Have you ever desperately wanted to get an urgent message to your spouse, pronto? Do you recall a time when your spouse was about to make a huge decision and you happen to learn of some news at the last minute that would dramatically effect their decision? Have you ever been warned in a dream? In the gospels we find a wife, who just awoke from a haunting nightmare. She's dreadfully concerned about her husband who is in the middle of making a powerful, life-changing decision, not only for himself, but someone else.
In describing the last hours before Jesus' crucifixion, one of the gospel writers takes the time to record a scene in which a desperate wife is in an awful hurry to communicate with her prominent husband. Among the four gospels, only in Matthew will you find a short but significant verse about a governor's wife sending an urgent message to her husband, who happened to be the Roman Governor of Judea. He was sitting in the judge's seat early Friday morning during Jesus' trial proceedings. What was her urgent message?
While Pilate was sitting on the judge's seat, his wife sent him a message: "Don't have anything to do with that innocent man, for I have suffered a great deal today in a dream because of him." Matthew 27:19
A short while later, verse 24 records:
When Pilate saw that he was getting nowhere, but instead an uproar was starting, he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. "I am innocent of this man's blood," he said, "It is your responsibility!" Although he washed his hands of the matter, verse 26 says: But he had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified. Pilate only partially heeded his wife's warning.
Pilate had several opportunities to make the right decision, all reinforced by a plea from his wife who sent an urgent message saying, "Don't have anything to do with that innocent man." He chose to heed her message, but not completely. In addition, he didn't listen to his own conscience, which was telling him that Jesus was innocent. To top it all off, Roman law said an innocent man should not be put to death. So why did Pilate hand Jesus over to be crucified when he had no good excuse to condemn him? He was afraid of the crowd. He was willing to do whatever it took to keep the peace, even if it meant that a completely innocent man would die a terrible death.
A note regarding verse 24 in Tyndale's Life Application Study Bible reads: In making no decision, Pilate made the decision to let the crowds crucify Jesus. Although he washed his hands, the guilt remained. Washing your hands of a tough situation doesn't cancel your guilt. It merely gives you a false sense of peace. Don't make excuses - take responsibility for the decisions you make.
What did Pilate's wife dream about Jesus? What troubling images did she see in her dream during the wee hours of Friday morning that convinced her that it was imperative that she send a messenger to interrupt her husband while he sat in the judge's seat in the middle of a trial?
In her book, At Jerusalem's Gate: Poems of Easter, Nikki Grimes contemplates the quandary with this comment and the following poem: I love a good mystery and the Easter story is full of them. The night before Jesus stood in the Pilate's court, Pilate's wife spent hours tossing and turning from a nightmare. She woke with an overwhelming sense of dread and a certainty that the man on trial was innocent. Unable to shake the feeling, she sent a warning to Pilate during the proceedings. What exactly did she dream? I wish I knew.
Pilate's Wife
The dream that robbed my rest
still echoes in my ear
dispatching waves of fear
along my tingling spine.
The dream is drenched in blood,
the details of it gone
like mist by morning's end.
The memory lays me low.
I call my servant, "Quick!
Go to my husband's side.
Confide these words:
'Dismiss the one who waits
before your judgment seat.
Spill nothing of his blood
for he is innocent.'"
On this the dream was clear:
there's evil working here.
As you contemplate the messages you send to your spouse and receive from your spouse in the coming days ahead, whether urgent or subtle, keep in mind that the good Lord may be trying to get a message through to benefit both of you. Will you be listening? Will you heed the message entirely, or just partially? What might be holding you back from making the right decision?
Back at the Governor's Palace...On Sunday morning after Jesus' resurrection and in the days following, I'm wondering if the governor wished that he had completely heeded his wife's urgent message sent to him early Friday morning after she awoke from a dreadful nightmare at the palace.
Your Soul Sister
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3 comments:
Great Devotional...it reminds me that God speaks to me in so many ways, especially through my spouse.
I can attest to the truth of this message. There have been so many situations in our marriage over the years when I would have been so much better off had I taken the advise of my wife. Call it what you like, women's intuition, a sixth sense, or whatever... I believe God has gifted women with a naturally more keen ability or sensitivity to receive the messages and promptings of the Holy Spirit. As husbands, we would be wise to consult with our wives more often before making important decisions. This is one of the gifts that they bring to the marriage. And wives, you must be careful to use this not for self-serving gain, but for the benefit of the relationship.
I do believe this to be true, but sometimes I tend to forget this fact or is it that I really don't always trust my self in the decisions I make. i have had a time when I believe I heard from God and didn't act right away. even just to go and see a person or to call someone, and didn't do it and the person died and I wished I would have gone and saw them. So yes Ladies we need to be more in tune with the Holy Spirit and what He directs in our lives for our husbands and family. thanks for the reminder to listen.
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