SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
5/2/2017 8:13 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-5 “Pilate’s Failed Proposals”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: John 18:39-19:7
Message of the verses: “39 “But you have a custom that I release
someone for you at the Passover; do you wish then that I release for you the
King of the Jews?" 40 So they cried out again, saying, "Not this Man,
but Barabbas." Now Barabbas was a robber.
1 Pilate then took Jesus and scourged Him. 2 And the soldiers twisted
together a crown of thorns and put it on His head, and put a purple robe on
Him; 3 and they began to come up to Him and say, "Hail, King of the
Jews!" and to give Him slaps in the face. 4 Pilate came out again and said
to them, "Behold, I am bringing Him out to you so that you may know that I
find no guilt in Him." 5 Jesus then came out, wearing the crown of thorns
and the purple robe. Pilate said to them, "Behold, the Man!" 6 So
when the chief priests and the officers saw Him, they cried out saying,
"Crucify, crucify!" Pilate said to them, "Take Him yourselves
and crucify Him, for I find no guilt in Him." 7 The Jews answered him,
"We have a law, and by that law He ought to die because He made Himself
out to be the Son of God."”
We will be
looking at the last verse in this section as we try to finish up this section
we have been looking at for the last four days.
It could be
that Pilate thought that he was through with the Jews as they saw Jesus
standing there all bloody and tied up with a crown of thorns on His head, but
these blood thirsty Jews wanted to make sure that Jesus would die and so they
told Pilate “We have a law, and by that law He ought to die because He made
Himself out to be the Son of God.” In
saying this the Jews knew that Pilate was still trying to evade the issue and
so pass the buck back to them, and they would have none of that. The Jews knew that they could not put Jesus
to death, and they also believed that Jesus was breaking their law by claiming
to be God’s Son, which of course He was and is.
John MacArthur writes “Part of the genius of the Roman form of
occupation throughout the empire was to grant autonomy in civil matters to the
conquered nations. Roman provincial
governors were expected to maintain control while upholding local laws insofar
as they did not conflict with Roman priorities.
The Jews demanded again that Pilate acknowledge their legal rights and
order Jesus to be executed.”
The truth
finally comes out as to why the Jews wanted Jesus to be executed, and that is
because “He made Himself out to be the Son of God.” They failed to get Pilate to execute Him on
political reasons, and so they are telling Pilate why they really wanted Him to
die. “’Moreover, the one who blasphemes
the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death; all the congregation shall
certainly stone him. The alien as well as the native, when he blasphemes the
Name, shall be put to death (Lev. 24:16).”
MacArthur adds “Because they rejected Jesus’ claim to be God incarnate,
the chief priests held Him guilty of blasphemy for making it ‘63 But Jesus kept
silent. And the high priest said to Him, "I adjure You by the living God,
that You tell us whether You are the Christ, the Son of God." 64 Jesus said to him, "You have said it yourself;
nevertheless I tell you, hereafter you will see THE SON OF MAN SITTING AT THE
RIGHT HAND OF POWER, and COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN." 65 Then the high
priest tore his robes and said, "He has blasphemed! What further need do
we have of witnesses? Behold, you have now heard the blasphemy;’ (Matthew
26:63-65). This was an especially
sensitive issue for Pilate, who had himself offended Jewish sensibilities
regarding idolatry. To do so again might
provoke the Jews to riot, or to complain to his superiors. Either would be fatal to his future as
governor.” We talked earlier about the
shields that the Jews protested as being idolatrous, and caused Pilate to
change his mind and not have them used.
I have to
think that this charge the Jews had against Jesus as to being the Son of God
had to bring chills down Pilate’s spine because of the dream that his wife had
told him about and also because it sees that Pilate was a superstitious person
and things like this would bother him.
When you don’t know the truth and the truth was offered to Him by Jesus
and he turned his back and left, you have to settle with lies.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Jesus said that we need to know the truth
and the truth will set us free. In order
to understand the truth we have to continue to study the Word of God where
truth is found.
My Steps of Faith for Today:
To understand the truth from John 17 as I continue to prepare for my
next Sunday school lesson.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Nazareth” (Luke 2:39).
Today’s Bible question:
“Who was appointed to replace Judas?”
Answer in our next SD.
5/2/2017 8:43 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment