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Belief vs Unbelief

4/26/2017

Have you ever been asked which Bible character you most relate to? We tend to gravitate, it seems, to the usual suspects: we’re like Peter because we’re impetuous; we’re like Joseph because we’re long-suffering; we’re like David because we made a grave mistake but repented of it. All valid. But one of the people I best identify with is a man whose name we’re never told, about whom we know very little. In fact, he only utters only a few lines before disappearing from the scene. We find the most detail about him in the Gospel of Mark:

A man in the crowd answered, “Teacher, I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not.” “You unbelieving generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me.”
So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.
Jesus asked the boy’s father, “How long has he been like this?”
“From childhood,” he answered. “It has often thrown him into fire or water to kill him. But if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.”
“‘If you can’?” said Jesus. “Everything is possible for one who believes.”
Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”
When Jesus saw that a crowd was running to the scene, he rebuked the impure spirit. “You deaf and mute spirit,” he said, “I command you, come out of him and never enter him again.”
The spirit shrieked, convulsed him violently and came out. The boy looked so much like a corpse that many said, “He’s dead.” But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him to his feet, and he stood up.
(Mark 9:17-27)

There are a number of ways we could analyze this passage and points of focus we could emphasize. But I want to look specifically at this father and the quality of his faith. His seeming contradiction (“I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief,” emphasis added) naturally raises the question, what condition was this man’s heart in? That is, which statement overrode the other? Was he a man of faith who struggled with doubts, or was he a disbeliever trying to muster some small seed of faith? And does it matter?

First, we must make a clarification. There is a difference between doubt and disbelief. Webster defines the former thusly: To waver or fluctuate in opinion; to hesitate; to be in suspense; to be in uncertainty; to be in suspense; to be in uncertainty, respecting the truth or fact; to be undetermined.[1] Disbelief, on the other hand, implies willfulness. One could say a person with doubts is trying to believe or wants to believe, but struggles to do so because faith isn’t always easy, isn’t always natural. On the other hand, a person who disbelieves is trying not to believe, is refusing to believe, regardless of the evidence. While there are warnings against doubting in the Bible, it is this latter form of person Scripture especially condemns.[2]

We tend to fall into the trap of thinking that having faith means never having doubts. But look at the “father” of faith, Abraham, a man who we’re told “did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God”[3] but lived “by faith.”[4] If anybody had perfect faith, it was him, right? Yet in Genesis we find him trying to bring about God’s promise on his own terms[5] and twice passing off his wife as his sister out of fear instead of faith.[6] Even Abraham, the man of faith, struggled with doubts.

So what of the man in Mark’s gospel? “Help me overcome my unbelief.” The Greek word used for unbelief is apistia, and it’s the same word found in Mark 6 when Jesus “was amazed at [many in his hometown’s] lack of faith,”[7] in Hebrews 3 (as noted above) to lament the Israelites who rebelled against God and were denied entrance to the Promised Land, and which Paul used to describe his pre-conversion state.[8] It is also the same word used to define Abraham’s lack of unbelief in Romans 4 (also as noted above). As it pertains to the man in Mark 9, then, it doesn’t seem to be relating to a passing doubt. It seems to be describing someone who is seriously wrestling with who God is. Indeed, what did he say to Jesus—“If you can.”

So we have here a man who expresses faith, but at the same time admits a lack of faith. If we’re honest, I think we can all relate to that at some point and in some way in our lives. I know I can. So to rephrase my earlier question, does his faith cancel out his lack of faith, or does his unbelief cancel out his belief? And what does that mean for us when we find ourselves in the same situation. Are we going to be left on the outside looking in because of our unbelief?

I think we find the answer in how Jesus responds to the man. He commands the spirit to leave the man’s son, then lifts him to his feet healed. Jesus then moves on to talk to his disciples about what has taken place and why they couldn’t drive out the spirit. He turns it into a teaching moment. But as it relates to the man, we see Jesus responding to his faith. Throughout the Gospels, Jesus’ healing is not always based upon a declaration or demonstration of faith. Often we read of Him making a comment to the affect that He is healing in response to faith,[9] but not always. However, we never see Him perform healing in response to a declaration or demonstration of disbelief. In fact, we’re told in one instance that “he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.”[10] Another time He quoted from Isaiah 6, saying “For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.”[11] Note that Jesus does not heal these calloused people because they exhibit signs of disbelief. These verses open an entirely new conversation on the correlation between our faith and the movement of God, but that is for another time. What I think it tells us in this particular instance is that Jesus looked at this man and his struggle of faith and saw legitimacy in his belief.

We tend to talk about being people of faith, or having faith. And Scripture is clear, a faith response is required on our part to receive God’s forgiveness and salvation. But the issue is not the size, strength, or substance of our faith. It is the size, strength, and substance of the One in whom we have faith. If perfect faith was required to be right with God, no person would attain that right standing any more than if the standard was perfect obedience. But the beauty of the gospel is that God does not require our perfection—either in works or in faith. He simply requires that we have faith. As He told His disciples immediately after the interaction with the man and his son, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”[12] The key seems to be having faith at all, not having perfect faith. Not until, as the old hymn puts it, “the day when my faith shall be sight” will we have perfect faith, and then it will no longer be faith.

So if you relate to this man, as I do, take heart. Your doubts and struggles do not separate you from God. In fact, a doubt implies there is something (a belief) to be doubted. A struggle implies two sides (one of them being faith) are present. This is by no means an excuse to wallow in doubt or unbelief. Perhaps the key word in all this text is “help.” This also clues us in to the man’s true position. “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief” (emphasis added) is a heartfelt, perhaps even tearful[13] request—a plea. If you, like this man, say to Jesus, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” I think you can be confident that your faith “is enough” or is sufficient, as was—as demonstrated by Jesus’ response—his.

[1] American Dictionary of the English Language “doubt,” accessed April 20, 2017, http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/doubt
[2] See Numbers 14:11-12; Romans 11:20-23; Hebrews 3:12-19
[3] Romans 4:20
[4] See Hebrews 11:8-19
[5] See Genesis 16
[6] See Genesis 12:10-20 and Genesis 20
[7] Mark 6:6
[8] I Timothy 1:13
[9] See Matthew 9:22, 29; 15:28; Mark 10:52; Luke 17:19;
[10] Matthew 13:58, emphasis added.
[11] Matthew 13:15
[12] Matthew 17:20
[13] See Mark 9:24 (ESV) and footnote

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Pilate Error, Part III

4/14/2017

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Part I and Part II examine Pilate’s failure to recognize Truth, ignorance of truth, and devaluing truth.

Pilate has failed to recognize that he should be seeking truth. He has failed to recognize truth when presented to him. And he has disregarded truth when it came knocking again. But the story is not finished. And we will see Pilate have several more opportunities to encounter truth, and we will see him come tantalizingly close to responding to truth. But in perhaps one of the saddest (and most easy for us to identify with) errors in all of Scripture, we will see Pilate turn away from truth.

We’re told that Pilate goes back out to the Jews and tells them, “I find no basis for a charge against him.”[1] We would at first cheer Pilate in at least recognizing that Jesus didn’t deserve to die. But his next statement condemns him. “But it is your custom for me to release to you one prisoner at the time of the Passover. Do you want me to release ‘the king of the Jews’?”[2] The Jews respond, “No, not him! Give us Barabbas!”[3] Their bloodlust was such that they were willing to have a thief, an insurrectionist, a murderer, released into the populace again. But as we focus on Pilate, we see an abdication of duty. Jesus was clearly innocent of the charges against Him, and Pilate saw it. But instead of standing up to the mob, he tries to bribe them to do the right thing. He seeks the path of appeasement. Now, I don’t envy Pilate facing these crazed, bloodthirsty folks. But neither can I absolve him of guilt for caving to them.

We are given another tidbit of information in Matthew’s Gospel, where between Pilate’s offer to free Jesus and the people’s response to give them Barabbas instead, we’re told that his wife sends the following word to Pilate: “Don’t have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him.”[4] Scripture gives us no indication as to how Pilate receives the news, but it doesn’t appear to stiffen his spine at all.

In John, we’re told that Pilate has Jesus flogged.[5] This is perhaps the greatest understatement ever penned (aside from the description of the crucifixion). In reality, Pilate has Jesus’ body mutilated. After this, the soldiers place the crown of thorns on Jesus’ head and mock him, and we read that Pilate again goes out to the crowd and says, “Look, I am bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no basis for a charge against him.”[6] He then has Jesus brought out and says, “Here is the man!”[7] Compare that with verse 14, where he says, “Here is your King.”[8] I’ll touch on that more later, but for now, the distinction is that Pilate has dehumanized Jesus and now has Him stand before the crowd and refers to Him not as the King of the Jews but as a “man.” I think Pilate was again hoping that the chief priests, elders, and the mob would see the spectacle that Jesus’ body had become, be overtaken with pity—or that their bloodlust would be satisfied—and would relent. Pilate is torn here—he wants to free Jesus, but he doesn’t have the courage to do so. Truth has found its way into his heart and head, but will he accept it?

The Jews demand that Jesus be crucified, and tell Pilate, “We have a law, and according to that law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God.”[9] John records that “[w]hen Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid.”[10] I mentioned earlier that Jesus’ statement about His kingdom being from a different place seems to affect Pilate. I think, at least on some level, Pilate recognizes that not only is Jesus not guilty of any crime, but also that he is somehow different from the average person on the street. I think he has a supernaturally-inspired fear, and when the Jews announce that Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, that fear strikes home.

Pilate questions Jesus some more, asking “Where do you come from?”[11] He is probing. This time, I think he is sincerely asking the question of Jesus. He has begun to respond to truth! But now Jesus, who previously spoke to Pilate more than to anyone else, is silent. We could speculate as to the reason, but it would be just that. So let’s focus on what Pilate says next. “Do you refuse to speak to me? Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?”[12] Pilate is still focused on power, and he dangles a carrot in front of Jesus. Were this an ordinary human—were Jesus not on a divine mission to lay down his life—he would jump at the chance to get out alive. But Jesus answers, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.”[13]

Pilate plays his trump card—I have the power to save your life. And Jesus trumps it by telling Pilate that his authority is at the discretion of God. This response by Jesus is the type we might expect to incur a violent outburst from Pilate. But what happens next?

From then on, Pilate tried to set Jesus free.[14] That is an interesting statement that gives us insight into Pilate’s state of mind. Remember what he just told Jesus, “I have authority to release you.” So why does John write that Pilate “tried” to set Him free? The answer comes in the latter part of the verse, but before we go there, let’s press pause and review what has happened so far. Christ has revealed Himself to Pilate, declaring Himself to be a king from another place and declaring—as reported to Pilate by the Jewish leaders—Himself to be the Son of God. Pilate’s wife has called Jesus an “innocent man.” And Pilate has three times protested to the Jews that Jesus is innocent. Now, the phrase “from then on,” suggests a turning point. Pilate has been confronted with truth, and he has turned toward it. He has not placed faith in Christ as his Savior or recognized Him as the Messiah, but an initial softening of his heart has taken place. He is being drawn to Jesus.

This presents a fascinating tangent for us to explore for a minute. As we read through the last half of John 18 and the first part of John 19, we cannot help see the Holy Spirit tugging at Pilate. He is presented time and time again with truth and with opportunity to respond. Clearly Jesus came to die on the cross—it was the mission He referred to repeatedly throughout the Gospels. We see how the events leading up to His death were prophesied centuries earlier and fulfilled in precise detail. It would seem that Pilate is destined to play the part of the villain. And yet, we cannot but infer that God is drawing him to the truth throughout these events. Which raises the obvious question of why?

I think there are two reasons. First, because God “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.”[15] I think the case of Pilate is one of the strongest arguments supporting the idea that man does indeed have free will, and is capable of accepting or rejecting the salvation God has offered. In His omniscience, God could have worked out His purposes and plans had Pilate ultimately freed Jesus. God didn’t create Pilate, imbue him with a soul, and damn him to a role in the cosmic story that would send him to hell. Rather, before time began, God knew the ultimate decision of Pilate’s heart, and worked accordingly.

Second, I think God—knowing Pilate would ultimately not respond in faith—still revealed Himself, still drew the Roman governor, so that there could be absolutely no question of his guilt on the Day of Judgment. Neither Pilate nor anyone else will be able to stand before God and accuse Him of playing favorites, of not giving them their fair shot. Pilate clearly had it. And as we’ll see, he blew it.

Back to John 19. Pilate seeks to free Jesus, we’re told. [B]ut but the Jewish leaders kept shouting, “If you let this man go, you are no friend of Caesar. Anyone who claims to be a king opposes Caesar.”[16] The Jews now play their trump card. They hate Caesar. They hate Rome. The people have been longing for a Messiah, but not a spiritual one. They want a conquering hero to come and overthrow the oppressive Romans. To invoke the emperor must have nearly gagged them. But they know it will bend Pilate to their will.

We have seen repeatedly that Pilate is obsessed with power. And the one thing he would hate to lose, more than anything, is his position of power. Let word get back to Caesar that he’s tolerating a man who claims to be king, a usurper, and that position would be in danger. (Study the history of Rome—they pulled the trigger pretty quickly and dramatically when it came to regime change.) And the Jewish leaders knew this. Earlier, while plotting to kill Jesus, they said, “Here is this man performing many signs. If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.” The high priest, Caiaphas, responded, “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”[17] They themselves fear the Roman hammer falling on them, and Pilate shares their fear.

He makes one last, desperate push. “Here is your king,”[18] he says. Consider what he’s really saying: “Look at this guy. His body’s been ripped apart. He’s been mocked, ridiculed, spat upon, taunted. His ‘devoted’ followers all ran away. Look at him! This--THIS!—is the king you’re claiming is a threat to Caesar? Really?”

They are undeterred. They chant for Jesus to be crucified, and close their case with the words, “We have no king but Caesar.”[19] It had to stick in their throats, but the fact that they would utter something so heinous to them tells Pilate they will follow through on their threat. If he lets this man claiming to be a king go free, they will make sure Caesar hears about it. And so while Pilate “tried” to free Jesus, he is unable to overcome his obsession with power, his fear of being unseated and losing his position. Truth was presented to him. And Truth began to win him over. But Truth was never paramount to Pilate, and in the end, He chooses his own god while sending the Son of God to His death.

Note: History doesn’t tell us what ultimately became of Pilate. According to the Romano-Jewish historian Josephus, he was deposed and sent to Rome few years later. Rumors exist that he was ultimately driven mad and committed suicide. If true, one could understand why.

[1] John 18:38
[2] John 18:39
[3] John 18:40
[4] Matthew 27:19
[5] See John 19:1
[6] John 19:4
[7] John 19:5
[8] John 19:14
[9] John 19:7
[10] John 19:8
[11] John 19:9
[12] John 19:10
[13] John 19:11
[14] John 19:12
[15] I Timothy 2:4, emphasis added; see also II Peter 3:9
[16] John 19:12
[17] John 11:47-50
[18] John 19:14
[19] John 19:15

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Pilate Error, Part II

4/13/2017

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Part I examines how Pilate failed to recognize truth and how he was ignorant that truth even existed to be found. Read it here.

Having missed the ultimate question Christ was asking him, Pilate proceeds to say the following: “Your own people and chief priests handed you over to me. What is it you have done?”[i] This is clearly not inquisitiveness on the part of the governor, because the charges against Jesus have been presented to him. No, he’s mocking Jesus. He is supposed to be the King of the Jews, and yet it is the Jews who are asking Pilate to execute Him. Pilate is basically taunting, “What kind of lousy king are you?”

Jesus doesn’t reply directly, which is very common for Him. Instead, he says, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.”[ii] Again, let’s ask the question, why does Jesus answer the way He does?

He has just asked Pilate a question to determine whether or not Pilate acknowledges Jesus for who He is. As we looked at, Pilate doesn’t recognize Truth as it stands in front of him. Pilate doesn’t even recognize that he should be seeking Truth. So Jesus introduces to Pilate this concept of a heavenly kingdom—a kingdom “not of this world.”

If Jesus was the earthly, solely physical “King of the Jews,” one of two things would happen: The Jews would claim Him as such and not arrest Him in the first place, or His servants—those closest and most loyal to Him—would fight to stave off the uprising and rebellion. This takes us back twenty-five verses, to the Garden, when “a detachment of soldiers and some officials from the chief priests and the Pharisees”[iii] came to arrest Jesus:

Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.)
Jesus commanded Peter, “Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?”[iv]

In Matthew’s Gospel, we read that Jesus also said, “all who draw the sword will die by the sword. Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?”[v] Peter, who exhibited great faith by proclaiming Christ’s identity as the Son of God, is also known for showing a very human focus and perspective, perhaps never more so than in Gethsemane. But Jesus’ focus was not on avoiding arrest. It was not on putting down these usurpers to His kingdom. It was not about the physical, but the spiritual. Thus His words to Pilate.

Jesus gives Pilate a second encounter with the truth. This time, Pilate cannot claim ignorance—although such a claim wouldn’t really excuse him. “My kingdom is from another place,” Jesus says. He cannot be speaking of an earthly kingdom from another place (i.e., Greece or Persia) because His earlier statement about His servants fighting to prevent His arrest would still be true. Here before Pilate is a man who did not resist arrest, who did not defend Himself when accused, who engages the most powerful man in Jerusalem not with pleas for mercy but with a high-level debate. Weighing Jesus’ words and actions, we should infer—as should have Pilate—that Jesus is claiming something supernatural, a kingdom that transcends even the mighty Roman Empire by its very nature. And that should, considering Jesus displayed no symptoms of a madman, give Pilate pause. As we’ll see later, it appears that is—at least on some layer—the case.

Commentaries disagree on the tone of Pilate’s response, “You are a king, then!”[vi] Some suggest he is mocking Jesus, having some fun with Him as we might with someone who claimed to believe in aliens. Others claim that Pilate is uneasy and in awe of Christ’s manner. I tend to lean toward the former, as evidenced by Pilate’s next remark, and believe that he is patronizing Jesus.

Having introduced to Pilate the concept of a supernatural, eternal kingdom, Jesus now confronts him head on with the truth: “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth.”[vii] The phrase “you say” is essentially an affirmation, which is why the previous edition of the NIV stated it, “You are right in saying . . .”[viii] This is an important distinction because it is a definitive declaration by Jesus that He is indeed a king. He is not ducking the issue or avoiding going on the record.

Now note what comes next. Jesus tells Pilate His purpose in being born, the purpose of the incarnation, is “to testify to the truth.” Paul writes to Timothy of “Christ Jesus, who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession.”[ix] We must ask then, what is this truth that Jesus is confessing? What is this truth of which it is His purpose to testify? Is it truth in general—has Jesus come to be a human lie detector? Or is He speaking of a specific truth? Similarly, when Jesus told the Jews who had believed in Him, “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free,”[x] of what truth was He speaking? And how exactly is testifying to the truth His ultimate purpose? Didn’t He tell the disciples “the Son of Man [came to] give His life as a ransom for many,”[xi] the Pharisees that “I have come that they may have life,”[xii] and Zacchaeus that “the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost”[xiii]? Did Jesus have a dual purpose? Was His primary purpose to speak truth and He just happened to also save the world while He was at it? What are we to make of this statement?

This question is important as we ultimately examine Pilate’s response (and, indeed, as we form our response to a questioning world). And I think John’s Gospel gives us the answer. In his extended dialogue with the Jews in John 8, Jesus made the following statements:

“I stand with the Father, who sent me.”[xiv]
“If you knew me, you would know my Father also.”[xv]
“[H]e who sent me is trustworthy, and what I have heard from him I tell the world.”[xvi]
“When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me. The one who sent me is with me; he has not left me alone, for I always do what pleases him.”[xvii]

“I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”[xviii]
“[I]f you do not believe that I am he, you will indeed die in your sins.”[xix]
“So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”[xx]

Two observations from these verses: 1) Jesus is speaking and doing what the Father has told Him to say and do. The two are in union, a theme common in John’s Gospel. 2) Jesus’ actions lead to life and freedom. The context of the rest of the book and of the Gospels (and indeed of all Scripture) tell us that that life is eternal life and that freedom is freedom from sin and death, and both are a result of Christ’s death on the cross. Thus, when Jesus says, “As it is, you are looking for a way to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God,”[xxi] we can conclude that the core of that truth to which he has testified or confessed is none other than the truth he told Nicodemus:

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.[xxii]

In other words, the truth Jesus came to testify to is also the work He came to do. This is how He can tell the disciples, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Therefore we see that Jesus’ purpose as stated to Pilate is in harmony with the purpose He gave His disciples, the Pharisees, and Zacchaeus. So to recap, Jesus has told Pilate that He is a king, that His kingdom is not a mere physical kingdom, and that He has come to testify to the truth that He is the Savior of the world. This ties back to His initial question to Pilate, asking if the governor recognized Jesus as the King of the Jews—the true, rightful king—on his own. Jesus has in these few verses made a truth claim—not just any truth claim, the ultimate truth claim. It is the claim that divides all mankind into two categories— “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life.”[xxiii] And Jesus concludes his remarks to Pilate with the statement, “Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”[xxiv] He has put before the Roman governor “a time for choosing,” with the sides clearly defined.

Pilate’s response is haunting: “What is truth?”[xxv] The NIV tells us he “retorted” this question, and all versions inform us that he viewed this as the end of the discussion. This was not, then, an inquisitive remark. Pilate is not seeking wisdom from Jesus. He is dismissing Him. He is scoffing at the idea of truth. Perhaps he is a postmodernist who doesn’t believe in absolutes. More likely, the only truth that matters to Pilate is that he has power. Either way, he makes a grave error in devaluing truth. It’s a two thousand-year-old account, but it could be ripped from today’s headlines—a politician (or the average guy or gal on the street or in a church pew) who views truth as subservient to personal preference, emotion and feelings, and power or money. But Truth will not long be suppressed . . .

[i] John 18:35
[ii] John 18:36
[iii] John 18:3
[iv] John 18:10-11
[v] Matthew 26:52-54
[vi] John 18:37
[vii] John 18:37
[viii] Courtesy of StudyLight.org
[ix] I Timothy 6:13
[x] John 8:32
[xi] Matthew 20:28
[xii] John 10:10
[xiii] Luke 19:10
[xiv] John 8:16
[xv] John 8:19
[xvi] John 8:26
[xvii] John 8:28-29
[xviii] John 8:12
[xix] John 8:24
[xx] John 8:36
[xxi] John 8:40, emphasis added
[xxii] John 3:14-17
[xxiii] John 3:36
[xxiv] John 18:37
[xxv] John 18:38

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Pilate Error, Part I

4/11/2017

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One of the most intriguing passages in Scripture, in my opinion, is the back-and-forth between Jesus and Pilate. As we pause this Passion Week to remember and reflect, I want to take a deep dive into that conversation. But I want to do so from the perspective of the Roman governor of Judea, the man known as Pontius Pilate. Particularly, I want to focus on how he responded when he encountered Truth, and use his errors as cautionary tales for us. I’ve broken this examination up into three posts, each looking at a different portion of their conversation and each highlighting a different Pilate Error.

John’s Gospel gives us the greatest glimpse of this interaction, so we’ll focus primarily on his account, but we’ll also fold in other references to flesh out our knowledge of the situation. We first come upon Pilate in the middle of John 18, where we’re told the Jewish leaders bring Jesus from Caiaphas the high priest to Pilate, who asks them, “What charges are you bringing against this man?”[i] Their response, in John, is essentially, “He is a criminal.” Mark tells us that they “accused him of many things”[ii] and Luke records them saying, “We have found this man subverting our nation. He opposes payment of taxes to Caesar and claims to be Messiah, a king.”[iii] It is this charge that prompts Pilate’s interaction with Jesus, starting with a question recorded verbatim in all four Gospels:

“Are you the King of the Jews?”[iv]

We should note here that Jesus does not respond to any of the Jews’ accusations, “not even to a single charge.”[v] This mirrors His behavior when on trial before Caiaphas. He gave no answer, offered no defense, except in response to one question, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?”[vi] Each of the Synoptic Gospels records Him confirming it. Now, before Pilate, Jesus is again silent until asked if He is the King of the Jews. He replies, “Is that your own idea, or did others talk to you about me?”[vii] At first, this seems like a somewhat odd response, but I think Jesus is asking a much deeper question of Pilate. I think He is essentially asking the same question He asked the disciples, “Who do you say I am?”[viii] Let me unpack that.

Pilate’s question is an odd one as well, because the Jews have not had a king in over six hundred years. The Southern Kingdom, Judah, was captured by Babylon and the Jews were taken into exile in 586 B.C., approximately 135 years after the Northern Kingdom, Israel, was overthrown by the Assyrians. Currently, the Jews are under Roman control. Pilate, as governor, would clearly know this, and would never think to ask anyone—much less an itinerant rabbi, the son of a carpenter—if he was the King of the Jews unless either that person had made such a claim or someone had made the claim about the person (as noted in Luke, above). Even then, the question “Are you the King of the Jews?” would be asked the way a psychiatrist might humor a mentally unstable person. So why does Jesus reply the way He does?

There is another way the phrase King of the Jews could be meant, and to understand it, we have to go back to the Old Testament. In I Samuel, we read the following:

So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have.”
But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord. And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.”[ix]

God then had Samuel anoint Saul as king. Saul was followed by David, then Solomon, and then the kingdom split up into North and South until the respective captivities. But the divine plan was never for Israel to have a human king. Yahweh was to be their only king. This is the same Yahweh who revealed Himself to Moses in the burning bush, saying “I am who I am.”[x] Jesus incited the Jews to attempt to stone Him when he said to them, “Before Abraham was born, I am!”[xi]—a declaration that He was Yahweh. (Interesting to note, “I am” in John 8:58 is translated from the Greek eimi, the same word we find when Jesus answers, “I am,”[xii] to the charge of the high priest in Mark’s Gospel.) Tie this all together and we see that the only true King of the Jews who was ever to be is Yahweh—the very Person standing before Pilate at that moment. And it would only be a person who recognized Jesus as such who could, on their own, come to the conclusion that He is the King of the Jews.

So when Jesus asks the question, “Is that your own idea, or did others talk to you about me?” I would suggest to you He is really asking, on a deeper level, “Do you believe that I am Yahweh, the true King of the Jews, or are you responding to what someone else said?” In other words, “Who do you say I am?”

And what is Pilate’s response? A sarcastic, dismissive, “Am I a Jew?”[xiii] Pilate completely misses the question, and it leads to our first Pilate Error: When confronted with the truth—and in this case, Truth with a capital T—Pilate doesn’t even recognize it as such. There are two ways we can miss truth. We can be like the Jewish leaders, who knew to ask the question, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?” They knew truth existed—they had been taught the truth all their lives, yet “refuse[d] to come to [Jesus] to have life.”[xiv] They were looking for Truth in the wrong place—they were looking for a political savior—and were so focused on their own power and self-righteousness that they didn’t realize they were in need of a spiritual savior. Or we can be like Pilate, who—not being a Jew—was not anticipating the coming of the Messiah. We can be ignorant that truth even exists to be found.

But don’t underestimate our God. Even if we fail to recognize that truth exists, He is still gracious to reveal Himself to us—as we will see as we study Jesus’ interaction with Pilate in more detail.

[i] John 18:29
[ii] Mark 15:3
[iii] Luke 23:2
[iv] Matthew 27:11; Mark 15:2; Luke 23:3; John 18:33;
[v] Matthew 27:14
[vi] Mark 14:61
[vii] John 18:34
[viii] Matthew 16:15
[ix] I Samuel 8:4-7
[x] Exodus 3:14
[xi] John 8:58
[xii] Mark 14:62
[xiii] John 18:35
[xiv] John 5:40

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Taking God's Name in Vain

4/1/2017

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You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.[1]

Somehow, somewhere along the way, I fear we’ve gotten into our heads that the Third Commandment is a third-rate commandment. And I’m not talking culture at large. I’m talking about Christians. I’m talking about me. Murder and adultery and lying—sure, they’re bad and we frown on them. But read some Christian blogs, listen to Christian conversations, read Christian social media posts. Do we live out “hallowed be your name”[2] in how we talk? Are our words half as holy as the cows, cats, certain species of fish, and northern Ohio cities to which we ascribe sacredness? Now, I’m sure some of you are rolling your eyes and asking what’s next, prohibitions against playing cards and going to the movies? Maybe I’ll growl for you to get off my lawn? And I get it, nobody wants a visit from the language police. My intention is not to go around with a little notecard marking up demerits when I hear you utter a “darn” or “dang.” Rather, I want to remind us all of the holiness of God’s name. We dare not profane it. And I use the plural “we” intentionally, because I am talking to myself as much as anyone.

As we look at the Third Commandment, I want to focus primarily on two words, “take” and “vain,” as we seek to understand what exactly this commandment is outlawing. What constitutes taking God’s name in vain?

A check of multiple versions repeatedly shows the original Hebrew translated simply as “take,” or else as the NIV puts it, “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God” (emphasis added). It’s pretty straightforward. So how do we take God’s name that we could take it vainly—how do we use it that we could misuse it? Scripture gives us the answer with several examples. First, look at Joshua, who instructed Achan (who had broken God’s commands by taking the devoted things from Jericho) by saying, “My son, give glory to the Lord, the God of Israel, and honor him. Tell me what you have done; do not hide it from me.”[3] Similarly, the Pharisees, when questioning the blind man whom Jesus had healed, put him under oath by saying, “Give glory to God by telling the truth.”[4] And when questioning Jesus at His “trial,” the high priest said, “I charge you under oath by the living God: Tell us if you are the Messiah, the Son of God.”[5] We do something not all that different in our modern courts of law, where a witness places their hand on a Bible and swears “to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God.” The author of Hebrews sheds a little more light on this practice: People swear by someone greater than themselves, and the oath confirms what is said and puts an end to all argument.[6] Sort of like swearing on your mother’s grave or crossing your heart and hoping to die. All of these have in common the idea that you would never dare tread upon that by which you take the oath. Your life, your mother’s grave, the Bible on which you place your hand, and God’s name and glory are all sacred. This then, I believe, is what is meant by the phrase “take the name of the Lord your God.”

Put a pin in that thought for a moment and consider the meaning of our second word, “vain.” It is the same Hebrew word used in other passages warning against taking God’s name in vain, as well as in admonitions against bearing a false report[7] or false witness[8] and in regard to seeing false visions.[9] It is also the same word we find in Psalm 127:1: Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. We don’t need to overthink this one—“in vain” means just what it sounds like it means. The point of the Third Commandment, then, is that we should not invoke the name of God—we should not swear—lightly.

But let’s flesh out this idea a little more. Where did the taking of oaths originate? Didn’t Jesus say in the Sermon on the Mount, “All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one”[10]? We’ll come back to this passage in a moment, because I think it needs some clarification. And the reason for that is because oaths actually originate with God. Do a word search of “oath” in the Old Testament[11] and you will see repeated mention of God’s oath to Abraham and to the Israelites, as well as instructions for the administration of oaths in legal matters. You’ll even find the command, “Fear the Lord your God, serve him only and take your oaths in his name.”[12] Referencing God’s oath to Abraham, the author of Hebrews writes, “Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of his purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, he confirmed it with an oath. God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope set before us may be greatly encouraged.”[13] The text goes on to give us assurance in our “anchor,” Christ Jesus—assurance based on God’s promise and the impossibility of God lying. He cannot break a promise. And He is our model when we make an oath, when we make a promise. Our word should be our bond. This is why James echoes Jesus when he writes “let your ‘yes’ be yes and your ‘no’ be no.”[14]

This brings us back to the Sermon on the Mount:
“Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but fulfill to the Lord the vows you have made.’ But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.”[15]

Is Jesus revoking the Old Testament instructions about oaths and, in fact, condemning Himself for taking them? I’ll answer that by quoting from two well-respected commentaries that I think resolve the apparent tension between God’s words in the Old Testament and Jesus’ words (and actions, as seen in Matthew 26:63-64) in the New Testament:

There is no reason to consider that solemn oaths in a court of justice, or on other proper occasions, are wrong, provided they are taken with due reverence. But all oaths taken without necessity, or in common conversation, must be sinful, as well as all those expressions which are appeals to God, though persons think thereby to evade the guilt of swearing. The worse men are, the less they are bound by oaths; the better they are, the less there is need for them. Our Lord does not enjoin the precise terms wherein we are to affirm or deny, but such a constant regard to truth as would render oaths unnecessary.[16]

Our Saviour here evidently had no reference to judicial oaths, or oaths taken in a court of justice. It was merely the foolish and wicked habit of swearing in private conversation; of swearing on every occasion and by everything that he condemned.[17]

Once again, the idea expressed in the Third Commandment and supported by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount is that of falsely or loosely invoking God’s name. As He said elsewhere, “Do not swear falsely by my name and so profane the name of your God. I am the Lord.”[18] This can have several meanings. We can swear an oath we have no intention of keeping. But we can also swear an oath (i.e., wedding vows) that we have every intention of keeping, but then break. And if we take that oath in God’s name, we have just profaned God’s name—we have by our actions taken it in vain. And if we somehow can read the second half of the Third Commandment and still think this is not a grave offense, consider some other biblical instances of profaning God’s name: sacrificing children to the false Ammonite god Molek,[19] stealing,[20] disobedience and idolatry leading to being exiled from Israel,[21] sexual perversity,[22] and marital unfaithfulness.[23] Friends, this is not a list we want to be part of.

We live in a pretty informal culture. Short of swearing in court or some legal proceeding, we don’t take oaths very often. But that does not mean we don’t take God’s name in vain every day. Have you broken the wedding vows (and I’m not just talking about adultery) you made “in the sight of God and these people”? Have you, as a Christian, who professes to follow God, not let your “yes” be yes or your “no” no? Have you tossed out a casual “Lord willin’” or “God forbid” or “for God’s sake” without truly meaning those words? Do you say “God bless you” when someone sneezes without the slightest intent of actually pronouncing a spiritual blessing upon that person? Have you texted “OMG” without considering what the “G” stands for? I would suggest these are all instances of invoking God’s name lightly or loosely, of taking it in vain.

I know some who read this will be likely to say I’m nitpicking or am being overly legalistic. Once again, my intent with this post is not to point out everyone’s flaws (mine included). Instead, it is to remind us all of the holiness of God’s name. It is not something we should use casually or dismissively, but rather reverently and soberly.

[1] Exodus 20:7, ESV
[2] Matthew 6:9
[3] Joshua 7:19
[4] John 9:24
[5] Matthew 26:63
[6] Hebrews 6:16
[7] See Exodus 23:1
[8] See Deuteronomy 5:20
[9] See Ezekiel 13:7-9
[10] Matthew 5:37
[11] https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?qs_version=NIV&quicksearch=oath&begin=1&end=46
[12] Deuteronomy 6:13
[13] Hebrews 6:17-18, emphasis added
[14] James 5:12, ESV
[15] Matthew 5:33-37
[16] Complete Commentary by Matthew Henry, Public Domain
[17] Notes on the Bible by Albert Barnes, Public Domain
[18] Leviticus 19:12
[19] See Leviticus 18:21, 20:3
[20] See Proverbs 30:9, ESV
[21] See Ezekiel 36:18-20
[22] See Amos 2:7
[23] See Malachi 2:10

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Belief vs Unbelief

Pilate Error, Part III

Pilate Error, Part II

Pilate Error, Part I

Taking God's Name in Vain

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