4/8 Through the Bible in Devotions

John 18

“Then said Pilate unto them, Take ye him, and judge him according to your law. The Jews therefore said unto him, It is not lawful for us to put any man to death:” (v. 31)

It is amazing to me that they make this statement to Pilate, and in the next chapter they contradict themselves completely (Jn. 19: 7). They knew fully well what they were doing. The verse above speaks of “murder” and not of legal punishment; they knew that Jesus was innocent and that they were committing murder, but they refused to “have this man to reign over us” (Lk. 19:14). There “unbelief” was a stubborn, and deliberate unbelief, which had its root in pride. This is the kind of unbelief that Jesus attacked in the scribes and Pharisee’s, the open, flagrant, and deliberate unbelief that defies any proof or denies any grace. This is the kind of unbelief that condemns a man. To be deceived is one thing, but to be openly opposed to the truth, when you know it is truth, is another. No doubt, in lieu of this, they sought to blame the Romans for His death, and felt that their hands were clean of the affair. They even went as far as demanding the release of a convicted thief, who was a bane to society, and rightly in prison for his crimes. Today we would call this a “conspiracy”, because they plotted, and worked so desperately to crucify an innocent Man, who was much more than a mere man. Pilate seemed to recognize their evil too, and tried to push the blame back on them, and he even “washed his hands” of the whole affair himself. It appeared that no one was to blame.

In Mark 15:39, we see that a centurion recognized Jesus for who He was, even though it made little difference in His death, but don’t you think that if He knew that Jesus was, indeed, the Son of God, that the “religious” leaders of the day knew it long before that? Of course they did. The soldier had no power to affect the death of Christ, but Jesus had a great affect on him, as He did on so many others of His day, and of generations to come. The leaders of the day did not want to succumb to the authority of another, because they loved their status, and did not want to lose any influence to Jesus. This is quite obvious as we read through the Gospels and “hear” the discourses of Jesus against them. It was not lawful for them to commit murder, but capital punishment, just and righteous punishment, was ordained of God. Their statement in the verse above is an admission of their intent to murder an innocent man; They knew the law very well, and if indeed Jesus was a blasphemer, they would have been justified in condemning Him, but they knew He was not. Will ye also condemn Him through flagrant unbelief? I pray you would not.