Reading your Bible for today January 12

January 12: John 19:1-16

KJV Key Verse: John 19:6
6 When the chief priests therefore and officers saw him, they cried out , saying , Crucify him, crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye him, and crucify him: for I find no fault in him.

Devotion:
Have you ever been in a crowd where people are shouting about something that you do not quite agree with; but because they shout so loud and they want you to join in so you give in and join in? It is so easy to give in to a very persuasive crowd! Leaders are no different to us, they are humans and they give in to the majority at times just as we do.

Pilate did not want to crucify Jesus but everything seemed to go against him. He tried to pacify the crowd by having Jesus scourged or whipped. The guards doing the job seemed to enjoy what they were doing because they dressed Christ up in a kingly robe and gave Him a crown of thorns. But when the tumultuous crowd saw Christ they again cried out to have Him crucified.

Pilate again tries to get the Jews to crucify Christ so the blood will not be on his hands; they do not want to kill any man but to use the law to kill Jesus. They try to convince Pilate by telling Him of the law of blasphemy even though they seem to be breaking all sorts of their own laws already. After that does not seem to work, they again pressure Pilate by saying that he would not be Caesar's friend if he does not judge Christ. How to get into a politician’s head, tell them they are working against their party or government!

Throughout this Christ is being kept cruelly and unjustly imprisoned. But Christ does not shout out about this but accepts it because He knows this has all been done for a reason. He never tells Pilate He would seek vengeance. He never tells Pilate he has got the wrong man. He knows this has all got to come to pass and willingly accepts it for our sins. The one person who has the greater sin than Pilate (who is about to put an innocent man to death) was the man who had heard Christ's testimony and rejected it. That man carried the one and only sin that Christ cannot forgive, the sin of unbelief.

Points to Ponder:
How far do you go to please others?

Do you think about God’s laws or people’s laws?