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In 172.
Teach us more.
Holy.
I wonder if we could take up the 18th chapter of John.
Very nice Lemoine, did you have any special exercise about it?
Are we just saying teach us more of Thy blessed ways?
In John's Gospel, he's the Lamb of God, isn't he? And.
There's a lot of instruction in it.
I don't recall it ever being taken up.
In a reading meeting.
Conference.
18th chapter of John to read the whole chapter is your portion you have in mind.
John, Chapter 18.
Beginning at verse one.
When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His disciples over the brook of Sidron, where was a garden, into the which He entered, and his disciples. And Judas also, which betrayed him, knew the place. For Jesus of times resorted thither with his disciples. Judas then.
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Having received a band of men.
And officers from the chief priests and Pharisees cometh, thithered with lanterns, and torches, and weapons. Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, when forth, and said unto them, Whom seek ye, they answered, They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith unto them, I am he.
And Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them as soon then as he had said unto them.
I am here they went backward and fell to the ground. Then asked he them again, Whom seek ye? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am He. If therefore ye seek me, let these go their way, that the saying might be fulfilled which He speak of them which Thou gave us me have I lost none.
Then Simon Peter having the sword, drew it and smoked the high priests servant, and cut off his right ear. The servants name was Malgus. Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath, the cup which my father has given me, shall I not drink it? And then the band and the captain and officers of the Jews took Jesus.
And bound it.
And led him away to Anna's first, for he was father-in-law to Caiaphas, which was the high priest that same year. Now Caiaphas was he which gave counsel to the Jews that it was expedient that one man should die for the people. And Simon Peter follow Jesus, and so did another disciple. That disciple was known unto the high priest.
And went in with Jesus into the palace of the high priest. But Peter stood at the door without. Then went out that other disciple which was known unto the high priest, and speak unto her that kept the door, and brought in Peter. Then saith the damsel that kept the door unto Peter, Art not thou also one of this man's disciples?
He saith, I am not. And the servants and the officers stood there who had made a fire of coals, for it was cold, and they warmed themselves, and Peter stood with them and warmed himself. The high priest then asked Jesus of his disciples and of his doctrine. Jesus answered him, I speak openly to the world I ever taught in the synagogue.
And in the temple whether the Jews always resort? And in secret have I said nothing? Why askest thou me? Ask them which hurt me what I have said unto them? Behold, they know what I said. And when he had thus spoken, one of the officers which stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, Answer us, thou the high Priest soul.
Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil, but if well wise, mightest thou me? Now Anna's had sent him bound, and to Caiaphas the High priest, and Simon Peter stood and warmed himself. They said, therefore unto him, Art not thou also one of his disciples? He denied it, and said, I am not one of the servants of the high priest, being his kinsman.
Whose ear Peter cut off, saith, Did not I see thee in the garden with him? Peter then denied again. And immediately the cock crew then let they Jesus from Caiaphas into the Hall of Judgment. And it was early. And they themselves went not into the Judgment Hall, lest they should be defiled, but that they might eat the Passover.
Pilate then went out unto them, and said, What accusation bring ye against this man? They answered and said unto him, If he were not a malefactor, we would not have deliver him up unto thee. Then said Pilate unto them, Take ye him, and judge him according to your law. The Jews therefore said unto them, It is not lawful for us to put any man to death.
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That the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled, which he spake, signifying what death he should die. Then Pilate entered into the judgment hall again, and called Jesus, and said unto him, Art thou the King of the Jews? Jesus answered him, Sayest thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of me? Pilate answered, I am a Jew.
Nation and the chief priests have delivered thee unto me. What hast thou done? Jesus answered, My Kingdom is not of this world. If my Kingdom were of this world, at the end, would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews? But now is my Kingdom not from hands? Pilate therefore said unto him, Art thou a king? Then Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I, I am a king.
To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness. And to the truth everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice. Pilot said unto him, What is truth? And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and said unto them, I find in him no fault at all. But you have a custom that I should release unto you one, one at the Passover.
Will ye therefore that I release unto you the king of the Jews? Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber.
John's Gospel.
God presents Himself to man in the person of the Son.
And so from the very beginning of the gospel, it is the Son who speaks and who is one with the Father. And so he says multiple times over in the gospel, I and my Father are one.
And.
He is the word.
That's the means by whereby we communicate. A very important way of communication is by words. And here we have the person who is the word of God who presents himself to us as such. But we also know in John's Gospel he's presented to us as the Lamb of God. And in fact.
From I think it's chapter 12 where it speaks of him going up to the feast 6 days before the feast all half of the gospel is taken up with the last week of his life.
And it's really taken up in the sense that you have it in Leviticus or in Exodus, where in the Passover lamb was selected to be the lamb. It was kept from the 10th to the 14th day to see whether it was a lamb truly without spot and without blemish. And so in John's Gospel, we have the Lord Jesus presented to us as the Lamb of God, and as it were, he's presented from the 10th to the 14th day to our gaze.
Is He truly a suitable Lamb of God? And He is perfectly expressed to our hearts as the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world, knowing He's going to leave them from chapter 13 to 17, just before where we started this afternoon, He knows He's going to be separated now from His disciples, and so He prepares them for that separation.
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Because he himself, a Son of God, knows perfectly the day and the hour.
When he must present himself to God as the Lamb of God.
The 18th chapter where we start as the character of the testing of those who had read him before them for 3 1/2 years.
In our lives, even this afternoon and in our past lives, we have each been exposed to the Word of God. We have each had opportunity to listen to it, to accept it, to live it out in our lives.
And God often presents the Word to us.
Makes it there for us and then comes the testing. How did we receive it?
Young people in this room have heard the word, like some of us that are older, and there comes a point in your life where you're put to the test. Do you receive it in reality and live in it? Do you walk in it or was it just words? Was it just the way you were raised or brought up or something like that? Was it real?
Or not real. And so in the 18th chapter people are put to the test as to the reality of their relationship with the Lord Jesus.
Pilot doesn't pass the test. The Jews don't pass the test. Peter, a true disciple of the Lord Jesus, has to learn something about his own weakness as a follower. Real as he is. Judas doesn't pass the test. He's found to be false and but he's exposed through the circumstances in which the Lord Jesus is. And so likewise in our lives, God puts us in circumstances.
That will expose the reality or otherwise of what we are professing.
He's also presented as the burnt offering, the offering that was voluntary. It is the Lord Jesus himself going down, going forth and laying down his life. It wasn't taken from him. And so this first verse, this first sentence here connects with the the previous chapter where he prays for us.
His people and ask that we be with him in glory, with him when he goes there. And in order for that to take place, he must go to the cross. And so here that the Lord Jesus is that that perfect one who is not because it had to be done, but because he wanted to do it. That is, he loved the Father, He loved his people, and so he goes forth.
I.
I used to think and it may still be right, but when the Lord Jesus they asked who he was there in the.
6th verse and they asked who he was. He says I am and they fall back to their ground, fall back to the ground that maybe that was a bit of his, his deity that shown that may be true, but on the other hand it may just have been the surprise.
That there was a man before them that had a purpose and was willingly going to do that purpose and when they knew they were there to get him and he did not in any way attempt to hide himself and blatantly sit here I am, I am that that man does not understand that.
The Lord Jesus doing that, but that's his dedication. That's his willingness to go.
This path that He and the Father had worked out to redeem us and to glorify God.
Could we also say that?
And we want to be very reverend as to this. But as Dawn has said, the first part of the Epistle does bring out in that sense the 10th to the 14th day of the Passover. There was every opportunity for men to observe the Lord Jesus and for every evidence to be given of who He was. But when we see Him coming to the cross.
There is a tremendous contrast, isn't there, between the way he reacts to circumstances and the way others do. As you mentioned, Don, there are the other disciples, there is Pilate, there are the Jewish leaders, there is Peters, perhaps singled out above the other, not above. But in distinction to the other disciples, the Lord Jesus provides the perfect example of one who voluntarily takes the low place.
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In full conscious dignity of who he is, in full consciousness that he is the Son of God. And so as you mentioned, Doug, when they say whom seek ye Jesus of Nazareth, without any hesitation, he uses that title that God took as Jehovah in the Old Testament. I am when he stands before Pilate, he can without any hesitation bear a testimony before Pilate, while at the same time.
As the one who humbled himself, submit to Pilate's authority and give him the place that God had put him in. And so it really draws in relief, doesn't it? The beauty and grace of the Lord Jesus, in contradistinction to the failure of man, whatever may have been their motives and intentions behind it.
Wonderful and helpful to recognize that when He presents himself as Son of Man and Lamb of God.
You don't have the same details in this gospel that you have in the other gospels.
Because when he presents himself as a Messiah, there were necessary proofs.
That had to be seen as to the character of the one that so presented himself. Did he or did he not fulfill the Old Testament statements concerning the Messiah? And so the Spirit of God carefully records those things in his life that give proof to who He was. It starts out by tracing the fact that he was, could be his lineage, could be passed through from Abraham to himself, through the royal line of the kings, and so on.
When he's presented to us in Mark's gospel as a servant, there is certain aspects of his character that have to be tested as to whether or not he's a suitable servant. When you get to Luke's gospel, where he's presented to us as the perfect Son of man, the perfect man, his ancestry, if you will, as man has traced all the way back to Adam. And if he's a man, he's tested as a man.
In the taken by the Spirit of God himself to be taken into the wilderness to be tested as to his manhood, is he sinless or is he not? And he perfectly passes those tests where we know who he is. But you don't have and it's beautiful that you don't. You don't have all those details in John because the Son of God.
Rather than there's no proof of that that man could ever see or know.
As far as setting up some test of lineage, it's God the Son come among us and we are to receive Him as such. We're not to put, if you will, if I can put it this way, him to the test or He doesn't need to be put to the test by God.
In order to see that he's the Lamb of God in the 10th of 14th day, that was to the assurance of those who were going to trust him as lamb for themselves. And so he's presented to us in a way that our hearts would say that's my lamb. God's lamb is my lamb. I accept him.
But when it comes to the truth of his deity, there is no.
Testing in the wilderness, there's no temptations of Satan in that sense in the Gospel when he's going to present himself as the burnt offering character to God. You don't have the sufferings on the cross that recorded that you have before us in the other gospels.
It's really a higher character. It was a sweet savor to the heart of God. It is the fullest expression of all the gospels really, far greater to the heart when it's entered into than the martyr sufferings through which he went that are carefully recorded in the other gospels because.
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It's to bring us into fellowship with the Father.
In the pleasure of his own heart, as expressed in the sun.
Offering Himself willingly to the Father. And so it gives before us those things that would draw in our souls, or out of put in our souls, that sense of common appreciation and enjoyment with the Father, of what he saw when both of them went together to the cross, and where the sun voluntarily presents Himself to God as His Lamb.
That same thought.
And we don't need to spend a lot of time on it, but it's significant that the Brooke Kedron is brought into the picture here.
We know from the geography of the area that the Kedron Valley ran from north to South on the east side of Jerusalem. And then if you went up the other side from that eastern bank, you ended up in the Mount of Olives and in the Garden of Gethsemane. And that Brooke Kedron ran down toward the valley of Hinnom at the South side of Jerusalem there.
And we find it mentioned a number of times in Scripture, which I commend to each one here for your meditation. We find, for example, that when David was rejected running away from Absalom, that it specifically mentions his crossing of the brook Kedron. We find that when ASA took the idol that his mother, or perhaps his grandmother had made and grounded up.
He threw it into the brook, Kedron. And so there are other instances that I believe remind us of the passing over that Brooke Kedron and what it represented as being the pathway of total rejection.
It was the pathway of putting oneself right outside of the pale of Jerusalem, right outside of that which you might say was God's center. It was being cast out of that very place where God had in the Old Testament sent, set his name. So the rightful king and the person of David had to go away temporarily while Absalom took his place. And we find the Lord Jesus taking that the very same path.
And as Don has mentioned, he presented himself not merely as the Messiah that was true, but as the Son of God. And so in John he's rejected right from the very beginning, rejected not only his Messiah, but rejected as the Son of God who came to do the Father's will.
That rejection takes on significance in the fact that God's love is not thwarted in giving his son. In spite of that rejection, God doesn't turn around and retrieve his son and bring him back and say, OK, you won't have him, I'll bring him back. No, he sends him all the way to the cross. And so it's the love that shows out, and God's love shows out in spite of man's rejection.
The Lord Jesus goes forth, He goes to the cross, He grows, goes over this brook.
And it's with purpose. It's the purpose of showing the love of God to us.
While Judas is tested and it's a solemn statement about him, that verse two begins. Judas also which betrayed him knew the place. What words knew the place?
Judas knew right where he would be found. He knew where he was. He sold him to those who wanted him by saying, as it were, I know where you can find him. And so I'll lead you to him.
And so it records, Judas knew the place.
What a solemn word for anyone who enters eternity having known the place where the Lord Jesus could be found. And I I'm going to say, I dare say that there's probably no one in this room that doesn't know where to find the Lord Jesus.
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There's no one that's going to stand before God someday and say I didn't know where the place where the Lord Jesus could be found.
You have the word of God in your hands, and you have.
Experienced mist of us at least have experienced being together with the Lord Jesus where he's.
Can be found in our weekly lives too, in another sense of the place.
But here Judas knew that the Lord often went to that place, to that garden.
To pray, To express.
Speaking to the Father.
And so he could take them there, but his heart wasn't right. His heart wasn't right. And and his heart gets exposed.
In it to the eternal loss of his soul. As the Lord had said, it would have been better for Judas if he'd never been born.
What a sad commentary about a life that knew where the Lord Jesus could be found.
And yet, in the end, it has to be said it would have been better for him if he'd never been born.
Well, it is a very sad thing concerning Judas and our brother Clifford Brown, our late brother Clifford Brown, and maybe some here will remember his saying this. He used to remark he said there had to be a Judas. That is, there were prophecies that concerned him that had to be fulfilled. But he put it this way. He said Judas did not have to be Judas.
He did not have to take that place. He didn't have to fill that role. And so there was responsibility there. And what a solemn thing has done, as remarked, for a man who knew the place, who had accompanied with the Lord all his life, to be found at the end betraying him for money. And sad to say, this has happened many times in this world's history, not only among those who are connected with the Lord Jesus, but in many other fields. But the solemn thing about Judas is, I believe, and we don't need to dwell too long on it, but simply to recognize.
That it shows how far one could go who had lived and company with the Lord Jesus.
And how far one could go, perhaps. And I have no doubt that Judas worked miracles along with the others when the Lord sent them out two by two to go to the lost sheep of the House of Israel, and when they were told to heal the sick and raise the dead and cleanse the lepers and so on, casting out demons. I have no doubt that Judas did all that in the name of the Lord Jesus and was successful. And it shows us how far one could go in pretending and yet not be real to the point where when it came down to the crunch, as we would say.
And the Lord was about to expose Judas for what he really was, that none of the other disciples had any idea that he was the one. And so it's a very solemn warning, as Dawn says, to any who have been brought up in Christian homes and who have perhaps known how to, as we would say, speak the language and how to pass themselves as believers, and yet are not real inside.
And for the Spirit of God in the Word to say.
It had been good for that man if he had not been born, is one of the most solemn statements in the entire Word. There are many times in connection with someone where, when the question is raised as to their salvation, we simply have to say, Well, we don't know. The Lord knoweth them that are his. But there is at least one man in the person of Judas where no doubt is left in our minds. No, no, no statement could ever be made.
About anyone who was a true believer. Good word for that man, if he had not been born. And you know there is at least one who is in a lost eternity to day, having had the opportunity that very few others had of living and companying with the Lord Jesus. Of being amongst the ones who heard the gracious words that proceeded out of His mouth, Of seeing every evidence of divine power and of seeing who he was.
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And yet turned his back on him.
Very, very solemn warning, isn't it?
Well, there's company to take Judas to the Lord Jesus, and it's to me.
Amazing in one sense, the way the Spirit of God records for us in verse three. They come hit her with lanterns and torches and weapons.
Did you bring a flashlight to go out into the midday sun so you could see it?
Here was a group of people that were going to come into the presence of one who was the light of the world. He could say I am the light of the world.
Far beyond the noonday sun light of the world. Do you take a flashlight?
To go find the light of the world.
The same person is presented in this gospel, is in him was life, and the life was the light of men.
Well, as the light and the light.
Do you bring a weapon of death?
So that you can go see the one who gave you life.
That's man.
That's the darkness of man. It says he came as that light, and the darkness comprehended it not. It was night time in their souls, and being in the presence of light it was still night time in their souls. The darkness comprehends it not. And so it is with man. In his unbelief he comes to the light, or that he's exposed to the light.
He's exposed to the life giver and all he has for himself is is Lantern and his weapons, his torch. Sad isn't it? And yet how wonderful for us that we who have put our trust in the Lord Jesus.
Find glorious light and life for our souls in that same person that these ones come out with their poor little provisions to be in His presence.
Perhaps as other contrasts like that.
It's a light which is a man made light and the light of the glory of God.
But the Lord also asks, whom seek ye?
And he was the one that had come to see and to say they came to seek him to destroy.
They came to a garden that was well known.
That the Lord Jesus, he was one who had.
Realize in the Old Testament that he had a garden that he tended and he was going to bring fruit out of it someday.
There was the weapons, of course.
And what good were they in comparison to the very word of the Lord Jesus Christ? And he simply says, I am. They fall back.
They took him to a high priest.
They were on the way to a high priest, but who was truly the high priest?
Christ himself.
Came to bring blessing.
This high priest is going to sit in an unfair judgment on the Holy One.
And the Christ nurtures his people as the high Priest.
Perhaps there's other contrasts as well, but it seems pretty dramatic.
Go back to the notice a couple of verses in the 12Th chapter concerning Gethsemane not being mentioned here. We don't have Gethsemane ever mentioned in John's Gospel except briefly alluded to in the verses I'm going to read.
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In the 12Th chapter of John's Gospel it says in verse.
25 Now is my soul troubled? And what shall I say, Father, save me from this hour, but for this hour? But for this cause came I unto this hour. Now you get the answer.
Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify.
It again.
This is all you get alluded to in this Gospel as to what might have been what the Lord went through in Gethsemane, because here He and the Father jointly in unison are together in this mission of showing the world who the Father is through the Son.
And so part of that is the Lord Jesus to go to the cross.
And as we mentioned earlier afterward, not to go back to heaven alone, except the corner of the fall on the ground, it biteth alone. The Lord Jesus didn't want to go back to heaven alone for that purpose, it was necessary to fall into the ground and die. And so that is all that is alluded to here in this.
Gospel, I believe as to Gethsemane, but it's so beautiful how the answer the Lord Jesus, as it were, resolves in his own soul, in the presence of the Father, the answer to whether he should go forward or not is expressed, Father, glorify thy name.
And so Jesus going to the cross is the expression of glorifying the Father and obedience unto death, a perfect voluntary sacrifice.
This is the Father's heart being showed out to all of us, and that's all we have of Gethsemane because it's the Father and the Son together. And so I believe this is so beautiful, why Gethsemane is not mentioned.
And the allusion to it is really just God expressing his love.
Through the sun.
Like to add a little comment too on that 12Th verses that we've just read and that is that.
As Doug has said, God glorifies himself in the cross.
Which results in the Lord Jesus at the end of the.
End of it in death.
But that's not the end of the glory in which God glorifies himself. He also, in a very important way, glorifies himself in the resurrection.
And so the sun could go into death to glorify God at the cross. Also well knowing what was the other side of it. In answer from the Father in resurrection. It's been commented on those verses after the glory I have glorified it.
The voice from heaven says I have both glorified it and it's suggesting that that is the resurrection of Lazarus and I will glorify it again.
Which is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus after he glorifies the Father in the work of the cross.
So it's it's good for us to see that can I say the Longview of it and that is God's purposes in it and the Father and the son doing the work. The son doing the work to the Father's glory can look on to its the future aspects of it. Not only that which is the most crowning jewel of it, which is the the work on the cross.
Earlier, it was said that Judas knew the place.
There were certain things that Jesus also knew.
If we turn back in the Gospel of John chapter 13.
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We read verse one of John 13.
It says now before the feast of Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour was come, that He should depart out of this world and to the Father, having loved his own who were in the world, He loved them unto the end. So He knew that knew that His hour was coming. Verse three of that chapter, Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things unto his hands, that He was come from God and went to God. And then in our chapter in 18 we have verse 4.
Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth and said unto them, Whom seek ye?
This is the beautiful verse out of the beginning of chapter 18 here.
And other places that is like the fulfillment of a part of Isaiah 53. Jesus could not take his own interpretation of Isaiah 53. He knew full well that it would be fall upon him. And so we hear we say he saying that he knowingly Jesus therefore knowingly all things that should.
Come upon him. That's like reading Psalms 22 and the billows that were going to roll upon him.
And so also when if you follow back later in John in chapter 19 and look at verse 28 after this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, that scriptures might be fulfilled, said I thirst. So he knew full well those things, didn't He, and what we was reading back there when it was read to us in the 12Th chapter and he.
Said Father, glorify thy name.
You are looking directly into the heart of Jesus and you can see what?
Is on Jesus heart and he knowingly knew that his hour was come.
And he knowingly knew why he was going to Calvary and what he was to accomplish. It is nice that it Father answered him. I have both glorified it and will glorify it again. There's a couple interpretations on the first one on glorifying it. Some of the Lazarus resurrection, because it's similar to the resurrection later on glorified again. Others say that sometimes it's the name given to him above all other names that He'd glorified him in. The name would be that what it may, it is the resurrection and he would glorify it again.
He will raise him up, and that is the beauty of the passage that Jesus here.
Submitted himself without any resistance. This is what we have to look at because immediately in verse 10 that Simon Peter having his sword drew it and smote the high priest servants ear and cut off his right high priest servant and cut off his right ear, we see the resistance of man immediately there was absolutely no resistance by Jesus. It was complete submission to fill the Father's will and to go to Calvary, which he knew full well what he was doing.
Well, it's beautiful to see, isn't it? In John's Gospel, as you brought out, Brother Bill, the superiority of the Lord Jesus to every circumstance, man might be the instrument that God allowed to take him and to put him to death. And in that sense, they were charged with that crime later on by the apostles. They were charged with the sin of murdering the Lord Jesus, and rightfully so.
But all through the gospel we see one who as Son of God, is superior to all His circumstances, knowing everything that was coming upon him, realizing that it was the will of the Father that He was doing, not submitting in that sense to man as man, but submitting to what the Father was allowing through man in order to accomplish the Father's will. Well, that's something marvelous that really speaks to our hearts and to our souls.
To see that there was One who was Lord of all, One who came into this world and at the at the time he was in this world, was indeed upholding all things by the word of His power. One in whom, as Paul says in Colossians dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. And yet he voluntarily takes a position of total submission to the Father's will, whatever it might be.
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Well, it's wonderful to see that and to see the way that the Lord Jesus submits totally to all that, and yet in the conscious dignity of who he is, submits in that character. He doesn't hesitate, for example, later on in the chapter, to remind Pilate of where his authority came from. He doesn't hesitate to speak in a right way to the chief priests when he's wrongfully smitten.
Reminding them that they were smiting and contrary to the law. And many other occasions where in the conscious dignity of who He was, He speaks according to that dignity, but coupled with that the perfect submission to whatever the Father's will was.
Submit to it and to accomplish it by that submission.
It's a wonderful thing because as we go from here to the cross, He is in control and He does submit to man, but He submits to man as fulfilling the will of God and to accomplish certain things that had been.
Prophesied concerning himself, concerning the work, and so really in the gospel, instead of man having him under his control.
He's the Son of God and what men are doing are being tested by him like Pilate, like the Jews and Pilate might have said, I have Jesus Christ in my courtroom, but in reality, Pilot was in God's courtroom through the Lord Jesus Christ. That was the truth of the situation as presented in John's gospel. And so when it's a matter of going out.
To be consistent with that way of seeing it to our hearts He bears his own cross.
It's not somebody coming out of the country to help them tarry the cross, because that was a part of the work that was necessary to fulfill the Father's will when it comes to the matter of his actual death.
After he could look at everything and see it all and say it is finished, what does he do?
He does the thing that only he could do.
He dismisses his own life. They did not have the power in reality to take the life giver's life.
I, the Son of Man, the Lamb is the source of life. He had life in himself even in manhood because of who he was. And so when it comes to the ultimate, if we would say it, the ultimate step in that path of submission.
As as the Lamb, he had to die, so how does it happen? He bowed his head and dismisses his spirit. He was in control to the last moment, the last breath to leave His body of light was by his own act, a necessary act in that case. And so it is.
Beautiful to see each of these details reinforces.
To the soul who he is and who is, can I say?
Fulfilling in what he's doing. Both of them, it says in Genesis 22 went together.
We see the Father and the Son in these verses, going together, you might say, right through the crowd.
That makes him and fulfilling along the way those interactions with them, but always purposefully going toward the end result, which is the cross.
Not to take away from the thought you had, Doug, but I just asked the question.
Is the using of the title. I am part of that same.
Shall we say testimony to his being in control of the whole situation?
They might come with their torches and their weapons, they might use the instruments of human violence in order to take them. But is it right to say that in that act He reminds them that He is the one that is in control, and they can do nothing except that the power is given them from God?
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That's the same as Jehovah in the Old Testament. Jehovah is the I am right, and he was that.
He doesn't waver from it in such an hour.
Is the beginning of the verse five when he's asked, When they're asked, well, who are you looking for? Who do you see?
Will they give their answer? Who were they seeking? Jesus of Nazareth. That's all they blew. That's all they were looking for. They were looking for that man that came from that part of the country called Nazareth, whose name was Jesus, because they had the responsibility of taking him to the chief priests.
So that he could be judged his answer to them.
Is yes, I'm Jesus of Nazareth? No. Was he? Yes, he was. Did he acknowledge it? Yes, he did. But he goes far beyond it. And he says I am. That's the one. If you're going to seek Jesus of Nazareth, the one you're going to have to face.
Is the I am the one that you are responsible to then whatever judging is before your eyes, it's not going to be Jesus of Nazareth only, but you are going to be before the I am the Jehovah, and that's going to make them and does make them exceedingly responsible as to how they deal with I am.
We might say, well, I'd like to know more about Jesus. I've heard, you know, he lived a long time ago. He was a Goodman. He was this and that.
Is that what we see it says, Whom seek ye? No, not really.
We seek the I am.
As presented to us in all that He is as Lamb of God, Son of God, Jesus Christ, and all of the various ways in which he's presented to us, and we want to know Him in all of them. But we seek far more than Jesus of Nazareth.
This, this effort of Judas and the scribes and the soldiers and so on, were an attempt to get the Lord Jesus in the absence of the people, because they had an agenda they wanted to accomplish against the Lord Jesus in the absence of the people. And in order to do that they they had to pull a secret mission here and catch him and do away with him. They were afraid the people of Israel would rise up.
And protest if they did it in public. And so that's the scenario that's going on here.
And in the middle of this then when they come to him and then he can say I am.
That is, it's you can't, you can't find an opportunity moment and catch him and do away with him. He's the ever existing one.
You really can't face them on your own terms.
So having said to them I am, they fall backwards and to the ground in the face of such a statement.
And then he asks him again, verse seven, Whom seek ye?
They go back to the original statement, Jesus of Nazareth. He goes back to the ground on which they must face him.
In verse eight, I have told you that I am.
Notice that he is italics. It's the I am is that expression of the Old Testament.
He is the great I am, and so if you seek me, let these go their way. In other words, there's an insistence that they must have to do with Him. Not on their terms. They wanted just Jesus of Nazareth, but they're going to have to deal with the matter on the true ground. And so does Pilot when he faces him later in the chapter, and the high priests and so on. Every one of them is forced into the situation.
Where they have to deal with him on proper terms, if you will. And so man, when the gospel is presented to him, he might want to hear about him as a good man, but that isn't going to be the ultimate issue. He must face him as Savior, his Savior, or ultimately face him as his judge. But he can't escape.
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The fact that he's going to face him on his God's terms, on the terms of the Lord Jesus.
As much as he may wish to, people may laugh and scoff at the Lord Jesus today, but they will ultimately have to face Him on God's terms.
And part of those terms and were that he was going to be the lamb that laid down his life and the rest could be set free. And so that's why he says let these go their way. It was only needful for one to die. And later it says that Caifa said prophesied that probably not in good intent, but in a malicious way.
So the God takes that man up on that way and says, OK, I will provide that one to die for the nation and my son. And so those are God's terms that are insisted on here.
The end of verse five you have.
Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them.
So he felt the effects of that falling to the ground didn't.
Later.
In the chapter we get.
The same phrase.
In a verse 18.
But it's about Peter.
Peter stood with them.
What is our company?
Who do we keep company with?
It's important, isn't it very important, But.
There's two different.
Eternities in these two different souls.
Isn't it Lemoyne that here, the one in the person of Judas, who had wielded, as it were, that power in the name of the Lord in the past, now finds himself having that power used against him? And what a solemn thing it is for the heart of man.
Someone else has remarked that here were these men come in the night with lanterns and torches and weapons, everything they needed, as it were, to arrest and take somebody away, and there they were, thrown backward on the ground.
And yet, what is the heart of man? Do you would think, humanly speaking, that they would get up and say, if I could use modern language, let's get out of here?
But no, they get up and maybe dust themselves off.
And then start all over again as if nothing had happened. And so it shows us really how far the heart of man can go, right in the face of God's power of effrontery and rebellion against God. And the solemn thing is, as you say, that Judas is there with them.
For a long time he accompanied with the Lord Jesus. He was identified as one of his disciples.
And if anyone had spoken about Judas, they would have identified him with the name of the Lord Jesus and as one of those accompanied with him. But now he's on the other side, about to take part in one of the worst acts that's ever taken place in man's history.
Sometimes when we try to present the Lord Jesus to others.
They may disagree with us and start to argue.
Peter is a little by application here, a little word to us.
Don't take out the sword and cut their ear off.
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Even using the Word of God to do it, we know that the Word of God is powerful and it is the sword of the spirit, but it can also be misused if our hearts are wrong and I'll put that person right, I'll show what's true and in a sense.
To put it another way here.
They came with their weapons. The Lord Jesus presented himself to them as he was.
There was power in that presentation of himself as the I am, and they fall backwards as a result of it. And then Peter thinks in his mind, I've got to defend the Lord here, and he whips out the sword and starts to use it. We don't have to defend the Lord.
We represent the Lord, but He doesn't need our defense. What a soul needs is to be brought into the presence of the One who is the power.
And not us saying I'll show who's right, I'll convince them that the word of God is true, and so on.
The Lord, in order to give somebody a hearing here after Peter was done, had to restore the year. And sometimes it happens after we're done with somebody, spiritually speaking, the Lord has to step in afterwards and give them their ears back so that they are in a place to be able to listen to Him. So there's something for us in this, and fear is true hearted in it. There's no lack of zeal, there's no lack of desire here. But he didn't understand.
Lord has to say that to him. Peter, you don't, you don't get it right now. Did I, should I not do what my father has told me to do? Are you going to try to hinder me, Peter, from accomplishing what the my father has given me to do? Shall I not drink that coffee? And so he's gentle with Peter and protective. He doesn't allow Peter to be taken at this point by them.
That none would be lost. And Peter's the Lord always was going to see that. Peter gets through the lesson without being lost himself. So Lord says, I prayed for you, not that you won't fail in what you're going to do, but that your faith fail not. He sustains that faith which was his living link with the Lord.
In regard to the comment Brother Le Moyne made about who are we associating with and who are we spending time with, I hope this is a right comparison. But in the Song of Solomon.
Chapter One.
Think this is a good question for us?
Verse 7.
Tell me, O thou whom my soul love it.
Where do thou feed him?
Where does it all feed us?
We're a weed feeding.
We're our little ones feeding.
We want to be on the right side and we want to be on God's side because that is the right side.
We might just say in one last comment to that that.
I believe with dear Judas, ultimately, and the scripture identifies it as such, it was his covetousness, his love of money, that got him into trouble.
Judas no doubt didn't expect the Lord to be taken. He thought he could use the opportunity to make some money.
And very often there is a besetting sin can be in our own hearts. It's in the hearts of men of the world too.
Where that besetting sin eventually leads them into difficulties where they didn't really.
At the beginning, intend to go, and no doubt Judas never intended that everything should develop this way, but in seeking to get the money that he wanted, one thing led to another and eventually was his total downfall.
187.
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#27.