17. Amazed with Jesus and Pilate
17. Amazed with Jesus and Pilate.
“Life without wonder – radical amazement – is not worth living. It is the beginning of our happiness. Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement… get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible. Never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.” (Abraham Joshua Heschel).
I Stand Amazed | Celtic Worship ft. Steph Macleod
Jesus Christ engaged in a ministry of amazement, astonishment, wonder. Everywhere He traveled, He left people astounded and in awe. He caused a big stir wherever he went, and people left in His wake were amazed at who He was and what He was able to do, whether from His unusually wise teaching, His authoritative exorcisms, His unprecedented healings, His clever and insightful conversations, His dramatic miracles. It seemed everyone marveled at Jesus, despite His best efforts sometimes to be off the radar. There are three Greek synonyms that mean complete astonishment or radical amazement: ekplesso, thaumazo, and existemi. The differences between these three words, though, are fascinating. Are those of us who follow Jesus now, are we also amazed and astonished with Jesus?
“And the people were astonished (“ekplesso”) beyond measure, saying, ‘Everything He does is beautiful (“kalos”), and is done with excellence!” (Mark 7:37).
(1.) ASTONISHED: “ekplesso”; a strong Greek word for astonished; amazed; dumfounded; awestruck; overwhelmed at something extraordinary; struck out of one’s senses; takes your breath away, even to the point of panic. There were at least fifteen gospel events in which the Greek superlative “ekplesso” was used to communicate a radical amazement, astonishment, wonder at Jesus. Jesus was met with overwhelming astonishment after His Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 7:28); by His hometown friends as they rejected Him (Matt. 13:54); after His teaching on the inadequacy of wealth (Matt. 19:25); after His conversation with the Sadducees about heaven and the resurrection (Matt. 22:33); at His synagogue exorcism (Mark 1:22, 27); after His healing of the deaf and mute man (Mark 7:37); after He whipped the moneychangers in the Temple (Mark 11:18); at His brilliant level of understanding with the rabbis at just 12 years of age (Luke 2:48); after casting out a demon with just a word (Luke 4:32, 36); at the exorcism of a demon-possessed boy (Luke 9:43).
“And behold, a man from the crowd shouted out, ‘Master, I beg you to look at my son, for he is my only child! A spirit seizes him and suddenly he screams out and it convulses him so that he foams at the mouth! It mauls him and will scarcely leave him!’ Jesus answered, ‘Bring your son here to me.’ And even while the boy was coming, the demon threw him down to the ground and completely convulsed him. But Jesus severely rebuked the unclean spirit and healed the child, and then restored the boy to his father. And all were completely astounded (“ekplesso”) at the evidence of God’s mighty power, His majesty and His magnificence. While they were all marveling (“thaumazo”) at everything Jesus was doing…” (Luke 9:38-43).
(2.) MARVELED: “thaumazo”; another strong Greek word that means… marveled at, astonished by; amazed at; filled with wonder to the point of being bewildered; being awestruck in admiration. There were forty-four “thaumazo” passages in the gospels in which people marveled at Jesus, were greatly amazed by Jesus, astonished to the point of awed by Him. Included in the group of people who were completely amazed, “thaumazo’d” by Christ: the shepherds, Mary and Joesph, the disciples, the Pharisees, various crowds during His ministry, and even Pilate himself was astonished by Jesus and marveled at Him. People were amazed by everything from the angelic baby announcement, to various prophecies in Jesus’ young life, to the calming of the storm and the withering of the fig tree; from His miraculous exorcisms and healings to His teachings that always were on point and what were needed at the time.
“And when the friends of the paralytic couldn’t get near to Jesus in the house, they made a hole in the roof and lowered him down in front of Him… When Jesus saw their faith, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, ‘Son, your sins are forgiven!’ ‘But that you all here may know that the Son of Man has authority to forgive sins,’ he turns to the paralytic and says to him, ‘I say to you, arise, pick up your mat, and go home!’ And the man rose, immediately picked up his mat, and went out before them all, so that all the people were flabbergasted, out of their minds with amazement (“existemi”), and glorified God, exclaiming, ’We never saw anything like this!” (the whole story is in Mark 2:1-12).
(3.) FLABBERGASTED: “existemi”; an extreme word that means to be out of one’s mind with amazement; crazy with wonderment; a stunned astonishment so strong that one is beside oneself; to be overwhelmed so as to be bowled over; literally, to remove from a standing position. This word is used seventeen times in the gospels, including when Jesus healed and forgave the paralyzed man dropped through the ceiling of Peter’s house; when Jesus raised a young girl from the dead; when Jesus calmed the storm and casually climbed into the boat with His disciples; on the road to Emmaus when the disciples heard about the empty tomb from the women. Existemi is also used when the family of Jesus thought He was crazy, going out of His mind.
I Stand Amazed (How Marvelous) – Chris Tomlin – Passion 2014
“Now Jesus stood before the governor Pilate, and the governor asked Him, ‘Are you the King of the Jews?’ Jesus answered him, ‘You have said so.’ But when Jesus was accused by the chief priests and elders, He gave no answer. So Pilate asked Jesus, ‘Do you not hear how many things they testify against you?’ But Jesus gave no answer, not even to a single charge, so that the governor was filled with wonder, marveling in complete amazement (“thaumazo”). (Matthew 27:11-14).
No Self-Defense. Jesus knew very well His life was on the line with Pilate and the Temple authorities, but He simply refused to answer to any of the charges brought against Him. His passive silence in the face of all those accusations fulfilled the messianic prophecy of the Suffering Servant in Isaiah 53:7, “He was oppressed, and He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so He opened not His mouth.”
Pilate’s Question for the Ages. John filled in the confrontation between Jesus and Pilate by including their fascinating discussion about truth. “My Kingdom is not from this world… For this is my purpose, this is why I was born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the Truth. Everyone who is a friend of the Truth, who belongs to the Truth, listens to my voice. And Pilate said to Jesus, ‘What is truth?” (John 18:36-38).
Mission Statement of Jesus. What led up to Pilate’s famous question as he stood toe-to-toe with Jesus? What prompted Pilate’s question was the Son of God giving His life purpose in one sentence: to “bear witness to the truth.” Jesus took on flesh in order to reveal the indisputable fact of God’s existence in the world. Jesus testified to the truth by revealing Himself, the Author of truth. Jesus came into the world to show us that truth actually exists. He became incarnate to show the world what God’s living Truth looks like in real life. Jesus came to the world to show the true face of God.
Who, Not What. We don’t know if Pilate was asking his famous question, “What is truth,” as a cynic, a skeptic, a manipulator, or an earnest seeker of the answer. But we do know he asked the wrong question of Jesus, didn’t he? Instead of What, he should have asked Who. Tragically, he didn’t realize that he was staring directly into the Answer to his question, standing right there in front of him. Little did he realize that truth is a Person, not an abstract concept. It’s hard to blame Pilate though, because we don’t normally think of an intangible concept as being a tangible, flesh and blood person. When an abstraction turns out to be an actual Person, so much so that the concept is the Person’s identity, that’s difficult to digest. Is it even possible for a human being to be so saturated with something, so in union with and in synch with it, that the person can be identified as that concept? No, that is humanly impossible. It’s difficult enough to try to understand a divine being who contains all the truth in the universe, but to literally be that truth incarnate? Faith needs to be activated, to say the least. When an established fact like a mathematical concept is understood, that’s one thing. But when that concept becomes somehow a tangible reality and takes on flesh? But to believe in God is to accept that this type of impossibility is possible. As it turned out, Pilate, Truth had a pulse, God’s pulse, and you didn’t have eyes to see it. The certain fact is that Jesus was so deeply joined in union with truth, truth is so invested in Him, that God is actually Truth itself.
Concept to Reality. The more we think about it, though, the more we can see this principle that God loves to turn the abstract into something tangible. In His mercy and wisdom, God makes truth accessible to us by taking the impersonal and making it personal. Word became flesh (John 1:14). Wisdom is embodied in Christ (1 Cor. 1:24); the Spiritual becomes personal (John 14-16). Love is an abstract principle until it is fleshed out, put into practice (1 Cor. 13). Tangible creation was just an idea in the Creator’s mind until He made the material world out of nothing (Genesis 1-2). So for truth to become a Person, for God to be Truth itself, maybe this isn’t so foreign an idea. And it follows that if the Trinitarian Godhead is Truth itself, that means that the Father is Truth, the Son is Truth, and the Spirit is Truth.
“Truth is so obscure in these times, and falsehood so established, that unless we love the truth, we cannot know it.” (Blaise Pascal, French scientist, mid-17th century);
TRUTH: (Hebrew, “emet;” Greek, “aletheia”) Truth is the only absolute in the world. If everything else in the world falls part, only Truth will remain standing; the building blocks of all creation; the framework upon which we build our faith; the true Reality that has established the world’s reality; that which can never be truly altered or changed; that which is universally trustworthy as facts of life; the foundation of what is truly real in our experience; the plumblines from which to measure our lives; that which is common knowledge in God’s mind; that which lines up with God’s perspectives; established facts from God as opposed to a person’s changeable opinions or preferences; that which is solid and certain as opposed to a lie, deceit, an illusion or superstition; the tangible fundamentals issued forth from the intangible mind of God. Truth is always true even when discounted or disbelieved. Since the Almighty God is the ultimate source of all truth, then it follows that the ultimate presence of truth resides in the Trinity of Truth: Father God is Truth, the Lord Jesus is Truth, and the Holy Spirit is Truth.
“One word of truth outweighs the world.” (Alexandre Solzhenitsyn, Russian author, early 20th century);
Emet = a Hebrew word meaning primarily either truth or faithfulness. Emet has also been translated secondarily as stability, certainty, trustworthiness, constancy. In Hebrew, “faithfulness” and “truth” are interchangeable, and the literal meaning is: True to His word; steadfast loyalty; trustworthy; truthful about promises; reliable; constant and dependable; act in good faith; certain in commitment; His word is His bond. Many Biblical scholars believe that John 1:14, where John states that Jesus is “full of grace and truth,” is an intentional repetition of the phrase in Yahweh’s important self-revelation (Exodus 34:6), “abounding in love and faithfulness.” John 1 no doubt hearkens back to Yahweh’s nature in Exodus 34, flatly stating that Jesus is of the very same eternal nature as Yahweh, the glorious God of the Hebrew Bible. The fact that the Hebrews saw truth and faithfulness as interchangeable points to God’s character, that He is true to His word, true to His nature, that God keeps truth certainly and with stability and trustworthiness. God is literally, truly faithful.
“Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34).
Barbara Brown Taylor, in her sermon “In the Name of Law and Order,” posed an intriguing question: Who was Jesus thinking of when He asked the Father to forgive “them?” Who is “them?”I decided to take her question and run with it. We do know that by praying that prayer on the cross, Jesus was echoing Isaiah 53:12, which declares that the Suffering Servant was “interceding for the rebellious.” But for whom was Jesus interceding as He suffered His torturous death, as He fulfilled His eternal role as the Great Intercessor? Jesus seems to be asking the Father not to charge certain people with the depravity involved with killing the very Son of God. Jesus is pleading with the Father to overlook the wrongs of these perpetrators, since they do not understand the profound role they play in this cosmic drama. These abusers and traitors simply can’t grasp this deep mystery, and how they are part of God’s grand scheme of prophecy fulfillment and eternal salvation. His prayer was profoundly merciful, mouthing those words as he gasped for air. His Spirit of grace simply overflowed as He convulsed in pain. Who did He want forgiven… all those who did Him harm, or only those who repented? Because of Jesus’ unlimited loving-kindness, it could be a mistake to draw too small a circle of those being forgiven.
A Long Prayer list on the Cross. Some Biblical scholars claim that the Greek text implies a repetitive action, that His prayer on the cross was not a one-time prayer. Jesus evidently continued praying this prayer of forgiveness. He kept asking the Father to forgive all those who had done Him wrong during His Passion. One can easily imagine Jesus, in his depleted, exhausted mind, hanging on the cross, mentally going through an inventory of who needs to be forgiven. In his continuing prayer, Jesus considered everyone who had a hand in the sacrifice of the Innocent One.
Father, forgive Pilate. He was the insecure, belligerent Roman governor of Judea, where Jerusalem was located. In history Pilate is known as a cruel tyrant who was known for executing people without a trial. He evidently loved to badger the occupied Jews to keep them under his thumb. On the other hand, his job was to stifle any possible revolt against the Roman occupation, including any messianic movements. Pilate was directly accountable to Caesar, so he had to watch his step. Any Jewish unrest had to be handled or he was out of a job, which he held for ten years before he was removed to Rome. Since the Jewish authorities didn’t have the power to condemn someone to capital punishment, Pilate was soon confronted with Jesus, the Temple leaders, especially the Sadducees, and a small crowd of rowdy bystanders. Pilate questioned Jesus and declared Him innocent three separate times, but each time the Jewish leaders found that decision unacceptable. They wanted Jesus to die, and they finally got their wish, after threatening to tell Caesar about Jesus claiming to be a king. Pilate became desperate to appease the Jews, since the bystanders were turning into a mob. Even after his wife warned him, Pilate soon relented, releasing a murderer instead of Jesus. Pilate handed Jesus over to the soldiers for a near fatal flogging and to crucifixion. He gave the bloodthirsty crowd what they wanted, despite his inner conflicts. In the end, he may have tried washing his hands of the whole mess, but his partial responsibility for the suffering and death of Jesus stuck to him like glue. Remember, Pilate is the one who gave the death sentence to Jesus. Father, forgive Pilate, for he doesn’t know what he is doing.
Imani Milele Choir | I Stand Amazed (How Marvelous)