The Redemption of Pontius Pilate (54 page)

About two dozen acolytes surrounded the Apostles, as James told them the story he had heard from his father about Jesus' miraculous birth, and then Peter and John explained how they had been called away from their nets by the mysterious rabbi from Nazareth. One of the believers in the group looked a little different than the others—his olive skin and Roman nose marked him as Italian by birth, and the beard and robes he wore could not disguise the ramrod-straight bearing that twenty years in the Legions had drilled into him. Brother Gideon, as he was known these days, had heard the stories before, but could never get enough of them. He was one of the most effective preachers of the Gospel in the Jerusalem church, and he helped the Apostles choose those who would be trained as missionaries and pastors.

John had started describing the lengthy discourse Jesus had shared with the Apostles on the night of his betrayal, and everyone in the room was hanging on his words, when the door came crashing open and a bearded stranger entered the room, looking exhausted and bedraggled. He did not look at the startled Apostles, or at the faces of any of their acolytes save one. He crossed the room directly to Brother Gideon and said: “Longinus, where is my wife? Where is my son?”

James flushed pale as he stared at the face of the stranger. “It's Pilate!” he exclaimed. “This is the man who crucified my brother!”

John shushed him as Longinus looked his former commander in the eye.

“They are safe, sir,” he said. “The Apostles have given them shelter. Lady Porcia is staying at the house of John and his wife, Miriam.”

Pilate looked at John with an expression of mixed relief and guilt. “After all I have done, you would still shelter my wife and son?” he said.

“The lady Porcia shares our faith,” said John. “And your son is an innocent child. We would never turn such away. Also, one of our number, a man named Agabus, who is occasionally gifted with prophecy, told me that I must warn her to flee Caesarea. He said that her fate was bound up with mine, and that if she perished there would be great harm to the advancement of the Gospel.”

James interrupted. “This man is not to be trusted! He is a ruthless agent of the Roman government, here to betray us all!”

Pilate stood and faced him. “It is true that I was an agent of Rome for my entire life, until three months ago,” he said. “It is true that I have inflicted great suffering on many in the name of Rome. I tried to make sure that it was the guilty who suffered most, but I also have shed innocent blood—most notably, that of your brother Jesus. I could have saved him—I wanted to save him—but when the crisis came, I was weak. I bowed to pressure from the High Priest and his cronies.” He dropped to his knees and held his arms out to the Galilean. “From the bottom of my heart, I am sorry. I have not known a night of peace since I sent your brother to the cross. Can you forgive me, James of Nazareth?”

The entire room was frozen in shock at the sight of Judea's former governor, the scourge of the Zealots, on his knees before a carpenter from Galilee. James stared at Pilate for a long time, and his gaze slowly softened.

“I bear my own guilt, Prefect,” he said. “When my brother claimed to be the Messiah of Israel, I did not believe him. When he performed miracles, I scoffed at them. When these men proclaimed him the Son of God, I cursed them for encouraging his delusions. When the High Priest wanted to kill Jesus, I dared him to go and confront Caiaphas and the Sanhedrin. I thought he was insane, an embarrassment to the family, and most of all I hated him because my mother and father always treated him differently. When I heard he had been sentenced to the cross, I left Jerusalem and refused to stand by him at the end. That is why my mother now lives with John and not me. You did not know my brother, yet these men tell me you acquitted him seven times of any crime. I knew him longer than any of them, and I was willing to see him die. I forgive you, Pontius Pilate, because despite my meanness and jealousy, He forgave me. How could I do less?”

Pilate looked at the young Galilean in wonder. Jesus' own brother had rejected him? He could not help but ask the question that crossed his mind.

“What made you become a believer?” he asked.

James smiled. “A week after he died on the cross, Jesus appeared to me,” he said. “He came to me in Nazareth, walking through the door without ever opening it! When I saw him, I broke down and wept. He embraced me, just as he did when I was little and had hurt myself. I cried until I could weep no more, and he just held me as all the jealousy, misery, and guilt went pouring out of me. I felt them leave! It was as if my very soul had become lighter. When I finally looked up at him, he was staring at me with that same fond smile he always regarded me with. Then he simply said: ‘Follow me, my brother—and believe!' Since then I have made my home with these men. I am the bond-servant of my Lord Jesus, and no longer his angry little brother.”

John stepped up beside Pilate. “You are weary, Governor, and have journeyed far. Shall I take you to your wife and son?”

Pilate nodded, blinking back tears. Something inside him was shifting, changing—he could not grasp it, or perceive it, but he could feel a part of himself stretching, tearing, and separating itself from the rest of him. He had the feeling that some transformation was about to take place, but he could not tell what he was about to become. However, he found himself caring little. If he could hold his wife again, he was prepared to become whatever this strange new God wanted him to be.

John led him through the dark alleys of Jerusalem. The Jewish capital never went fully asleep, but the noises that would be cacophonous during the day were muted, murmuring all around him as those whose business took them out after midnight moved about, trying not to disturb those who slept. Pilate still felt strange, and found himself wanting to talk to John.

“I didn't know you were married,” he finally said.

John looked back over his shoulder and smiled. “I married a girl from Nazareth that I met at the market one day,” he said. “Miriam is beautiful and glad-hearted, and when I saw her smile I knew that she would be my wife. When I proposed, her mother and brothers told me that I would need to establish myself and prepare a home for her before they would give their consent. I fished harder and longer than ever and sold our catches all over Judea—even delivering to the High Priest's household in Jerusalem! It took me a year, but I saved enough money to build a small house in Capernaum and buy three boats in partnership with my brother and Simon. Miriam's mother gave her consent, and our wedding became the talk of the district.”

“How so?” asked Pilate.

“We held the ceremony at the synagogue in Cana, since it was between her hometown and mine,” he said. “The wedding party was at a friend's house. I had spent so much money purchasing our house and the fleet that I could not afford as much wine as I should have. The party had only been going two hours when the steward informed me that the wine was giving out.”

“Wait a minute!” Pilate said. “I heard about this! You mean to say that it was your wedding where Jesus—?”

“Yes,” said John. “Miriam was his sister. He and the others—he had already begun calling some of us as his apostles, even then—were all in attendance. He transformed the water in the big storage pots into the finest, sweetest wine that any of us had ever tasted.”

“So it really was a miracle,” Pilate said.

“Indeed it was,” said John. “I followed Jesus for many reasons after that, but not least among them was the fact that, on my wedding day, he saved my bride and me from embarrassment and shame.”

Pilate processed that information for the rest of their walk. Sometime later, they came to a small, narrow house, sandwiched between several other small dwellings in the merchants' quarter of Jerusalem. A slender, lovely young woman greeted them at the door, and stared in astonishment at the gray-bearded stranger who had accompanied her husband home. But she bowed courteously and bade Pilate enter their home in peace.

“Have our guests gone to bed already?” John asked.

“About an hour ago,” Miriam replied. “The lady Porcia was very weary, and little Decimus had worn himself out playing with the children of the neighborhood.”

“Your family is upstairs,” said John. “Go and see them, my friend.”

Pilate took the stairs softly and opened the door. Decimus was curled into a tight ball on one side of the bed, while Porcia lay on her back, eyes closed, her countenance calm but still showing the lines of worry and stress from the events of recent years. All Pilate could see when he looked at her, though, was the beautiful seventeen-year-old he had fallen in love with when he returned from Germania all those years before. He crossed the room and leaned forward, kissing her brow.

She opened her eyes and stared at his face for a long moment, then wrapped her arms around him in a tight embrace. Decimus, woken by the noise, sat up and saw his mother hugging a bearded stranger. He gave a startled squawk, but then when Pilate looked at him and smiled, his face lit up.

“
Tata!!”
he cried, and threw his arms around Pilate.

The governor of Judea, with his wife and son in his arms, broke down and wept as if his heart would break. The tears were a flood that swept through his troubled soul and washed away the pain of the last three months, leaving him as clean and untroubled as a child, innocent of the world's evils. Finally he fell asleep with one arm around his wife and the other around his son, and rested as he had not in many years.

Early the next morning, he woke up and sought out John the Apostle.

“So what do I do now?” he asked.

“I beg your pardon?” asked John.

“What must I do to be redeemed, or saved, or whatever it is you call it?” Pilate asked. “Whatever it is that my wife has gained since she became a follower of the Nazarene is what I want for myself.”

John guided him to the small table where some writing materials were set up. He scooted the papyrus aside and sat across from the former governor of Judea.

“What you ask is both simple and difficult,” he said. “Salvation is free to all who seek it, but you must seek it for yourself, not on behalf of another, or because you see it in another.”

Pilate nodded. “I do,” he said. “I once believed in Rome, but the Rome I served is gone. My service has only earned me the status of a fugitive, and the wrath of a madman. All my old life is dust and ashes, and I need something to take its place—a reason to live and go on.”

John looked at him. “Then you must repent of all your sins,” he said. “You must turn your back on anger, lust, hatred, and all the destructive impulses that weigh you down. You must let go of your old self and ask the Lord Jesus to save you from your sins. It means forgiving those who have hurt you, and abandoning all thoughts of vengeance, trusting in the justice of God to take care of those things.”

Pilate swallowed hard. “I do not think I can forgive the Emperor for what he did to my family. I want to be saved—I want this new life that seems to make you people so happy and fulfilled—but your God is asking too much!”

“In our weakness, He is strong,” said John. “Ask forgiveness for your sins, and invite Him to rule your life, and He may give you the strength to do the things which you thought you never could.”

Pilate bowed his head. He had said the formal prayers to Jupiter Optimus Maximus and the other gods of Rome, and even called upon the
Divus Julius
from time to time, but praying to Jesus was something new and different. He knew no ritual or invocation to gain this man-god's attention, so he simply spoke the name of the Galilean.

“Jesus of Nazareth,” he said, “Son of God, Messiah of the Jews—I know not how to address you properly. I know that you remember me, and I know you remember that I failed you. I knew you were an innocent man, and I let you be condemned. But I know now that you were more than a man. I believe that you are indeed the one sent to save mankind. You know that I have done great wickedness—that I have shed innocent blood and rejoiced in the deaths of my enemies. I have been cruel and ruthless, and my life has been marred by
hubris
and vain ambition. I don't want that life anymore. I don't want to be that Pontius Pilate anymore. If you can forgive me for all my wickedness, and find it in your heart to redeem a man so unredeemable, I beseech you to save me. I have finally realized that I cannot save myself.”

Pilate felt the same sensation that he had experienced the night before—a seismic shifting of the soul, a rending and tearing as something was rooted out of him and cast aside once and for all. It was so powerful and overwhelming that he cried out and buried his face in his hands. A flood of tears poured down his face, but something shining and new was being unveiled within him. When he looked up again, he was smiling.

“Tell me everything you know about Jesus,” he said. “I want to hear it all. I want to understand Him.”

John smiled. “Then you will need to come with me. Ask the lady Porcia if she would like to go as well. It is time for the daily teaching session to begin.”

The next few months were the happiest days that Pilate had ever known. His thirst for the words of the Christ was insatiable—he asked Peter, James, and John to repeat the stories over and over again, until he committed them to memory. The believers were stunned at first to find the man who had sent Jesus to the cross as one of their number, but Pilate's transformation was so complete that they came to accept him. All he asked was that not a single word of his presence among them be breathed to anyone. The Praetorians were still making inquiries throughout Judea, trying to find Pilate or his missing family. Through a disciple of Christ named Matthias, Pilate purchased a small home in a back alley of the Merchants' Quarter, and spent most of his time going from there to the Upper Room to meet with the Apostles.