A Meditation Delivered by
The Rev. John D. Painter
at The Ecumenical Good Friday Preaching Service
St. Luke’s Episcopal Church
Metuchen, New Jersey
April 10, 2009

Text: Matthew 27:11-24, 26

Now Jesus stood before the governor; and the governor asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus said, “You say so.” But when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he did not answer. Then Pilate said to him, “Do you not hear how many accusations they make against you?” But he gave him no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was greatly amazed.

Now at the festival the governor was accustomed to release a prisoner for the crowd, anyone whom they wanted. At that time they had a notorious prisoner, called Jesus Barabbas. So after they had gathered, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release for you, Jesus Barabbas or Jesus who is called the Messiah?” For he realized that it was out of jealousy that they had handed him over. While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, “Have nothing to do with that innocent man, for today I have suffered a great deal because of a dream about him.” Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowds to ask for Barab-bas and to have Jesus killed. The governor again said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?” And they said, “Barabbas.” Pilate said to them, “Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” All of them said, “Let him be crucified!” Then he asked, “Why, what evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Let him be crucified!” So when Pilate saw that he could do nothing, but rather that a riot was beginning, he took some water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves….” So he released Barabbas for them; and after flogging Jesus, he handed him over to be crucified. —Matthew 27:11-24, 26, NRSV
Pilate said to them, “Then what should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?
—Matthew 27:22a (NRSV)

Had he been asked at the time, he would probably never have guessed that he would be known best for centuries afterward for the his role in the events of Passover A.D. 30 as summa-rized in the simple words of the Apostle’s Creed: “he was crucified under Pontius Pilate.” There are some historians who tell us that Pontius Pilate was, in most other respects, not all that bad of a guy. He was a career official with considerable military experience, serving in a rather frac-tious (and some thought backwater) part of the Roman Empire. Pilate held the second longest tenure of any Roman governor of Judea in those centuries, lasting a full ten years. What’s more—in most respects, say these more favorable historians, Pilate did a difficult job fairly well. He had a conscience and sense of justice. He generally tried to do right by those who came be-fore him, and he even wanted to do right by the prisoner named Jesus who was hauled into his residence early that Friday morning of Passover Week. Indeed, Pilate’s face may well have been the most sympathetic into which Jesus looked that day.

Now there are other historians who will be quick to tell you that Pilate was really not such a nice guy, and that his ten-year record as Governor of Palestine was a very difficult dec-ade; indeed some would say “disastrous.” He sponsored some activities in and around the Tem-ple which were blasphemous and deliberately offensive to the Jewish populace. And he was not above engaging in political intrigue and perhaps even selectively dispatching a few of his politi-cal enemies “with extreme prejudice.” Yet it does appear throughout the Gospel narratives of the events of that Friday morning in Jerusalem, that Pilate did not find Jesus guilty of any major crime and tried to sway the boisterous crowd into releasing him.

Whether we conclude in the end that he was a fairly-good guy or a not-so-nice guy, many commentators believe Pilate had one rather tragic flaw. Unfortunately, Pontius Pilate was rather spineless, ultimately lacking the courage to back his convictions with his actions. The result for Pilate was not fame, but infamy: forever to be remembered not for any of the right decisions he may have made, but for this single wrong one. I wonder if you and I can identify with him just a little bit here. Sometimes many of the good things we do can be erased in a matter of moments with one stupid or ill-considered decision. We say something that we wish we could take back. We make a judgment call on an important matter, only to realize in hindsight that we blew it. We may even get blamed for being wrong when it’s not really our fault. Several years back, a weath-erman was actually sued by a woman who said that, because he predicted a sunny day, she dressed lightly and got caught in a storm, from which she caught the flu, missed four days’ work, and had to spend money on medicine and suffer stress. It’s crazy, of course, for we can’t really blame the weather on any meteorologist. But we do blame Pontius Pilate. He did not simply make an unfortunate guess—he made a fatally wrong judgment. He chose to listen to the shouts of an angry mob rather than to the still, small voice of God, even while his every instinct may have been telling him that Jesus was innocent.

Pilate surely understood that crowds can often get things terribly wrong. The crowd is wrong, for instance, when it seeks to impose an injustice on a minority simply by overwhelming them with its numbers. The crowd is wrong when it tries to use its power to tyrannize individuals who dare to disagree with it. And the crowd is wrong when it attempts to press its cause with the sheer volume of its protest, and not with the soundness or rightness of its claims. God seldom speaks in the roar of a frenzied mob. Rather, God’s cause has often been championed precisely because an individual or a small group was willing to stand up against the shouts of the many and do that which was right, no matter how unpopular. Pilate, however, was willing to sacrifice the sacred for the secular, the eternal for the immediate, the spiritual for the political. In the end, Pilate chose to put the service of Caesar over the fear of God.

If all that were not bad enough, Pontius Pilate did one other cowardly thing. He failed to accept the responsibility for his own actions. Washing his hands in front of the crowd, he told them, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; I find no fault in him; it is your responsibility if we kill him.” But then, of course, it was not their responsibility; for it could not be. On that fatal day, only one man had the authority to order the crucifixion of Jesus, to say “Let him go” or “String him up.” Only one man could overrule the mob and do that which in his own heart he knew was right, and that was Pontius Pilate. Thus, just as no one else had the power to crucify Jesus, so Pi-late could not deny his responsibility afterward.

Neither can we. When it comes to the kind of important questions that have to do with Je-sus Christ and our response to him, we cannot shrug that responsibility off onto anybody else—it is ours alone to make, and the simple truth is that none of us were ever made to remain neutral. What’s more, the most important decision any of us ever make is the same choice Pilate had to make on that day of the Crucifixion. Pilate himself clearly asked the question: “What should I do with Jesus who is called the Messiah?” (Matthew 27:22a, NRSV) And while he may have asked it of the frenzied mob…and maybe, even, of himself…this question echoes down the centuries and lands clearly before us on a day like today: What should we do with this Jesus who is called the Messiah?

Can Jesus claim priority in our lives, or do we simply squeeze Jesus into those times that aren’t too inconvenient and those places that don’t make a significant difference? Shall we stand with him for truth, or shall we crucify him again by the things we do that kill his spirit within us, that drown out that still, small voice speaking to us? Will we acclaim him as the Christ, or reject him as an imposter? Pilate could never have imagined that for one wrong decision he would for-ever remain known. Yet how much like Pilate are we? How often have we listened to the crowd rather than to God, sacrificing our spiritual relationship with God and Christ so as simply not to mess up the priorities we have established for our lives?

In her book, The Man Born to Be King, Dorothy L. Sayers declares: “God was executed by people painfully like us, in a society very similar to our own…by a corrupt church, a timid politician, and a fickle proletariat led by professional agitators. On this Good Friday, Jesus once again stands before me and before you, and each of us must decide how we will answer Pilate’s question: What will we do with this Jesus, who is called the Christ?

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PRAYER

Lord of all, we come today because we cannot escape the truth any longer. We’ve come because we know that it is our sins that led you to the cross, and your love for each of us that kept you there. We’ve come because the Crucifixion was real, and the verdict we deserved was laid instead upon you. Forgive us for all the times we have looked away or remained silent. For-give us for embracing your cross as a stunning piece of jewelry, but not as a stark reminder of the inexpressible price you paid for our sake. As weak and feeble as our faith may be, may we yet stand and keep watch with you for at least these few moments, knowing that the victory was won on that hillside long ago because of your great love. All this we would ask in your name, O Lord. Amen.