Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 1647
Delivered on Lord’s-Day Morning, February 26, 1882
“When he was set down on the judgment seat, his wife sent unto him, saying, Have you nothing to do with thatjust Man: for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of Him.” Matthew 27:19.
I EARNESTLY wished to pursue the story of our Savior’s trials previous to His Crucifixion, but when I sat down to study the subject I found myself altogether incapable of the exercise. “When I thought to know this, it was too painful for me.” My emotions grew so strong and my sense of our Lord’s grief became so extremely vivid that I felt I must waive the subject for a time. I could not watch with Him another hour and yet I could not leave the hallowed scene! It was, therefore, a relief to meet with the episode of Pilate’s wife and her dream. It enables me to continue the thread of my narrative and yet to relax the extreme tension of the feelings caused by a near view of the Master’s grief and shame.
My spirit failed before the terrible sight. I thought I saw Him brought back from Herod where the men of war had set Him at naught. I followed Him through the streets, again, as the cruel priests pushed through the crowd and hastened Him back to Pilate’s hall. I thought I heard them in the streets electing Barabbas, the robber, to be set free, instead of Jesus, the Savior, and I detected the first rising of that awful cry, “Crucify, crucify,” which they shrieked out from their bloodthirsty throats! And there He stood, who loved me and gave Himself for me, like a lamb in the midst of wolves, with none to pity and none to help Him.
The vision overwhelmed me, especially when I knew that the next stage would be that Pilate, who had cleared Him, by declaring, “I find no fault in Him,” would give Him over to the tormentors that He might be scourged, that the mercenary soldiery would crown Him with thorns and mercilessly insult Him—and that He would be brought forth to the people and announced to them with those heart-rending words, “Behold the Man!” Was there ever sorrow like His sorrow? Rather than speak about it this day, I feel inclined to act like Job’s friends, of whom it is written, that at the sight of him, “they lifted up their voices and wept; and sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spoke a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great.”
We leave the Master awhile to look at this dream of Pilate’s wife which is only spoken of once in the Scriptures—by Matthew. I know not why only that Evangelist should have been commissioned to record it. Perhaps he, alone, heard of it, but the one record is sufficient for our faith—and long enough to furnish food for meditation. We receive the story as certified by the Holy Spirit. Pilate, throughout his term of office, had grossly misbehaved himself. He had been an unjust and unscrupulous ruler of the Jews. The Galileans and the Samaritans, both, felt the terror of his arms, for he did not hesitate to massacre them at the slightest sign of revolt. And among the Jews, he had sent men with daggers into the midst of the crowds at the great gatherings and so had cut off those who were obnoxious to him.
Gain was his objective and pride ruled his spirit. At the time when Jesus of Nazareth was brought before him, a complaint against him was on the way to Tiberius the Emperor, and he feared lest he should be called to account for his oppressions, extortions and murders. His sins at this moment were beginning to punish him, as Job would word it, “The iniquities of his heels compassed him about.” One terrible portion of the penalty of sin is its power to force a man to commit yet farther iniquity. Pilate’s transgressions were now howling around him like a pack of wolves—he could not face them and he had not Grace to flee to the One Great Refuge!
But his fears drove him to flee before them and there was no way, apparently, open for him but that which led him into yet deeper abominations. He knew that Jesus was without a single fault and yet, since the Jews clamored for His death, he felt that he must yield to their demands, or else they would raise another accusation against him, namely, that he was not loyal to the sovereignty of Caesar, for he had allowed One to escape who had called Himself a King. If he had behaved justly, he would not have been afraid of the chief priests and scribes. Innocence is brave, but guilt is cowardly.
Pilate’s old sins found him out and made him weak in the presence of the ignoble crew, whom otherwise he would have driven from the judgment seat.
He had power enough to have silenced them, but he had not sufficient decision of character to end the contention. The power was gone from his mind because he knew that his conduct would not bear investigation and he dreaded the loss of his office, which he held only for his own ends. See there with pity that scornful but vacillating creature wavering in the presence of men who were more wicked than himself and more determined in their purpose! The fell determination of the wicked priests caused hesitating policy to quail in their presence and Pilate was driven to do what he would gladly have avoided. The manner and the words of Jesus had impressed Pilate. I say the manner of Jesus, for His matchless meekness must have struck the governor as being a very unusual thing in a prisoner.