What Is Truth On The Last Sunday Of The Church's Year The Feast Of Christ The King

Pilate’s last recorded action again comes from Josephus (Ant. 18 85 89).

This was the massacre of Samaritans at Mount Gerizin.

This led to such a protest that Vitellus, Governor of Syria recalled him and sent

him to the Emperor to explain his actions.

Philo – a contemporary Jewish historian

from the 1st Century AD (in his book De Legatione ad Gaium 301) sums up Pilate as

by nature rigid and subbornly harsh

of spiteful disposition and an exceedingly wrathful –

a man full of bribes, ‘

acts of pride

acts of violence,

outrages,

cases of spiteful treatment,

constant murders without trial and

ceaseless and grievous brutality.

And it was this very man, when confronted with Jesus - asked the poignant question – “What is truth”.

Pilate had a choice to make.

Pilate asked him if he was a worldly king – a question incidentally that would carry the death penalty for Jesus if he answered in the affirmative,

But Jesus replied:

“You are right in saying I am a king. In fact for this reason I was born, and for this I came into the world – to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of Truth listens to me” (Jn 18: 37)

An unknown writer summed up Jesus’ life in a poem called One Solitary Life

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman.

He grew up in still another village, where he worked in a carpenter’s shop until he

was thirty.

Then for three years he was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book.

He never held an office.

He never had a family or owned a house.

He did not go to college.

He never visited a big city. ( Jerusalem in those days was considered a backwoods)

He never travelled two hundred miles from the place where he was born.

He did none of the things associated with greatness.

He had no credentials but himself.

He was only thirty three years of age when the tide of public opinion turned against him.

His friends ran away.

He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial.

He was nailed to a cross between two thieves.

While he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth.

When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Nineteen centuries have come and gone and today he remains the central figure of the human race, and the leader of mankind’s progress.

All the armies that ever marched,

all the navies that ever sailed,

all the parliaments that ever sat,

all the kings that ever reigned,

put together have not affected the life of man on this planet so much as that one solitary life.

Yes, Jesus Christ was someone special.

What have other people said about Jesus

1. Napoleon Bonaparte

Emperor Napoleon I of France (1769-1821), was one of the greatest military commanders of all time.

He conquered the larger part of Europe and did much to modernize the nations he ruled.

What did Napoleon say about Jesus?

"I know men and I tell you that Jesus Christ is no mere man. Between him and every other person in the world there is no possible term of comparison.

Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and I founded empires.