We now come to the little episode of Peter warming himself. He has sunk down into humanity, becoming, not the companion of Jesus of Gethsemane, but a poor man seeking to warm himself in the outer court of the palace.
There are two things brought to our attention here—the crow and the look. How do we interpret them? They are symbols of two very different things, but two things with which each of us have to do—conscience (the “crow”) and Christ (the “look”).
The crow awakened his conscience; the look placed him with Jesus. I want to have an awakened conscience and an eye by faith directed to Jesus. If we are not all conscious of the cock-crow and the look, we are not yet in the school of God.
My intellectual activity about the things of God will not do. Conscience must be occupied, and faith must be occupied. “Peter went out, and wept bitterly.” But his faith did not fail. He may be sent through sorrow and tears, but his faith does not fail.
Now we come to the council who ask Him, “Art Thou the Christ?” The Lord deals with their condition in answer to their question: “You will not deal with Me righteously, you are set on mischief, and mischief you will have. You are set on My blood, and My blood you will spill.”
Having convicted them, He rises up. “Hereafter shall the Son of Man sit on the right hand of the power of God.” This is the exhibition of Christ in judicial power. Here we see Him in judicial power.
We track Christ to the highest heaven in many characters: Personally as with the Father, His priestly character as making intercession in the sanctuary, and what is presented here—as the One whom earth has sent there. In this character He is waiting until His enemies be made His footstool.
We see here the way in which He was viewed by the Gentiles, by the ecclesiastical and civil powers, that every form of society might be brought in guilty before God. Pilate and Caiaphas might be amiable men, but, as touching God, one and all stand guilty in a common revolted nature.
Do you and I realize that the blessed Lord consented to walk such a path for us? We may well say that such love as that “passeth knowledge.”
J. G. Bellett (from Notes on the Gospel of Luke)