Devotional on Mark 15:6-16

by Tim Williamson

Now at the feast he used to release for them one prisoner for whom they asked. And among the rebels in prison, who had committed murder in the insurrection, there was a man called Barabbas. And the crowd came up and began to ask Pilate to do as he usually did for them. And he answered them, saying, “Do you want me to release for you the King of the Jews?” For he perceived that it was out of envy that the chief priests had delivered him up. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to have him release for them Barabbas instead. And Pilate again said to them, “Then what shall I do with the man you call the King of the Jews?” And they cried out again, “Crucify him.” And Pilate said to them, “Why? What evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Crucify him.” So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released for them Barabbas, and having scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. Mark 15:6 – 15 (ESV)

This portion of the narrative of Good Friday is familiar to most of us. Jesus, an innocent man, is condemned by Pilot to be crucified due to the incessant protests of the crowds outside his palace. These crowds had been gathered and whipped up by the Jewish religious leaders in Jerusalem who believed Jesus to both be guilty of blasphemy (that is, claiming to be God) and saw him as a threat to their positions of power and their attempts to justify themselves before God through their outward obedience to the law. Pilot was a fairly shrewd man and had correctly, “perceived that it was out of envy that the chief priests had delivered [Jesus] up.”