Daily Sacrifice, August 1 (19:12)
“If thou let this Man go, thou art not Caesar’s friend”— John 19:12.
CRAFTY, self-seeking, and relentlessly cruel, Pilate was a scheming politician, who regarded the rights of no man if to maintain them might prove an embarrassment to himself. Thoroughly convinced, both of the innocence of Jesus and the enmity behind the accusation of the leaders in Israel, Pilate quailed before the threat embodied in the words, “If thou let this Man go, thou art not Caesar’s friend.” Fearing that his political enemies might misrepresent him before the emperor, he chose to sacrifice the Lord Jesus, who in his eyes was an unimportant Galilean artisan, turned teacher, in order that He might retain the favor of Rome. Consequently, his name has gone down in infamy throughout the centuries, as embodied in the words of the creed, “Suffered under Pontius Pilate.”
—Horatius Sonar.