Sermonstudio

Character
Pontius Pilate

Props
None required

Setting
None required

Costume
Use period costume

Pontius Pilate: He was no threat to the Roman empire, this Jesus. I don't care what they said in their early-morning meeting.

"Are you the King of the Jews?" I asked, and he wouldn't even answer. Oh, they accused him, of course.

The elders and the chief priests, paltry Jewish officials, came before me and accused him.

But what could he do that mattered to me? I was back in Jerusalem at the time -- in Fortress Antonia, which overlooked the temple.

It was Passover and the temple was full, but after all, I commanded more than 5,000 men. A lot of them were massed right there.

You had to do that. You had to be ready for disturbances and riots during Passover, but this Jesus was no threat to the Roman empire.

I had complete authority in the province. My only job was to keep Judea for the Roman empire. I didn't care about the Jewish faith. I didn't care about their little meetings and their little leaders. Even now that it's all over, I don't care.

But there's only one thing that bothers me about that time. I was the governor of the province. I was the one who had the right to question witnesses, to sit in the judgment seat, to pass judgment. And I wish I had. In a way, I turned it over to the people. In a way, I let them choose. Oh, I've heard it said that I was a coward, that I was trying to avoid a riot. But that's not the way it happened.

They had their early-morning meeting. They brought him to me, and I failed to decide.

Some day, people may argue about whether it was Jews or Romans who killed Jesus. It was neither. It was the system, the same kind of system of which you're all a part.

Some say he was crucified unjustly. If he was, it wasn't any race or group that killed him. It was human evil, plain and simple. It was human evil struggling to work a human system.

I've heard the stories that he rose again. I've heard the stories that he is the Savior of the world. I've heard it said that when he was born, kings came to worship him, and when he comes again, princes will bow before him.

I've heard all that, but that's not the issue here. The one mistake I made was to wash my hands before the crowd and say, "I'm innocent of this man's blood."

You have to take a stand. No matter who you are, whether you're the governor of the province or a common man, you have to take a stand.

Suppose he did rise again the way they said he did. I may be wrong, but I suspect that if he did, it would have been better to have been the one who killed him than the one who stood aside.

I'd rather be in hell for what I did than what I failed to do.

Let me say that to you again. I'd rather be in hell for what I did than what I failed to do. You can't ignore this Jesus. That's the one thing I learned.

I could have condemned him or freed him, but when I ignored him....

My wife warned me, "Have nothing to do with this righteous man for I have suffered much over him today in a dream." And I just stood aside.

You may think you can stand aside. You may think you can go on about your life, doing whatever it is you want to do.

I've heard the things he said. I've heard the sayings like, "Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in to steal...." Lay up treasures in heaven, he said, and you may think you can ignore that.

I've heard how he said the time would come when he would separate the sheep from the goats based on what they did for the poor, on how they visited the prisoner, and how they helped the hurting. You may think you can ignore that, but I'm here to tell you that this Jesus just keeps coming back.

They say he rose again. They say he is coming to judge the quick and the dead. People are living for him right now and dying for him. I couldn't get away from him. No matter what I did, I couldn't get away from him.

They say he told his disciples to go to all the world and to baptize in the name of "the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit," whatever that means. Some of them are trying to do it.

This Jesus just keeps coming back. Oh, I don't believe in him anymore than many so-called Christians do, but I have to think it would have been better for me to have condemned him than to have stepped aside.

There are some things on which you have to take a stand. Like I said before: I'd rather be in hell for something I did than for something I failed to do.

I don't know if you can understand this, but that matters a lot to me right now. I've done a lot of things in my life, but what I failed to do with Jesus may bother me the most.

As I face my own death (and I am about to die), for some reason, I think about this Jesus most of all.

He just keeps coming back.

I was the governor of Judea for ten years, and then just a little while back, I sent troops to break up a riot in the territory of Samaria. The city council of Samaria protested to the governor of Syria, and I was sent to Rome. When I got there, Tiberius, the Roman emperor who was my patron, had died.

I could hardly believe it when I was convicted for malfeasance in my office, and now there's just one honorable thing for me to do.

So I, myself, am facing death. Isn't it odd, that as I face it, I am thinking most of all of Jesus?

____________

Note: We don't know exactly what happened to Pontius Pilate, but according to Christian tradition as Eusebius recorded it, "calamities forced him to unavoidable suicide." He may have killed himself after a trial in Rome during which he was asked to explain the death of several Samaritan fanatics who had gathered at Mount Gerizim to hunt for relics of the prophet Moses.