The Apostles' Creed runs, "I believe in God the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ His only son our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate …" Suffered under whom? Pontius Pilate? What on earth is he doing there - in the creed, along with the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary? He does not belong in that company. His appearance there is as unexpected, as offensive even, as if a tramp were to gate-crash a Palace Garden Party.
The ironical thing is that he did not really want to be there himself. He was dragged in against his better judgment, spent his time there wishing heartily that he were out of it, and tried to wash his hands of the whole affair. But there he is, fixed for ever on a plinth of history, as it were, where his name and his infamy are mercilessly exposed to the gaze of succeeding generations to the end of time. Is it his punishment to have to hear, endlessly repeated, the chant that must hardly ever, somewhere on the earth, die away from human lips, "suffered under Pontius Pilate … suffered under Pontius Pilate"?
It is a fact that what he did he did to preserve his good name with Imperial Caesar, the one man whose judgment mattered to him. How grim was his blunder. Pontius Pilate is an enduring reminder to the world that he who desires a good name for himself among men, and buys it at the cost of his good name with God ends up condemned by both.
The story of how this unwilling victim got ensnared is a solemn warning to us that no man, however he wishes it, can avoid a showdown with God.
Pilate was the man who carries responsibility for the final decision to have Jesus crucified. Of the many who wanted it - a sinister alliance of forces came together to bring it about - Pilate was perhaps the least willing of them all to be involved. But it was he who finally gave the order. The buck stopped with him.
Though Jesus had come into the world to give His life a ransom for many we must remember that never, by any action of his own, did He manipulate anything to bring it about. Despite the fact that it was His own and His Father's purpose that he should die for the sins of the world, He did not engineer His own death. He played His part in determining when and where it should be done, but He did not make it happen. All the engineering of it was done by sinful men, so that as the Passion story unfolds, the Lord's innocence shines with greater brightness as men's guilty deeds grow blacker. At every step, He does only what is right, only what is good, only what is true; and for that very reason the mounting malignity of men stands clear for the wretched evil that it is.
Jesus did not betray Himself into the hands of sinners; He was betrayed - betrayed because one man, Judas, opened his heart to evil intent.
And once it was done other men followed suit, adding evil of their own to his, so that an avalanche of evil was precipitated. Sin, when we yield to it, always has that potential in it. We none of us know what a Pandora's Box our one evil deed may unloose upon others.
The Jewish authorities, given that one opportunity, seized upon it with swift determination. It was to them too good a chance to miss … to be able to seize Jesus outside the city … on private property … in the dead of night.
He was brought swiftly to the High Priest's house where an illegal trial was mounted, conducted with illegal procedures, and an unjust verdict secured.
Then came the tricky bit - how to make the verdict stick. For the Jewish authorities were not, by Roman Law, permitted to execute the death sentence for civil crimes. A death sentence on religious grounds they were permitted to execute, as in the case of Stephen, the first Christian martyr. But for crimes against the state, Rome kept the power of punishment in her own hands. And it was part of the evil intent of the enemies of Jesus that His death should bring public shame upon Him. The Roman Governor had to be persuaded, therefore, to back up their verdict. And there was not much time. There must have been some behind-the-scenes manoeuvring to persuade Pontius Pilate, the Roman Governor, even to consider a trial so early in the morning. The swollen population of the city would have strengthened their case: the risk of a riot had to be taken seriously.
And the charge against Jesus had to be changed from a religious one to a political one. Jesus had been found guilty in the trial before the High Priest on a charge of blasphemy. Pilate could never have been persuaded to condemn the prisoner to death on that count. He would have dismissed the whole thing as a purely religious squabble, and obliged the Jews to sort it out for themselves. So the charge was subtly altered. Jesus is represented at first to Pilate, not as one who has claimed equality with God, but as one who has set himself up as a rival to Caesar. Only later in the trial, when the priests sniff out Pilate's superstitious fear, do they come out into the open with the truth. They are not concerned to serve the truth, but only to make it serve them.
So Jesus is led to Antonia's castle, high on one corner of the Temple's precincts. Pilate has been got out of bed, if indeed, he had been allowed any sleep at all that night; he is in no mood for a long and complicated trial. It is obvious from his early conduct of proceedings that he wanted to dismiss this obvious foolishness as quickly as possible. His irresponsible desire for haste contributed in fact to his downfall.
Bound, and unresisting, Jesus is pushed forward roughly, made half to stumble, while Pilate, still suppressing a yawn or two, is told by the High Priest that this man has threatened Caesar's throne, and is a terror to the peace.
Pilate looks at Jesus a long moment. He has presided over many a trial before this, has had many a criminal before him. Experience has taught him to reach a swift assessment of men's characters. He knows that Jesus is no threat to civil order. It is my belief that there passed between Pilate and Jesus in that moment one of those human flashes that established an immediate rapport, at the man-to-man level. I think in that moment Pilate thought his task was going to be easy. A little intelligent co-operation from this obviously intelligent man, who had clearly been framed, and they would soon settle this bit of nonsense.
He looks at Jesus, and then says, "You! … King of the Jews?!"
And Jesus answers, "What do you say?"
It wasn't quite the answer Pilate expected. He expected Jesus to give him a straightforward, honest denial: "No." Pilate could then have said, "The prisoner has disclaimed any bid for power, here, before witnesses. Whatever you claim he may or may not have said, He has denied it on oath. Case dismissed."
But Jesus could not answer "No" as Pilate wanted. In the deepest sense of all he was King of the Jews. Neither could He answer "Yes", for that would have been to say "Yes" in the sense Pilate understood the question, and that would have been to mislead him. To answer "No" would be to lie, to answer "Yes" would also be to falsify the truth.
Jesus' answer unsettled him. It made him impatient. While the priests ranted on he gave Jesus repeated opportunities simply to deny their silly charges. It is as though Pilate were saying to Jesus, "O come on, man, speak up. Deny these stupid accusations. Help me now, and let's put an end to this farce."
So Jesus tried to help him appreciate the issues. Truth was at stake. "Truth," asked Pilate, "What's truth? Don't be so naive. Truth is what the man with all the power says three times is true. I'm that man here."
That was the world of values in which Pilate had grown up. That was the value system on which Roman government operated. It is the value system on which government operates still, even in a democracy. Truth is what the man with the numbers says is true. Jesus in fact was doing what He could in the severely restricted circumstances He was in to save Pilate's soul.
But Pilate was in no mind to bother with issues of that sort. He wanted to bring the whole business to a swift conclusion and have his breakfast.
So he went out to the Jews again. "I find no fault in this man at all." And he thought by saying it to settle the whole thing. Pilate was a man to whom power, not truth, was the final reality. And power was his. Within his lights, Pilate was a perceptive, honest man, and no coward. So long as he felt satisfied he could dispense rough justice, he was content for force and sheer authority to smother all the finer points.
But this was the moment when there was a disturbance outside. A fresh crowd had turned up, who were nothing to do with the trial of Jesus. They had come with their decision which of Rome's prisoners they wanted for the Passover amnesty. It was an annual custom. They had already decided on Jesus Barabbas, and they were probably surprised to find a trial in progress. They may have been quite unaware that Jesus of Nazareth had been apprehended during the night.
At their cry of "We want bar Abbas," Pilate saw a fresh chance to settle the matter. "Jesus bar Abbas," he asked, "or this Jesus they call 'the King of the Jews'?" He counted on the crowd's good sense. But he had not reckoned with the priests' power over the people, and in a moment this little ruse to get a quick decision exploded like a bomb in his face. He had relied on expediency instead of on justice, and in that moment the ground was cut from under his feet. From this point on he grows more and more desperate. He has tried to hurry matters instead of patiently serving justice. He has wanted to play the power game. Now he found the priests could play it better.
"All right, all right. What shall I do with this fellow?"
"Crucify him," they shouted.
"What, crucify your king?" It was pure
sarcasm on Pilate's part. "Look at him!"
Jesus presented an almost comical appearance in face of the charge -
a pathetic spectacle, with his tatty robe and cock-eyed crown and
floppy sceptre. "He's a joke, not a menace. Just the sort of king you
wretched Jews deserve."
But his sarcasm only stings them into greater vehemence, and because things are getting out of control he thinks to pacify their lust with a little blood. "I'll flog him, and let him go."
Pilate, weakening under pressure, but still paying lip service to justice.
He knows he has bungled the opening gambits, he knows the priests smell victory, he knows the crowd's blood is up, he senses dimly and disturbingly that there are forces in the situation that soar above his comprehension. His wife's message serves only to aggravate him the more. He is uncomfortably aware that everything is getting out of hand.
And then the threat to his own career is insinuated.
He knows that the threat the priests made was no idle one. If they reported unfavourably on him to Caesar it would not matter what sort of defence he presented, his inability to control the situation without recourse to higher authority would spell the end to his career; all hope of promotion would be finished. That is what finally got to him - penetrated all his defences and stung him on the raw. That finished it. "Take him then and crucify him."
To save his own skin he violated justice, abandoned responsibility, murdered truth, trampled on innocence, and yielded the day to mob rule and the law of the jungle.
It was the judge who emerged from the trial the condemned man. Pilate it was, not Jesus, who stood condemned that day.
It happened then the way it always happens - the way it happens still: by the way we react to Jesus we pronounce a verdict, not on Him, but on ourselves.
Put a genuine work of art on public display, a truly great sculpture, or a painting which is a work of real genius, and the people who confront it and make their comments on it pass judgment, not on the painting or the sculpture, but on themselves. The man who despises it proclaims himself a philistine.
So Pilate judged himself that day.
He blustered while Jesus remained calm.
He floundered and dithered while Jesus stood firm.
He showed himself a coward where Jesus showed only courage. He was
ruled by self while Jesus was ruled by honour.
While Jesus remained true, Pilate let truth, justice and honour fall
in the public square.
Jesus it was who judged Pilate, not Pilate Jesus.
And so it is with us all. What we think of Jesus brands us, not Him. Reject Him, despise Him or ignore Him, it is we ourselves on whom we pass sentence, not on Him. We are all judged when we confront Him.
And yet, it was not to judge us that He came. He does not take the initiative to move against us, to condemn us. He presents Himself to us to serve us at our point of need, to bear witness to us to the truth - the truth of how things really stand between us and God: how badly wrong we have gone, and how passionately God desires to put things right. The truth of Him exposes our falsehood. The love He bears us condemns our enmity.
But the very love that does so shame us is our remedy. Because He comes to us as God, the love He has for us is God's love. In the forgiveness He would have us receive lies our release from guilt. In the love He bears us lies our healing. In the sheer strength of righteousness which is the backbone of His love lies our hope of renewal.
What would we have? A love that has no goodness in it, so it has no power to make us into a better man, a better woman? Or a righteousness that has no love in it, no pity, so it has no power to do anything but to condemn? No, no. "Mercy and truth in Him are met together. In Him righteousness and peace have kissed each other."
They are resolved only in pain, His pain and ours. There is pain for us and pain for Him. The pain of forgiveness is His, and He bears it - while the joy of forgiveness is ours. The pain of judgment, of condemnation is ours, and we must bear it. But our repentance, when we acknowledge our sin and look to Him for help - that repentance is joy to Him.
His presence is hurtful to us; it exposes us for what we are. But He wounds only that He might heal.
Open all our heart to Him and to His coming, and He will heal and make us whole … He before whom we stand condemned. He would make His bid for our soul, the way He did for Pilate's, even while we presume to dismiss Him.
Think not to pass judgment on Him. Rather let His judgment of you lead you to salvation.
Said Paul to Timothy: "Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called … In the presence of God who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, I charge you to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. This will be made manifest at the proper time by the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has ever seen or can see. To him be honour and eternal dominion. Amen.
"Fight the good fight of the faith." (1 Timothy 6:12 -16)
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