Here's the Man

Pilate says more than he thought he did.

Pilate’s role in John can’t be overstated. Perhaps better said: he plays a very interesting, perhaps sometimes surprising role in the grand scheme of Jesus’ trial.

In the middle of it today, we have him declare to the Jewish leaders:

Here’s the man.

On the surface, it’s mockery. A half-hearted gesture toward mercy. As if the bruises, the robe, and the crown of thorns are punishment enough. As if beating someone to near-death is a way of getting out of killing him. Some think that Pilate’s tactic here is to relieve the Jews’ fears that Jesus is a threat, as if to say, “Just look at him! A weak nothing.”

But the line lands heavier than Pilate intended. Because we know who’s standing there.

Here is the man.

Not a king, not a criminal. Just… the human. The human one. In Latin: Ecce homo. That phrase has shown up in Christian art and reflection for centuries.

Pilate didn’t mean to preach. But in some accidental way, he names what we now see clearly: Jesus is the fully human one. This is what God looks like in flesh. This is what humanity is supposed to be. Suffering for the sake of others. Refusing to return violence for violence. Silent in the face of power that shouts. Crowned with mockery, robed in humiliation—and still, without hate.

This is the tension of Holy Week. Humanity rejecting the very image of what it was meant to become. The crowd sees a man. But we’re invited to see The Man.

The Gospel of John has always taken its time to show us who Jesus is. Here, even in Roman sarcasm and political maneuvering, it quietly tells us again:

This is him.
The Human One.
The Word made flesh.
The Truth.

Here is the man.

John 19:4-7

Pilate came out of the palace again and said to the Jewish leaders, “Look! I’m bringing him out to you to let you know that I find no grounds for a charge against him.” When Jesus came out, wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, “Here’s the man.”

When the chief priests and their deputies saw him, they shouted out, “Crucify, crucify!”

Pilate told them, “You take him and crucify him. I don’t find any grounds for a charge against him.”

The Jewish leaders replied, “We have a Law, and according to this Law he ought to die because he made himself out to be God’s Son.”

Psalm 69:7-9

I’ve been insulted because of you; shame covers my face.
I’ve become a stranger to my own brothers, an immigrant to my mother’s children.
Because passion for your house has consumed me;
the insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.

Prayer

God,

On this Sunday, we pause together to behold Christ again. In him, you’ve shown us what it truly means to be human—not powerful, not polished, but faithful, self-giving, and full of grace. We confess how often we miss him, how often we walk right past the truth because it doesn’t look like the victory we wanted. But here he is—wounded and silent, mocked and crowned—and still, somehow, the truest image of you. Help us to behold him rightly. Help us to follow him fully. And through your Spirit, shape us to become truly human in the way he is.

By your Spirit & in Christ,
Amen.