I once read an imaginary story about Pilate in his old age. He was now retired and congratulating himself on the apparent success of his political career. As the story unfolds, Pilate is visiting with some of his guests, and one of them asks the former governor about an itinerant preacher by the name of Jesus, who many years previous had caused a considerable amount of commotion in the city of Jerusalem. The guest specifically asks Pilate if he could tell them something about this ‘Jesus of Galilee.’ Pilate supposedly leaned back and quietly mused, and then said: “Jesus! Jesus? No, I don’t remember.”
Legends and fables often distort the facts for various reasons. Rather than present an accurate picture of how things really are, the story is embellished and exaggerated. The imaginary story makes for interesting reading, but in such cases, history tells a different story. Pilate did not retire with honors. He was deposed by Lucius Vitellius and was sent to Rome less than a decade after his conviction of Jesus and died shortly thereafter around 39 A.D. On a side note, archaeologists uncovered a ring bearing the name of Pontus Pilate in the 1960. But it was not until recently (2018) that researchers, analyzing those objects with advanced photography, were able to decipher the ring’s inscription. It reads “of Pilates,” in Greek letters set around a picture of a wine vessel known as a krater and is said by archaeologists to be only the second artifact from his time ever found with his name.
Pilate is probably best known for his involvement in the trial of Jesus, which trial ended in the Lord’s crucifixion. When Pilate realized that he could not pacify the crowd’s demand for Jesus’ crucifixion, he “took water, and washed his hands” (Matt. 27:24). That act was a symbolic gesture by which Pilate thought he could exonerate himself from his pathetic behavior and judicial indecision. He thought that he could simply be indifferent toward Jesus and thereby sooth his conscience. In this, he made a fatal blunder.
No man can ignore the Christ, for in so doing, he makes the same fatal mistake that Pilate made. It is not a question of whether men are ignoring Christ, but whether they can ignore Him without serious repercussion. Jesus said, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to one, and despise the other” (Matt. 6:24). The Lord was not giving men a choice void of serious consequences. When a man rejects Christ the spiritual void in his life will be filled with something, for no man can live in a vacuum. Pilate was granted his position by the grace of God (John 19:11). With that blessing came the responsibility to render fair and equitable justice. Evidently, Pilate thought he could rid himself of giving answer to the Almighty by merely washing his hands in water. Pilate may have cleared his conscience by rubbing his hands under water, but what he failed to understand is that the conscience is not properly cleansed unless it is properly regulated by the divine will. When one grasps that truth, he will treasure a good conscience above all the promises that might come with compromise. History is replete with examples of those who so treasured their conscience, and who would be willing to die rather than “wash their hands in water.” Here are some examples of such godly men.
“Racoon” John Smith was one of the giants in the restoration movement of the 17th and 18th centuries. When he learned the truth, he made a clean break from Calvinism. His friends told him that he would lose his farm and go hungry. Smith replied: “Conscience is an article that I have not brought into the market; but if I should offer it for sale, Montgomery County with all its lands and houses would not be enough to buy it, much less that farm of one hundred acres.”
Barton Stone was another pioneer preacher who would not sell out his conscience. Though some of his close associates left the restoration movement to go back into denominationalism, Stone maintained his integrity and loyalty to the truth. He refused to “wash his hands” in order to maintain favor in the sight of God.
Moses Lard is said to have been in financial straits most of his life. He once refused to write for an annual fee of $5,000 because it would call him away from his work as a preacher.
T.B. Larimore once said about his former teacher, Tolbert Fanning, “He preached as if he believed the temporal and eternal salvation of the whole human race and all the holy angels depended upon the discourse as then and there delivered.”
Abraham Lincoln is credited with having expressed his sentiments like this: “I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.” Don’t you wish politicians today had the same convictions as Mr. Lincoln? How sad that so many government leaders in this 21st century have “washed their hands” at the fountain of compromise and worldly lusts, thinking that they, like Pilate, could excuse themselves from their great responsibility by simply running a little water over their hands.
I will close this article with the following quote attributed to the late T.B. Larimore: “Some sweet day I will breath my last. When you tell the world I am gone, please tell them I was ready, willing, and anxious to go; that I dreaded not death; that I fought and fell believing I was on my journey to the best and brightest place. My conscience is clear always – never an exception. While I have often come short of duty’s demands, and frequently gone beyond the limits of right, I have never done so intentionally. I have never done what I believed to be wrong, never refused to do what I believe duty demanded. Without a clean conscience I could not endure to live, and I could not dare to die” (as quoted by Bobby Key, Four State Gospel News, August 1995).
All such noble men have one thing in common. They refused to wash their hands at the fountain of compromise and cowardliness.
By Tom Wacaster