The Day Pilate Never Imagined

About this sermon

Introduction: Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea. A man who was a veteran of Roman politics, and Roman military life. A man who was tasked with trying to manage a very hard to manage group of people. The Jewish people, with all their separateness, and all their sensitivities. A man who had not always done that in the most artful way but did it with enough consistency that he was left in his post for a reasonably long period of time. THAT man woke up on what seemed to him to be a normal Friday morning. It was out-of-the-ordinary in the sense that it was the time of Passover and Jerusalem would have been packed full of people, and there would have been the potential for more drama than usual — I’m sure they were on high alert — but this was not his first experience with Jewish religious high days. No, this was supposed to be just another day. What he would have never expected, and perhaps what he never fully perceived, is that on this Friday morning, he would be questioning his Creator. He did not imagine that he would be standing face to face with the Son of God. ALL FOUR GOSPEL ACCOUNTS TELL US ABOUT THIS PHASE OF THE TRIALS OF JESUS. Why do the gospel writers tell us about Christ’s appearance before Pilate? Well, certainly, they are simply telling us what actually happened. This is history. This is how Jesus arrived at the cross. Never forget that Christianity is not a myth. Christianity is firmly grounded in history. Our story is a true story, a perfectly true story, and inerrantly true story. God not only provides the facts of the story; He provides an inerrant interpretation of the facts. God, through Mark, is telling us exactly what happened when Jesus of Nazareth was on this earth. Our God is telling us how He provided our salvation. God is telling us how He saved His people through the life, death, and resurrection of His Son. But in giving us this history, the biblical evangelists are also making a case. It’s a perfectly truthful case. By giving us the truth, we can get at the truth. When Jesus went through the Jewish phase of His condemnation, the verdict was guilty. But any honest person looking at how that trial was arranged and how it was conducted, knows that Jesus was innocent. You can proclaim Him guilty, but you can’t make Him guilty. And now, by showing us Christ before Pilate, we see another indication of the innocence of Jesus. Pilate will say so. Pilate was no friend of the Jews. He was not someone to be compassionate either. Those facts make his assessment of Jesus even more striking. He finds no guilt in the man. And there’s a sense in which the wicked can be very discerning about wickedness. They can see it because they think in those terms. And as we will see, Pilate recognizes what is going on in this whole charade (vs.10). BUT GET THIS. THOUGH PILATE NEVER ASKED FOR THIS. THOUGH PILATE NEVER EXPECTED THIS. THOUGH JESUS WILL EVENTUALLY SAY THAT PILATE’S GUILT WAS NOT THE GREATEST GUILT IN THIS WHOLE SERIES OF EVENTS. Pilate is still tested. Truth tests. Christ tests. You don’t get to choose your tests, and you can’t punt them either. Pilate would have never wanted this, and yet he was there.