City Life Starter

Written by Scott Fiddler

The Word

 16 So he then handed Him over to them to be crucified.

 17 They took Jesus, therefore, and He went out, bearing His own cross, to the place called the Place of a Skull, which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha.

 18 There they crucified Him, and with Him two other men, one on either side, and Jesus in between.

 19 Pilate also wrote an inscription and put it on the cross. It was written, “JESUS THE NAZARENE, THE KING OF THE JEWS.”

 20 Therefore many of the Jews read this inscription, for the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Latin and in Greek.

 21 So the chief priests of the Jews were saying to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The King of the Jews’; but that He said, ‘I am King of the Jews.’ ”

 22 Pilate answered, “What I have written I have written.”

Exegesis

What was Pilate thinking when he wrote an inscription to be put on the cross, “Jesus the Nazarene, The King of the Jews”? I’ve settled on three possibilities. First is the possibility Pilate thought Jesus was  destined to be the king of Jews. Maybe Pilate’s wife’s dream, combined with the accusations of the Jewish religious leaders, led him to that conclusion. 

Another possibility is that Pilate didn’t believe Jesus to be the king of anything but was fed up with what he saw as the Jewish leaders’ petty religious squabbles, and so he wrote, “King of the Jews” to snub them for pressuring him into crucifying Jesus. He knew the Jewish leaders had turned Jesus over to him because of envy. Matt. 27:18. How better to pique their envy than to declare Jesus their king and do so publicly in the three languages of the region?

A third possibility is that Pilate despised the Jewish leaders for bothering him with such matters and Jesus for refusing to answer Pilate when he asked him to answer the charges brought against Him (Matt. 17:13-14) and that Pilate wrote what he wrote in a sarcastic stab directed at both.

What is clear is whatever Pilate’s motive, he wasn’t telling. When pressed by the Jewish leaders about what he wrote, he answered, “What I have written I have written.” This apparently was the first century version of “It is what it is.” Pilate’s motives for writing what he wrote to be placed on the cross of Jesus would remain with Pilate.

I think that is how the Lord intended it. Pilate’s motive ultimately does not matter. What matters is what was written, and what was written is true: Jesus was the king of the Jews, and God in His sovereignty and foresight ensured that the person who would be the Roman governor of Judea at this time would, in the exercise of his free will, truthfully designate Jesus as king of the Jews in all languages for those to see.

Application

Even in the most unjust and seemingly out-of-control event in history, God displays His sovereignty. This should provide all with comfort in the midst of the pandemic that the Lord has not been caught off guard and is working, just as Jesus is working. John 5:17.