Pilates’ Faith and Pilates’ Works
When the chief priests and the officers saw him, they cried out, “Crucify him, crucify him!”
Pilate said to them, “Take him yourselves and crucify him, for I find no guilt in him.”
The Jews answered him, “We have a law, and according to that law he ought to die because he has made himself the Son of God.” When Pilate heard this statement, he was even more afraid.
He entered his headquarters again and said to Jesus, “Where are you from?” But Jesus gave him no answer. So Pilate said to him, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?”
Jesus answered him, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.”
From then on Pilate sought to release him, but the Jews cried out, “If you release this man, you are not Caesar’s friend. Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar.” So when Pilate heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat down on the judgment seat at a place called The Stone Pavement, and in Aramaic Gabbatha.
There is no doubt from this account that Pilate was moved by Jesus. He knew something was going on that was bigger than bickering between religious people.
In the midst of that realization, he held onto his own position, power, and comfort and gave into the loudest voice in the fight. I don’t think God made him make that decision. There are plenty of places in the scriptures where God gives people the freedom to make decisions that are bad but fulfill God’s will.
As Pilate made these choices, he showed what he believed in. Our actions always overflow out of what we believe, and in his belief, he cautiously, hesitantly, turned Jesus over to the executioners.
When we have that nudge that God might be doing something, we have a choice to believe it with joy or to believe it with doubt. That sounds like it doesn’t make any sense but stay with me. Believing something could be true and then doing what we want although we know that is against what we believe is true is the worst. If we are going against the thing we know deep down is true, we are putting the Holy Spirit on the shelf and sitting in His chair.
Every day, we are nudged toward the Lord. He shows up in friend’s conversations, the scriptures, our prayers, and more. Let us slow down and not hold so tightly to our comforts and power so that we can listen to Him.
Every one of us that can read this has more power to communicate, impact, and even teach more people than Pilate ever had. Let’s take that power seriously and be ready to surrender it as God directs. Believe in Him fully with everything you’ve got.
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