the
police saw him, they shouted, “Crucify him! Crucify him!” Pilate said to them,
“Take him yourselves and crucify him. I find no case against him” (vv 4-6).
Do you remember the 1970 rock opera,
Jesus Christ, Superstar? After Jesus
is returned to Pilate, it is the governor who is far more frustrated than the
shackled Savior:
“How can someone in your state be so cool about your fate? An amazing
thing - this silent king--“Why do you not speak when I have your life in my
hands? How can you stay quiet? I don't believe you understand”—[2]
Pilate, you can tell, really doesn’t “get”
Jesus—“an amazing thing, this silent king.” Yet, he never wanted to put Jesus
to death either. In fact, it’s highly probable that if the Priests hadn’t
pulled their Trump card from their Togas, Jesus would have been set free.
Pilate had a number of sins to cover up—sneaky
death plots and merciless massacres, abrogating the temple treasury to fund a
new aqueduct that would bear his name, among other things.
And the chief priests knew all about them. “If
you let him go, you are no friend of Caesar, and Pilate did not need the threat
translated for him, and he was far too savvy to be fooled by the Jews’ sudden
loyalty to Roman law. It was a simple case of blackmail—and Pilate was not a
man who made good choices—because a good choice is choosing Jesus—and so the
Jew’s blackmail worked beautifully against the prefect.
The most important thing for us
to understand today is that the choice Pilate ultimately made, people like us
make, too…but I will get to that later.
Basically, Pilate’s dilemma came down to this:
He wanted to release Jesus but without any cost to himself—not to his position, not to his power and
definitely not to his person. The trump card the Jews pulled clarified Pilate’s
choice.
You see, Pilate’s choice had far less to do
with doing the right thing or the popular thing; setting a guilty man free or
sentencing an innocent one to die; knowing what he should do yet being
afraid to do it. No, no and no: the choice Pilate had to make had far more to
do with covering his own ass than uncovering the truth that Jesus was an
innocent man, the Son of God, the Christ, the King of the Jews.
The Choice Pilate makes is actually between
himself and Jesus. When Pilate washed his hands in front of the angry mob, he
made a choice…for himself.
Pilate’s choice is eerily similar to decisions
not unfamiliar to Christians who live through the everyday trials of twenty-first
century life, except for the fact that a large number have found all sorts of
ways to keep our faith above the neck. That makes it easier not to have to make
a hard choice—the choice between ourselves and Jesus Christ.
Pilate’s ultimate dilemma was, “What shall I
do with Jesus?” Let’s tweak the question, make it more personal and address it
“below the neck.” What will you do with Jesus? You have a choice. You can join
those who crucified him or you can join those who crowned him. Whom do you choose, yourself or Jesus Christ?
The journey of Lent is a journey of choice.
Each Christian can choose to pick up his or her own cross and follow Jesus, the
Son of God, the Christ, the King of Heaven and Earth and of us all, or each
Christian can wash his or her hands of the whole Good Friday thing. Let’s not be indecisive about Jesus as Pilate
was. Let’s not stand mere inches from the Truth and be blind to it!
Pilate tried to wash his hands of the whole
bloody mess, but there is no water that will wash off that kind of blood once
it’s on us. We need something more to make us clean again. We need Jesus
Christ. So, my brothers and sisters in Christ, let’s help each other to make
the right choice: to choose Jesus. You won’t regret it. I promise you that.
Amen.
April 6, 2013/First Parish Federated Church of South Berwick, ME/Rev
Donna Lee Muise, Pastor
