Is there a passage filled with more irony than this? The church leaders and the crowd, infuriated by Jesus’ message on behalf of the poor, decided to lynch him. They knew they could not simply murder him — given his loyal following — so they brought him to Pilate, who had the executioner’s power. Pilate, finding no legal fault in Jesus, offered an alternative to killing him. He would release Jesus under the tradition of releasing one Jewish prisoner at each Passover.
The first church conflict I remember as a kid was over “bi-part” offering envelopes — a single envelope with two separate and distinct pockets, one labeled “current expenses” and the other “benevolences.”
My father railed against them, arguing that they presented church members with a false choice. He called it “robbing Peter to pay Paul.”
