Pilate

You are listening to a message from Thrive Community Church, a church located in Southwest Florida. For more info visit us at thrive-fl.org. It's good to have you here as we're in still this sermon series on identity and we're looking at today a very unique, a unique situation on identity. So we're covering the Gospel of John and as I've mentioned before the Gospel of John has more one-on-one dialogues than any of the other Gospels where Jesus is interacting with different individuals along the way and many of them are dealing with the question of identity and where you find your identity, the source of meaning and purpose and who you are in life. And today we are at a very unique one with Pontius Pilate. It's not an intimate conversation I would dare say, it's an interrogation that is going on with Pilate and but the question is who's getting interrogated? Let's read about this. It is, well first of all I want to let you know that some people do find that Pontius Pilate comes across as kind of a weak character for some. They kind of make him, well he's the guy who got caught in the middle and didn't know what to do. I don't think that's necessarily the best understanding. David Regensberger writes this, he said there is virtually universal consent. Pilate is seen in John as more or less a sympathetic figure, a man who wants to be fair, who would gladly acquit Jesus but who through the lack of resolve and susceptibility to political pressure all too easily becomes a tool of the Jews and their malevolence, okay? Malevolence. I always say that word wrong. Malevolence. Okay. I don't think that's the case. After studying this a bit more there are reasons to believe that Pilate is truly an effective politician. Cunning, brutal, blunt, and he gets what he wants in the end in this situation. By the way he corners the Jews that come and present Jesus before him in this situation and he gets them to say something that, you just read it and you go like, oh that's fine, but they say we have no king but Caesar. And you have to understand in that day and age no Jewish person would ever say that willingly. They would say we have no king but God. But he got the Jewish leaders to betray themselves and to pledge their allegiance to Caesar. That's more than almost anybody else had done in that day. That's power. That's effectiveness. And he also does show brute force and know how to use it. He possessed the power of what's called the Imperium and that means that he has supreme administrative power over the whole province, both military and judicial authority. So he's not in a position of weakness when he meets Jesus by any means. In fact I found this interesting. When I've studied in the past, you know, I've read through the Gospels and I see that when Jesus is arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane I usually think that the contingent of soldiers there, what a dozen or so, I mean how many do they really need? Jesus isn't going to do too much. But what's fascinating is in the Gospel of John the word that's used for the contingents of soldiers is sparo, spiro, and that word means between 200 and 600 soldiers. And in addition to that Judas brought his own temple guards with him from the temple and the priesthood. So you're dealing with this giant group of people who are trying to arrest Jesus. That's a show of force. That was like quash this while we can, make sure nothing happens, put a lid on this, and make sure everybody else knows anybody who's going to try to be an insurrectionist or to defy Rome in any way will be treated the same. So now with that in view we've got a powerful pilot and a humble, weak Jesus. Let's read our text which is in John chapter 18. Then they led Jesus from the house of Caiaphas to the governor's headquarters. It was early morning. They themselves did not enter the governor's headquarters so they would not be defiled but could eat the Passover. So Pilate went outside to them and said, what accusation do you bring against this man? They answered him, if this man were not doing evil we would not have delivered him over to you. Pilate said to them, take him yourselves and judge him by your own law. The Jews said to him, it is not lawful for us to put anyone to death. This was to fulfill the word that Jesus had spoken to show by what kind of death he was going to die. So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, are you the king of the Jews? Jesus answered, do you say this of your own accord or did others say it to you about me? Pilate answered, am I a Jew? Your own nation in the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done? Jesus answered, my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world my servants would have been fighting that I might not be delivered over to the Jews but my kingdom is not from the world. Then Pilate said to him, so you are a king. Jesus answered, you say that I am a king for this purpose I was born and for this purpose...