6 Days until Easter

6 Days until Easter

Pilate was a coward.  He believed Jesus was innocent.  He was moved by the Man who stood before him, beaten and humble, yet strong and poised.  But when it came down to it, he wasn’t willing to stand up for his beliefs against the crowds.  How many times have we been afraid to stand up for what we believe in because of those around us?  Jesus had been delivered to Pilate by the chief priests and council for blasphemy, and when he could not find fault in Him, Pilate confronted the council and elders and explained that he found Jesus blameless after his examination.  

This was fuel to the fire for the chief priests and crowd.  The people in the crowd were being instigated by the chief priests with their accusations, and Pilate heard them talking about all the places Jesus had been teaching.  Through this, Pilate figured out that Jesus was under Herod's jurisdiction.  And since Pilate was lacking in the guts department, he did what gutless people do; he passed the problem to someone else.  Pilate sent Jesus to Herod, who was in Jerusalem at the time. 

Herod was super excited to see Jesus because he had been wanting to see one of the miracles being performed that he had heard so much about.  However, when Herod began to question Jesus continually, He had no response.  Jesus, just and blameless, stood there in silence, and took on all the accusations by the chief priests and scribes.  Herod was hoping for a "magic show" of miracles for his own entertainment.  When all he got was silence, it did not sit well with him.  When I stop to really think about Herod’s self-serving intentions it really sounds like so many of us today.  We want the magic show.  We want the miracles that benefit us.  We want things done when the timing is right for us.  And when we hear silence, we get angry.  

So Herod and his men got back at Jesus for not responding by clothing Jesus in a robe and mocking Him, then sending Him back to Pilate.  As I think about what Christ has already endured up to this point in the story, I start to wonder how He held up. He had been buffeted at Caiaphas's, where the chief priest, elders and council encircled Him, taking turns striking Him with their fists, one after another.  I doubt there was any sleep that night.  He'd been through most of the morning under the accusations of the chief priests and the crowds.  And the mockings.  The mockings bother me terribly.  To think of how tired and sore and humiliated Jesus was heading back to Pilate upsets me because I know the worst is yet to come.

When Jesus returns from Herod, Pilate addresses all the people, telling them that he nor Herod could find Jesus guilty of anything he had been accused of and that He was not worthy of death.   It was custom during Passover to pardon a criminal, so Pilate brought out a murderer named Barabbas, thinking that they’d surely choose to pardon Jesus over a murderer. But no.  They’d choose darkness over light.  Pride over truth.   And Barabbas was released. When Pilate told the crowd that he'd like to release Jesus, it ignited the fire of fury within them.  The mob mentality set in.  They were out for blood. So in an attempt to appease the blood thirsty crowd, he sent the Prince of Peace away to be scourged.

How do I write about something so brutal, that it's difficult to even skim by in thought?  As I reflect on this part of scripture, my heart just wants to spill out on this paper to tell Him how sorry I am that He had to endure such excruciating torture to pay the debt of my ugly sin.  I’d rather skip past this part, but I won’t.  I’ll go to the whipping post where He stands.  I’ll sorrowfully examine the wounds caused by my sin.

And the flogging began.  They took a whip with leather straps, each one having pieces of bone or metal tied at intervals.  During a Roman scourging, the clothes were stripped and the hands were tied to an upright post.  The hands that had washed the feet of His disciples the day before, were tied to a post so that His shoulders, back and legs could take on the tearing whip of the scourge.  His shoulders once used to cradle the heads of the weary as He prayed for them, were now exposing bone.  His back, seen so many times by His mother as He prayed to His Heavenly Father, now exposed His organs.  His legs once carried Him on mission to heal the sick and bring hope to all, now exposed muscle and veins.  Christ stood at that post, taking on the sin of the world as the final blood sacrifice.  The bones, metal and leather tore His skin, cut through His muscles and began to tear His body apart. I really wanted to leave this part out.  But Jesus didn’t. He endured every gruesome detail.  For every sin we've ever committed, Christ, our Savior, stood, bound to a post, and voluntarily received every single detail of that scourge to willingly pay for all my transgressions.

But that wasn’t enough.  The crowds wanted more.  The riots were beginning. They were rejecting their King.  He stood there, beaten, broken, completely exhausted and barely hanging on to life, but He stood there still perfect and without sin.  But they chose rejection.  And as for Pilate, he didn’t want to hurt his political future.  He didn’t want to upset the crowds or the religious leaders. So even though Pilate believed Jesus was innocent and even though his wife believed Jesus was innocent, he chose the easy way out.  Doing what’s right isn’t always easy.  Sometimes we have to give up things that we want for ourselves in order to follow Christ. And I’m sure Pilate told himself a whole bunch of lies to make himself feel better.  The mob was chanting and cheering “Crucify Him!!” and Pilate stood beside Jesus and called for a bowl of water.  And there in front of the crowds, Pilate washed his hands and announced his own innocence.  It’s hard to believe.  Pilate proclaims himself innocent as he’s standing next to the only innocent Man on the face of the earth.  Pilate, full of sin chooses a bowl of water to wash his sins when he was standing next to his Savior, the only One capable of washing his sins away.

Christ stood there for us. He stood there for me. He stood there for you. He stood there for that crowd.  Knowing he was going to die, He humbly stood there as they chose to reject Him.  And He is still rejected today.  Christ, the Son of God, Who came to earth as a baby, became a Man to save the world.  There is no pain He doesn’t understand.  There is no sorrow He hasn’t felt.  There is nothing that we will face that falls out of His realm of understanding.  He did it.  He came to earth and felt our pain and then, choosing us, He gave Himself up to be sacrificed.  I’m so unbelievably undeserving.  But over and over again, I choose Him!