Today, I am reading and commenting on  John 19-21.

When Jesus was before Pilate, Jesus did not answer any of the accusations brought against Him, or make any sort of defense.  This led Pilate to ask Him if He understood that he had power over Him.  Jesus responded by telling Pilate that he only had power over Him because someone greater had given it to him.  Pilate then tried to find a way to release Jesus without the crowd starting a riot (John’s wording hints that the crowd was either composed of Jewish religious leaders or was filled with agents of the religious leaders who kept it stirred up).  The Jewish religious leaders suggested that any leader who claimed sovereignty over the Jewish nation was an enemy of Caesar.  Then when Pilate asked them if they really wanted him to crucify their king, the chief priests declared that they had no king but Caesar.  At this point, the chief priests denied the sovereignty of God.  They put Caesar above God as king over themselves.  It would be very easy to get caught up in writing about the implications of what they said relative to First Century Jewish thought and miss the lesson for us.  How easily we can get caught up in trying to use the government to accomplish what we believe to be godly ends and thus give over sovereignty which belongs to God to members of the government.  In this recent election, all too many people were ready to lift up Donald Trump, or Kamala Harris, as the one who would bring about our salvation.  All too many of us are ready to declare that we have no king but Caesar, when truly there is only One King who deserves our loyalty and worship.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.