PT-2 "Pilate's Final Pronouncement" (John 19:13-16)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 5/6/2017 11:33 AM

My Worship Time                                                    Focus:  PT-2 “Pilate’s Final Pronouncement”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  John 19:13-16

            Message of the verses:  “13 Therefore when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha. 14 Now it was the day of preparation for the Passover; it was about the sixth hour. And he said to the Jews, "Behold, your King!" 15 So they cried out, "Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar." 16 So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.”

            We looked at some things from my Online Bible Greek/English Dictionary in our last SD along with an informative quote from John MacArthur that spoke of the mother of all ironies, and now today we want to continue in our study of these verses. 

            I have to quote from John MacArthur again for us to understand something that I certainly have not understood before.  “The supreme moment to which all of redemptive history pointed had arrived, so John carefully, dramatically set the scene.  It was ‘the day of preparation for the Passover.’  The time ‘was about the sixth hour;’ or late morning, approaching noon.  This statement presents an apparent difficulty, because according to Mark’s account, Jesus was crucified at the third hour (9:00A. M.).  But as Andreas Kostenberger writes, ‘Since people related the estimated time to the closet three-hour mark, any time between 9: A. M. and noon may have led on person to say an event occurred at the third (9”A. M.) or the sixth hour (12:00 noon).”  D. A. Carson cautions against ‘insisting on a degree of precision in by Mark and John which, in days before watches could not have been achieved.’”  I truly believe that Jesus Christ was crucified on the Passover and died, as He gave up His life, at 3:00 P. M. the time when the Passover Lambs were slain as this actually pictured the death of the Jewish Messiah.

            Pilate has one more sarcastic statement “Behold, you King,” as Pilate looks at the bloodied beaten Jesus and then tells them that this is your king.  It mattered little what Pilate said to the Jews as long as he sentenced Jesus to death, and the way would be crucifixion as David wrote of in Psalm 22 some 1500 years before crucifixion ever happened.  The Jews then cried out “We have no king but Caesar” after Pilate once again asked them if he should crucify their king.  When the Jews stated that they had no king but Caesar it was although something they said in jest, it again was true and it again was another ironic statement.  After the killing of Jesus, their true Messiah the only king that had left to serve was Caesar, who would, in 70 years fulfill the prophecy of Jesus that Jerusalem would be destroyed.  Jerusalem had to be destroyed, along with the temple for after Jesus died there was no need of animal sacrifices at that time, and since Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed, the only place where these sacrifices could be offered, in a sense Judaism ended. 

            Pilate seeing that all of his options ended we then read “So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.”  MacArthur adds “John is not saying that the Jews took physical custody of Jesus; Roman soldiers would perform the actual crucifixion. Rather, the sense is that Pilate ‘delivered Jesus to their [the Jews] will’ (Luke 23:25).”

            MacArthur concludes his chapter “Jesus Before Pilate—Part 2: Phase Three of the Civil Trial,” with the following paragraph that everyone should read and understand:

“Pilate’s dilemma, expressed in his question, ‘Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?’ (Matthew 27:22) is the same one facing every person.  There are only two alternatives:  to stand with His rejecters and crucifiers and face eternal damnation (Heb. 6:6), or to acknowledge Him as Lord and Savior (Rom. 10:9) and be saved.  Pilate’s futile attempts to evade the issue reveal clearly that there is no middle ground for, as Jesus declared, “He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me scatters’ (Matt. 12:30).  In the end, pride and fear of man led to Pilate’s downfall, and he sided with the crucifiers of Christ to the damnation of his soul.  He stands in history as a monumentally tragic figure.  Privileged to converse privately with the Savior, he found no value in the opportunity.  It was likely the worst experience of his life.  He belongs in Judas’s category.”