John 19:17-37
Pilate answered, “What I have written I have written.” (v. 22) Following up on a comment from my Study Bible… Yes, Pilate needed a reason to have Jesus crucified and the inscription that he wrote would have implied treason against the Roman empire – someone pretending or claiming to be king. But I also see this quotation as Pilate throwing it back in the Jewish leaders’ faces. Essentially he had already acceded to their wishes and put Jesus to death, but he was not going to let these leaders push him any further. He was in charge, not them. In my second set of comments below I have boldened and italicized and put in all caps the word LOVE. Going back to the Jesus Storybook Bible that we use for our Avanza devotionals, there is one other line from Jesus’ crucifixion that has always stood out to the kids: “It was not nails that kept Jesus on the cross, it was love.” These kids knew that Jesus had all power available to Him and that He could have come down from that cross, but He stayed there out of love for us and His obedience to the Father. And the kids pick up on that, every year when I ask them a question that yields that answer – it was LOVE, not nails that kept Jesus on the cross.
See also: December 4 / John 19:17-27; December 8 / John 19:28-30; December 9 / John 19:31-37