During World War II, Winston Churchill was forced to
make a painful choice. The British secret service had
broken the Nazi code and informed Churchill that the
Germans were going to bomb Coventry.
He had two alternatives: (1) evacuate the citizens
and save hundreds of lives at the expense of
indicating to the Germans that the code was broken;
or (2) take no action, which would kill hundreds but
keep the information flowing and possibly save
many more lives. Churchill had to choose and
followed the second course.
If you’re a lettuce seed, you really have no choice. They’ll plant
you in the ground, water you, & you’ll become a lettuce plant.
You don’t have any choice about that.
But God says that as human beings we’re created higher than
plants & animals, and He gave us the freedom to choose. The
Bible very clearly teaches that we’re
responsible for our choices. Romans 14:12
says, “So then, each of us will give an
account of himself to God.” God is going to
hold us responsible for the choices we make.
Everyday we are faced with making choices, we are faced with
decisions.
Dr. Eric Klinger did a study at the University of Minnesota and
he determined that all of us face somewhere between 300 and
17,000 decisions every day.
There are MICRO decisions—those we don’t think much
about. Two ink pens are on the desk and we decide to use the
blue one. We decide what
clothes to wear, and what to
eat for breakfast. We
approach an
intersection and the
traffic light is yellow.
We decide to… slow
down and stop (right?). 
And then there are MACRO choices.
These are choices that mean something – they literally
affect our destiny, our eternity—and perhaps the
destiny of others as demonstrated by Winston Churchill.
Choices like…
--will I have an affair
--will I go to church or not go to church
--how will I spend my money
--who will be my MATE
--what is my MISSION
--who will be my MASTER
Sometimes choices are made for us because of our
indecision.
Former president Ronald Reagan once had an aunt
who took him to a cobbler for a pair of new shoes.
The cobbler asked young Reagan,
"Do you want square toes or round
toes?" Unable to decide, Reagan
didn't answer, so the cobbler gave
him a few days. Several days later
the cobbler saw Reagan on the
street and asked him again what
kind of toes he wanted on his shoes.
Reagan still couldn't decide, so the
shoemaker replied, "Well, come by
in a couple of days. Your shoes will
be ready.
" When the future president did so, he found one
square-toed and one round-toed shoe! "This will
teach you to never let people make
decisions for you," the cobbler said
to his indecisive customer. "I
learned right then and there,"
Reagan said later, "if you don't
make your own decisions,
someone else will."
Sometimes choices aren’t always clear cut.
You have been asked to join an Ethics Committee to
review a case involving a possible kidney transplant,
as each new piece of information is given, determine
whether or not the transplant should take place.
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
c
o
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
3. Her father wants to donate his kidney
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
3. Her father wants to donate his kidney
4. Transplants are only viable for about 5 years
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
3. Her father wants to donate his kidney
4. Transplants are only viable for about 5 years
5. This is her second transplant
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
3. Her father wants to donate his kidney
4. Transplants are only viable for about 5 years
5. This is her second transplant
6. Her father is
on death row
for murder.
A young woman needs kidney transplant,
1. Her father is the only possible donor
2. Her father has only one kidney
3. Her father wants to donate his kidney
4. Transplants are only viable for about 5 years
5. This is her second transplant
6. Her father is on death row for murder
7. She was an
accomplice in the
murder.
Today we look at Pilate and how he dealt with a
choice, “What will I do with this Jesus, who is called
the Christ?”
On January 17, 2004, a 66-ton whale died and was
beached on the southwestern coast of Taiwan, near the
city of Tainan. Two weeks later, on January 29,
authorities decided to truck the dead whale to a
laboratory where they could do an autopsy. It took 50
laborers and three lifting cranes 13 hours to hoist the
56-foot behemoth
onto a flatbed
trailer truck.
Pedestrians and
shop owners poured
into the streets to
watch the spectacle
of a whale carcass
driven through the
streets of downtown
Tainan.
And then it happened. As the truck crawled through
that downtown region, with crowds looking on, the
whale exploded. The inner conditions of the dead
mammal, combined with the bumps in the road
caused an eruption that the townspeople will not
soon forget. Cars, people, and local shops were
splattered with
whale entrails.
Traffic was brought
to a halt for hours.
The smell was
almost unbearable.
No one got up that morning thinking they would
have whale guts on them by noon!
Isn't that just like life sometimes? We're going about
our business, and a whale explodes. We didn't see it
coming. We didn't plan for it, and we certainly don't
welcome it.
When Pilate got up the morning after the Passover,
he didn’t see what was coming, and he certainly
didn’t welcome it. When Jesus was brought before
Pilate, Pilate had a choice to make.
Make the right choice,
even though it was unpopular,
or make the wrong choice
because it was acceptable and
easy?
Who was this Pilate?
In 4 B.C., Herod the Great was still king in Palestine.
When he died, he left a will saying that the kingdom
should be divided into three sections for his three sons:
Antipas, Archelaus, and Philip the Tetrarch. At the time,
Archelaus was only about eighteen years old. He turned
out to be the worst of the three. Philip and Antipas
ruled quietly and fairly.
Archelaus was a tyrant and
an extortioner. The people
hated him. Finally, the Jews
persuaded Rome to get rid
of him. So, the Romans
moved Archelaus out and
brought in a governor.
History tells us that Pilate was the 5th governor and arrived on the
scene in A.D. 26 and remained until A.D. 35, when he was sent
home.
Pilate didn’t have a wealthy upbringing. He was of the middle class.
He had served in the Roman army in Germany, and while he was in
Rome he caught the eye of a Roman girl of very high social rank.
Her name was Claudia Procula, the illegitimate daughter of Claudia,
who was the third
wife of the Emperor Tiberius
and, that made her the
granddaughter of Caesar
Augustus.
Because of this connection with
the man at the top, Pilate was
given a position that would never
had been given to him any other
way.
He was to rule fairly and justly...and he was to rule
for the Roman emperor. But right from the start,
Pilate's term in Israel just didn't go right.
In his first visit to Jerusalem, Pilate came to set up
his office. The Roman seat of rule in Palestine was in
Caesarea, where the main fortress and garrison and
Pilate's house were located. When he came to
Jerusalem, he came with all of the soldiers and
standards and flags. On all of the
Roman standards there was a
sculptured image of the emperor.
The emperor was not only the ruler,
but he was also god because the
Romans believed in emperor
worship. So, in actuality, their god
was on their standards.
In all of the years before Pilate, the Roman rulers
had not kept those images on their standards
because they offended the Jews. The Jews were
really strong on the idea that they should have no
false idols. But Pilate was hard-nosed about this and
would not remove them. So he
came storming into Jerusalem with
these little images of the emperor
on the standards. The Jews
immediately went to Pilate and
told him to remove them, and
then begged him to, but he was
adamant.
When he finished his business in Jerusalem, he left
for Caesarea, and a whole mob of Jews followed him
all the way to Caesarea incessantly bugging him for
five days to remove the images from the standards.
Pilate was so furious that he finally ordered them all
to meet him in the amphitheater.
He immediately had them
surrounded with his soldiers.
He then informed them all that
if they didn't go back to Jerusalem
and stop with the request, he
would have them all killed on the
spot.
But they all just bared their necks and said, "Go
ahead. Kill us all." Well, he was stuck. He had tried to
scare them, but he was not the kind of a man who
would begin his rule in the land by wiping out all of
the citizens. He knew that wouldn't set real well with
Rome. So he was stuck -- he
couldn't massacre defenseless
men. He was beaten. He gave in
and removed the image from the
standards. They won and now
they had him under their thumb.
The Second Incident
During the first years of his rule, Jerusalem needed more
water and the supply was inadequate. Pilate was
determined to build a new aqueduct, but he didn't have
any money. So he robbed the Temple treasury, which
didn't go over real big with the Jews. Evidently there
were millions in the Temple treasury, so he found all
that he needed. But the people rioted and surged
through the streets.
Pilate then infiltrated
the people along with
plain clothed Roman
soldiers, and at a given
signal, the soldiers
either clubbed or stabbed
many people to death,
and that broke up the riot.
The Third Incident
Later in Pilate's career, there was another conflict over the
idols. Pilate had made a temporary dwelling place in Herod's
palace in Jerusalem, where he hung shields on the walls with
the name of Emperor Tiberius inscribed on them. The Jews
complained and asked Pilate to remove them, but he refused.
Now, Rome had built into the legal system the Pax Romana -the right of any subject people to appeal their case to the
emperor. When Pilate wouldn't go along with the Jews, they
sent word to the emperor that
Pilate wouldn't comply. As a result,
Emperor Tiberius sent back word that
Pilate was to take all of his shields down
and comply with the Jews' request.
The Jews had Pilate right where they
wanted him. At any time they could
report him to Rome and he would lose
his job. He was walking on thin ice.
Now Pilate was in conflict with the Jews again. Jesus
was brought before Pilate on the charge of
insurrection, being a revolutionary. The people who
brought Jesus for trial wanted to be sure that it was
an offense that carried death
as the expected punishment.
When they presented their case before Pilate, they
knew they could blackmailed him. They were saying, in
effect, "You better go along with us, or we'll tell Caesar.”
John19:12, "And from then on Pilate sought
to release Him; but the Jews
cried out, saying, If thou let
this man go, thou art not
Caesar's friend...." In other
words, "Do you want to keep
your job?”
Pilate tried several strategies
to get out of this sticky
situation. First he tries to
pass the buck.
“When he learned that Jesus was under Herod’s
jurisdiction, he sent Him to Herod...”
He knew Jesus was innocent. He knew the Jews were
just jealous. His wife had had nightmares, telling him
not to have anything to do with harming the man
called Jesus.
So, Pilate just passed the buck. He discovers ol’
Herod was in town and sent Jesus to Herod, hoping
the problem would just go away. He was between a
rock and a hard place. Rome wanted peace, no
matter what. The Jews wouldn’t give him peace
unless he killed Jesus. He wanted to keep his job. He
and his wife both knew
Jesus was innocent.
So, since Jesus was a Galilean
and that was Herod’s
jurisdiction, let him deal with
it. Case closed.
The origin of “pass the buck” is from poker. A buck
was a marker that indicated whose turn it was to
deal. Passing the buck moved the deal onto the next
player. The dealer bears responsibility for the hand.
Nobody wants to deal, so they pass the
responsibility off to someone else!
Have you ever played a game called “Hot Potato.” You just pass
the potato around. You’d wind it up and it would ding and
vibrate and explode at some random time. The quicker you’d
pass the potato, the more likely you were to not get caught
with the hot potato exploding in your face.
Passing the buck.
It would be a lot easier to be like Pilate – for us to just pass the
buck when we are faced with difficult issues. But unlike Pilate,
we just can’t cast aside the difficult issues of the day. We have
to face them--face them in such a way
that tries to seek the truth of God.
And even if others are disappointed,
we must uncompromisingly stand
where biblical authority has drawn the
line.
In other words, “The Buck Stops Here!”
Well, that strategy didn’t work. When Jesus refused
to speak to Herod, Herod sent Jesus right back to
Pilate. Since that didn’t work, Pilate went to Plan B.
He tried bending the rules.
Pilate said to the crowd in effect, “Since he really
hasn’t done anything wrong, why don’t I just give
him a good beating and let him go?” Jesus was still
just as innocent, and didn’t deserve the beating
either, but Pilate was hoping that a little unjust
punishment would be enough to satisfy the crowd.
It’s like little lies, little wrongs, that we do. They’re
not so bad. Bend the rules just a little. That’s the
approach a lot of people take this time of year when
they are working on their income tax. What’s the
harm if I fudge just a little on my deductions. It’s not
really stealing; it’s just a little wrong. We have
learned how to convince ourselves that a little wrong
isn’t so bad.
Syracuse verses Carlisle. As the teams made ready for
the game, the Carlisle coach, Pop Warner, decided to
bend the rules to give his team the upper hand. He was
a good coach, but he wasn’t above bending the rules
when it was to his advantage. Before the game, he had
them sew what looked like footballs unto the front of
their jerseys, so that the other team
wouldn’t know
who had the ball!
Now, there was no
written rule
against it, but it
violated all the
principles of fair
play!
The beating wasn’t good enough. The crowd would
have none of it; they wanted a death sentence. So
Pilate moved to Plan C.
Pilate decided to create a diversion. It was Passover, and
the custom was for the Roman governor to release one
of the prisoners, so Pilate offered the people a choice
between Barabbas, the most despicable person he could
think of, and Jesus. Surely the people wouldn’t choose a
murderer and a robber over Jesus. But the people
shouted for Barabbas. Pilate seemed almost amazed,
shocked, that the people
chose Barabbas. Luke
records this ominous
line: “And their voices
prevailed.” (23:23)
The pressure of the
crowd was too much
for Pilate.
Have you ever noticed how Satan works his way into our
lives. He attacks us where we are vulnerable.
He doesn’t show up as a scary dude running around in
red tights and horns.
No he shows up in Prada—designer clothes. Because his
objective is to create a diversion, to sell us an image or
an idea. An image of what he wants us to embrace
about ourselves.
Satan packages his product in such a way that we see
what he wants us to see... not what his product
would actually do to our lives.
Fame
Popularity
Power
Beauty
Wealth
Prestige
Would you be more inclined to buy cigarettes from
this man? He’s handsome, rugged... a real man’s
man.
Or would you buy cigarettes from this woman?
Would you be tempted to buy alcohol from this
friendly looking bartender?
Or by this man who has taste tested alcohol most of
his life?
For Pilate, the package was power and prestige—His
job. He realized that to do the right thing could cost
him what he had become
accustomed to.
Still with no success, Pilate tried one last approach—
the blame game. In so many words, he says, “Kill him
if you want to, but it’s not my fault.” And he washed
his hands of the affair. He knew that what he is doing
was wrong, but he hoped it would sit a little easier
on his conscience if he could convince himself that it
was not really his fault.
This might be called the
“Adam and Eve” strategy:
“It’s not my fault; Eve gave
me the apple.” “It’s not
my fault; the snake
made me eat it.”
In 1991, Richard Harris sued Anheiser-Busch for
$10,000 for false advertising. Harris (no relation to
the above-mentioned burglar) claimed to suffer from
emotional distress in addition to mental and physical
injury. Why? Because when he drank beer, he didn't
have any luck with the
ladies, as promised in the
TV ads. Harris also didn't
like that he got sick
sometimes after he drank.
The case was thrown out
of court.
In 1992, 23-year old Karen Norman accidentally backed
her car into Galveston Bay after a night of drinking.
Norman couldn't operate her seat belt and drowned.
Her passenger managed to disengage herself and make
it to shore. Norman's parents sued Honda for making a
seat belt their drunken daughter (her blood alcohol level
was .17 - nearly twice the legal limit) couldn't open
underwater. A jury found
Honda seventy-five
percent responsible for
Karen's death and
awarded the Norman
family $65 million. An
appeals court threw out
the case.
It didn’t work for Adam and Eve; it didn’t work for
Pilate; and it doesn’t work for us.
We cannot do something wrong and pretend that it’s
someone else’s fault. That is one of the greatest
marks of maturity and wisdom--when we are willing
to accept responsibility for what we have done, to be
accountable for our mistakes, our failures, our
wrongdoings. It’s not an easy thing to do, but it is the
right thing to do.
The old saying goes, “It takes two to tango.” Yes,
sometimes others are to blame as well, but that
doesn’t excuse us from our actions or choices!
Out of options, Pilate gave in and turned Jesus over
to the people to be crucified. Even knowing what
was right, Pilate did what was wrong because it was
easier. He didn’t have the moral strength or courage
to do the right thing.
It is probably safe to say that it is unlikely that we
will be called on to make decisions that have the
same history‐making consequences as the decision
that Pilate made that day. But every day we have the
chance to do what is right even though other voices
may be calling us to do what we believe is wrong. In
the end, the choice is ours.
With every choice that we make, it doesn’t just stand
alone – it keeps going and going and going.
Our choices are not just random things that affect
just the moment, but they have repercussions…
--to others
--in time to come
--toward our destiny
--our eternity
You might be able to pass the buck, bend the rules,
create a diversion, or play the blame game to
delay making a choice, but in the end has to make
a choice regarding the following:
What will you do
with Jesus?
There are only two answers to this question. You
either accept Him as Lord and Savior of your life or
you reject Him as Lord and Savior. There is no ‘I’ll
think about it later’ option. If you choose to ‘think
about it later’, then you have decided to reject
Christ.
There is a fable which tells of three apprentice devils who were coming to
this earth to finish their apprenticeship. They were talking to Satan, the chief
of the devils, about their plans to tempt and to ruin men. The first said, "I
will tell them that there is no God."
Satan said, "That will not delude many, for they know that there is a God."
The second said, "I will tell men that there is no hell."
Satan answered, "You will deceive no one that way; men know even now
that there is a hell for sin."
The third said, "I will tell men that
there is no hurry."
"Go," said Satan, "and you will ruin men
by the thousands."
The most dangerous of all delusions is
to think there is plenty of time.
Jeff Strite--The Devil Wears Prada
Charles C. Williamson--Encounters with Jesus: Pilate